Beam Me Up, Scotty

I am not, and never have been a trekkie (NOT that there's anything wrong with that). But I have used this line many times during my life and, perhaps, never more than the past few weeks. It just seemed that there was, how should I say it, an overabundance of inane activity and strange conversations that I found myself involved in, particularly at the office.

It began with a butt-naked man (actually it wasn't just his butt), a TOTALLY naked man running around our parking lot, mumbling some indecipherable rhetoric. Unfortunately, I didn't think to snap his pic; I think I was just not believing what my eyes were beholding. When I realized that it was, indeed, a fat, tattooed man, I thought one of my co-workers finally had snapped under the pressure. I don't know how this story ended. The police were summoned, but I think the Monday Morning Streaker had already moved on (hopefully, to warmer climes).

I know it's said that there is no such thing as a dumb question. BULL HOCKEY!! Dumb questions are asked all the time. And, I must admit, I've uttered some stupid things myself. When I come upon a co-worker's cube, decorated with balloons (some which may actually say "Happy Birthday) and automatically, the first thing out of my mouth is "Oh, is it your birthday?" I just can't seem to stop myself. I'm waiting for a sarcastic reply such as "no, I just have a desperate need for attention," or some such thing. I'd totally deserve it; I guess my co-workers aren't as snarky as I am.

So, I want to share a few of the brilliant exchanges I've had this past week. I actually printed some of them out so I wouldn't forget them. These first two were part of convos on out interoffice IM system:

IT GUY: It looks like she entered this using our codes and she should have used the customer's codes (Author's note: We rarely use the customer's codes for this situation).

ME: How will we know when a customers' code has to be entered instead of ours?

IT GUY: JUST KNOW.

Thanks. You've been very helpful.

I'm sure you've all had to call Help desks when IT issues arise. Our Help desk is in Alpharetta, GA, a truly lovely area of our country. (My ex was going to be transferred to Atlanta, so his company flew me down there a few times to go house-hunting. I found my dream home, surrounded by horse farms, quite an idyllic setting. Then, the company lost the account that was in Atlanta. So, good-bye, dream house. But, I digress.) So, help desk is in GA. We're in NJ. We MUST call the help desk, so they can create a ticket to forward on to a tech that is sitting approximately 100 feet away from me. No lie. Normally my conversation with them goes like this:

ME: Hi. This is Kathy H in RB, user id#_____, phone#--------. I can't print on Printer 20. You need to contact Joe B. I know he's in because I just had coffee with him in the kitchen.

IT GUY IN GA: Ticket#54954. Thanks, y'all!

I had called the "Report Your Problem And Tell Us Who Can Resolve It" desk about an issue. After 20 minutes the RYPATUWCRI" guy called back and said he contacted the tech, whose recommendation, after giving it much deep thought, was to tell me to "just reboot." Now, I don't have a diploma from Billy Bob's School of Computer Science and Truck Driving, but, even my 3 year old niece knows enough to reboot when Dora The Explorer stops exploring. So I sent an IM to the tech dow the hall:

ME: Our problem here needs more than a reboot to fix this (you lazy slob; can u tell I do not get along with this lazy slob)? This issue was reported yesterday and we're still having the same problem?

LAZY SLOB IT GUY: Who resolved it yesterday?

ME: (Yay! Another chance to be snarky!) Obviously no one. Otherwise I wouldn't be wasting my time with you.

Email between me and one of our salesmen:

ME: I got the order you sent. But line 16 is blank. How many do they want?

SALESGUY: That was sent to me directly from another person, different department.

Thanks for sharing. So, how many do they want?????

And, the best one yet, on a fax coversheet:

IF YOU DO NOT RECEIVE THIS FAX, PLEASE LET ME KNOW.

Is there room for one more, Captain Kirk?