Much to the good Doctor's surprise, there's still somebody out there who occasionally looks at this little slice of Internet hell. The truth is, I had no idea anybody was still paying attention and hadn't thought about the "good old days" when I was miserable but had tons of funny stories about the people that contributed to that misery in quite some time. Since there is someone peeking in, at least once in a while (and since she happens to be an incredibly beautiful woman), I figured maybe it was time to give this thing another go.
Now, I'm entirely too tired to grace this page with funny little Office-Space type stories, but thankfully there have been plenty of other technical traumas over the last few months that I can use for a cheap, quick, painless update.
You see, I've continued doing the whole online dating thing and it's been one comedic disaster after another. I'm not going to go into any long stories about the online interactions that actually became dates, because those are funny on their own and I want to keep this one quick. Instead, I'm just gonna go with a few one liners that, while disturbing, are still kind of funny. You see, this dating site has an IM feature. I'm not a paying member, so I can't send emails or IMs, or read any of my emails. Really, the only thing I can do is receive IMs from people who actually pony up the $30 a month for "premium" membership. It seems as though the women who pay tend to be of the slightly crazy variety, and lo and behold, those are the ones who are attracted to me. Some of the messages I get aren't bad...a simple "hi" that turns into a conversation, which may or may not lead to a date. Others, though, are so mind-numbingly bizarre that they need to be immortalized somewhere, and what better place than the Trauma Center (after all, IMs are tech related...sorta).
Most of these IM "sessions" were closed without a response, either because of disgust, confusion or the simple fact that I couldn't think of a suitably horrific response.
Weird IM #1 (from a rather attractive 26 year-old): "Would you be open to starting with a one-night stand and seeing where things go from there?"
*um, no thank you, but hi, I'm Dr. Nerd...
Weird IM #2 (from a less attractive 25 year-old): "Would you be open to a tresemme?"
*I thought she meant shampoo, and before I could respond with a "WTF" (the only suitable response), she made it clear that she simply couldn't spell "threesome," by explaining to me that the kind with 2 girls is better than the one with 2 guys (I never would have guessed).
Weird IM #3 (from an unattractive, yet extremely well endowed blonde): "So, do you like my boobs?"
*This one, I actually responded to...told her I hadn't looked, at which point she informed me that they were real, spectacular (ripping off Seinfeld I believe) and would look great bouncing up and down in my bed. I would have continued the conversation had I not realized just how unattractive the rest of her was.
Weird IM #4 (from a girl I'm convinced was once a guy): "You look like you're well hung...am I right?"
*I couldn't help but wonder how many other guys she had IMd with that and if any of them were desperate enough to respond.
Weird IM #5 (from one that didn't seem so bad at first): "I just saw you at Duane Reade on [insert address here]...you're cute"
*As with #3, I responded...asked her why, if she thought I was cute and just saw me IN REAL LIFE, she wouldn't talk to me and would instead try to find me immediately on the Internet (she didn't have an answer to that question)
Weird IM #6 (I don't have any recollection of who this one was from): "Where do you live. Can I come over?"
*I thought about giving her my friend's address, just as a goof, but ignored it instead.
Not so lucky #7 (this was probably just one of my friends playing a joke on me): "Ur cuuuuuuuute...I want u to hav my babees."
*Putting aside her obvious issues with our language, I decided to focus on the logical issues with this statement. Now, I'm no biology major (despite being a doctor), but I'm pretty sure it's girls that have babies, not boys.
That's all I've got for now. In the coming days, I shall try to dig up some actual funny shit from the "archives." Worst case scenario, I'll go to some dating stories (when online dating is taken into the real world, things can get scary). I've got one that's actually somewhat topical with the upcoming release of the new Harry Potter movie...
Monday, July 6, 2009
Sunday, February 1, 2009
A Surprise in the DVD Player
My company gradually upgraded its non-essential technology. Over the years, we got TVs in the conference rooms, moved from VCRs to DVD players and added other nice touches to make us seem like a real company. Every time we got a new piece of "common" tech, I begged the powers that be to have a mandatory training session, figuring it would save me a lot of time and agony, but they always refused.
One very lovely morning had me paged to the conference room to help a group work the semi-new DVD player. When I got there, I was told they weren't sure what was wrong, but that they knew it wasn't the obvious...dead batteries in the remote, since they had replaced them before calling me. Figuring it was an issue with the player itself, I opened the cabinet, plugged it in and asked for the disc as it was powering up. Disc in hand, I pressed eject and as I was preparing to drop in the DVD with the presentation video, I noticed there was something already inside...a copy of "Young Wet Bitches 46" (not 100% sure on the title, but it was definitely an adult film). I had no idea what to do with the contraband, so I just left it on the shelf next to the player, figuring whoever it belonged to would eventually reclaim his skin flick. Got them set up and went back to work as they were hunkering down to watch their video. When I sat down and tried to start working again, I was distracted by three important but strange questions:
1. To whom did this porno belong?
2. Which chairs in the conference room can I never, ever sit in again?
3. Why part 46? What was so good about this one that my distinguished colleague chose it over any of the first 45 volumes in this undoubtedly epic series. I mean the Godfather only got 3 parts, Star Wars got 6...Young Wet Bitches must be quite the masterpiece if it's on part 46 (and counting).
One very lovely morning had me paged to the conference room to help a group work the semi-new DVD player. When I got there, I was told they weren't sure what was wrong, but that they knew it wasn't the obvious...dead batteries in the remote, since they had replaced them before calling me. Figuring it was an issue with the player itself, I opened the cabinet, plugged it in and asked for the disc as it was powering up. Disc in hand, I pressed eject and as I was preparing to drop in the DVD with the presentation video, I noticed there was something already inside...a copy of "Young Wet Bitches 46" (not 100% sure on the title, but it was definitely an adult film). I had no idea what to do with the contraband, so I just left it on the shelf next to the player, figuring whoever it belonged to would eventually reclaim his skin flick. Got them set up and went back to work as they were hunkering down to watch their video. When I sat down and tried to start working again, I was distracted by three important but strange questions:
1. To whom did this porno belong?
2. Which chairs in the conference room can I never, ever sit in again?
3. Why part 46? What was so good about this one that my distinguished colleague chose it over any of the first 45 volumes in this undoubtedly epic series. I mean the Godfather only got 3 parts, Star Wars got 6...Young Wet Bitches must be quite the masterpiece if it's on part 46 (and counting).
Friday, January 30, 2009
I want to watch the Internet on TV
It can be incredibly difficult trying to help people understand how individual pieces of technology come together to form a system and what role each piece plays in the system.
My presence was requested in a conference room by one of the older folks, who needed my technical wizardry. I walked in to find him sitting at the table, staring at the TV which was turned on, but showing a blank screen. He had a keyboard and mouse (which I later found out were taken from another conference room) on the table in front of him and explained to me that he needed to "get the Internet on this TV, but it wasn't working." I grabbed the remote for the TV, checked the input settings and everything seemed set up properly. Equal parts impressed and surprised that he had gotten this far on his own, I told him it was likely an issue with the computer, but it should be fixable, at which point, he completely blew my mind. He looked at me, and said, in complete seriousness, "what computer?" Unbeknownst to me, they had taken the computer out of this room, and decided to use the TV only for watching videos.
I tried, very hard, to explain that the Internet is data, that you need something to process this data, which is usually a computer, and that it's impossible to "get the Internet" on a TV by itself. I told him that the other 3 conference rooms all had computers with TVs, and that we could very easily set him up in one of those. He looked at me disappointedly and explained that he really wanted to use this particular room. My curiosity now piqued, I asked what was so special about this room, at which point he told me he liked this TV better than the others (I should point out that 2 of the other 3 rooms had TVs that were identical to this one). Rather than risk an aneurysm by trying to have a logical discussion, I gave him 2 options...we could either take the tv and switch it with one of the other (identical) sets and he could use one of the other rooms, or I could get a computer and hook it up to the TV temporarily so he could use "his" TV in this conference room. He sat there contemplating these options for a good minute or 2 before asking me what I thought would be best. My back was a little sore, so I went and got a laptop to hook up to the TV. Figured it would be a lot easier than carrying a 36" set across the office.
In hindsight, I probably should have suggested moving TVs, gotten hurt and gone on disability for a few months...would have been a really nice break.
My presence was requested in a conference room by one of the older folks, who needed my technical wizardry. I walked in to find him sitting at the table, staring at the TV which was turned on, but showing a blank screen. He had a keyboard and mouse (which I later found out were taken from another conference room) on the table in front of him and explained to me that he needed to "get the Internet on this TV, but it wasn't working." I grabbed the remote for the TV, checked the input settings and everything seemed set up properly. Equal parts impressed and surprised that he had gotten this far on his own, I told him it was likely an issue with the computer, but it should be fixable, at which point, he completely blew my mind. He looked at me, and said, in complete seriousness, "what computer?" Unbeknownst to me, they had taken the computer out of this room, and decided to use the TV only for watching videos.
I tried, very hard, to explain that the Internet is data, that you need something to process this data, which is usually a computer, and that it's impossible to "get the Internet" on a TV by itself. I told him that the other 3 conference rooms all had computers with TVs, and that we could very easily set him up in one of those. He looked at me disappointedly and explained that he really wanted to use this particular room. My curiosity now piqued, I asked what was so special about this room, at which point he told me he liked this TV better than the others (I should point out that 2 of the other 3 rooms had TVs that were identical to this one). Rather than risk an aneurysm by trying to have a logical discussion, I gave him 2 options...we could either take the tv and switch it with one of the other (identical) sets and he could use one of the other rooms, or I could get a computer and hook it up to the TV temporarily so he could use "his" TV in this conference room. He sat there contemplating these options for a good minute or 2 before asking me what I thought would be best. My back was a little sore, so I went and got a laptop to hook up to the TV. Figured it would be a lot easier than carrying a 36" set across the office.
