8 Years & Counting

"Peter if you find yourself in the same job after 5 years you have to stop and ask yourself, 'Why are you still here?'"

Chris Robertson was the first IT boss I ever had. He loved to talk, he could type 90+ words per minute and he had me convinced that IP Subneting was the hardest thing I would ever have to learn.

His theory was simple on jobs though, "In IT we aren't in it for the long haul. You should invest about 3-5 years per job. If you are looking to move on, an employer will want to know why you either left too early or stayed too long."

I've been at my current job for 8 years. That's the longest I've been anywhere. It's hard to stay in one place for so long, I feel like I'm losing my edge. Like I'm getting numb to this one environment and this one way of doing things.  After a while you stop questioning why you are building networks the way you are and just accept it.

"That's the way we've always done it," is a sure sign that you don't have a clue why your design hasn't changed.

I like it here. I have an office, a stable network and I'm finally comfortable with my co-workers, but there is always a part of me looking to move on. Chris Robertson's words ring in my ear. "Why are you still here?"

His advice was given almost 15 years ago. It was the reason I left that job and the next two. I was reaching for the moon and stuffing my matress with stock options that were going to make me rich. I was trading my 9-5 Win95 knowledge for 60 hour weeks and the promise of learning network design and telecom troubleshooting.

In all reality, I owe Chris my career. If not for him I would have stayed a PC tech at a giant company and could see myself there today.

I love networking. So I made the right choice, but I wonder what he would say today. In this new economy there are people who would kill for a steady job. I suppose I should be happy, content and learn to live with this new phase.

I suppose it could be a lot worse. I could have ended up as a manager...

Servicing The Car: Confessions of a Geek.

My truck has been making this funny noise for a while now. I really really really need to take it in for a service check but I hate doing it. Every time I turn my truck in for service I'm at the mercy of some who knows I don't have a clue.

So I'll call up and say, "Yes, my car is making a funny noise"

"Right. Bring her in!"

Obviously they cannot diagnose funny noises over the phone, that's not surprising. But what they can diagnose over the phone is a sucker. Which means when I drive up and get out, they know that I am a complete car moron. Mechanics love this. It means that they can say anything they want and I have to respond with, "Ah.. well that makes sense."

So I pull up and get out...

"So, did you hear that noise?"

"Yessir. Yep I sure do."

"Any idea what that is?"

"Well sir, that is probably the rear bushing. We need to see it and align your torque sensor."

"My what sensor."

"You torque sensor. Hopefully that's not blown!"

"Would that be bad if it had?"

"Well..." The technician holds back the laughter, "It sure wouldn't be very good would it?!"

"Ah. No, I mean. I guess not. How much are we talking here?"

"Well we won't know that till we slap her up on in the grease nest and see. How long have you been hearing this?"

"A week or so."

"Ah... well then, I imagine that the torque sensor has started to effect other systems by now."

"Really?"

"Yep. They'll do that you know."

"I didn't actually..."

"Well the manifold will start recalibrating it's alignment. So we'll have to give it the full overhaul."

"You still haven't said how much this will cost me yet..."

"Do you have a second mortgage?"

"No."

"Good. "

"That's not funny..."

"Sorry.  Let me have the keys and and we'll try to fix it by next weekend."

"That long?"

"Well, it's not easy work. I mean we have to drain the pan, and rework the hoses before we can even get to the torque sensor. Then we plug in the diagnostic station and run a full baseline. After that it's just test and retest until were sure the groove is wearing correctly."

Sigh..."Ah.. well that makes sense."

Giving Away The Internets

Such a strange new world we find ourselves in. Something that was once a sought after commodity is now cheap currency on the world market. It used to be that the thing itself was worth something, but now everyone is just giving it away.

When did we start giving away the Internet? Who decided that we couldn't charge for this anymore? Why is everyone convinced that free Internet is what we need more of in this world? Not that I'm complaining. Well, maybe I am.

Do you remember the sound of dial-up? That sweet minute or so of anticipation while you waited with bated breath for the connection protocols to finish their handshake?

"Hello, sir"
"Good morning!"
"I'm looking for 33.6k"
"Sorry best I can do is 3200 baud"
"Ah.. are you sure? I can try back later?"
"No, no... that's the best we can do."
"Alright. Shake on it?"
"Agreed. Welcome to the Internet"

And then you were on the Internet and all else was near utopia. Chatting with people halfway around the world, electronic mail and text based gaming. Could the world possibly get any better? For me this experience cost me plenty. @ 16 I bought an AST computer for $2,100 from Circuit City.  I paid for my own phone line in my bedroom and paid monthly for my Prodigy service. And it was worth every red cent it cost me.

Now here we are in 2012 just giving it away.

Yesterday I spent most of the day setting up free WiFi in our buildings. Free. No strings attached. You connect, you get on and then browse the web for nothing. No $2100 computer, no phone line no prodigy service.

