Are you a nice person? How do you know?
I’m not. Or, at least I don’t think so.
Don’t misunderstand. I don’t think I’m a mean person either. But, a particularly nice guy? I don’t see it.
I got a call from my friend Carson last week. Carson, despite his name, is not a car guy. He’s a great guy, but not into cars. Shortly after I first met him I asked him,
Do you know anything about cars?
Sure. I know my mechanic’s phone number.
Carson drives a Jaguar. It’s a nice car, but not perfect. I got a call from Carson.
Hey, my car won’t start. I tried jumping it, but it still won’t start. I know it’s a Sunday night, but would you be available to come look at it?
Here’s a secret. I’m not much of a car guy either. I know a true car expert. He’s my neighbor and he helped me restore my Lexus. He offered to go with me. We swung by and picked up Carson and headed to his work where the car was located.
A Jaguar has the battery in the trunk. At least this one did. My buddy tested the battery and it was low. He pulled out Carson’s jumper cables.
Rodney, do you have jumper cables?
Yeah. Do you want to use them instead of Carson’s?
Not exactly. I want to use both.
He attached both sets of jumper cables. Carson’s car started right up. His needed more power to start then a single set of jumper cables could provide. I learned something new. Carson was appropriately grateful, of course.
We followed him to the auto parts store to get a new battery, but the store was closed. I gave him my neighbor’s phone number and they agreed to get together and replace the battery. I then took my neighbor home.
Here’s the problem. Carson posted on Facebook about what a great guy I was for coming to his aid. Let’s be clear: I was the DRIVER. If we’d been robbing a bank, I’d be an accomplice, not the main bank robber. I posted a comment trying to explain that I didn’t really do anything. And in fact, I don’t really know that much. I didn’t know how to use two sets of jumper cables. My only skill was that I know people.
Carson wasn’t buying it. And not only that, but mutual friends jumped into the thread saying what I wonderful guy I was and how I helped them out multiple times.
They have it wrong. I wasn’t doing those things because I’m a nice guy. They are my friends. You do things for your friends. You have time for the people you make time for. I wasn’t being a nice guy. I was simply acting like a friend is supposed to act.
My reputation for being a nice guy is largely undeserved.
Rodney M Bliss is an author, columnist and IT Consultant. His blog updates every weekday at 7:00 AM Mountain Time. He lives in Pleasant Grove, UT with his lovely wife, thirteen children and grandchildren.
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or email him at rbliss at msn dot com(c) 2015 Rodney M Bliss, all rights reserved
Fall is my favorite time of year. As the weather turns colder, I can finally stop wearing a jacket at my desk.
Let me explain. I work in an office building just south of Salt Lake City’s airport. It’s a fairly typical building. I work on the fourth floor of our four story building. And our building is a call center. That means that we are really good at “maximizing space.” In other words, we can fit a lot of bodies and computers into a space. In its current configuration, our building has call center agents on the first, second and third floors. The fourth floor used to house agents, but we converted it to office space. And that’s the problem. When you move cubicles into an area that used to be a call floor, you get fewer people per square foot.
Here’s a view of the space where the Project Managers and Technical Account Managers sit.
It used to house about 200 call center agents and their computers. Currently it houses about 40 admin staff. And here is a shot of the floor next to my desk.
Data centers do not need heaters. They come with hundreds and thousands of tiny little heaters.
So, what’s the problem with my desk? The problem is those heating registers. Or more specifically the cooling registers. Two hundred agents means two hundred computers and 400 monitors. The space was designed to keep 200 people comfortable during even the hottest summer days.
Now, we have about 50 computers and maybe 120 monitors. As the temperature outside heats up, our building cooling system cranks into high gear. The first three floors house 600 agents, with their computers and monitors. The hotter it gets outside, the cooler it gets inside. On floors one through three that evens out. On the fourth floor? Welcome to Christmas in July. We are missing the presents and the snow, but the temperature is perfect. . .for a sleigh ride. Not only would we wear coats at our desks, occasionally, I needed to walk outside to get the feeling back in my fingers.