In hindsight, I probably should have suggested moving TVs, gotten hurt and gone on disability for a few months...would have been a really nice break.
It Smells Like Burning...
I promised more work stuff, and here we go.
In my years as a wannabe IT guy, I've learned a lot. One of the more important lessons is that when you encounter a burning smell and see smoke coming from a computer, it's always bad. It's also always the result of either something bad, something stupid or something stupid that causes something bad. I've had a few "smoke issues" over the years, but one really stands out...
I was at my desk, doing some work when a colleague ran in and told me she was having a computer emergency and really needed my help. I was busy, but out IT guy had been out drinking the night before and had "called in sick," so I was semi-obligated. Asked her what the problem was and she responded that it "smelled like burning" (not sure if she was intentionally quoting Ralph Wiggum, but it was funny for about 6 seconds). I walked back to her desk with her and started smelling the "burning" from about 20 feet away.
Realizing that everything was still plugged in and on, with smoke starting to come from the back of her computer, I yanked the power strip from the wall. This was something that really seemed to upset her, as she was now going to have to "re-program" the clock radio on her desk. I told her that if everything was plugged in, it was dangerous, and that I'd re-program the clock for her once I fixed the major problem.
Reached under the desk to pull the computer out, but it was too hot to touch. Not wanting to waste any more time, I started to slide it out with my feet. Didn't even need to pull it all the way out to realize what had caused the problem. My lovely, well intentioned colleague had jammed a pen into the back of her case, in between the blades on the fan, stopping it and causing the power supply to overheat. I asked if she had done this and she explained that she had, because there was an annoying noise coming from the back of the computer, and that when she put the pen in, it stopped making the noise.
As I was waiting for the machine to cool off enough that I could pull out the pen, I tried explaining that the noise was coming from the computer's fan. She very calmly told me that the fan must not have been working, because it was making all that noise, but not cooling her off at all. Thinking it would be rude to bang my head on her desk while she's there, I tried to control my rage and started explaining that computers have "stuff" inside them that gets hot when it runs, and that you needed to have a fan to help circulate the air and keep this "stuff" from overheating. Her blank stare told me I had just introduced concepts that were way over her head, but I had to try. I pulled out the pen, which had half melted and was leaking ink all over the place. Since our IT guy was out, I couldn't get a new power supply, so I set up an old machine from an empty office to keep her operational until we could get the new part, re-programmed the clock and got back to work.
When the IT guy returned to work (3 days later), I explained the situation to him and he ordered the PS with overnight shipping. He was out again the next day (either strung out or hung over), but when it came, I installed it, cleaned everything else up and got her up and running. Tested everything and went back to my actual job, but not before taking every pen, pencil and other object small enough to stick inside the power supply away from her. Despite what had just gone on, I had little faith that she wouldn't try it again. She also leaves her computer on all night...can only imagine what would have happened if it had started to "smell like burning" after hours.
My desk was around the corner and probably 50 feet down the hall from her. As I was sitting back down, I heard her turn the radio back on and started to wonder how she was annoyed by the fan when she's listening the Backstreet Boys at maximum volume.
In my years as a wannabe IT guy, I've learned a lot. One of the more important lessons is that when you encounter a burning smell and see smoke coming from a computer, it's always bad. It's also always the result of either something bad, something stupid or something stupid that causes something bad. I've had a few "smoke issues" over the years, but one really stands out...
I was at my desk, doing some work when a colleague ran in and told me she was having a computer emergency and really needed my help. I was busy, but out IT guy had been out drinking the night before and had "called in sick," so I was semi-obligated. Asked her what the problem was and she responded that it "smelled like burning" (not sure if she was intentionally quoting Ralph Wiggum, but it was funny for about 6 seconds). I walked back to her desk with her and started smelling the "burning" from about 20 feet away.
Realizing that everything was still plugged in and on, with smoke starting to come from the back of her computer, I yanked the power strip from the wall. This was something that really seemed to upset her, as she was now going to have to "re-program" the clock radio on her desk. I told her that if everything was plugged in, it was dangerous, and that I'd re-program the clock for her once I fixed the major problem.
Reached under the desk to pull the computer out, but it was too hot to touch. Not wanting to waste any more time, I started to slide it out with my feet. Didn't even need to pull it all the way out to realize what had caused the problem. My lovely, well intentioned colleague had jammed a pen into the back of her case, in between the blades on the fan, stopping it and causing the power supply to overheat. I asked if she had done this and she explained that she had, because there was an annoying noise coming from the back of the computer, and that when she put the pen in, it stopped making the noise.
As I was waiting for the machine to cool off enough that I could pull out the pen, I tried explaining that the noise was coming from the computer's fan. She very calmly told me that the fan must not have been working, because it was making all that noise, but not cooling her off at all. Thinking it would be rude to bang my head on her desk while she's there, I tried to control my rage and started explaining that computers have "stuff" inside them that gets hot when it runs, and that you needed to have a fan to help circulate the air and keep this "stuff" from overheating. Her blank stare told me I had just introduced concepts that were way over her head, but I had to try. I pulled out the pen, which had half melted and was leaking ink all over the place. Since our IT guy was out, I couldn't get a new power supply, so I set up an old machine from an empty office to keep her operational until we could get the new part, re-programmed the clock and got back to work.
When the IT guy returned to work (3 days later), I explained the situation to him and he ordered the PS with overnight shipping. He was out again the next day (either strung out or hung over), but when it came, I installed it, cleaned everything else up and got her up and running. Tested everything and went back to my actual job, but not before taking every pen, pencil and other object small enough to stick inside the power supply away from her. Despite what had just gone on, I had little faith that she wouldn't try it again. She also leaves her computer on all night...can only imagine what would have happened if it had started to "smell like burning" after hours.
My desk was around the corner and probably 50 feet down the hall from her. As I was sitting back down, I heard her turn the radio back on and started to wonder how she was annoyed by the fan when she's listening the Backstreet Boys at maximum volume.
Thursday, January 29, 2009
I'm baaaaaaaaack...for now
Much has happened in the life of the good doctor since I attempted to bid you both farewell so many months ago. ECB has gone away and is but a horrible memory. The bachelor pad / nerd cave is up and running, although not reeking of as much awesomeness as I had hoped (the ginormous TV is wonderful though). The job that brought such misery and so much great material is also in the rearview, as I left for what seemed like greener pastures. Unfortunately, it sucks almost as much as the other place, but for entirely different reasons. Everyone at the new place is as nerdy as the doc, so there have been no good new stories since I left. On the bright side, the stuff in the archives is plentiful, and I thought it best to stop depriving both of you of a couple of cheap laughs.
Before coming back to technical traumas of the corporate kind though, I've started to realize that the technological revolution we've witnessed over the last couple of years has made dating very different from what it was the last time I tried and failed (failed, of course, being when I asked ECB to marry me). Some of these changes are for the better...being able to text instead of having an actual conversation, dating on the Intarwebs and the opportunity to stalk potential dates on facebook before going out with them are all wonderful, welcome changes. Of course, this progress has made the whole horrible process a lot more complicated, and enabled some rather unpleasant side effects. It is with this in mind that I bring you two quick little ditties from my last six months in romantic purgatory. You see, recognizing his inability to meet women in real life, the Doctor decided to join a dating website that caters to people like him (jews, not geeky, sarcastic assholes). Some of the resulting dates sucked less than others and a few, including one that happened rather recently, were actually pretty good. These, on the other hand, are two of the far crappier examples of what has happened since I left you.
1: Apparently stalking can work both ways, and it's not nearly as much fun as I thought...
The Doctor was "approached" via the website by what appeared to be a rather attractive young lass from another neighborhood in his newly adopted hometown. Initial conversation was interesting, and she even seemed somewhat normal. We went out and all was not as it seemed. Thankfully, she wasn't a guy (as far as I could tell), but she was completely mental. There was no follow-up call, text or email on my part, mainly because this whack job was sending them in clusters. I tried to ignore them, but the sheer volume was so overwhelming that I made the mistake of responding to every 20th message, making sure to avoid replying to anything that made mention of what would have been an absolutely awful second date. Eventually, I told her I was moving to the other side of the country for my awesome new job (that part was sort of true...it was an extended visit). She asked if she'd ever see me again and I told her I wasn't sure when I'd be back, so she should probably not wait around. While I was on leave, the texts, emails, facebook messages and phone calls went through the roof. I'd be sitting in the office in the middle of the day and start receiving emails from her with pictures showing various states of undress, providing further evidence that this broad was crazier than I thought. Couldn't muster up much of a response, other than the less than trying to not-so-subtly suggest I wasn't interested, but she never seemed to be able to take the hint. One such lovely day saw my presence required at a morning meeting that ran a little more than four hours. When I got back to my desk and checked my personal email account, I had 160 new messages - 2 mass mails, one from a friend and 157 from her, meaning she had gone from just nuts to the new realm of completely batshit crazy.