What do they think people in my office are going to use this for? Edification? Looking up facts for clients? Searches for how to replace commas in Excel spreadsheets with a return carriage? No. They can already do that on our corporate Internet connection. They will use free Internet browsing for all those things we are blocking on our corporate LAN. A direct stream to all the stuff I spend months of time try to protect the network from.

Who needs anti-virus, anti-spam, web filtering and IPS level protection when folks can now connect their corporate computers to the free Internet and get all that unhindered via the free Wi-fi?

Because people need the Internet, for checking Facebook, Googling pictures of Abraham Lincoln and reading stupid blogs...

Wireless Installation

Working in a small IT shop affords many benefits. One of the best is being able to perform so many different jobs. Today I found myself installing new wireless access points in one of our buildings.
These are little square devices that connect to the metal frameworks that support false ceilings. It allowed me to learn a couple of things.

1. Ceiling tiles are evil
2. People love to watch other people work

I have enough ceiling tile dust in my eyes, hair, ears and collected in my shoes and open pockets to tile the ceiling of a new building. I also have a pretty fare idea that I don't like the way ceiling tile dust tastes. Who needs fiber cereal when you could ingest ceiling tile dust.

"CST- The REGULATOR!"

Plus the little buggers take a downright maniacal pleasure in not functioning as designed. You can pop one out but have you ever tried to get one to re-seat properly in the framework? Impossible. Not going to happen. You need pop out an adjacent tile in order to wrap your finger around to push down the first one. Now of course you have a different tile up. Give it a wiggle. Nothing. A tap. Nada. Then you pry it, push it, squeeze it, grab it, force it, jam it and curse it. All the while teetering back and forth on your ladder trying to get some leverage on this horrible little beast!

So you end up having to pop up some 20 odd tiles moving the wedged up corner from tile to tile hoping that the next one will be slightly loose and just fall back down in place. As it was, of course, designed to do.

Luckily though, you're not alone. No sir, you've got an audience. A whole building of workers who never say hello, but will watch you out of the corner of their eye. If you turn around to look their heads whip back and they pretend that they didn't notice you.

"What? A 230lb tech wrestling ceiling tiles for the last 20 minutes? In this building?!"

Not that I really want to chat with anyone when I'm busying playing Whack-A-Mole with the tiles.

"Whatcha you doing?"
"Installing stuff"
"What kinda stuff"
"Cisco 1400 Wireless Access Points."
"For what?"
"Wireless. It's even in the name..."
"Why do you have to plug them in if they're wireless?"
"..."

So, I was on my last one of the day with very few interruptions. I'd gotten through almost all of my ceiling tile madness when someone rounds the corner and looks up at me.

"Whatcha you doing?"
Sigh... Here we go.

And then out of nowhere it came to me and I spurted this off without missing a beat:

 "As part of the new green initiative we're installing these new collectors. They absorb negative thoughts from the employees and we turn that into energy to power the servers."

He looked at me, looked up at the wireless controller and said, "Wow. What will they think of next." And then he walked away.

Unbelievable. Or, apparently not.

Veronica Is A Hard Working Girl

Veronica is a hard working girl and I use her services quite frequently. She's always there for me and at my beck and call. I like her close beside me and hold her very tight. Now there are times with she seems a bit unresponsive but for the most part she suits my needs. I got her for a bargain and she was practically a steal for what she's worth. In truth my wife picked her out and new she was just my type. At 16 GB she holds quite a bit more than my previous flash drive.

Here's Veronica:


And here is her namesake:


Veronica Lodge from the old Archie comics. I have no clue why she popped into my head when the computer asked for a name after I first formatted her. It just did.

"Veronica is all loaded up and good to go!"

"Peter, why did you name your new flash drive Veronica?!"

"Because I'd already named my MP3 player Planchet"

Planchet is the manservant of d'Artagnan in one of the best novels ever written. If you are a boy or man and have not read The Three Musketeers stop everything you are doing this instant. Now, go to the bookstore and get a real book. Paperback or hardcover. One that you can pick up, hold, feel, smell, dog-ear and doesn't require batteries or electricity and read The Three Musketeers right now. After that, feel free to come back here and finish this post. Women, I have no idea what the best book is for you but the wife seems awfully found of Pride and Prejudice.

Anyway there is something cool about plugging in my MP3 player and having Windows declare, "Planchet is ready what now?" It's like having my own servant standing at the ready.

"Load up those files and check to make sure they're all sorted correctly."
"Oui monsieur!"

Planchet has been with me since 2005. We've shared a lot together over the years, as only a man and his servant can. From Frank Sinatra, The Fray, Owl City to my recent obsession with Marty Robbins. In many ways Veronica could never be Planchet but honestly, that's not her job. Her job is digital shopping and believe you me, Veronica loves shopping...



Someday I might have to upgrade. She's got a lot of space, but I'd have no trouble trading her in for a newer model if I ever needed more than 16GB.

Yeah, you're right, men are pigs...

