The Tech whisperer
Wow, my first call, how exciting! I put on my professional voice, “IT Support, how can I help?” “You’d better get someone up to the main 11th floor conference room pronto, the projector is on the fritz again and we have the finalist presentation for the Johnson account in 7 minutes.” “No problem, I’ll be right there.”
I run to the lift and hold the door for a waddling gentleman who is crammed into a suit. He squeezes through the opening and starts jabbing at the door close button with a porky digit. I can’t help but cringe, “Sir, could you please stop, the lift is closing the door as fast as he can. Your poking is only upsetting him.” He stares at me like I’ve lost my mind before hammering the button for his floor. I give the metallic wall a gentle stroke and whisper, “sorry about him, he doesn’t mean it. Thank you for so efficiently ascending us to our destination.”
I step out at the 11th floor and can already hear the screams of frustration. I follow them to the conference room and a scene of total chaos. A tall muscular man is stomping around like a rampaging toddler. As soon as he sees me he says, “Are you the tech nerd?” “I suppose I am. I was told the projector was experiencing some performance anxiety?” “Performance what? It’s shitting the bed if that’s what you mean. Can you just reboot it?” I control my expression while my insides rage, “I won’t pull the plug unless I absolutely have to. Let me have a quick word with her and see what’s the problem.”
I can hear the projector wheezing from here. The poor thing must have been left on for weeks, her undersized fan simply unable to keep her sufficiently cool. To make matters worse, someone has plugged a cable into every port and tangled them all together. If only I had my comb. No wonder she’s feeling under the weather. I lean in close, “I know you’re tired, but I need you to do one last thing before you can rest. Are you able to project this obnoxious mans slides? I promise after this I will change your bulb and do all those firmware updates.” There’s a flicker, and then the title slide appears. Angry man says, “about time. Now piss off, I don’t want the Mr. Johnson to bump into the help.” I give the projector a little pat and mutter, “Maybe change the resolution halfway through?” Another flicker and I am out the door.
I’ve barely made it five feet before I see the most horrific crime in progress. I rush over and shout, “Sir, please step away from the photocopier…”