After a few more triple digit days, I decided to tell her that the higher ups at my company wanted me to stay there a lot longer than expected, possibly forever at which point she suggested coming out to visit me. At this point, my head started to hurt, so I told her it was a bad idea, but that if I ever came back to the other coast, I might call her, but that she shouldn't wait around since it seemed like this was going to be permanent. I then proceeded to block her from every method of electronic communication and thanked my lucky stars I was able to put personality ahead of looks for once. Six months later, I still get the occasional email from her (every time I block one address, she gets a new one), asking if anything has changed and if she's ever going to see me again. This odd attraction to yours truly would be evidence enough of her obvious mental problems, but there's so much more. The worst part of the whole thing...she's a teacher. I shed a tear for the youth of America every time I think about her.
2: The "pimping" of the Blackberry and the horrors that went with it...
After the first date from hell with the whack job above, I decided to move on as quickly as possible. Met a lovely young lass, very cute, semi-smart, in grad school for a profession I didn't really respect, but the positives far outweighed the negatives. We had about a half-dozen dates before my adventure on the other coast, and agreed that we'd re-evaluate the situation when I got back. One night, just before my departure, a few of my lovely friends decided to have "leave and don't come back" party for me (after 2 previous "going away" parties...any excuse to drink), at which point they made it their mission to prove to me that bar girls were far superior to these online women I was trying to reel in. They just about started throwing drunk chicks at me, which was a little disturbing, but had its fun moments as well. I ended up chatting with a little cutie who had just moved here. As an added bonus, she was part of the tribe. She was very drunk and a little annoying, so naturally, it led nowhere. A month later, I returned from my adventure and picked things up with lovely young lass. Things went well for another half-dozen or so dates, until she cancelled one because she has a bad allergy attack. She came over the next day because she needed me to "pimp out" her new blackberry. Since I was the "cutest geek she knew," she wanted my help. While I'm pimping, she grabbed my laptop and decided to play on facebook for a while, showing me pictures, including one of her with annoying cutie from the leave and don't come back party, who turned out to be her cousin. I told her the cousin looked familiar, and mentioned that a friend of mine had tried picking her up at the bar before I went away. She asked about the friend, I described, and she told me that he had no chance, since she only dates jewish guys, but that I "probably could have done her, since she's a giant slut." Not exactly the kind of thing I wanted to hear from the girl I was seeing, but interesting nonetheless. While setting up her inboxes, I noticed a text from some guy saying that last night (when she was apparently too sick to go out with me) was awesome. We weren't exclusive or anything, but she could have just told me that she had other plans, even plans with another guy. She was pretending to cough every few minutes, to keep up the whole allergies thing, so I "accidentally" deleted my info from her address book and removed a bunch of the texts I had sent her (wouldn't want the other guys she's seeing to read that stuff). Finished the pimping and sent her on her way. A couple of days later, I sent her a quick note saying that I had been thinking about what she said, about doing her cousin, and asked for the cousin's number. Surprisingly enough, she gave it to me without question...never used it, and never spoke to her again after that. Given how things went the entire time we dated, it seemed like the most appropriate way to end things.
Back to funny work stories soon...I promise.
Before coming back to technical traumas of the corporate kind though, I've started to realize that the technological revolution we've witnessed over the last couple of years has made dating very different from what it was the last time I tried and failed (failed, of course, being when I asked ECB to marry me). Some of these changes are for the better...being able to text instead of having an actual conversation, dating on the Intarwebs and the opportunity to stalk potential dates on facebook before going out with them are all wonderful, welcome changes. Of course, this progress has made the whole horrible process a lot more complicated, and enabled some rather unpleasant side effects. It is with this in mind that I bring you two quick little ditties from my last six months in romantic purgatory. You see, recognizing his inability to meet women in real life, the Doctor decided to join a dating website that caters to people like him (jews, not geeky, sarcastic assholes). Some of the resulting dates sucked less than others and a few, including one that happened rather recently, were actually pretty good. These, on the other hand, are two of the far crappier examples of what has happened since I left you.
1: Apparently stalking can work both ways, and it's not nearly as much fun as I thought...
The Doctor was "approached" via the website by what appeared to be a rather attractive young lass from another neighborhood in his newly adopted hometown. Initial conversation was interesting, and she even seemed somewhat normal. We went out and all was not as it seemed. Thankfully, she wasn't a guy (as far as I could tell), but she was completely mental. There was no follow-up call, text or email on my part, mainly because this whack job was sending them in clusters. I tried to ignore them, but the sheer volume was so overwhelming that I made the mistake of responding to every 20th message, making sure to avoid replying to anything that made mention of what would have been an absolutely awful second date. Eventually, I told her I was moving to the other side of the country for my awesome new job (that part was sort of true...it was an extended visit). She asked if she'd ever see me again and I told her I wasn't sure when I'd be back, so she should probably not wait around. While I was on leave, the texts, emails, facebook messages and phone calls went through the roof. I'd be sitting in the office in the middle of the day and start receiving emails from her with pictures showing various states of undress, providing further evidence that this broad was crazier than I thought. Couldn't muster up much of a response, other than the less than trying to not-so-subtly suggest I wasn't interested, but she never seemed to be able to take the hint. One such lovely day saw my presence required at a morning meeting that ran a little more than four hours. When I got back to my desk and checked my personal email account, I had 160 new messages - 2 mass mails, one from a friend and 157 from her, meaning she had gone from just nuts to the new realm of completely batshit crazy.
After a few more triple digit days, I decided to tell her that the higher ups at my company wanted me to stay there a lot longer than expected, possibly forever at which point she suggested coming out to visit me. At this point, my head started to hurt, so I told her it was a bad idea, but that if I ever came back to the other coast, I might call her, but that she shouldn't wait around since it seemed like this was going to be permanent. I then proceeded to block her from every method of electronic communication and thanked my lucky stars I was able to put personality ahead of looks for once. Six months later, I still get the occasional email from her (every time I block one address, she gets a new one), asking if anything has changed and if she's ever going to see me again. This odd attraction to yours truly would be evidence enough of her obvious mental problems, but there's so much more. The worst part of the whole thing...she's a teacher. I shed a tear for the youth of America every time I think about her.
2: The "pimping" of the Blackberry and the horrors that went with it...
After the first date from hell with the whack job above, I decided to move on as quickly as possible. Met a lovely young lass, very cute, semi-smart, in grad school for a profession I didn't really respect, but the positives far outweighed the negatives. We had about a half-dozen dates before my adventure on the other coast, and agreed that we'd re-evaluate the situation when I got back. One night, just before my departure, a few of my lovely friends decided to have "leave and don't come back" party for me (after 2 previous "going away" parties...any excuse to drink), at which point they made it their mission to prove to me that bar girls were far superior to these online women I was trying to reel in. They just about started throwing drunk chicks at me, which was a little disturbing, but had its fun moments as well. I ended up chatting with a little cutie who had just moved here. As an added bonus, she was part of the tribe. She was very drunk and a little annoying, so naturally, it led nowhere. A month later, I returned from my adventure and picked things up with lovely young lass. Things went well for another half-dozen or so dates, until she cancelled one because she has a bad allergy attack. She came over the next day because she needed me to "pimp out" her new blackberry. Since I was the "cutest geek she knew," she wanted my help. While I'm pimping, she grabbed my laptop and decided to play on facebook for a while, showing me pictures, including one of her with annoying cutie from the leave and don't come back party, who turned out to be her cousin. I told her the cousin looked familiar, and mentioned that a friend of mine had tried picking her up at the bar before I went away. She asked about the friend, I described, and she told me that he had no chance, since she only dates jewish guys, but that I "probably could have done her, since she's a giant slut." Not exactly the kind of thing I wanted to hear from the girl I was seeing, but interesting nonetheless. While setting up her inboxes, I noticed a text from some guy saying that last night (when she was apparently too sick to go out with me) was awesome. We weren't exclusive or anything, but she could have just told me that she had other plans, even plans with another guy. She was pretending to cough every few minutes, to keep up the whole allergies thing, so I "accidentally" deleted my info from her address book and removed a bunch of the texts I had sent her (wouldn't want the other guys she's seeing to read that stuff). Finished the pimping and sent her on her way. A couple of days later, I sent her a quick note saying that I had been thinking about what she said, about doing her cousin, and asked for the cousin's number. Surprisingly enough, she gave it to me without question...never used it, and never spoke to her again after that. Given how things went the entire time we dated, it seemed like the most appropriate way to end things.
Back to funny work stories soon...I promise.
Wednesday, April 16, 2008
Goodnight and good luck
It is with a heavy heart that I must now bid you, my fair readers (both of you) farewell. This is something I have been contemplating for a while now, and Dr. Nerd's Technical Trauma Center will be closing (at least temporarily...) There are two reasons for such an untimely end to my tribute to the techno-stupidity of others:
I've become obsolete. As I had mentioned in a prior post, we recently hired a new IT guy who is a god among geeks. Everything around the office is starting to work the way they describe it in the manuals, and he's restricting our access in ways that only the most blazing idiots could screw up badly enough that they'd require help. Unlike those who held this position before him though, this guy is actually qualified and my dear colleagues are coming to me less and less with their questions and problems. I'm starting to realize that the archives will only get me so far and eventually, I'm going to need some new material.
More important than this though, is something I'm terribly ashamed to admit. Doctor Nerd, savior of the clueless masses (who enjoys laughing at them behind their backs), has been beaten. It pains me to type this, but I have fallen to the forces of evil and stupidity. This happened a few days ago and I've been broken up about it ever since...so much so that even my new favorite co-worker setting me up with her (very attractive) nice little Jewish girl friend hasn't been enough to vanquish the thought of this failure from my mind.