Hammer Time

You will not find this procedure in the manual for the $10,000 Quantum Superloader that up until recently resided in one of the racks of our server room. That doesn't mean it is not an effective means of extraction when the bolt has been stripped and your hand will not fit into the space to grip it. Plus hammers bring with them their own credence and understanding.

A hammer rarely says, "I'm here to negotiate a truce." Even technology can understand that sort of persuasion.

The Quantum Superloader, put up very little fight...

The Case For Games: Revisited

I'm a devoted PC gamer, I enjoy them because they stretch the imagination, immerse you in plot, and transport you to another world. Plus they let you repeatedly make bad decisions and blow up crap with stunning graphics and sound!

As far as I'm concerned games are the natural evolution of entrainment media. Consider:

Books rescued people from the humdrum boredom of their life, and the harsh realities of the local paper. They allowed for unreal imagination and helped the reader discover the intricacies of their language.

Movies were the immersion media of their time, they had the ability to squeeze the vital juice of a book, play or story and portray it in two hours or less. They bombarded viewers with a wonder of sights and sounds they had not experienced previously

Television is a vulgar media, like the stupid cousin of movies. Chopping viewing time to minutes and subjecting you to unwanted ads, and weak story lines. Regardless they have managed to bring a small amount of the movie experience home and allow for the serialized story so I will list them here

Most people want more. When you see a good movie, read a good book, watch a great series on television, you want to subject yourself to further experiences. Relive the experience with others, and re-capture that joy of not knowing what is going to come next.

Video games are the answer. They give you the immersion that you can never have with movies, television, or even books. They allow you to control the choices of your characters. I've been playing PC games for 20 years, and they have grown unbelievably complex in that time but at their core is imagination. You can almost always approach a problem from different angles.

One of the first games I played was a series called Kings Quest. It blew my mind. You didn't have a clear path. You had to solve a puzzle and reason for the answer. Sometimes you got it and sometimes you died. Before that I has just had an Atari. And while shooting at pixelated blobs was somewhat rewarding, it certainly didn't engage my mind in a story.

I spend a lot of time playing RPG's (role playing games). As the name suggests, you take the role of a character and use your strengths and weaknesses to guide your interaction with others, and what you can or cannot do. Some characters are strong fighters, some are thieves, and some use magic to accomplish their means. Some good, some evil and you get to decide what you'll be. Consequences. Like a choose-your-adventure book with infinite possibilities.

Like any good medium creators of RPG's stretch their craft by placing players in space, in suburbia, even in Victorian England. With PC Games you can spend 30-100 hours of gameplay before reaching the end of the story. Most good RPGs have a solid driving story and dozens of side quests. PLus you can play the game over and over with different characters, objectives and even alternate endings. For the money, they're the best entertainment ratio of dollar to hour.

PC gaming can also be a great social activity. Not every gamer need be an overweight, anti-social, geek (some of us are just lucky that way). I like it when we all get together for a LAN party. This is the time when you find out who your real friends are. Who will you make allies with? Who will be the first attacked? Who can hold out the longest? Who will drug your Mt Dew? The truly cunning will keep up the diplomatic relations all the while caching a deadly arsenal of minions and WMD's.

"No Carl, I'm with you, man."

"Then why are you parading an army of heavy tanks into my base!!"

"About that..."


I have plenty of male bonding stories that took place while blowing the tar out of a friend’s poorly guarded base. It's not personal, it's gaming.


I'll leave you with a brief summary of one of my all time favorite RPGs.



Arcanum is set in a Tolkien style world in the middle of an industrial revolution. The graphics were poor even by 2001's standard but the story captivated me. It pulled me in and wrapped me up in a way that I haven't experienced since. You can pursue magic, learn to build electric lights, steam engines, or Molotov cocktails. Even the game manual is written in the style of the game, as diary excerpts of an anthropologist exploring the countryside. A very immersive game and well worth your time, even a decade later.

Of course I'm not living in the past. I play through about a game every couple of months I'm always up to try the next game and see how far we can go. I doubt we've even scratched the surface of what is possible.

Going Back To Geek Bootcamp

Video games. It's my real only purpose for a home PC. Sure I like email and the web, but they do not afford the real computing meat that comes from gaming, the entrée or substantial repast, if you will. Don't misunderstand, I do enjoy the occasional You-Tube side dish, but what is rice without a savory curry of RPG, FPS or RTS? Hollow. Wanting. Mac like, if you will.

Anyway. So I have an older PC that I've tried to keep current over the years. Maxed out the RAM in 2008. Bought a cutting edge GPU in 2009, upgraded to 1Tb 2010... blah blah. You know, $100 here and there over 3 years is pretty painless. Over all it has allowed me to keep up with my gaming habit with little issue. Save one little issue. My CPU. It is a sad and pitiful 2.4 Ghz Pentium 4 with almost no L2 cache. I'm ashamed to admit it, but there it is. I feel like a computing failure.

