Well, you know Murphy? He has laws, and sometimes they affect yourself. In this case, me. I got into work and turned on my computer. I got the password screen, entered it and got the next screen that says welcome. We have Windows 7 software loaded on our computers, and are resisting going to Windows 10. The welcome screen I got had a spinning circle that tells you something is loading. The only problem was, that 5 minutes later it was still spinning.
First diagnosis? Turn off the computer and start again. This time, I got nothing past the login screen. It was black. Turn it off again and this time when it starts, enter it in safe mode. That worked. Hmmm... Log off, turn off and restart. This time, I got back to the Welcome screen and....nothing.
At this point, I knew there was trouble, so I go to our IT/WaterJet Operator/CAD room assistant, Shannon. He is a guy and like the song "A Boy Named Sue," by Johnny Cash, you don't want to mess with Shannon. He loves Star Wars, is a great family man, but you don't want to meet him in a dark alley. Anyway, he had a migrane and intended to go home early. (He stayed all day)
After consulting with my boss and Shannon, I began a day of musical chairs. I work in a small office, with (7) workstations. Today, I was at 4 of them. To make this easy, let's diagram this out.
Let's call the workstations by the first letter of the people that sit there. We have T, J, D and S (my desk), and we have a Copier/Printer. Call this CP. Normally at my desk, I enter the orders, email customers, and print everything out at my desk printer. None of that worked today.
So, how to get orders entered, email confirmations out, and generally do my job, while not impacting everyone else. You play musical chairs. The day played out sort of like this.
T, CP, T, CP, T, CP, T, CP, J, CP, J, CP, J, CP, T, CP, T, CP, D, CP, D, CP, D, CP. I started out at desk T while they took their work elsewhere. All these desks print to the main Copier/Printer. The Work Cards that I enter are printed on yellow sheets. Normally, I hand feed them at my desk. Today, I have to insert them into tray #1 on the CP. Then run back to the desk I am at, hit enter, and print before someone else is printing there. That is why there is a CP so many times listed. Sit at desk T. Put yellow paper in CP, run back to desk T. Enter another order at T, run to CP, etc.
When J was at lunch I sat there and entered orders. After D left (he works a half day), I stayed there for the afternoon. So, there I went, up and down and at different desks all day, while Shannon tried to figure out what was going on. Eventually, he backed up my mail info, desktop stuff, etc on a flash drive and he re-installed Windows. He expects to finish tomorrow morning and have it ready for me when I arrive.
It was interesting to see our Production Supervisor that I work closely with, come in to look for me, and each time I was at a different desk. Or my boss asking the same thing. The funniest comment came from one of our Estimators, who said "This is like a game of Wack a Mole, you never know where Steve is going to pop up next.
(Where will Steve pop up next?)
See, just another ordinary day at work. But I still managed to enter a large amount of orders, and leave work on time, and get to VBS in one piece. Speaking of which, what am I still doing up? I need some sleep. One more day of work and night of VBS before sleeping in on Saturday.
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