Story #3
Blah, blah, blah. This one's 868 words, if you're curious. I think my LJ friends will get this much better than most of my classmates. And yes, my sister in the story really is my sister (the night I wrote this, no less).
Technical support is not glamorous, so let me just clear away any misconceptions you might have. Imagine if you were a doctor, and the bulk of your patients had complaints like “something hurts, and I don’t know why,” or “I broke my hand,” when their problem is actually that they stubbed their toe. Or if one day a patient walked in and said that no matter how hard they tried, they couldn’t walk anymore, and their problem was that they had both legs in the same pant leg. In addition, this very same patient came in two weeks ago with the very same problem. Welcome to my world. I am problem solver, in a way. Everyone expects me to be able to fix everything, because it’s my job. Except I don’t so much solve your problems as gently hold your hand while I try to explain to you where you’ve gone wrong. Again.
If you use the internet, you’re bound to have come across a few of the now infamous horror stories, like the user whose “cup holder” was broken, or the one who couldn’t figure out why she couldn’t open her documents anymore… during a power outage. There are some other good ones that aren’t as well known to the general public. I’ve actually dealt with a user who had her power strip plugged into itself. Even worse was when she didn’t see what the problem was after I had pointed it out. A secretary once thought that Bounce drier sheets would help keep pages from sticking together in her laser printer, but at least she didn’t duck and cover in fear like her boss when I opened up the printer to take out the laundry jam. It seems he was afraid the lasers in the laser printer might blind him. I could have told him it was safe to come out, but then he might have seen me laughing at him.
Not everything is fun and games, though. Plenty of end users bring a smile to my face, but I always felt bad whenever a girl would show up at my desk on the last day of the semester, makeup all smeared from tears, disk in hand, sad puppy look on her face. It was always the same thing. She’s been working all semester on this paper and she can’t open it from this disk and, always the kicker, her only copy is on the disk. I tried my best every time. I’d run every tool I had and go over every inch before finally handing it back to her. I felt like the guy that just ran over her cat in the street with my car. Holding this dead thing out to her, as if she can do anything besides bury it, along with her hopes for a 4.0 gpa. I always felt like I should have done more, but really, there’s nothing I can do for you if you don’t protect yourself. If your grade or your job depends on it, back it up! My projects always existed on at least two disks and a server, in addition to my computer. Which is why I was never able to use that excuse for why my papers were late.
Sometimes, it’s just damn frustrating. Friends and family feel this sense of entitlement to your time. Just because it’s ten o’clock doesn’t mean your sister isn’t going to have some problem that needs immediate fixing. You want to come through for them, but really, do cab drivers drive their friends around town as a favor when they’re off the clock? I probably wouldn’t mention it if my phone hadn’t rang at ten o’clock tonight. My sister’s internet wasn’t working, which was about as descriptive as “doc, something hurts.” The call lasted about an hour as we tried to figure out what was wrong with her wireless equipment. I walked her through changing all sorts of settings before she finally noticed she was connecting to the wrong network. That’s wireless internet for you. Some poor schmuck next door is going to wake up tomorrow and wonder why the hell he can’t get online. This is the kind of computer error we commonly refer to as a “keyboard-chair interface error."
But most of my time in tech is of a more amusing nature. Oh, sweet revenge, when a teacher called in begging me to help him print the final exam he was to serve up to his class in a mere 20 minutes. Oh, I gave him my best, but when all was said and done and he still didn’t have a working printer, it was hard to mask the amusement as I told him “well, you shouldn’t have waited to the last minute, Dr Hagigi.”
There are so many more stories I'd want to share, but it's getting painful to write it all down. Whenever I type for too long my wrists start to hurt. I talked to my doctor about it a few weeks ago, he said something about carpool tunnels. I don't know how my transportation arrangements have anything to do with my computer, but I'm sure my doc can fix it. It's his job.
Technical support is not glamorous, so let me just clear away any misconceptions you might have. Imagine if you were a doctor, and the bulk of your patients had complaints like “something hurts, and I don’t know why,” or “I broke my hand,” when their problem is actually that they stubbed their toe. Or if one day a patient walked in and said that no matter how hard they tried, they couldn’t walk anymore, and their problem was that they had both legs in the same pant leg. In addition, this very same patient came in two weeks ago with the very same problem. Welcome to my world. I am problem solver, in a way. Everyone expects me to be able to fix everything, because it’s my job. Except I don’t so much solve your problems as gently hold your hand while I try to explain to you where you’ve gone wrong. Again.
If you use the internet, you’re bound to have come across a few of the now infamous horror stories, like the user whose “cup holder” was broken, or the one who couldn’t figure out why she couldn’t open her documents anymore… during a power outage. There are some other good ones that aren’t as well known to the general public. I’ve actually dealt with a user who had her power strip plugged into itself. Even worse was when she didn’t see what the problem was after I had pointed it out. A secretary once thought that Bounce drier sheets would help keep pages from sticking together in her laser printer, but at least she didn’t duck and cover in fear like her boss when I opened up the printer to take out the laundry jam. It seems he was afraid the lasers in the laser printer might blind him. I could have told him it was safe to come out, but then he might have seen me laughing at him.
Not everything is fun and games, though. Plenty of end users bring a smile to my face, but I always felt bad whenever a girl would show up at my desk on the last day of the semester, makeup all smeared from tears, disk in hand, sad puppy look on her face. It was always the same thing. She’s been working all semester on this paper and she can’t open it from this disk and, always the kicker, her only copy is on the disk. I tried my best every time. I’d run every tool I had and go over every inch before finally handing it back to her. I felt like the guy that just ran over her cat in the street with my car. Holding this dead thing out to her, as if she can do anything besides bury it, along with her hopes for a 4.0 gpa. I always felt like I should have done more, but really, there’s nothing I can do for you if you don’t protect yourself. If your grade or your job depends on it, back it up! My projects always existed on at least two disks and a server, in addition to my computer. Which is why I was never able to use that excuse for why my papers were late.
Sometimes, it’s just damn frustrating. Friends and family feel this sense of entitlement to your time. Just because it’s ten o’clock doesn’t mean your sister isn’t going to have some problem that needs immediate fixing. You want to come through for them, but really, do cab drivers drive their friends around town as a favor when they’re off the clock? I probably wouldn’t mention it if my phone hadn’t rang at ten o’clock tonight. My sister’s internet wasn’t working, which was about as descriptive as “doc, something hurts.” The call lasted about an hour as we tried to figure out what was wrong with her wireless equipment. I walked her through changing all sorts of settings before she finally noticed she was connecting to the wrong network. That’s wireless internet for you. Some poor schmuck next door is going to wake up tomorrow and wonder why the hell he can’t get online. This is the kind of computer error we commonly refer to as a “keyboard-chair interface error."
But most of my time in tech is of a more amusing nature. Oh, sweet revenge, when a teacher called in begging me to help him print the final exam he was to serve up to his class in a mere 20 minutes. Oh, I gave him my best, but when all was said and done and he still didn’t have a working printer, it was hard to mask the amusement as I told him “well, you shouldn’t have waited to the last minute, Dr Hagigi.”
There are so many more stories I'd want to share, but it's getting painful to write it all down. Whenever I type for too long my wrists start to hurt. I talked to my doctor about it a few weeks ago, he said something about carpool tunnels. I don't know how my transportation arrangements have anything to do with my computer, but I'm sure my doc can fix it. It's his job.