Knowing that I still didn't have a lot of coin, I thought I would just upgrade a notch to a simple dual core processor. This one specifically. I figure for $150 I could stave off the upgrade fairy for another year and still get enough power to play some newer games. Oh gentle reader, I must admit to you that I have been a long time removed from my hands in computer cases. I haven't build a computer from scratch since 2001 and had no notion of ever undertaking the endeavor again. So, it never occurred to me that my Dell mainboard with a Socket 775 wouldn't run this processor.

The resulting bios beeps where deafening. Especially since there is no return policy on processors. Ah yes, a familiar path. If you recall my GPU upgrade a couple years ago. So here I am with thermal paste on my fingers wondering what to do next?

I did what I always do. Take a bad situation and juggle it with massive amounts of poorly thought out decisions mix that with potential disaster! It's my MO!

So I shelled out for a brand new outdated mainboard and cheap unfiled computer case! I spent $89, which brought my total up to $240 something and left an astounding $6.34 in my paypal account. How stupid can one man be? It was that or have a $149 processor paperweight.

Anyway. So last night saw me trying to recall over a decade of lost skills. I felt like I was back in geek bootcamp, "Drop down and find that jumper switch pasty!!" I forgot how tedious computer builds really were. Still I did alright. Started at 7:00 and finished getting all the new drivers installed by 10:30 or so.

BTW if you upgrade your motherboard, Windows XP needs to be reactivated. It will not let you install your NIC driver first, so you must punch in two hundred thousand digits on the telephone to an electronic operator. If you weren't aggravated before you got to this point, you soon will be.

I can't complain too much. I do have a working system that is clocking about 3.4Ghz on Core 2 Duo. It is certainly a step up from where I was. And tonight? Well I think it might be time for a little DragonAge...

Oh Progress Bar

Progress bar, oh progress bar
How you taunt at me

I wait and watch with faith eternal
I pray on bended knee

I see you jump from ten to twenty
Just to sit at thirty-three

I sit and stare as nothing happens
As if my gaze you see

Soon as I start to push the button
Once more alive you'll be

On we go, up through the count
Now eighty-five I see

And as we reach for ninety-nine
I pulse with energy

The screen goes black then a beep
The cursor doth decree

That you've crapped out for the fourteen time
And I must punish thee...

Peter Brown 2011

Upgrading IOS

There is something both productive and pointless about upgrading the IOS on network switches. I know I'm doing something worthwhile but no one else in the office has a clue why they are getting inconvenienced by equipment that hasn't been rebooted in over 3 years. Try explaining that to a person who sets Windows servers to reboot every two weeks 'just to be safe'

"I need to schedule overtime to upgrade the switches and reboot them. The last time they were power cycled was in 2008"
"So... they've been running for over 3 years without error and you want to fiddle with them?"
"Kinda. I want to upgrade the IOS so we can leverage rapid spanning-tree and a better QOS command set"
"I have no idea what you just said. Here's the deal, will it interrupt users?"
"It could potentially cause some errors for users with after-market switches at their desks..."
"Then you need to let the users know."
"Crap."

Dear Users-

There will be a scheduled maintenance after hours tonight that might effect connectivity at your location. You many or may not encounter issues where Outlook will complain of lost connection for several hours even though it has one. It's also possible your illegal file sharing applications, that are sucking all the Internet bandwidth, will crash.

This of course means you'll blame the upgrade for any computer issue you might see tomorrow, including why your PDA won't sync to Windows. I didn't really want to tell you what I was doing tonight but my boss made us.

After all this is completed and functional, you will not be able to notice any significant changes.

Thanks,
Your ever caring network administrator

Now the users and my boss are both aware that I do stuff that appears lacking in merit. I know it's important to have the right QOS on the network especially with Voice over IP and video conferencing in our environment, but it's hardly a glamorous upgrade. We were just in a meeting where everyone was justifying their existence for the month. Mine justification seemed quite lacking.

"Keith?"
"I'm installing readers to increase work flow and allow clients faster access to our services."
"Excellent! Janice?"
"We're rolling out a new interactive voice response to lessen the burden on the incoming call queue."
"Wow! Peter?"
"I'm causing intermittent network errors on hundreds of our users computers in order to replace IOS 12.1.9 with 12.1.22 on all 50 switches..."
"Ah... okay then."

In some ways that's just IT. No one really cares how it works, until it doesn't. And if we don't take the initiative to keep the nodes up to date, you're going to find yourself in a pickle when your manager walks in a declares a new direction. If you haven't experienced yet, then buckle up 'cause your due.

"The execs just decided we are going to replace all the old phones with VoIP units."
"What?! When?"
"Next week. It should be awesome-"
"You know they won't work on or network. You told them that, right?!"
"Why? What have you done to it?!!"

So we do the thankless tasks and realize that in the end, it's better to be overlooked and left alone then blamed for errors you could have prevented. In many ways it's just a selfish method for keeping people from showing up at my door. And that slice of realization is worth almost any effort I can muster!