One of my colleagues (a repeat offender) called me to see if I could come help her with something. She was getting very angry and close to throwing "this damn computer" out her window (odd, since this particular co-worker doesn't have a window). I went over, figuring it would be something amusingly, innocently dumb that I could share with you. However, what I found was something way over my head. She was working on an enormous spreadsheet, copying data from one workbook to another. When clicking on a cell in the destination workbook, however, it was opening up a blank email addressed to various people whose names were in the first workbook. I figured she was somehow hyperlinking cells in her destination sheet to email addresses in the origin sheet, but was concerned by the randomness of the addresses and the fact that the "mailto" function was being put into what seemed like miscellaneous cells - there was no pattern to speak of. I had her send me the workbook so I could do a quick zeroing out of the formatting, which is supposed to remove the hyperlinks. It worked, but 4 minutes after I gave it back to her, she called again in a panic. Apparently copying one additional set of fields over put ALL of the random links back. I took a look at the original book but couldn't see anything there. Even google was of no use to me in figuring this out. I never thought I'd see the day when I was truly, completely, hopelessly stumped, but it has happened and I feel that continuing under the Dr. Nerd moniker would be akin to fraud. At best, I should be demoted to "Med Student Nerd" or something equally degrading.
So with this, I bid you all farewell.
Shalom Beeotches!!!!!
I've become obsolete. As I had mentioned in a prior post, we recently hired a new IT guy who is a god among geeks. Everything around the office is starting to work the way they describe it in the manuals, and he's restricting our access in ways that only the most blazing idiots could screw up badly enough that they'd require help. Unlike those who held this position before him though, this guy is actually qualified and my dear colleagues are coming to me less and less with their questions and problems. I'm starting to realize that the archives will only get me so far and eventually, I'm going to need some new material.
More important than this though, is something I'm terribly ashamed to admit. Doctor Nerd, savior of the clueless masses (who enjoys laughing at them behind their backs), has been beaten. It pains me to type this, but I have fallen to the forces of evil and stupidity. This happened a few days ago and I've been broken up about it ever since...so much so that even my new favorite co-worker setting me up with her (very attractive) nice little Jewish girl friend hasn't been enough to vanquish the thought of this failure from my mind.
One of my colleagues (a repeat offender) called me to see if I could come help her with something. She was getting very angry and close to throwing "this damn computer" out her window (odd, since this particular co-worker doesn't have a window). I went over, figuring it would be something amusingly, innocently dumb that I could share with you. However, what I found was something way over my head. She was working on an enormous spreadsheet, copying data from one workbook to another. When clicking on a cell in the destination workbook, however, it was opening up a blank email addressed to various people whose names were in the first workbook. I figured she was somehow hyperlinking cells in her destination sheet to email addresses in the origin sheet, but was concerned by the randomness of the addresses and the fact that the "mailto" function was being put into what seemed like miscellaneous cells - there was no pattern to speak of. I had her send me the workbook so I could do a quick zeroing out of the formatting, which is supposed to remove the hyperlinks. It worked, but 4 minutes after I gave it back to her, she called again in a panic. Apparently copying one additional set of fields over put ALL of the random links back. I took a look at the original book but couldn't see anything there. Even google was of no use to me in figuring this out. I never thought I'd see the day when I was truly, completely, hopelessly stumped, but it has happened and I feel that continuing under the Dr. Nerd moniker would be akin to fraud. At best, I should be demoted to "Med Student Nerd" or something equally degrading.
So with this, I bid you all farewell.
Shalom Beeotches!!!!!
Monday, April 14, 2008
New hires + the old guard = hillarity ensuing
We recently enhanced our staff with the addition (or promotion) of a former intern. She just graduated, seems very bright, motivated and enthusiastic. After accepting our offer, she promptly changed her instant messenger screen name to something appropriate and sent an email around to the staff letting us know that her old name was no longer active. She got a reply from one of the old timers, who took a liking to her during the internship, congratulating her and asking what a screen name was...
Wednesday, April 9, 2008
Inspiration from beyond the hallowed halls
Thankfully, I got this one from a colleague whose significant other is an IT person. This did NOT come from here (although it wouldn't have surprised me if it did)...
About 20 minutes later, one of my techs comes in laughing and says he was just in the lobby, saw a piece of paper on a printer and went to investigate.
Below is what he found. Sometimes things don't always come out the way you want them to........
A co-worker got a pen stuck inside our printer. He started to try and remove the pen, but I told him we don't have time for that now, just put a note on the printer telling folks not to use it and then report it to the Help Desk. So he grabbed a piece of paper and scrawled on it.
I left before he finished the note. . . .
About 20 minutes later, one of my techs comes in laughing and says he was just in the lobby, saw a piece of paper on a printer and went to investigate.
Below is what he found. Sometimes things don't always come out the way you want them to........
Monday, April 7, 2008
Nerdiness is next to godliness
My company recently changed our IT department, getting rid of the outsource and hiring a new superstar...the savior of the broken, the beaten and the damned. He started a week ago and I've become obsolete, at least as far as tech support is concerned. On the bright side, it's the first time in years I really feel like it's going to be a challenge to keep up my less than acceptable technical activities at the office (no more bittorrent, no more downloading, probably no more hacked, cracked or patched proggies on my machine, until I can beat this bastidge).
With my alter-ego and tech support role apparently no longer active, I'll have to turn to other sources for inspiration. Thankfully, I had one today...before going any further, I must warn you that what you're about to read is nauseating.
I was out for the day with a client...actually, 3 of the senior people at one of my client companies. It's a somewhat revamped team, as I've had one primary point of contact for the last 5 years or so, but he recently left the company. The guy that replaced my longstanding contact is a nice guy, and seems pretty good at what he does. He had an absolutely beautiful thinkpad laptop too, which immediately made me think he was cooler than he seemed...at first.
When we were on our fifth meeting of the day and I was fighting to stay awake, I was taking notes as replacement guy's boss was talking to our audience. Just as I was about to doze off, new guy's computer started making some of the most heinous noises I'd heard in some time...never before have I heard a battery warning alarm blare so loudly. He shut off his computer but didn't bother to put it away. About 10 minutes later, I happened to look back over and saw him still sitting, looking intently at the screen on this pretty laptop. At that point, I saw something that disturbed me beyond belief. There he was, a senior executive at one of my longest standing clients, with a finger shoved deep in his nose. If that wasn't bad enough, I then saw him pull finger from nostril, and start typing again (typing what, I have no idea - I thought the laptop was still powered down). Glancing over a few other times during the meeting, I saw several more gross abuses of technology, including one instance where he appeared to be knuckle deep, and another where he looked like he was doubling up, the first time since kindergarten that I've seen someone with both index fingers simultaneously invading the nasal cavity. As grossed out as I was, the only thing I could think was that poor laptop.
wow, I really AM a geek.
With my alter-ego and tech support role apparently no longer active, I'll have to turn to other sources for inspiration. Thankfully, I had one today...before going any further, I must warn you that what you're about to read is nauseating.
I was out for the day with a client...actually, 3 of the senior people at one of my client companies. It's a somewhat revamped team, as I've had one primary point of contact for the last 5 years or so, but he recently left the company. The guy that replaced my longstanding contact is a nice guy, and seems pretty good at what he does. He had an absolutely beautiful thinkpad laptop too, which immediately made me think he was cooler than he seemed...at first.
When we were on our fifth meeting of the day and I was fighting to stay awake, I was taking notes as replacement guy's boss was talking to our audience. Just as I was about to doze off, new guy's computer started making some of the most heinous noises I'd heard in some time...never before have I heard a battery warning alarm blare so loudly. He shut off his computer but didn't bother to put it away. About 10 minutes later, I happened to look back over and saw him still sitting, looking intently at the screen on this pretty laptop. At that point, I saw something that disturbed me beyond belief. There he was, a senior executive at one of my longest standing clients, with a finger shoved deep in his nose. If that wasn't bad enough, I then saw him pull finger from nostril, and start typing again (typing what, I have no idea - I thought the laptop was still powered down). Glancing over a few other times during the meeting, I saw several more gross abuses of technology, including one instance where he appeared to be knuckle deep, and another where he looked like he was doubling up, the first time since kindergarten that I've seen someone with both index fingers simultaneously invading the nasal cavity. As grossed out as I was, the only thing I could think was that poor laptop.
wow, I really AM a geek.
Thursday, March 27, 2008
More Happy Memories
After yesterday's hellish journey back to the early days of my career, I went out for "a drink" with a few colleagues. That one drink turned into about 9 hours, many many many pints and some good times. Of course, those good times also brought back a few more good memories...
"Asshole," the former IT guy, used to call me (a lot) to fix computers, servers and whatever else broke around the office when he was hung over, still drunk from the night before or just scared of the reaction to his most recent fark-up and decided not to come to work. One such call will always stand out. It was the morning after a night of drinking (back when I was young and could throw back a few without making an ass out of myself or feeling the pain the next morning). "Asshole" had come out too (I was among the first to leave that night...decided to go home right after he started telling me how hot my then-fiancee was and how he'd love to nail her).
The next morning, sure enough, email is down...but that's not all - our entire network had crashed. Boss guys are frantically calling IT A-hole to get him in to fix it, I'm calling our comm provider to see if it's a problem on their end or if it's internal and everybody's yelling at everybody else. As I hear angry, psychotic voicemail number 4 being left for IT dude, he calls me. Says he had a rough night and asked if I could get into the server room without anyone seeing. I couldn't fix this one on my own, but was able to get the system back up and running with a little phone support (from Microsoft - not IT guy). He showed up a few hours later with a black eye - turned out he had "challenged" one of the bigger guys at the company and the 2 of them left the bar and went back up to the office to wrestle. Big guy had a couple of cuts on his face, apparently having taken a bit of punishment as well.