But, the weather outside is cooling off. The leaves are changing colors. College football is back. And our building AC is not running as hard as it did in July and August. I can finally take my coat off at my desk.
Rodney M Bliss is an author, columnist and IT Consultant. His blog updates every weekday at 7:00 AM Mountain Time. He lives in Pleasant Grove, UT with his lovely wife, thirteen children and grandchildren.
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or email him at rbliss at msn dot com(c) 2015 Rodney M Bliss, all rights reserved
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The signs were all there; a house full of guns, a history of anti-social behavior, a garage door standing open in the middle of the day, the car missing, and a barking dog.
I’m not a suspicious person. I believe that most people are good people, that the simplest solution is normally the right one, that we live in one of the safest societies in the world. So, I wasn’t too concerned when I went by my friend Darrin’s house Monday afternoon to return his ax and found his garage door open. I’ve been to Darrin’s house dozens of times. We are really close friends.
I’ve never seen the garage door left up.
Darrin’s garage is full of really expensive toys. The one thing missing from Darrin’s garage? His car.
Okay, so lots of people occasionally forget to close their garage door when they leave. There’s nothing too suspicious about that. And I wasn’t suspicious. I put the ax behind a computer cabinet and pressed the button to close the garage door. As I stepped over the invisible beam I heard Darrin’s dog barking from inside the house. That would be an important clue later on. At the time, I wasn’t thinking about anything other than being late for dinner.
I called Darrin to let him know I brought back the ax. Darrin is a great guy, but like many people, he has some social anxiety. I usually call before I show up at his house, because it’s not unusual for Darrin or his wife to not answer the door if they aren’t expecting visitors.
No answer on Darrin’s cell phone. I tried a couple of times. I tried his home phone. Also no answer. I finally texted him.
Your garage was open. I left the ax behind the server cabinet. I closed your garage door.
Over the course of the evening I tried Darrin a few more times. Okay, maybe more than a few, but I was started to think about that open garage door. Maybe they had headed off to Darrin’s parents’ in Ogden. But, they wouldn’t go and leave their dog.
Before bed I sent Darrin a email.
Ha ha. Just checking to make sure you’re not dead. Send me a text, or an email, or call me.
I wasn’t exactly worried. But, I was certainly concerned.
Yesterday I had to be at work at 6:00AM. Our client was on site from San Antonio and we had a major product launch. I checked my email and phone when I got up. Nothing.
My morning was taken up with our product launch. It went well and about 10:30 I was back at my desk with some time to catch up on email. But, still nothing from Darrin. I texted a mutual friend that talks to Darrin every day.
Have you heard from Darrin recently? Kind of worried about him.
He tweeted me a joke too offensive to post publically yesterday about 2:30pm.
Social media! Darrin is very active on social media. I went to his twitter feed. Nothing for the last three days. That’s like 6 months in Darrin-days.
Called cell phone and home phone again. No answer. I texted:
Darrin – I’d better hear ‘my phone fell in the toilet’ or something.
What should I do? What would you do?
I don’t often post about current events on here. I’d like to think that my musing here might have some value at some point in the future. Maybe just to my kids, but at least someone.
Last week there was a case in the news about a boy who brought a homemade clock to school. The school officials thought it looked like a bomb. They called the cops. The boy was arrested. It turned out to be a clock. The officials overreacted. It caused much embarrassment.
On our production floor we have a no cell phones policy. It applies to the agents. It doesn’t apply to me because I have to troubleshoot issues on a regular basis. Last week I was walking through the call floor while using headphones on a call with our client. I passed one of our supervisors who nearly did a perfectpirouette as she turned to follow me.
Umm. . . .
It’s okay. I’m Rodney, the Technical Account manager.
Oh. . .Okay.
Thanks for checking though.
“If you see something, say something.”
The problem was I didn’t see something at Darrin’s house. Finally, around 11:00AM I decided I’d rather be made to look foolish than risk ignoring a threat.