Geeky Valentines Day 2011

The 36" Monitor

So.... I might have acted a little rash. Maybe my geekiness got the better of me. Maybe my lack of sleep affected me. My wife believes I've lost my mind. Who knows she might be right, but I would never admit it to her.

Here's how it went down. I was surfing Craigslist when a posting for a free 36" monitor popped up. I calmly took a deep breath and then mashed out a very well thought out e-mail.

"WHOA BABY!!! I WANT IT!! I can come and get it tonight!!!!"

The seller responded, "Okay. Here's my address. That's a 3 hour round trip for you."

"Leaving NOW!" Clearly something had taken hold of my better judgment and shook the living daylights out of me.

After my hour and twenty minute drive I arrived. As soon as I saw the beast, I knew I had made a gigantic mistake. What to do? My brain and I discussed it.

"Take it, before he says no!!"
"It's absurd. I don't have space for this..."
"36" inches! DUDE TAKE IT! Can you imagine playing video games on this?"
"Can you imagine my legs breaking after the desktop gives way?"
"You have a fine desk and it will have no trouble supporting this trifle of a weight."
"This trifle is almost 225lbs!"
"I believe it is worth the risk!"

So against my better judgment I began down the path to herniated disks and hoisted it into my pickup. I couldn't even see out the rear view mirror.

Hooked up the laptop and made sure it worked!


Then the wife and I muscled it on to my desk and waited for sounds of breaking wood. After a few hours, we figured it was okay and decided to test it out. I couldn't help but smile. This was just too cool! Made my keyboard look like a PDA attachment!

Downside? Well, it's not so great for reading e-mail as the highest resolution is 800x600, but for gaming...this is amazing! The wife fired up some of her games and we played for a while. Hidden puzzle games are a joke on a 36" screen.

"We're looking for angels on the head of a p-"
"Got it. Next?"


Then I brought out the serious guns. Elder Scrolls IV.


After a 6 hour gaming coma I pronounced it good. When characters heads can be life size you know you're at total immersion. Oh and attacking monster literally had me jumping out of my chair!

20 Things I Learned From Troubleshooting

Do No Harm. You can and will make it worse if you're not careful.

Celebrate even small successes. This keeps you sane.

Searching the internet for a solution to your problem with a random Microsoft error message is akin to playing Russian roulette with yourself. Your odds pretty much suck.

Everything is fixable. Sometimes that means thinking outside the box or other times it means dropping that box in the ocean.

Between conspiracy and incompetency, bet on incompetency. More often than not, it's something stupid (or someone).

Whatever you do, don't temp fate. Fate will mop the floor with you.

If at any time you say, "Piece of Cake." You're doomed. You should just as well paint a target on your chest.

Ask the obvious questions, even if they sounds stupid. "Did you turn it off, then on again?"

Good troubleshooting is like good art, so don't be upset if people don't understand it.

It is possible to solve a problem and not realize if for an hour or more. This has happened, but mostly its the other way around.

Which means never take credit for coincidence. Just because a problem disappeared, doesn't mean you fixed it. Congratulations can turn to blame in a blink of an eye.

You might be surprised how many hours of downtime can be traced back to someone updating a Windows server.

Breadcrumbs. Remember what you've changed. If you tell an irate manger that you can't retrace your steps, don't be surprised when you wind up in the oven.

Never give an ETR. See #6

Caffeine, Caffeine, Caffeine. And then once more just in case.

Diagram, Diagram Diagram. Whether on paper, whiteboard or in a pool of your own bitter tears. Draw the problem out.

While troubleshooting my fingers look like a dry-erase-Mardi-Gras-celebration. Minus the music, nakedness, hangovers and general 'good time'.

The solution is rarely worth the effort. It's true. One mis-checked box after 5 hours of work can be a little less than gratifying.

Managers want explanations. Lie to them if you want. They wouldn't understand anyway.

Relax, you've earned your pay for the day. Go blog or something...

A Marketing Tale

I've been working in IT for over 15 years now and in the corporate environment since 1998. In that time, most places I've been at have not wanted for much in the way of computers. All in all the computers were always up to date and reasonably fast. Certainly adequate for whatever task was needed of them. Irregardless of this effort, nothing was ever good enough for the sheer vanity that was the Marketing department.

Aloft in the golden tower and miles away from the inferior wielders of the physical world. Marketing did not concern itself with the petty fumbling of Operations, Quality Assurance or Intellectual Properties. No, they dealt on a higher plane. A plane lacking in foresight, understanding or reality. In IT we considered marketing as the only place you could find someone willing to demonstrate their golf swing on request and the last bastion of civilization comfortable in embroidered polo shirts.

Move along to the day when Marketing got word of the newest thing. The 19" monitor. You remember, the big old CRT kind that took you and two co-workers to relocate it a quarter inch to the left. These were the big gloat in my pre 2k office world. As an IT support tech, I hated them. I hated them because I had to lug them around to everyone who was "special" enough for this "prestigious" update.

