OK, Jo Ann, I understand your new avatar a bit better now! And oh yea, Happy mothers' day!

One day at work (most of you know that I used to be a teacher and IT rep before I retired some three years ago), I was explaining some math problem to my 5th graders, and right in the middle of it, when I just had got the whole class actually trying to figure out a solution, a knock at the door, and the school secretary stuck her head in with the message that I had to come to the headmaster's office IMMEDIATELY, she would be attending my class in the meantime.

OK, I hurried off, wondering what was up, if I had done something wrong, but couldn't think of anything. Well, I got downstairs and entered the headmaster's office. He was in front of his pc (WinXP was fairly new at that time), and asked me to solve a serious problem. I went over to see what he was doing, and he said: "Look, this thing (he meant the taskbar) is sitting along the side of the screen, and I don't know how that happened and how to get it back down to the bottom. What can I do?"

Without a word I grabbed it with the mouse, dragged it back down and left the office. I was rolling on the floor, nearly wetting my pants, on my way back up to the class!

What's sad Scott, not too many years ago, I may have been one of those(with CC software), don't think I was ever this bad:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cdn97Ez_f6E&feature=PlayList&p=B7A7866E862093F6&playnext_from=PL&playnext=1&index=93

Btw, didn't like the parody of the name(blond), but couldn't find the audio(quickly) elsewhere.

IMHO, for the finest vintage computer/sysadmin nightmare humour, one cannot do better than Simon Travaglia's classic 90's 'B##tard Operator From Hell' series, portraying the "alternate-world Simon the Sysadmin who would torture and ruin his users in the pursuit of more free time and lager."

Please Note: These articles contain mild cursing, most notably the edited B word used in the title above and occasionally a couple of others like the edited P word below that are used for colour. That's as strong as the language in this series gets. If that doesn't put you off, the articles are hilarious. I enclose a sample from article #1 below.

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Another user rings.

"I need more space" he says

"Well, why not move to Texas?" I ask

"No, on my account, stupid."

Stupid? Uh-Oh.

"I'm terribly sorry" I say, in a polite manner equal to that of Jimmy Stewart in a Weekend Family Matinee Feature "I didn't quite catch that. What was it that you said?"

I smell the fear coming down the line at me, but it's too late, he's a goner and he knows it.

"Um, I said what I wanted was more space on my account, *please*"

"Sure, hang on."

I hear him gasp his relief even though he'd covered the mouthpiece.

"There, you've got *plenty* of space now!"

"How much have I got?" he simps.

Now this *REALLY* *PI##ES* *ME* *OFF*! Not only do they want me to give them extra space, they want to check it, then correct me if I don't give them enough! They should be happy with what I give them *and that's it*!

Back into Jimmy Stewart mode.

"Well, let's see, you have 4 Meg available."

"Wow! Eight Meg in total, thanks!" he says, pleased with his bargaining power.

"No" I interrupt, savouring this like a fine red at room temperature, with steak, extra rare, to follow; "4 Meg in total.."

"Huh? I'd used 4 Meg already, How could I have 4 Meg Available?"

I say nothing. It'll come to him.

"aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaagggggghhhhhH!"

I kill me, I really do!


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for the full series .....
http://bofh.ntk.net/BOFH/index.php

I like this tech support video

Some days I'm mightily tempted

Just after I read this I was browsing through a forum on an auction site and someone had the exact same problem... eerie...

If you want to have some real fun, take a snapshot of someones desktop, delete all the desktop icons, and save the snapshot as the wallpaper.

If you want even more fun, run 'remote' on 2 computers, each pointed at the other and watch them fight until one locks up.

Then there's the upside down desktop trick...which I can never remember...