Why must people suck?
So glad it's Friday...just saying.
So before we went out on strike there were all sorts of threatening letters from the company along the lines of "And don't even think about any vandalism to company property while we are negotiating this contract you blue collar hooligans!" blah blah blah threatencakes.
Usually when we are working without a contract the Union asks us to do "just enough" work. It's not business as usual. So no overtime, no branded apparel...nothing extra. No smiling, no talking to the boss! We are not happy workers you see. It's all part of the game. So if a manager calls a tech for an outage they would usually say no at this time and make the managers do it...thus causing them much hassle and headache.
Yesterday we had two cables hit. Big ones...important ones that affected health and emergency services. Hospitals, fire, police, etc! Whoever did the damage knew right where to strike to do the maximum amount of damage. So much so that it wasn't a quick fix and multiple crews had to work around the clock (they are still out there now and will be until tomorrow in fact) working to get the lines up.
So the Union immediately called off the "no working overtime" thing and we even had technicians come in FROM THEIR VACATION to get the lines up and working as soon as humanly possible.
But but but, right away the company starts making noises that it's obviously an employee originated hit and offers a 100,000.00 dollar reward for any information about it. The FBI has been called and has questioned technicians and service representatives and staff associates etc. Asset Protection (our in house detective agency) is involved of course as is local Sheriff and Police. It's chaos everywhere and everyone is pointing the finger and looking at everyone.
Here's the thing...and I hate to sound paranoid but I don't buy it. Personally the techs that I know who actually have the experience and knowledge to know exactly where these cables where and how to hit them? They are old enough to freaking know better and have been through enough contract negotiations to just sit tight. The ones that would do something this stupid...are too stupid to pull it off.
I DO think the company is smart and devious enough to wreck their own stuff and potentially put the lives of people at risk in order to create chaos and confusion with the Union. The letters before the strike and this cable outage that hit just now when we are still working (why when we are still working...wouldn't we do something like this when we are out on strike to mess with them?) and then the reward to get people to be all "It was Bob! No I heard Ray say something!" It's all a little to "pat" for my tastes, it just smells to me is all.
*shakes head*
If it was one of our guys then the idiot is facing serious time in jail/prison because it can actually be classified as a terrorist act to down communications. Dumbass.
So that was my morning....
Then I get a call from my friend Charles to tell me that someone has logged into my character on WoW and has systematically gone through the guild bank and taken everything of value from it. By the time we could change the password it was too late.
When I logged in I find out that it's not just the Guild bank. They had also sold everything of mine on EVERY character I had that was possible to sell...including my bags. They left ALL of my characters naked next to a mailbox and made off with everything. Even the badges I'd gotten out of dungeons and tokens I'd gotten off of daily quests...all gone. It only took them 40 min according to a guild member. They realized it wasn't me right away but they couldn't get a hold of anyone until it was too late.
The customer service people say that they can start to research getting my stuff back and they will let me know about the process in approximately 84-100 hours.
So yeah people suck. And I'm glad today is Friday.
So before we went out on strike there were all sorts of threatening letters from the company along the lines of "And don't even think about any vandalism to company property while we are negotiating this contract you blue collar hooligans!" blah blah blah threatencakes.
Usually when we are working without a contract the Union asks us to do "just enough" work. It's not business as usual. So no overtime, no branded apparel...nothing extra. No smiling, no talking to the boss! We are not happy workers you see. It's all part of the game. So if a manager calls a tech for an outage they would usually say no at this time and make the managers do it...thus causing them much hassle and headache.
Yesterday we had two cables hit. Big ones...important ones that affected health and emergency services. Hospitals, fire, police, etc! Whoever did the damage knew right where to strike to do the maximum amount of damage. So much so that it wasn't a quick fix and multiple crews had to work around the clock (they are still out there now and will be until tomorrow in fact) working to get the lines up.
So the Union immediately called off the "no working overtime" thing and we even had technicians come in FROM THEIR VACATION to get the lines up and working as soon as humanly possible.
But but but, right away the company starts making noises that it's obviously an employee originated hit and offers a 100,000.00 dollar reward for any information about it. The FBI has been called and has questioned technicians and service representatives and staff associates etc. Asset Protection (our in house detective agency) is involved of course as is local Sheriff and Police. It's chaos everywhere and everyone is pointing the finger and looking at everyone.
Here's the thing...and I hate to sound paranoid but I don't buy it. Personally the techs that I know who actually have the experience and knowledge to know exactly where these cables where and how to hit them? They are old enough to freaking know better and have been through enough contract negotiations to just sit tight. The ones that would do something this stupid...are too stupid to pull it off.
I DO think the company is smart and devious enough to wreck their own stuff and potentially put the lives of people at risk in order to create chaos and confusion with the Union. The letters before the strike and this cable outage that hit just now when we are still working (why when we are still working...wouldn't we do something like this when we are out on strike to mess with them?) and then the reward to get people to be all "It was Bob! No I heard Ray say something!" It's all a little to "pat" for my tastes, it just smells to me is all.
*shakes head*
If it was one of our guys then the idiot is facing serious time in jail/prison because it can actually be classified as a terrorist act to down communications. Dumbass.
So that was my morning....
Then I get a call from my friend Charles to tell me that someone has logged into my character on WoW and has systematically gone through the guild bank and taken everything of value from it. By the time we could change the password it was too late.
When I logged in I find out that it's not just the Guild bank. They had also sold everything of mine on EVERY character I had that was possible to sell...including my bags. They left ALL of my characters naked next to a mailbox and made off with everything. Even the badges I'd gotten out of dungeons and tokens I'd gotten off of daily quests...all gone. It only took them 40 min according to a guild member. They realized it wasn't me right away but they couldn't get a hold of anyone until it was too late.
The customer service people say that they can start to research getting my stuff back and they will let me know about the process in approximately 84-100 hours.
So yeah people suck. And I'm glad today is Friday.