Keep in mind, the corporate world isn't about fair. These bulking hulks of Trinitron monitor delight weren't for the needy, no sir. Screw you R&D and the technical writing staff! Those 15 inch monitors are more than enough for updating detailed CAD drawings! No, these were for those departments that could shell out the dough for them. As the way of most bleeding edge tech, the first spoils always seemed to end up in Marketing.

Ah yes, Marketing. Loaded with budget and lacking in clue. They already had an office popcorn machine and soda station. As far as the monitors go, they had no more use for them then the screaming fast BMW M3's that littered our business parking lot. But these monitors were an office status symbol and thus deemed an "intangible benefit" by the head of the Sales Division. This woman was 20 years past her prime, with deep dyed flame red hair and a penchant for forest green pant suits. We often referred to her as the "Evil Wrinkled Leprechaun" of Sales. When she wasn't cackling on the phone or scaring away clients with her unwelcome advances she was bringing pain to IT.

"We ordered dozens of those giant monitors for the whole division. We simply must have the big ones as the others are practically unusable!"
"Seriously? What does Marketing need with 19 inch monitors"
"Well. For E-mail of course"
"You know the native resolution is higher on these than the 17's"
"Obviously, and higher is better!"
"Okay..."

That meant hours of us techs walking back and forth from the lowest level of building "A" to the highest level of Building "C" with 800lb monitors on our shoulders.

"Peter? Is that you? Where's your head man..."
"Yea... Should have been here 20 minutes ago when I was trying to push the elevator button with my feet."

Then after all the work was finally done they realized, much like the sport suspension mode in their beloved BMW, they had no use for these things.

"They take up the WHOLE desk!"
"I know. They're freaking heavy too..."
"Well. Sheesh. This isn't going to work."
"We've already given your 17" monitors to the Engineering department. They're thrilled."
"Crap. Well can you at least make the icons bigger? I can't see anything on this monster..."

Marketing. The corporate engine where all wasted work originates. Everyone else is just an imitator or a mid level IT manager hoping to hitch a ride to a higher rung of brainless dwelling on the corporate ladder.

Intimidating Servers

When I first got into computers I was 14 or so. The man who helped us get it all plugged in said something interesting to me.

"After doing this for as many years as I have" David Smith mused, "I've come to the conclusion that all computers have personalities."

As he was 40 and I was 14 I did what all folks my age do. I dismissed the old man of being senile, and set about using my computer to play BASIC games and make me gobs of money.

Now, as a 33 year old computer administrator with no more BAISC games that interest me and slightly shy of my gobs of money, I find myself agreeing with David and wishing I had paid his advice more heed at the time.

Computers have personalities... It's true. Ignoring these personalities will only make your job harder as a computer administrator.

Windows Vista PC's are like IT managers. They think they know better than you, even when they don't.

"Access restricted: See your network administrator"
"I just want to open my E-mail..."
"Sorry, when we devised the acceptable use policy it was decided that e-mail wasn't a critical application."

Mac's are like Beverly Hills residents busy overpaying for peripherals and software upgrades.

"Have you tried the new Leopard darling?! It's wonderful and finally utilizes all my BEST features!"
"Sounds good. How much is it?"
"Four times the going rate! It's a must have this season."

But servers are the worst. There is something inherent that comes with knowing you are relied upon to maintain a business network that makes them self important. This responsibly breeds a sort of arrogance that can only be described as "The Office IT Guy". That's right our beloved servers have taken a que from our own cynicism and general distaste for the users. They are a dark reflection of us, their geeky keepers. For months they'll be chugging along working tirelessly and then one day, for no good reason, all work stops.

"Why did you stop serving files?"
"I'm busy, torrenting some Dr. Who episodes"
"What?! You can't do that, you've got spreadsheets to host!"
"It's on my list. I'll check into it, probably just a loose wire in the server room..."

Solution? I go Jack Bauer on them. It's the only thing I can think of. I'll bring an innocent server down and start taking out parts. I do this on the floor of the server room so all the other boxes can see.

"What's he doing to XEON?"
"He was working fine!"
"SWEET MERCY! Is that his HBA!"
"That's not hot swappable you MANIAC! What's wrong with you!"
"There's no way he'll get him running again, you're not even grounded!
"YOU FREAKING SICKO!"

Just for good measure I'll leave parts scattered on tables with the server chassis opened up and cables hanging loose like some horrific technical autopsy. I find, for me, the process has been quite effective. Sometimes though, on particularly suborn machines even more pressure is required to bring them back into obedient servitude.

"I'm Windows 2008 R2. You can't possibly know what rouge services I might be running by perusing the task manager. I could be doing ANYTHING I want with my 16 cores..."

In these times I bring in the consultant. Not because the man knows more than me. No actually quite the opposite. The last time we had a hardware consultant in to swap out a RAID controller card he grounded out the mother board. Then to make matters worse, during the mother board replacement he ended up wiping all the data from both RAID sets. This man is a full fledged mobster in the eyes of my servers.