Springville Police Department, how may I help you?
Yeah, I was wondering if you could send an officer to do a welfare check on a friend of mine?
I explained my concerns and why I worried. Either the Springville cops had some spare cycles, or they take Welfare Checks very seriously. The responding officers called me less than five minutes later.
We’re outside their house. Are there guns in the house? Dogs? History of domestic issues? How does your friend feel about the police?
Yes, several. Yes, but I think she’s frendly. Never any history of violence or domestic abuse. I THINK my friend is fine with law enforcement, but if you burst into his house, he does have a concealed carry permit.
The police don’t just knock on your door during a welfare check. It’s more of a pounding “we are trying to break this door down with our bare hands” “wake the dead” kind of knock.
That was good, because my friend REALLY didn’t want to come to the door. Being super sick will do that to you. Apparently it also makes you not want to answer your phone. . .or email. . .or be active on social media.
I owe my friend an apology for “Swatting” him. In fact, we laughed about it. But, in today’s world, I’ll take some teasing from him in exchange for knowing that I didn’t simply ignore the warning signs.
Oh, and I’m pretty sure he’s going to answer his phone the next time I call him.
Rodney M Bliss is an author, columnist and IT Consultant. His blog updates every weekday about 7:00 AM Mountain Time. He lives in Pleasant Grove, UT with his lovely wife, thirteen children and grandchildren.
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or email him at rbliss at msn dot com(c) 2015 Rodney M Bliss, all rights reserved
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Ring, ring
I’m working on it.
Ha, ha.
click
That was it. The shortest support call I’ve ever been part of. There’s some backstory, of course. I ran a small startup company called RESMARK. My buddy Dave (Heart Mind Code) was my lead developer. But, the call had nothing to do with our program.
Howard Tayler (www.schlockmercenary.com) was a mutual friend. Howard has just recently left Novell to try on cartooning full time. Dave and I were very interested in Howard’s success. We still are, but Howard no longer needs our help. He seems to have figured out that “draw a comic and give it away for free on the internet everyday” strategy.
One of the most impressive streaks that Howard has maintained is that since Schlock first launched on June 12, 2000 until today, his comic has updated everyday. He’s never missed a day. I’ve often talked about the fact that Howard is one of my role models for this blog. Unlike Howard and his typical 30 day buffer, I write my posts the night before they post. But, I set a goal very early on to update consistently; Monday through Friday at 7:00AM. . .or so.
A very wise marketing VP explained to me one time how you become an expert on the Internet; persistance and presence. Show up every day and keep doing it. I think there needs to be an element of talent in there as well. Practice doesn’t make perfect. PERFECT practice makes perfect. But, you can have the best content in the world, be it a comic, or a youtube channel or a meandering blog if you are inconsistent, you will eventually frustrate your base to the point they will give up.
I’m constantly amazed when I’m talking to my friends and I mention I’m a writer.
Well, I write this blog every weekday about business and personal events.
Yeah, I know. I read it every day.
And I. . wait. What?
Anyway, consistency is very important. And that’s what led to that short phone call. Dave provided support for Howard’s website. Every evening I would go to Schlock Mercenary and read the new comic. One night it was 9:15 and the comic still didn’t show up. If there was an issue, Dave would be the guy that needed to fix it.
Dave recognized my phone number and knew exactly what I would be calling him about at 9:15pm. We still laugh about it these many years later.
Rodney M Bliss is an author, columnist and IT Consultant. His blog updates every weekday at 7:00 AM Mountain Time. He lives in Pleasant Grove, UT with his lovely wife, thirteen children and grandchildren.
Follow him on
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or email him at rbliss at msn dot com(c) 2015 Rodney M Bliss, all rights reserved
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The guns were everywhere.
The day dawned bright and beautiful. The storms from earlier in the week were gone. The weather was turning out to be one of these days that make Utah so beautiful in the Fall. The beauty of the weather and the fall foliage was nothing compared to my daughter.