Last night was nuts, and I still feel horrid, but on the bright side, our IT person didn't try to throw me through any walls...
And I didn't even have to fix the server this morning.
"Asshole," the former IT guy, used to call me (a lot) to fix computers, servers and whatever else broke around the office when he was hung over, still drunk from the night before or just scared of the reaction to his most recent fark-up and decided not to come to work. One such call will always stand out. It was the morning after a night of drinking (back when I was young and could throw back a few without making an ass out of myself or feeling the pain the next morning). "Asshole" had come out too (I was among the first to leave that night...decided to go home right after he started telling me how hot my then-fiancee was and how he'd love to nail her).
The next morning, sure enough, email is down...but that's not all - our entire network had crashed. Boss guys are frantically calling IT A-hole to get him in to fix it, I'm calling our comm provider to see if it's a problem on their end or if it's internal and everybody's yelling at everybody else. As I hear angry, psychotic voicemail number 4 being left for IT dude, he calls me. Says he had a rough night and asked if I could get into the server room without anyone seeing. I couldn't fix this one on my own, but was able to get the system back up and running with a little phone support (from Microsoft - not IT guy). He showed up a few hours later with a black eye - turned out he had "challenged" one of the bigger guys at the company and the 2 of them left the bar and went back up to the office to wrestle. Big guy had a couple of cuts on his face, apparently having taken a bit of punishment as well.
Last night was nuts, and I still feel horrid, but on the bright side, our IT person didn't try to throw me through any walls...
And I didn't even have to fix the server this morning.
Wednesday, March 26, 2008
Hakuna Matata
It's amazing how the whole "circle of life" thing from the Lion King sometimes works. I've been at my company for 10 years (and endured countless therapy sessions as a result of the job), but am now considered (by one or two people at least) to be among the "higher ups" here. Of course, I'm viewed by others as the nerdy schmuck intern that the "real" staff had to sneak into bars 10 years ago. Today was one of those days where, as far as I've come, I had to go back to my roots. One of our clients was having a major event that wasn't properly planned, requiring the production of massive quantities of material in not nearly enough time. We have one guy who handles production jobs, and this was way too big for him alone, so my colleague that was running the event called me (in full-on panic mode) and asked me to "find people" to help. She needed at least 2 in there to make things run smoothly, but we only had one intern (the people that would normally pitch in on this were all at the event). Trying to be a good boss-type, I didn't ask anyone on my team to volunteer, and instead rolled up my sleeves and got in the trenches, just like the good (or less shitty) old days. My fellow slave laborers are both fairly new, and weren't fortunate enough to see some of what I saw. I couldn't help but think of some of the fun times that I had back then...
Our "original" IT guy didn't really know much about IT, or responsibility, or showing up to work. He also had a massive drinking problem. There were times (many times) that our mail server would crash. I was the first one in the office and as such, the first one to notice. Once the boss types found out, they'd call IT guy, who never seemed to have his phone turned on. One such morning, the "big boss" burst into my cubicle, the vein in his forehead throbbing like it had never throbbed before. He told me that "our shit didn't work again" and "the asshole" wasn't answering his phone. He told me to get in there and see what I could do. As I've said before, I'm completely self-taught and really had no clue how networks were supposed to work. I tried to calmly explain this to boss-man, who was now turning a shade of red I had never seen before, and he told me he didn't "give a flying fuck" if I "burned the damn place down trying to fix it," but we needed email and I was our best shot (as frightening as that may be). I went into the room and started throwing out random commands like I did in college when I was trying to crack a prog or hack a site, and somehow, magically, it started working.
Of course, once "the asshole" found out I was capable of fixing it, he started calling me, asking me to "work my magic" whenever the server went down and he was too hung over to come in.
Our "original" IT guy didn't really know much about IT, or responsibility, or showing up to work. He also had a massive drinking problem. There were times (many times) that our mail server would crash. I was the first one in the office and as such, the first one to notice. Once the boss types found out, they'd call IT guy, who never seemed to have his phone turned on. One such morning, the "big boss" burst into my cubicle, the vein in his forehead throbbing like it had never throbbed before. He told me that "our shit didn't work again" and "the asshole" wasn't answering his phone. He told me to get in there and see what I could do. As I've said before, I'm completely self-taught and really had no clue how networks were supposed to work. I tried to calmly explain this to boss-man, who was now turning a shade of red I had never seen before, and he told me he didn't "give a flying fuck" if I "burned the damn place down trying to fix it," but we needed email and I was our best shot (as frightening as that may be). I went into the room and started throwing out random commands like I did in college when I was trying to crack a prog or hack a site, and somehow, magically, it started working.
Of course, once "the asshole" found out I was capable of fixing it, he started calling me, asking me to "work my magic" whenever the server went down and he was too hung over to come in.
Monday, March 24, 2008
Sometimes technology causes stupidity...
Unfortunately (or maybe fortunately), nothing good happened at work today. A few "tutorials" on different tech subjects (IPTV, 700MHz, EDGE vs. GSM vs. HSDPA...almost all intelligent questions). The only thing I could think about was a story of stupidity from the good doctor himself. A story not where stupidity results in the misuse of technology, but one where an obsession with all things gadget-y causes temporary stupidity. For anyone brave enough to read this crap (or smart enough to scroll), there are a couple of stories at the end...of course, I think my own techno-stupidity is amusing too...
I'm moving soon. My house is sold, I have a closing date and my almost ex-wife is planning her move to a place far far away from me (free at last, FREE AT LAST). She's already started packing, while I've started looking for new "stuff" for my soon to be bachelor pad as I think about escaping the suburban semi-hell (not sure if it's considered purgatory...) I've been living in for the last 5 years of my life. I've literally done hours of research and have made a lot of progress. I've picked a TV (52" of Samsung LCD 1080P goodness), have narrowed my sound system down to 3 finalists, and have a preliminary plan in place for my wireless network (despite the fact that I'll have an apartment slightly bigger than my bed, I'll have 3 computers with me...one for everyday use, one as a set top box / DVR permanently hooked up to that beautiful TV and the third to function as a media server, streaming music (Sirius online and MP3s) to the stereo and video (illegally downloaded movies mainly) to the laptop that's connected to the TV. I've also started looking at furniture...picked out a mattress, have 3 bedroom sets and 2 living room sets on the short list, and starting to narrow down my kitchen options (cookware, knives, etc. - in addition to being a raging geek, I'm also an aspiring gourmet).
Of course, it hit me a little while ago that all this planning is for naught, as I haven't yet started looking for an apartment to put all this crap in, and chances are whatever I end up with will have enough room for about a third of what I've already picked out.
I suppose I'll chalk this up to a temporary lapse in better judgment caused by a raging geek-gasm. Assuming I can find a place to live, it's gonna be hooked up (forgot to mention, I found a KILLER deal on that 52" Sammy...saving enough to stock the bar for the housewarming party and pick up a PS3 for some Blu-Ray goodness afterwards).
Enough about me...most of you (ok, both of you) are here for the funny stories about stupid people, so here's a couple quickies before the muscle relaxers kick in and I pass out...
Now-former colleague, a sweet girl, but not the brightest bulb in the chandelier, calls me upset that she can't get a certain website to load. she says she's typed it about 10 times, tried copying and pasting, and it still doesn't work. I ask her what it says and she tells me nothing, except the website she's trying to visit. I walk over to her office to see that she didn't have her browser open and was typing it in the wrong place. On her screen was a word document with a web address typed over and over again (probably about 20 times). On the bright side, she had hit return so each one was hyperlinked. In an effort to make her feel smart, I told her to hold down control (and then had to rephrase and tell her to hold down CTRL, or "kuh-tarl") while clicking one of the blue sentences. It worked and she was able to go shopping.
Colleage calls me over because she's trying to listen to a webcast and the sound is muffled, despite the fact that she has the volume turned all the way up. She claimed to have heard something, so it couldn't have been any of the usual - volume off, speakers powered down, speakers unplugged. I went over to take a look, unplugged her headphones from the jack built into the speaker and everyone in a ~20 foot radius got to hear a quick snippet of her "webcast," which sounded strangely similar to Walk Like an Egyptian by the Bangles.
Another colleague calls me to ask if I can figure out why her sound is "messed up" - in the background, I hear what sounds like multiple audio tracks running at the same time. I go into her office and explain to her that if she has the YouTube video playing at the same time as the client webcast and the VH1 Internet radio, she'll hear all three simultaneously, which would explain why her sound was "messed up." The YouTube video (LEAVE BRITNEY ALONE!!!!!) finished playing, so it was down to 2 sources. To the surprise of no one in the room, she stopped the client presentation and kept VH1 running.
I'm moving soon. My house is sold, I have a closing date and my almost ex-wife is planning her move to a place far far away from me (free at last, FREE AT LAST). She's already started packing, while I've started looking for new "stuff" for my soon to be bachelor pad as I think about escaping the suburban semi-hell (not sure if it's considered purgatory...) I've been living in for the last 5 years of my life. I've literally done hours of research and have made a lot of progress. I've picked a TV (52" of Samsung LCD 1080P goodness), have narrowed my sound system down to 3 finalists, and have a preliminary plan in place for my wireless network (despite the fact that I'll have an apartment slightly bigger than my bed, I'll have 3 computers with me...one for everyday use, one as a set top box / DVR permanently hooked up to that beautiful TV and the third to function as a media server, streaming music (Sirius online and MP3s) to the stereo and video (illegally downloaded movies mainly) to the laptop that's connected to the TV. I've also started looking at furniture...picked out a mattress, have 3 bedroom sets and 2 living room sets on the short list, and starting to narrow down my kitchen options (cookware, knives, etc. - in addition to being a raging geek, I'm also an aspiring gourmet).
