And This Wrinkle Is For...

i should not even be allowed to blog about my work day. i am in the second most uninteresting field in the world - second only to being an actuary (yeah, i said it) and no one should have to hear about the things i do all day. just thinking about it gives me the yawns. but i just have to let it out today.

yesterday, my email started acting up. there were delays and little warning exclamation marks at the lower right-hand corner of my screen. and i mean, who even notices those things? i just thought, well, the server is old and will be upgraded next week and my machine should last that long - our it folk have been warning us for 6 months and we've been okay. what is a few more days anyway? yeah... famous last words.

today i get to work and try to save a document - error message, something about debugging and excel crashes. i decide to install internet explorer while trying to figure out what to do with excel. everything looks good and i go into blogger (still trying to figure out what to do with excel - i brainstorm best, apparently, while doing anything and everything unrelated to work). then i try to leave a comment for someone and web page won't load. damn it! i decide to try to do a system restore (does that ever work?) computer restarts and oh, man... my LAN connectivity is limited (whatever that means) and i have zero internet, outlook is down and my tcp/ip settings are all blank. didn't i just sound all intelligent and knowledgeable right there? i have no clue what all that is about. all i know is the machine was all wonky - couldn't connect to the server and i couldn't connect to the internet.

so i call our IT consultants - and someone calls me back. we go through a process, killing my keyboard in the process. i put her on hold to get a spare keyboard (only because we have so many crises, we have things like that in the office) and we carry on. she tells me to restart my machine and, boom, now i can't even log onto windows. do this and do that she says. i am wondering why i still listen to her but i do it anyway and then, like magic, i am all hooked up again. i mentally take back all the evil thoughts i had been having. i thank her profusely, wish her a fantastic weekend and hang up as i am restarting my machine.

this is when i start laughing hysterically. i can't log on to windows. i have to call back the IT consultants and this time someone new calls me. he doesn't believe that i am doing what he is tell me to do (i don't trust him one bit but i still have been doing everything he tells me to). he remotely logs into my machine and takes over control of my mouse. click click click - can you restart your machine. which i do and NOW the nothing works. username, password, nothing. we stick in a bootable disk and i end up with a black screen with a little white cursor blinking in the upper left-hand corner. it is 4:30 pm and tech tells me that he is going to have to escalate my issue and someone will call me right back to tell me when a human body will come in to fix my machine. i hang up and pick up new york magazine to read about stephen colbert.

of course, no one calls me back and so i have to call them. 1:30pm monday is the earliest that they can squeeze me in. so sorry i can't do any work until someone sorts out my problem but this is the best that they can do and they even had to cancel appointments with other clients to fit me in. so.. what? is this when i am supposed to be grateful? now i know why they work primarily offsite.

i pack and go home. the earliest i have gone home all year. woo hoo! the most exciting work day i have had in months and guess what? absolutely no work done. go figure.