Every daughter is a princess. It’s just that sometimes they look more like the the gardener than royalty. This daughter had certainly been one of those. She hated dresses growing up. She cut her hair short. She played baseball not softball. In fact there was nothing at all soft about her. One of the decisions she will make will be when to change her Army title from 2LT Bliss to 2LT James.
So, to see her dressed in white with something resembling lace and frills was a different look. And she looked beautiful. Even the white cowboy boots that she had paired with her dress were feminine and demure. Of course, the .45 Rutger semi-automatic pistol tucked in a holster at her hip made a more bold statement.
Most times when you are having the daddy/daughter dance, your biggest worry is stepping on someone’s toes. On Saturday we added “accidental discharge” as a potential consequence.
See, my daughter didn’t pick wedding colors. She was perfectly happy having the reception in her in-laws backyard. “Dinner” was my wife’s homemade potato salad and we served home canned grapejuice in mason jars to drink. But, the one important aspect of the reception was that she (and her husband) wanted an open-carry reception. The invitations even said that people were encouraged to bring firearms.
They did.
In addition to the bride’s .45, the groom had a holstered revolver. I think it was a .357, but I never actually asked. I don’t think I have ever seen so many guns in public in my life. At least not in a setting where no one is wearing a uniform. It was exactly the way the bride and groom wanted it.
I took advantage of the chance to hold a true shotgun wedding. My friend Dave does leatherwork. He made me a bandolier for the wedding.
He loaned me a shotgun as well.
Giving a daughter away is always a bittersweet moment. I think it’s part of the reason we have a big party, to distract the father of the bride from thinking too much about his changing relationship with his daughter. With the amount of firepower and live ammunition at the event over the weekend, we needed to pay even better attention.
I’m just glad Mormon weddings don’t involve alcohol.
Rodney M Bliss is an author, columnist and IT Consultant. His blog updates every weekday at 7:00 AM Mountain Time. He lives in Pleasant Grove, UT with his lovely wife, thirteen children and grandchildren.
Follow him on
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or email him at rbliss at msn dot com(c) 2015 Rodney M Bliss, all rights reserved
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Tonight is the last night that our house will be her house. Just yesterday she was playing dress up in her mom’s shoes and having tea parties with her dolls.
Oh, who am I kidding? She never enjoyed dress up. She was more likely to be playing with trucks and army men than dolls. But, it is true that she’s leaving us. Tomorrow, she’ll enter a Mormon temple with young man she’s in love with. She’ll go in with my name and come out with his.
I should be happy. This is the day you try to prepare them for. Last spring she graduated from Utah State University with a degree in pre-veterinary science, a commission in the United States Army Reserves, no student debt and a fiance.
One of my favorite movies is Steve Martin’s “Father Of The Bride.” He plays a man who is not quite ready for his daughter to get married. The movie gives a comedic sounding board for my own experience. I’ve decided the movie writers were way off base.
Steve Martin has a lot of time to sit around and angst over the prospect of losing his daughter/gaining a son. There’s one particularly poignant scene where he and his daughter play a game of late night basketball; sort of a nostalgic last bit of childhood moment. It’s a beautiful scene. I have no idea how the bride or the father of the bride has time for it.
I’m not even doing the bulk of the work and I don’t have time for all the tasks. I guess one of the differences is that Steve Martin paid a caterer. We are the caterer. In addition to the tables I built, we have spent the last two days buying and preparing food.
The tables were built earlier this week.
The wedding is tomorrow morning and the reception is tomorrow night and 80 miiles from our house. The goal is to get the tables, food and kids there with only two car trips. Given the frenzy of activities that surround a wedding, we are prepared to have to make multiple 160 mph round trips.
Having the full schedule is a curse and a blessing. It keeps me from spending too long dwelling on the implications. I’m happy my daughter has found a man whom she wants to share her life with. And he’s a great guy. But, the relationship between fathers and daughters is special. I realize I’m no longer the most important man in her life. That’s a not a bad thing, but it is a different thing.