Of course, it hit me a little while ago that all this planning is for naught, as I haven't yet started looking for an apartment to put all this crap in, and chances are whatever I end up with will have enough room for about a third of what I've already picked out.
I suppose I'll chalk this up to a temporary lapse in better judgment caused by a raging geek-gasm. Assuming I can find a place to live, it's gonna be hooked up (forgot to mention, I found a KILLER deal on that 52" Sammy...saving enough to stock the bar for the housewarming party and pick up a PS3 for some Blu-Ray goodness afterwards).
Enough about me...most of you (ok, both of you) are here for the funny stories about stupid people, so here's a couple quickies before the muscle relaxers kick in and I pass out...
Now-former colleague, a sweet girl, but not the brightest bulb in the chandelier, calls me upset that she can't get a certain website to load. she says she's typed it about 10 times, tried copying and pasting, and it still doesn't work. I ask her what it says and she tells me nothing, except the website she's trying to visit. I walk over to her office to see that she didn't have her browser open and was typing it in the wrong place. On her screen was a word document with a web address typed over and over again (probably about 20 times). On the bright side, she had hit return so each one was hyperlinked. In an effort to make her feel smart, I told her to hold down control (and then had to rephrase and tell her to hold down CTRL, or "kuh-tarl") while clicking one of the blue sentences. It worked and she was able to go shopping.
Colleage calls me over because she's trying to listen to a webcast and the sound is muffled, despite the fact that she has the volume turned all the way up. She claimed to have heard something, so it couldn't have been any of the usual - volume off, speakers powered down, speakers unplugged. I went over to take a look, unplugged her headphones from the jack built into the speaker and everyone in a ~20 foot radius got to hear a quick snippet of her "webcast," which sounded strangely similar to Walk Like an Egyptian by the Bangles.
Another colleague calls me to ask if I can figure out why her sound is "messed up" - in the background, I hear what sounds like multiple audio tracks running at the same time. I go into her office and explain to her that if she has the YouTube video playing at the same time as the client webcast and the VH1 Internet radio, she'll hear all three simultaneously, which would explain why her sound was "messed up." The YouTube video (LEAVE BRITNEY ALONE!!!!!) finished playing, so it was down to 2 sources. To the surprise of no one in the room, she stopped the client presentation and kept VH1 running.
Thursday, March 20, 2008
It pays to have priorities...most of the time
One more from the archives before the long weekend...
Having worked my way up at my company from, quite literally, slave labor, I've often been looked at as the little kid, regardless of my position, my workload or the value I brought to our organization and our clients. The best evidence of this is in the expectation of certain higher-ups that I'm going to be at their beck and call from 7 in the morning until 7 at night. Of course, this sad, pathetic part of my professional existence has also given me some good (albeit sometimes disturbing) stories.
There was a situation once where I was in a meeting with a client. I'm in the conference room with another member of my team and two senior executives who had literally just flown 12 hours to meet with me. About 20 minutes into the meeting, I get paged to reception. Given that I'm with an important new client, I ignore it. 10 minutes later, a second page, this time adding "ASAP." I buzz reception to find out one of the higher ups had a technical problem and needed my help. I explained that I was with important client and that it would have to wait. 15 minutes after that, I'm paged again, this time with the instructions to get to boss-type's office immediately, because it was "very" important. This new client, clearly being very understanding, let me go. I walked in and was told that he was having problems opening a fucking file and it was fucking up his computer. It was a media file and he was missing the codecs to run this type of video. I downloaded them for him and reset the player, and made the mistake of staying to make sure the file played properly before going back to my meeting...
It was a video of a woman blowing a horse. I had to drink a LOT that night, just to get the image out of my head. By the time I had gotten to double digit shots, I had forgotten that this guy actually called me out of a meeting with a new client so that he could sit at his desk watching equestrian fellatio.
Happy easter everbody
Having worked my way up at my company from, quite literally, slave labor, I've often been looked at as the little kid, regardless of my position, my workload or the value I brought to our organization and our clients. The best evidence of this is in the expectation of certain higher-ups that I'm going to be at their beck and call from 7 in the morning until 7 at night. Of course, this sad, pathetic part of my professional existence has also given me some good (albeit sometimes disturbing) stories.
There was a situation once where I was in a meeting with a client. I'm in the conference room with another member of my team and two senior executives who had literally just flown 12 hours to meet with me. About 20 minutes into the meeting, I get paged to reception. Given that I'm with an important new client, I ignore it. 10 minutes later, a second page, this time adding "ASAP." I buzz reception to find out one of the higher ups had a technical problem and needed my help. I explained that I was with important client and that it would have to wait. 15 minutes after that, I'm paged again, this time with the instructions to get to boss-type's office immediately, because it was "very" important. This new client, clearly being very understanding, let me go. I walked in and was told that he was having problems opening a fucking file and it was fucking up his computer. It was a media file and he was missing the codecs to run this type of video. I downloaded them for him and reset the player, and made the mistake of staying to make sure the file played properly before going back to my meeting...
It was a video of a woman blowing a horse. I had to drink a LOT that night, just to get the image out of my head. By the time I had gotten to double digit shots, I had forgotten that this guy actually called me out of a meeting with a new client so that he could sit at his desk watching equestrian fellatio.
Happy easter everbody
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...
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...
Tuesday, March 18, 2008
A happy memory
I've been very busy with meetings and sending out my resume lately, so I haven't had time to deal with the colleagues that usually give me new material. Not wanting to keep my audience waiting, I've decided to pull another classic from the archives.
As has been documented, I've been the "go-to" guy for computer stuff since very early on in my career. My usefulness in this regard has dwindled in recent years, as my company has gotten younger and more and more of my peers have grown up around technology the same way I have. I'll always have a few peeps whose obliviousness will help keep the coffers full, but I sincerely doubt we'll ever approach the levels we saw during the glory days. When I first started, the senior management was literally "senior" - there wasn't a one under 50 (for a guy in his early 20s at the time, that's pretty damn old). Despite being intelligent and successful, these fuckers didn't know a keyboard from a keychain and for that I'm eternally grateful.
There was one higher-up in particular who was always good for a laugh. Like me, he was in early every day, and more often than not, I'd have to provide some sort of tech support for this dude before anyone else got to the office. About a year and a half into my tenure, he discovered that you could put your stocks into some sort of thingie on the Internet and see the quotes all at once (this is how he described it to me after being enlightened by his broker). Knowing that anything more than the most absolute basic portfolio would cause me unbearable pain (in hindsight, it would have also given me great material), I set him up with a Yahoo! finance account and put his portfolio together for him. I even bookmarked it for him, so he could come in and see his portfolio in a single click, rather than going through the yahoo homepage. I set it to keep him logged in and explained that he may, from time to time, have to re-enter his info to access his personal finance page (it made him feel special) and stuck a Post-It with the login details on his monitor. He was appreciative, and fascinated beyond belief.
I was happy to have helped one of my elders with something that he'd never have gotten on his own, and really felt like I taught him something...until the next morning.
I got a call, about 5 minutes after he got in (he was afraid he'd forget his password and be locked out of his computer, so he never shut it down) telling me that his stocks were gone and asking me to work my "technical wizardry" (a favorite saying of his, complete with freaky wiggle of the fingers as if he's trying to cast a spell). I asked him if he was clicking on the bookmark and he stared at me blankly. I then asked how he was trying to get to his portfolio and he told me he was trying to go to the Yahoo Finance address. I was impressed, but also figured I knew the problem. I asked him what the address was (at the time, it was finance.yahoo.com) and he told me it was wwww.yahoofinance.com (the fourth "w" is not a typo...that's actually what he told me, and what was typed in the address bar). I corrected him, re-explained the bookmark concept and all was well again (for a few hours, before he screwed up Microsoft Word...another story for another time).
We repeated this exercise, almost to the word, 4 days a week for the better part of the next 2 months. I bookmarked it for him almost every time and, by the end, he had about 28 bookmarks pointing to Yahoo Finance in his favorites folder. I even tried putting a shortcut on his desktop, telling him to click the special picture (icon) when he wanted to look at his portfolio. That lasted less than a day, as he clicked that for his browser and complained that the "Internet thing" was taking him to his stocks when he wanted to look at something else.
This guy was "asked to leave" eventually and went on to start his own company, which ended up being pretty successful. During the early days of his new life, he tried to recruit me.
He offered me much more money than I was worth at the time and threw in an equity position in the company. Tempting as it was, I just couldn't do it...the thought of my boss wiggling his fingers at me asking me to perform "technical wizardry" every day while I'm helping him find the Internet (another of his favorites..."I lost the Internet") was just too painful to consider.
I made my decision and I stand by it.
Ahhhh...the good old days.
As has been documented, I've been the "go-to" guy for computer stuff since very early on in my career. My usefulness in this regard has dwindled in recent years, as my company has gotten younger and more and more of my peers have grown up around technology the same way I have. I'll always have a few peeps whose obliviousness will help keep the coffers full, but I sincerely doubt we'll ever approach the levels we saw during the glory days. When I first started, the senior management was literally "senior" - there wasn't a one under 50 (for a guy in his early 20s at the time, that's pretty damn old). Despite being intelligent and successful, these fuckers didn't know a keyboard from a keychain and for that I'm eternally grateful.