"No not Wes. Look look, Net Logon is up again. IT'S UP AGAIN!!! Please tell him to put his tools away"

Sure it might not be considered best practice but for ultimate reliability and five nines or better? Intimidating servers is the way to go.

Death by Whiteboard

There is a white board in my office and it is killing me slowly. It’s not really the white board. I would hate to falsely blame the poor thing. In all honestly it spends most of it time looking rather bleak. It’s hanging on to the wall like an unbiased office sentinel. Taking no sides and having no opinions. It's just perched there, empty yet hopeful. Staring at me, begging me to write something meaningful on it. Just some small thought to validate its existence.

Of course I do end up writing something on it. Some overly exciting geek game plan. Like how to get all our logs to spit back some benign report "REQUIRED IMMEDIATELY" by the managers. This thing that someone is convinced that they need, but no one knows why. They just want a report with pretty graphs in their e-mail, so they can forward that e-mail it to someone else and say "FYI".

So after I spend an hour or two brainstorming this worthless project on my white board, I leave it there. I leave it for weeks at a time. I don't do this because I'm lazy, but because I cannot erase it. I have a white board eraser, but it doesn't work. So it sits there, on my wall for three or four weeks at a time. Every day I come in, sit down and stare at a board full of wasted work and poorly executed diagramming.

"Remember when you needed me to do that pointless job? Was this blue tetrahedral suppose to be a server or a turtle? I can't tell"

This makes me very unhappy. I hate poorly executed diagramming

What to do? Many of you are thinking, "Fool. You're doing it wrong."

You know who you are. Self important white board experts. Look people, I’ve used plenty of white boards and I’ve never seen this. It's not difficult. Pointy color things write on the board, blocky gray thing erases board. Maybe I have neglected it too much. Maybe I don't show it enough attention and this is some sort of dirty protest.

"NO! I will not be clean. I like your cluttered thought process, and enjoy taunting you with wasted man hours! Don't touch me with the fluffy gray block!!"

That must be it, some desperate and pitiful call for help. Please love me, fill me with your thoughts! Or maybe it’s malevolent and suffering appeals to it. I suffer greatly when I am not in control. The white board must have found out somehow. That actually fits better and I'd rather have passive aggressive office paraphernalia then a emotionally deficient one. You don't have to care as much. In addition it makes my next move seem less calloused.

So, since I cannot have rebellious office equipment I strike back with the only weapon I have. Noxious board cleaner. This can take ten years of caked on dust off the butt of a yak. One downside. It makes me high.

I’m not sure I can relay to you the effect this has on me. I find myself smiling for no reason. I cannot get upset, stressed, or even out of my chair. I stumble to the phone and tell callers my favorite color. Really bad corporate mojo there.

"Server guy is high again. What do we do?"
"It'll pass. I hope he doesn't have to go to the bathroom and black out in the hall again..."

Whoa! This is a serious drug. I hate it and love it. It easily kills dry erase marks, mountain lions and cancer. This stuff is potent. It gets the job done. I’m frequently torn after we have a meeting in my office. Should I leave the board dirty, or do I clean it? Do I want to be happy or do I want to be dead? Sometimes immediate happiness is all that matters.

[spritz] [spritz]

"Boss... We need more white board cleaner..."

Secret Diary of Luke Skywalker Pt.2

Dear Diary:
That crazy snow monster came out of nowhere. He completely blindsided me. What's the freaking point of having Jedi reflexes if a giant tusked, snarling snow monster can catch me unaware. I should have been able to smell him at least two hundred yards away. I'm wondering if I'm ever going to become a Jedi. It's really hard to write hanging upside down...

Dear Diary:
I'm freezing! Looking back, I think it would have been smarter to kill the snow monster and I stay in his warm cave. Hello! I'm the one with the glowing kill stick! Stupid Luke, really stupid. I saw the old hermit in my hallucinations again. He didn't seem to care I was dying. I think my brain is trying to kill me. It's really hard to write with Tauntaun guts all over me...

Dear Diary:
The Hot chick kissed me. I think we've really got something.

Dear Diary:
I can't believe I got stuck with Dax as my navigator. Hello! Aren't I the hero of the republic? The destroyer of the the Death Star? This guy wouldn't know a tow cable control if it got in bed with him!! Oh, right. I should say, if it had gotten in bed with him. Luckily after I crashed, right before the walker smashed him and the ship to bits, I got my lucky grappler out of harms way.

Dear Diary:
So my hallucinations sent me to Dagobah. A slimy rotten snake pit. My ship is stuck in the swamp, R2 is covering muck and a stupid old frog just stole my lamp and licked my last protein stick. Yea. Thanks Ben, I didn't know how much you hated me...

Dear Diary:
So, the withered old frog man I insulted turns out to be the Jedi master I was suppose to find. He was more than a little put out with me. What are the chances....