I think every father views their daughter’s wedding as both a beginning and an ending. Even though she’s 22 years old, tomorrow, her childhood ends and the next stage of her life begins. No doubt I’ll cry a little at both.
Rodney M Bliss is an author, columnist and IT Consultant. His blog updates every weekday at 7:00 AM Mountain Time. He lives in Pleasant Grove, UT with his lovely wife, thirteen children and grandchildren.
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or email him at rbliss at msn dot com(c) 2015 Rodney M Bliss, all rights reserved
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The math should be easy. 2 and a half sheets of plywood cut into 2′ diameter circles and twelve 2×4’s, each eight feet long. Just kept ended up with too many 2×4’s.
My daughter is getting married. She was always an unconventional child. Her wedding reception would be no different. There are a lot of traditions around weddings and receptions. my daughter decided to pick and choose which ones she wanted to keep.
Much of her planning was unconventional at best. The wedding announcements invited guests to the reception.
This is an open carry event. Guests are encouraged to bring firearms.
Made me very happy that there is no alcohol at Mormon weddings. However, as a 2nd lieutenant in the US Army reserves, guns are an active part of her life. My future son-in-law also is a strong supporter of the 2nd amendment.
Another tradition that my daughter seems to be starting is that all guests are encouraged to bring a mason jar to drink out of.
Your industry has traditions. Your company has traditions. Your team probably has traditions. As a new manager, disrupt the traditions at your peril. While working for Microsoft, which was a very unconventional company, we hired a manager from Boeing, a very traditional company. The transition was not smooth.
Our manager wanted to create a team mission statement. We were a bunch of trainers. We insisted that the mission statement say
We’ll learn ya.
That was the end of the mission statement writing exercise. Our new manager had failed to account for team traditions.
Apparently another tradition for my daughter’s wedding was homemade tables. My job to prepare for the wedding was to make tables from playwood and sawhorses. I figured it fit right into the theme.
Getting the table tops perfectly round was more work than I expected.
I still ended up with too many “legs.” Good thing they are made from wood and I can just reuse them.
What are your traditions? Whether it’s weddings or work, they are important. Keep track of them, but don’t be a slave to them.
Rodney M Bliss is an author, columnist and IT Consultant. His blog updates every weekday at 7:00 AM Mountain Time. He lives in Pleasant Grove, UT with his lovely wife, thirteen children and grandchildren.
Follow him on
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or email him at rbliss at msn dot com(c) 2015 Rodney M Bliss, all rights reserved
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How does the server know which port to choose for it’s outbound connection?
I don’t know.
What I mean is, when the application is talking to the end point mapper, does it have a way of specifying the port range it wants?
I still don’t know.
Well, what about when. . .
LOOK! No matter how many times you ask that question I STILL don’t know the answer.
I was stunned. I was a new Microsoft employee and sitting in a training class for Windows NT Server. The class was set up in a less than ideal way. There were 33 students, but only 26 desks. I was one of the lucky ones who had a computer to myself.
Like a lot of other people in the class, I was new to Microsoft’s networking products and servers. I had recently been recruited from WordPerfect. I was an email specialist. This was my first introduction to Windows Server.
The course was a two week long course. The instructor started his introduction with
My name is Tim. I’m originally from New York and people say that they can tell.
He was a great instructor. Maybe a little brusque, but well skilled in explaining the complex concepts of Windows NT in a simple straightforward manner. The issue wasn’t the instructor. The issue was Jason.
Jason sat in the front row. Unlike most of us, he wasn’t new to Windows NT. In fact, he had been working in Microsoft’s IT department as a desktop engineer. The concepts that Tim was addressing weren’t new to Jason. And that was the problem.
In this overcrowded room of newbies, Jason wanted Tim to dive into the more technical and esoteric aspects of the server and network. Tim held it together for the first two days. On the third day he’d finally had enough. Jason was one of those tech people that doesn’t respond to subtle verbal clues.
