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A Recap Of The Last Three Weeks

AMERICA: Oh my god! Coronavirus! What should we do?

CALIFORNIA: Shut down your state.

AMERICA: Wait… what? Why?

CALIFORNIA: Because 40 million people live here and we did it early, and it’s working.

OHIO: Whoa… whoa… let’s not be hasty now. The president said that this whole coronavirus thing is a democratic hoax.

CALIFORNIA: He also said that windmills cause cancer. Shut down your state.

TEXAS: But the president said that we only have 15 cases and soon it’ll be zero.

CALIFORNIA: The president can’t count to fifteen. Nor even spell it. Shut down your state.

NEW JERSEY: Us too?

CALIFORNIA: Yes, you guys too. Just like when Christie shut down the bridge, but it’s your whole state.

FLORIDA: But what about all these kids here on spring break?? They spend a lot of money here!

CALIFORNIA: Those kids invented the tide pod challenge. Shut down your state.

LOUISIANA: But wait let’s have Mardi Gras first. It entertains people.

CALIFORNIA: It also kills them. Shut it down.

GEORGIA: Ok well how about we keep the state open for all of our mega churches? Maybe we can all pray really hard until the coronavirus just goes away!

CALIFORNIA: Which is working like a charm for mass shootings. Jesus told us to tell you to shut down your state.

OKLAHOMA: What about the tigers?

CALIFORNIA: What about a dentist. Shut it down.

WYOMING: Hold up, maybe we should go county by county like the president said.

CALIFORNIA: Stop acting like there are counties in Wyoming. There are no counties in Wyoming. Wyoming is a county. Shut it down.

PENNSYLVANIA: But big coal.

CALIFORNIA: But big death. Shut it.

WEST VIRGINIA: But we were the last state to get coronavirus!

CALIFORNIA: And don’t make us explain to you why that was. Shut it down.

NORTH CAROLINA: But the republican national convention is coming here!

CALIFORNIA: SHUT… ok fine do what you want.

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Prepare For The Ultimate Gaslighting

Ben and I were just discussing this last night.

From Medium:

From one citizen to another, I beg of you: take a deep breath, ignore the deafening noise, and think deeply about what you want to put back into your life. This is our chance to define a new version of normal, a rare and truly sacred (yes, sacred) opportunity to get rid of the bullshit and to only bring back what works for us, what makes our lives richer, what makes our kids happier, what makes us truly proud. We get to Marie Kondo the shit out of it all. We care deeply about one another. That is clear. That can be seen in every supportive Facebook post, in every meal dropped off for a neighbor, in every Zoom birthday party. We are a good people. And as a good people, we want to define — on our own terms — what this country looks like in five, ten, fifty years. This is our chance to do that, the biggest one we have ever gotten. And the best one we’ll ever get.

We can do that on a personal scale in our homes, in how we choose to spend our family time on nights and weekends, what we watch, what we listen to, what we eat, and what we choose to spend our dollars on and where. We can do it locally in our communities, in what organizations we support, what truths we tell, and what events we attend. And we can do it nationally in our government, in which leaders we vote in and to whom we give power. If we want cleaner air, we can make it happen. If we want to protect our doctors and nurses from the next virus — and protect all Americans — we can make it happen. If we want our neighbors and friends to earn a dignified income, we can make that happen. If we want millions of kids to be able to eat if suddenly their school is closed, we can make that happen. And, yes, if we just want to live a simpler life, we can make that happen, too. But only if we resist the massive gaslighting that is about to come. It’s on its way. Look out.

Read the whole thing here. It’s worth your time.

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Comic Relief

Two caterpillars are escaping a spider. They climb up a branch and get to the edge, but realize they are now trapped…

“Hold on tight!” says the first caterpillar and he quickly chews through the branch.

It snaps and they begin to fall, but he grabs two protruding twigs and uses them to steer the branch through the air with grace and finesse.

“That’s amazing!!” says the second caterpillar. “How in the hell are you doing that?!”

The first caterpillar scoffs.

“Am I the only one in the whole damn forest who knows how to drive a stick!?”

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Vintage Audio Porn

Teac A-700 Elcaset Deck, 1976-77

Elcaset was a format ahead of its time, and unfortunately supplanted by improvements in regular cassette technology that it was designed to replace. It (and cassettes) were ultimately killed off by the arrival of cheap digital recording, both in the form of CD-R and Minidisc in the 90s.

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Further Adventures in Cluelessness

Skype me Daddy!

And the beat goes on.

It’s said some people as adults have the awareness of a typical three-year old; i.e. their awareness extends to a three foot radius around them and then abruptly ends).

About six weeks ago—before the madness started—we got a request to upgrade the a/v equipment in the main conference rooms on three floors. We were all busy at the time so it got put on the back burner and life went on. Well, today we got an email from one of those perpetually-clueless individuals asking when these upgrades were expected to be completed because, “we have meetings with the public coming up.”

Excuse me? Meetings with who? Who is this “public” and who, exactly, is going to be physically coming back into the office to conduct these meetings?

My colleagues and I maintain a group chat via Skype during the day, and even before anyone said anything, I could hear their collective eyes rolling. Finally, my supervisor’s boss said, “I. just. can’t ,” immediately followed by, “I’ll take care of it.” Less than a minute later we all received a cc’d email to the user reminding her that there was a spending freeze in place for all non-essential purchases and laying out exactly why this project was non-esssential and now officially on hold for the foreseeable future.

I swear that some people—even in the midst of this crisis—continue to think only about about themselves and their needs; that everything is still “business as usual.”

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He Does Have a Point

Me (after reading yet another whiny email from one of our high-maintenance users who seems to have no clue that things are not business as usual): “There are certain people at work I just want to bitch slap.”

Ben: “But then you wouldn’t be following social distancing guidelines.”

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Done With It

It should come as no surprise that the same people who wait until the last minute to request VPN to work from home are also the most clueless individuals in our organization.

Those higher up the IT chain have decided that in the interest of corporate security, they need to lock things down a bit, so as of last week we were no longer able to request VPN access for users who were using their personal computers to get on the enterprise network via VPN. Makes sense, considering how vulnerable to attack the vast majority of home PCs are.

So the new protocol requires getting the name of the enterprise PC the users will be taking home, their personal cell number (for 2-factor authentication required for the initial install of the client), and a list of applications they need to access that would be inaccessible if they weren’t granted VPN access. Simple stuff, right?

In theory, yes. But then I end up with users like the guy I had today who was requesting VPN for three of his direct reports. First email request asking for these three items was returned with only the PC name for one of his reports. Second was only the list of applications that the three employees would be using. Finally, when I told this user his request could not be fulfilled without the other PC names and cell phone numbers did I get all the info required. “I guess you guys are really busy right now, huh?”

Why yes. Yes we are. Because of people like you who can’t read an email all the way through.

After the accounts were created, I sent out emails to the employees, telling them they were set up on the back end and providing instructions on how to install the client on their company devices. As a courtesy I cc’d the guy who’d put in the initial request for them.

I immediately get an email from the genius saying, “[Employee Name] isn’t in the office today.”

So? SO? How does this affect ANYTHING I just emailed you?

But you know what irritates me more than this generic brand of cluelessness? It’s the people that somehow think everything is still business as usual and can’t understand that certain things they used to take for granted simply cannot be done at the moment.

No Karen, you can’t just “stop by and pick up a projector for a meeting.”

Firstly, there’s a skeleton crew in the office to begin with and absolutely no one in I.T. is onsite, and secondly, who are you scheduling a meeting with considering no one is in the office?!

SMDH.