Dear Diary:
"There is no why." What the hell is that suppose to mean? Talking backwards makes you wise? Stupid frog. "Never his mind on where he was, what he was doing.." Whatever. Just what I need more of in my life, an eight hundred year old pontificating reptile backpack! I found a viper in my bed roll last night. Seriously creepy. Thanks again Ben!

Dear Diary:
The Righteous Jedi Frog refused to teach me Darth Vaders choke trick. Some virtuous dribble about the path to the Dark Side or something. Like floating rocks are going to be a big help to me in the middle of a battle. It's hard to write when you're pouting.

Dear Diary:
Ben and Yoda say not to leave Dagobah and save my friends. They claimed to have over eight hundred years of experience in the ways Force and the fact that I've only been at this for a couple of weeks or so. I bet he's regretting he didn't teach me that choke trick now...

Dear Diary:
So... Ben and Yoda might have known what they were talking about. Turns out I wasn't much help. Han is table top on his way to Tatoonie, C3PO hasn't shut up about the fact that he's in pieces and Dog boy tried to strangle Lano. Good Times. Oh right. And diary, funny thing happened while I was trying to kill Vader. Turns out he's my long lost father. Seriously. It was a less than happy reunion. He cut off my hand and then asked me to join him. "Oh yeah, well I wasn't till you mangled my appendage, but now I'm totally convinced!!" What a day. At least I've got Leia, and we seem to have a real good thing going.

Secret Diary of Luke Skywalker Pt.1

Dear Diary:
Uncle Owen is a Correllian piss ant! Seriously, this is the last straw! If he pulls that "one more season" crap on me again I'm going to flip out. Big help Anut Beru is... Biggs and the other guys all have power converters for their landspeeders. I'm sick and tired of moisture vaporators. Oh diary...I wish Uncle Owen would just drop over dead.

Dear Diary:
So I'm stuck talking to the stupid protocol droid all day. Like I care how many stinking Jawas can fit inside a sandcrawler. I'm this close to blasting his head off "I'm C3PO and I've been aboard an rebel cruiser for the past 20 years but I can't tell you one thing interesting about about it! But If you want to know the statistical improbability of finding a driod in the desert I can spit that out in a second!!" If I ever find out what slug rat build this wreck I'd give him what for...maybe with the business end of my rifle.

Dear Diary:
We just met a broken down old hermit. R2 showed him a picture of a hot chick, he gave me a light up stick and tried to convert me to his crazy religion. I like him.

Dear Diary:
Remember when I said Uncle Owen was a Correllian piss ant? Turns out the StormTroppers thought so too. I put on a good show for the hermit man, and now we're on on our way to Anchorhead. Maybe I'll get to use my light stick...

Dear Diary:
In only a hour or two, I've completely changed my outlook on the world. I'm now a crazed zealot in a new religious order. It's amazing how persuasive an old man can be. I hope he didn't use that mind trick on me. Naw...

Dear Diary:
We met a smug talking smuggler and walking dog man. I'm already acting rude and superior to him about my newfound faith. Ben seems pleased by my progress. I hope we don't have to swear celibacy or any crazy thing like that...

Dear Diary:
I don't have a lot of time and much has happened. Long story short, Han, Dog boy and I found the hot chick. Ben was killed, and Robot man got his light stick. I was so mad I started screaming and almost blew our get away. Luckily I started to hallucinate and we escaped. Too bad about the Hermit man, I really wanted his light stick...

Dear Diary:
I feel bad for Dog boy, everyone just pretends to understand him. I'd want to rip peoples arms out if they all ignored me too. One thing about Wookies I have learned, you never want to use the restroom right after them. I still smell horrible. Han can't stop laughing and suggested I incinerate my clothes... I'm hoping the Stormtroopers come after him next.

Dear Diary:
I'm feeling a little guilty for lying to Wedge. I have no idea what a womp rat is and just said it to get attention. Hopefully he doesn't go up in a flaming ball of fire like Uncle Owen. I might just start running out of friends.

Dear Diary:
We won. Thanks to my hallucinations I made a lucky shot that blew up the sphere ship. I saved the day only after most of my comrades died horrific meaningless deaths. You've never heard so much screaming. Thankfully there seems to be a lot more people than ships here on the rebel base and no one seems too upset about the casualties. All in all a pretty good couple of days. I think I'm going to like this new life...

The Three Hour Meeting

"Just sit right back and you'll hear a tale, a tale of a fateful pitch,
That started about lunchtime and caused my eyes to twitch.

The lead was a smarmy sellin' man, Who'd never take a breath
Of the five that sat down in there, only two of us are left. Only two of us are left

The powerpoint show was out of hand, at one hundred ten slides plus
If not for the bastion of my Blackberry, my mi-nd would be mush. My mi-nd would be mush.

The meet-ing ended thankfully an hour over-due, with shaking hands, and "thank you" lies. The projector dead and laptop drained. And ne-ver again, will we go back to....a meeting with Microsoft's rep."

TRON Legacy Prayer

I offer only what I can. A simple prayer for the upcoming TRON Legacy....



Oh please, please, please. Don't suck.