Tim’s response had two effects on me. First, I was surprised that an instructor could actually respond to a student like that. Don’t get me wrong, Tim wasn’t a rude instructor. He did all the training techniques correctly. For two days he tried to teach around Jason’s incessant questions. It was only after all of that failed that he was short with Jason.
The second surprise was I realized I really wanted to be a trainer. It wasn’t the anticipation of getting to yell at a student, of course. But, I realized that teaching a class was more than “standing up and reading what’s in the book.” A good instructor made the material come alive. By showing some personality, Tim helped me see the key role the instructor plays in making the class not just enjoyable, but valuable.
Several years later, I went to work in the trainer organization at Microsoft and was colleagues with Tim. I reminded him about that class. And thanked him for his response.
Well, I did warn you I was from New York.
Rodney M Bliss is an author, columnist and IT Consultant. His blog updates every weekday at 7:00 AM Mountain Time. He lives in Pleasant Grove, UT with his lovely wife, thirteen children and grandchildren.
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or email him at rbliss at msn dot com(c) 2015 Rodney M Bliss, all rights reserved
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Request Vacation Time: You have zero hours available
Well, that couldn’t be right. My daughter was going to be very disappointed.
My company takes a unique view of time off. I don’t have vacation days and sick days. I have a set number of personal time hours for the year. I can take them for vacation, sick time, or anything else.
Being a company that is largely made up of hourly employees, our benefits have a decidedly “hourly” bias. As a salaried employee, all of my vacation requests are in 8 hour blocks. I don’t have the option of taking less vacation time. Yes, I understand this is a benefit for me. If I come into work and need to leave early, I get paid for the whole day. Of course, if I get called on the weekend for the outage, I don’t get any extra pay either, so it’s a trade off.
I’ve always thought offering a block of time for time off was a better way to handle vacation/sick time. If I work for a company with a traditional vacation time/sick time split and I decide I need a “personal” day is that a vacation day or a sick day? As far as my employer is concerned, it doesn’t matter. I’m not at my desk working.
Because the amount of personal time I have access to is both sick and vacation time, it’s a fairly generous number. If you’ve followed this blog this year, you know that I’ve spent a lot of time off hiking and camping this summer. Much of the weekend campouts have started Friday after work. But, I spent a week in Colorado rafting with my older boys. I also spent a week at scout camp. Plus some other campouts at other times during the summer.
In addition to a generous number of personal hours, there is one other aspect of my time off that is unique to my current employer. They give me all my personal time off at the beginning of the year. And at the end of the year, they throw away anything I have left.
After scout camp in July, I had three days of personal time left. Actually, I had 24 hours. But, like I said, I have to take them in 8 hour blocks. I knew I was going to want some of those days and need some. This weekend is an “I need” time off. My daughter is getting married on Saturday.
Mormon weddings are typically a two day affair. The weddings (called Sealings in Mormon vernacular) take place in the LDS Temple. If you’ve ever been to Salt Lake City chances are you’ve seen the LDS Temple.
(Photo Credit: www.lds.org)
There are about 140 of these temples around the world. My daughter will be married in the Mt Timpanogos temple. (Yes, the same name as the mountain I climbed last month.)
(The mountain ^^^. . . .The temple \/ \/ \/)
(Photo credit: www.lds.org)
The day before the wedding, Mormon brides generally go through a temple ceremony called the “Endowment.” The details are private, but it’s an introduction to spiritual ideas and represents the most sacred ceremony in the LDS culture, except for the sealing ceremony. Active LDS family members typically accompany people going through the temple for the first time. That’s me, father of the bride. I really want to be in that ceremony.
So, what happened to my three days? I started digging through our online benefits portal. I finally found the page that shows my vacation days requests. Sure enough there were all those camping trips in a table. Each day had an “8 hour” total, except for the last one. Sept 1, 2015 I was apparently granted 24 hours of personal time off. Weird. I didn’t request time off for that Tuesday. I distinctly remember working that day. And it seems a little harsh to bill me for 24 hours of vacation time rather than the traditional 8 hours.