There was one higher-up in particular who was always good for a laugh. Like me, he was in early every day, and more often than not, I'd have to provide some sort of tech support for this dude before anyone else got to the office. About a year and a half into my tenure, he discovered that you could put your stocks into some sort of thingie on the Internet and see the quotes all at once (this is how he described it to me after being enlightened by his broker). Knowing that anything more than the most absolute basic portfolio would cause me unbearable pain (in hindsight, it would have also given me great material), I set him up with a Yahoo! finance account and put his portfolio together for him. I even bookmarked it for him, so he could come in and see his portfolio in a single click, rather than going through the yahoo homepage. I set it to keep him logged in and explained that he may, from time to time, have to re-enter his info to access his personal finance page (it made him feel special) and stuck a Post-It with the login details on his monitor. He was appreciative, and fascinated beyond belief.
I was happy to have helped one of my elders with something that he'd never have gotten on his own, and really felt like I taught him something...until the next morning.
I got a call, about 5 minutes after he got in (he was afraid he'd forget his password and be locked out of his computer, so he never shut it down) telling me that his stocks were gone and asking me to work my "technical wizardry" (a favorite saying of his, complete with freaky wiggle of the fingers as if he's trying to cast a spell). I asked him if he was clicking on the bookmark and he stared at me blankly. I then asked how he was trying to get to his portfolio and he told me he was trying to go to the Yahoo Finance address. I was impressed, but also figured I knew the problem. I asked him what the address was (at the time, it was finance.yahoo.com) and he told me it was wwww.yahoofinance.com (the fourth "w" is not a typo...that's actually what he told me, and what was typed in the address bar). I corrected him, re-explained the bookmark concept and all was well again (for a few hours, before he screwed up Microsoft Word...another story for another time).
We repeated this exercise, almost to the word, 4 days a week for the better part of the next 2 months. I bookmarked it for him almost every time and, by the end, he had about 28 bookmarks pointing to Yahoo Finance in his favorites folder. I even tried putting a shortcut on his desktop, telling him to click the special picture (icon) when he wanted to look at his portfolio. That lasted less than a day, as he clicked that for his browser and complained that the "Internet thing" was taking him to his stocks when he wanted to look at something else.
This guy was "asked to leave" eventually and went on to start his own company, which ended up being pretty successful. During the early days of his new life, he tried to recruit me.
He offered me much more money than I was worth at the time and threw in an equity position in the company. Tempting as it was, I just couldn't do it...the thought of my boss wiggling his fingers at me asking me to perform "technical wizardry" every day while I'm helping him find the Internet (another of his favorites..."I lost the Internet") was just too painful to consider.
I made my decision and I stand by it.
Ahhhh...the good old days.
Monday, March 17, 2008
PowerPoint
A colleague just called me and asked if I could help her with something. I go to her office and she's got a PDF ad on her screen for 20% off at Bloomingdales. She asked me if there was a way to tell what version of PowerPoint it was. I cried...
Before I could even come up with a sarcastic answer, she realized she had opened the wrong file, proceeded to open a presentation and asked me again (a legit question - woo hoo). I asked why it mattered, since the only important thing was that we were able to open them here (we're running Office 95 on some machines). She explained to me that her client told her their computers couldn't handle PowerPoint 2008 files. I told her there was nothing to worry about, since the most recent version is 2007, and that if we could open the files, they'd have no problems whatsoever...
Before I could even come up with a sarcastic answer, she realized she had opened the wrong file, proceeded to open a presentation and asked me again (a legit question - woo hoo). I asked why it mattered, since the only important thing was that we were able to open them here (we're running Office 95 on some machines). She explained to me that her client told her their computers couldn't handle PowerPoint 2008 files. I told her there was nothing to worry about, since the most recent version is 2007, and that if we could open the files, they'd have no problems whatsoever...
Sunday, March 16, 2008
Apparently my phone has a CC function...
One thing I was hoping not to have to mention following my international adventure was what often happens post-trip. You see, dear fans, every couple of months, big bossman likes to engage in a sort of character building exercise...these exercises have coincided with our last 2 overseas trips, and sure enough, third time ain't a charm.
What happens is that he'll spend a week or two trying to re-assert his dominance over the tribe by making me his bitch. He'll literally beat me within an inch of my resignation before he goes back to kinda sorta respecting me. At the same time this is going on, one of the other boss-types, seemingly afraid I'll get up and walk out (thereby requiring him to do a LOT more work), does his best to keep the old ego above water during this, reminding me how dumb most of BBM's points are and giving me data points on how well the firm is doing, how great my team is and trying to quantify the size of my individual contributions...it's kind of a nice good-cop/bad-cop dynamic.
Every once in a while, big bossman will come at me with something valid, but 99% of the time it's stupid shit. I'll have a different opinion on how to do something (and, naturally, be wrong), I'll do something that we discussed, but he'll have forgotten the conversation and I'll have to re-explain the logic that had been agreed to a couple of hours earlier.
Today, I had one that may have been a new extreme, and thankfully, there's a tech angle to it...During our overseas adventure, we met with a long-time client who's changing his business. This new endeavor of his could involve helping some of the clients from another department. We've been working to make the connections for him and yesterday, he asked for a little more information. I checked it with my counterparts on the "other side" and called my foreign friend to let him know we were working on it. Today, big bossman asked what we were doing about the request and I told him the people on the other side were looking into it, and that I had called foreign client guy to let him know we were working on it. His response...
"Why wasn't I copied?"
Now, Dr. Nerd has been told (usually by HR people at competing companies) that he's grossly underpaid for what he brings to the table. Because of this Sally Struthers infomercial-level poverty, I'm not always able to stay up to speed on the hottest trends in geek couture, but if this magical, wonderful phone that allows you to CC your boss on calls really exists, I must find it...
Bossman is 0 for his last 2 on these little power trips of his...he's going to be 0 for 3 soon. I may not be able to dish it out any better than Glass Joe (from the old school Mike Tyson's Punch Out), but I'll be damned if I can't take a hit and stay off the canvas.
What happens is that he'll spend a week or two trying to re-assert his dominance over the tribe by making me his bitch. He'll literally beat me within an inch of my resignation before he goes back to kinda sorta respecting me. At the same time this is going on, one of the other boss-types, seemingly afraid I'll get up and walk out (thereby requiring him to do a LOT more work), does his best to keep the old ego above water during this, reminding me how dumb most of BBM's points are and giving me data points on how well the firm is doing, how great my team is and trying to quantify the size of my individual contributions...it's kind of a nice good-cop/bad-cop dynamic.
Every once in a while, big bossman will come at me with something valid, but 99% of the time it's stupid shit. I'll have a different opinion on how to do something (and, naturally, be wrong), I'll do something that we discussed, but he'll have forgotten the conversation and I'll have to re-explain the logic that had been agreed to a couple of hours earlier.
Today, I had one that may have been a new extreme, and thankfully, there's a tech angle to it...During our overseas adventure, we met with a long-time client who's changing his business. This new endeavor of his could involve helping some of the clients from another department. We've been working to make the connections for him and yesterday, he asked for a little more information. I checked it with my counterparts on the "other side" and called my foreign friend to let him know we were working on it. Today, big bossman asked what we were doing about the request and I told him the people on the other side were looking into it, and that I had called foreign client guy to let him know we were working on it. His response...
"Why wasn't I copied?"
Now, Dr. Nerd has been told (usually by HR people at competing companies) that he's grossly underpaid for what he brings to the table. Because of this Sally Struthers infomercial-level poverty, I'm not always able to stay up to speed on the hottest trends in geek couture, but if this magical, wonderful phone that allows you to CC your boss on calls really exists, I must find it...
Bossman is 0 for his last 2 on these little power trips of his...he's going to be 0 for 3 soon. I may not be able to dish it out any better than Glass Joe (from the old school Mike Tyson's Punch Out), but I'll be damned if I can't take a hit and stay off the canvas.
Friday, March 14, 2008
It happens to the best of us
And we now present proof that, after all these years, even Dr. Nerd is capable of a slip up every now and then...
My "inspiration" (the same one who, just last night, figured out the concept of a volume knob all by herself) called me asking for help with Word. She was inserting comments into a document and was utterly baffled at the fact that the comments were showing up not with her name or initials, but with "MS Office 1" as the identifier. I walked her through the changing of the user ID in word, but the comments she had inserted still showed as "MS Office 1." Apparently, our IT rocket scientists gave her a new computer, but forgot to set up certain things for her...like her name rather than a generic identifier (yay team).
I had a theory, but pretended to be stumped. She called over Mr. McGee - her nerd in shining armor from last evening and I went back to my desk to test my theory before looking like a jackass and being subject to the ridicule of my readers. Sure enough, I was right - I opened up a doc that had changes tracked, changed my "ID" name to my Nom de guerre (Robert A. Booey) and made another change to the doc. Sure enough, the changes that were there were under my "real" name, while the new edit showed my homage to the producer from the Stern show.
I ran back down to her office, saw McGee still there, still stumped and took the opportunity to revel in yet another win for the good guys (or me...however you look at it). Went back to my desk to finish up a review of a doc for a colleague which I promptly sent off. Walked over to her workstation (a fancy word for cubicle) to ask her a quick question about something she was reviewing for me, and noticed that my changes to her document were showing up in 2 different colors. I had forgotten to go back from Booey to my real identifier before finishing up that doc.
Thankfully, she enjoyed my flub and I caught it before editing any client documents. Given that they're mostly foreign, I doubt they'd have gotten it.
