It's a computer

I was very excited at the prospect of some fresh material when I got an IM from a colleague (whose tales have been told here already) asking if I could come into her office "ASPA" (she makes mistakes when she panics). I was half expecting this as I heard her tell someone on the phone that she needed to "call in the expert."

Sure enough, it was me. Apparently one of her clients was trying to upload something to an FTP and it didn't work. My colleague, not actually knowing what an FTP is, wisely called for backup. She explained to me that "the FTP must be broken"because xxxxx couldn't get her file "downloaded"to us (there's got to be some joke in there somewhere, but I'm too tired to figure it out). Once I understood what the hell she was talking about, we got her contact on the phone. She explained her process to me...opened up the internet thing, typed in the address the guy gave her and nothing happened.

I thought of at least a dozen different things she could have been screwing up. Started with the obvious, asked her which FTP client she was using..."the Internet." Asked her what browser she was using..."the Internet one." Figuring it was either Safari or IE, I asked her what kind of system she had, to which she responded "it's a computer." Sensing this was going to be tough, I asked her what brand her computer was and she told me it's a dell. I asked what version of MS Internet Explorer she was using, which led to another 30 seconds of awkward silence before I explained how she could figure it out. She had version 7, which means the solution for her problem was both obvious and impossible given what I had learned of this lovely woman on the other end of the phone. I told her how to get the file to me and said that I'd post it for her (and my still-confused co-worker.

As I'm about to leave, she asked me a question that ensured this was getting written up - "should I put it on my ipod?" Turns out she had a Mac in her office and wondered if it would be worth trying to get onto the ftp via Safari since Windows had failed her. She also seemed to thing that any product made by Apple is known as an Ipod...this one being the as yet unsold Ipod gigantic...