A quick email to HR and cc:ing my manager and I’m back on track for getting to spend Friday with my daughter as she prepares for her wedding.
I did briefly consider how awesome a vacation day would need to be to justify taking 24 hours of time off. I’m pretty sure that no matter how awesome it would be, it wouldn’t compare with getting to go through the temple with my little girl.
Not even close.
Rodney M Bliss is an author, columnist and IT Consultant. His blog updates every weekday at 7:00 AM Mountain Time. He lives in Pleasant Grove, UT with his lovely wife, thirteen children and grandchildren.
Follow him on
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or email him at rbliss at msn dot com(c) 2015 Rodney M Bliss, all rights reserved
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What do we do with these three boxes of computer cables?
Oh, I’ll take them!
If you need a new network cable, but you don’t want to wait on IT bringing you a new one, who do you ask?
Ever notice that everyone is assigned a single coat hook for their cubicle, but there’s always that guy who has a spare if you need it? Where does he get it?
Somepeople call us pack rats. That’s fine. But, we know when you need a new mouse because yours broke and your report is due in two hours, you’ll be standing at our desk with a “Hey, do you have a . . .?” request.
We aren’t pack rats. A pack rat collects stuff. We don’t simply collect indiscriminately. The stuff we collect has to meet two requirements:
- It’s scarce
- People use it
Ah, but where do we get the stuff from?
The Great Escape is one of my favorite movies. It’s about a group of Allied prisoners who escape from a German POW camp. During the planning, various jobs need to be filled. I’ve always liked James Garner’s character, Hendley the best. He was the “Scounger.” Whenever the needed something, it was his job to figure out how to get it. Axes, bolts of cloth, even a camera.
Office scroungers aren’t committing blackmail or theft to aquire their supply of spare parts. But, there are some strategies for how to get hard to acquire equipment.
Bring it
First, sometimes they just bring it. At my work our operations team uses radios to communicate between floors in our building. Radios are scarce. And they are certainly useful. It’s also hard to keep track of them as people take them and then forget to return them. I have two on my desk. No one ever touches them but me. That’s because they are mine.
Actually, they are my kids. I “borrowed” them and took them to work.
Buy it
Like many people, I have my security badge on a “zip” device that hooks on my belt. I got mine years ago at Microsoft, but they are a spiff that our agents can buy. A couple of other project managers asked if I could get them some. I tried to get one from our operations folks. Apparently the badge holders are very scarce. I tried for weeks. Finally, I went to WalMart and bought a package of 6 for $4. I happily handed them to my coworkers.
Watch when people leave
The very best time to acquire equipment is when someone leaves. You wander over to say goodbye and leave with a spare stabler, a keyboard and a thrid monitor.
Get the broken one
And don’t ever EVER throw away a broken piece of equipment, be it a dead monitor, a keyboard or a mouse. It’s much easier to get a broken item replaced than to get a new one. When you show up with that broken mouse, we’ll trade you. But, we are keeping the broken one.
Over the weekend I went hiking in the Utah mountains again. This time I went to the High Uintas. It was my first time camping in this part of the state. The Uintas are beautiful.
They are also unique. They are the only mountain range in North America that runs east/west.
My pack was by far the heaviest of the group of three leaders and seven boy scouts.
The other leaders didn’t want to carry it. Even lifting it into the truck was a pain.
Rodney, what’s in there?
Well, a couple of things just in case.
During our camp out, I ended up loaning out
- Spare water bottles
- Extra water
- Extra food
- Camping oven mitts (otherwise known as leather gloves)
But, the most important “extra” I brought was the most critical of all.
Hey, do you have any extra toilet paper?
Yes. Yes, I do.
Rodney M Bliss is an author, columnist and IT Consultant. His blog updates every weekday at 7:00 AM Mountain Time. He lives in Pleasant Grove, UT with his lovely wife, thirteen children and grandchildren.
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