My "inspiration" (the same one who, just last night, figured out the concept of a volume knob all by herself) called me asking for help with Word. She was inserting comments into a document and was utterly baffled at the fact that the comments were showing up not with her name or initials, but with "MS Office 1" as the identifier. I walked her through the changing of the user ID in word, but the comments she had inserted still showed as "MS Office 1." Apparently, our IT rocket scientists gave her a new computer, but forgot to set up certain things for her...like her name rather than a generic identifier (yay team).
I had a theory, but pretended to be stumped. She called over Mr. McGee - her nerd in shining armor from last evening and I went back to my desk to test my theory before looking like a jackass and being subject to the ridicule of my readers. Sure enough, I was right - I opened up a doc that had changes tracked, changed my "ID" name to my Nom de guerre (Robert A. Booey) and made another change to the doc. Sure enough, the changes that were there were under my "real" name, while the new edit showed my homage to the producer from the Stern show.
I ran back down to her office, saw McGee still there, still stumped and took the opportunity to revel in yet another win for the good guys (or me...however you look at it). Went back to my desk to finish up a review of a doc for a colleague which I promptly sent off. Walked over to her workstation (a fancy word for cubicle) to ask her a quick question about something she was reviewing for me, and noticed that my changes to her document were showing up in 2 different colors. I had forgotten to go back from Booey to my real identifier before finishing up that doc.
Thankfully, she enjoyed my flub and I caught it before editing any client documents. Given that they're mostly foreign, I doubt they'd have gotten it.
Dr. Nerd - By Request
The informal poll about a potential name change yesterday led to an unfortunate email conversation last night about American Idol...the only 2 votes received were from my hillarious co-workers, showing support for their favorite karaoke contestants. After seeing these brilliant quips, I fired off an email to my 2 favorite non-Jewish yentas expressing my shock and dismay that this televised abortion had returned yet again, because, quite frankly, nothing can ever compare to the magical, spectacular wondrousness that was Sanjaya.
Inspired once again by this particular colleague (whose suggestion was the start of the blog you're suffering through now), I shot over to youtube to find the video of Benjy Bronk from the Stern show hijacking CNBC to express his love for both America and "Sangina," in an effort to show that I'm not a complete pop-culture tard. Colleague #1 replied almost immediately, letting me know that her speakers didn't work, and that she "fell angry about that" (typo preserved for posterity). Having been through the magical "no sound" issue with numerous other co-workers (including one who didn't have speakers...perhaps my easiest fix EVER, but that's a story for another time), I fired off the troubleshooting list - plugged in / power on (with red light) / volume knob turned on...to which she angrily (it was almost 8 and she was still at the office while most of the "cool kids" were out at the bar...I'd be pissed too) reminded me that I'm Dr. Nerd, not her. She also informed me that each of my diagnostic tests had been passed, and even added one QC to the list - she confirmed that she had checked the control panel in Windows to make sure the volume there was up (words cannot express how proud I was at that moment). Stumped and tired, I offered to stop by in the morning to try and diagnose the problem with her $4.99 set of speakers (nothing but the best for our senior staffers - mine were actually bought used for $0.75, so I'm a little jealous). Before I could switch over to ESPN to check the hockey scores (the playoff chase is officially upon us), I had another email from said colleague letting me know she fixed it and requesting a post in her honor.
She had no idea how she fixed it, but told me that the volume knob ended up being down. She had sought the help of another male co-worker (who some around the office refer to as tits McGee), who couldn't figure it out either. Proud that she fixed it, but devastated that her speakers had cheated on me and big-daddy-bitchtits (another name I've heard for this dude) was allowed to fiddle with her knobs (I'm still way too tired to come up with anything more creative or more subtle), I changed the subject to how much it sucked that she was stuck in the office working and I was home basking in the misery that is my life outside of work at the moment while a good size group of our compatriots were out getting loaded, having fun and enjoying their youth while both of us have gotten old before our time.
This one's for you pookie - hope I did it justice.
Inspired once again by this particular colleague (whose suggestion was the start of the blog you're suffering through now), I shot over to youtube to find the video of Benjy Bronk from the Stern show hijacking CNBC to express his love for both America and "Sangina," in an effort to show that I'm not a complete pop-culture tard. Colleague #1 replied almost immediately, letting me know that her speakers didn't work, and that she "fell angry about that" (typo preserved for posterity). Having been through the magical "no sound" issue with numerous other co-workers (including one who didn't have speakers...perhaps my easiest fix EVER, but that's a story for another time), I fired off the troubleshooting list - plugged in / power on (with red light) / volume knob turned on...to which she angrily (it was almost 8 and she was still at the office while most of the "cool kids" were out at the bar...I'd be pissed too) reminded me that I'm Dr. Nerd, not her. She also informed me that each of my diagnostic tests had been passed, and even added one QC to the list - she confirmed that she had checked the control panel in Windows to make sure the volume there was up (words cannot express how proud I was at that moment). Stumped and tired, I offered to stop by in the morning to try and diagnose the problem with her $4.99 set of speakers (nothing but the best for our senior staffers - mine were actually bought used for $0.75, so I'm a little jealous). Before I could switch over to ESPN to check the hockey scores (the playoff chase is officially upon us), I had another email from said colleague letting me know she fixed it and requesting a post in her honor.
She had no idea how she fixed it, but told me that the volume knob ended up being down. She had sought the help of another male co-worker (who some around the office refer to as tits McGee), who couldn't figure it out either. Proud that she fixed it, but devastated that her speakers had cheated on me and big-daddy-bitchtits (another name I've heard for this dude) was allowed to fiddle with her knobs (I'm still way too tired to come up with anything more creative or more subtle), I changed the subject to how much it sucked that she was stuck in the office working and I was home basking in the misery that is my life outside of work at the moment while a good size group of our compatriots were out getting loaded, having fun and enjoying their youth while both of us have gotten old before our time.
This one's for you pookie - hope I did it justice.
Thursday, March 13, 2008
Sometimes I don't know why I bother...
So after almost a full day back at the office, I have yet to get any good new techno-stories out of this place (our systems barely work right now, so people can't really misuse them, but I was still expecting at least a whopper or two to welcome me back to the office.)
Of course, that hasn't stopped ECB from fucking with me some more...
I really wanted to end the last post on a happy note, so I stopped after the hippie conversation. Of course, when I landed and the emails started pouring in, the first one was from ECB, asking me to review her resignation letter. She's a graphic designer, not a writer, so I ignored the spelling and grammar errors, as well as the fact that if one of my employees gave me this, I'd kick my own ass for hiring someone who writes this way. I started looking at it, but was so tired I just gave up. Opened it again this morning and it dawned on me that she has no clue how to use Word...the margins were off, fonts all over the place, bold in some places, underline in others, italics in yet others...random capitalization - just a freakin mess.
Now, ECB is a graphic designer. She's an expert at programs I've never in my life had any interest in using or learning about (other than to download them from BitTorrent) and has designed things that are really amazing. All this and she can't use the most basic, common waste of megabytes there is. I'm going to fix it for her, because I'm a sucker...
Of course, the real kicker was the second email she sent me. She has a pretty nice Dell notebook that her company bought her. Needless to say, she's going to have to give that bad boy back when she resigns. We have 2 computers "up for grabs" right now and I've told her she can take either of those with her when she moves. Of course, since I just got a new one (bought it while she was away on one of her 3 recent trips to Florida), she thinks she should have a better one too. In this email, she's asking me if I can go, maybe this weekend (when she'll be in Florida again), to look at getting a new labtop for her (yes, she put a b in there). She told me it should be like the one she has (which cost more than double the new one I just bought) because she needed all her graphics software on it. I really have no idea why she's going to need this, but I'll do it anyway, for a couple of reasons...
Of course, that hasn't stopped ECB from fucking with me some more...
I really wanted to end the last post on a happy note, so I stopped after the hippie conversation. Of course, when I landed and the emails started pouring in, the first one was from ECB, asking me to review her resignation letter. She's a graphic designer, not a writer, so I ignored the spelling and grammar errors, as well as the fact that if one of my employees gave me this, I'd kick my own ass for hiring someone who writes this way. I started looking at it, but was so tired I just gave up. Opened it again this morning and it dawned on me that she has no clue how to use Word...the margins were off, fonts all over the place, bold in some places, underline in others, italics in yet others...random capitalization - just a freakin mess.
Now, ECB is a graphic designer. She's an expert at programs I've never in my life had any interest in using or learning about (other than to download them from BitTorrent) and has designed things that are really amazing. All this and she can't use the most basic, common waste of megabytes there is. I'm going to fix it for her, because I'm a sucker...
Of course, the real kicker was the second email she sent me. She has a pretty nice Dell notebook that her company bought her. Needless to say, she's going to have to give that bad boy back when she resigns. We have 2 computers "up for grabs" right now and I've told her she can take either of those with her when she moves. Of course, since I just got a new one (bought it while she was away on one of her 3 recent trips to Florida), she thinks she should have a better one too. In this email, she's asking me if I can go, maybe this weekend (when she'll be in Florida again), to look at getting a new labtop for her (yes, she put a b in there). She told me it should be like the one she has (which cost more than double the new one I just bought) because she needed all her graphics software on it. I really have no idea why she's going to need this, but I'll do it anyway, for a couple of reasons...
- If I don't, she'll go out and buy it herself, most likely before that magical, happy day when we divide our assets and go our separate ways, so I'll be paying for half of it anyway.
- If left to her own devices, she'll overpay for something crappy because it has a nice screen saver or something
- I can accidentally drop a plasma TV (50" or so) into my cart while I'm looking for the laptop. It's very heavy, so I can't lift it to put it back on the shelf. It should slide easily from the cart into the trunk of my car though :-)
- And, of course, because I'm a dumbass
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