Working with Alex

Some simple rules for working with people from IT Support:

1. If I tell you to reboot, and your response is to twiddle through your application windows to show me how important your work is and how impossible it is for you to save and quit for the 5 minutes it would take to reboot, then your disconnected network drives will not be recovered. I could be Bill Gates troubleshooting for you and still your network dirves would not be able to connect. Really.
2. Looking at me like I have the pox when I try to explain to you the mechanics of FTP (because you wanted me to "make it work with one button", and I have no idea what you're talking about) and rolling your eyes at me because I'm so geeky will not make you cooler. Maybe you came from a more "creative" background where people looked and dressed better, but those people will not give you the ability to "make it happen in one click".
   I will.So pay attention.
3. Shouting "ASP! Wah! Never do for a long time already!" when you see me coding and slapping me on the back will not make me feel that you are a comrade-in-arms and will not motivate me to start a shallow conversation with you on how difficult you used to find your one-hour-a-week programming lessons back in your university days, when you probably spent most of your time as a member of the canoeing team. Standing behind me to admire my (admittedly rather messy) coding and making gushing comments about how difficult it all looks will not impress me. It demeans both our intelligences, in fact, and is an invasion of privacy, even though I'm pretty sure you don't understand what I'm typing.
4. Email addresses do not need to have a dot seperating first and last names. It is not an internet standard. It is not a corporate standard. It is not even this particular company's standard. Maybe your last three companies decorated their employees' addresses with flourishes of dots, dashes and underscores but we don't do that here. Really, it's not an internet standard. No, I don't think people will be "confused and unable to comprehend the lack of dots-and-dashes". Nor will it be more difficult to remember an email address that is not saturated with a cocktail of special characters. Really.
   Oh, and it doesn't matter if you CAPITALIZE EVERYTHING neither. THISFUCKINGEMAILADDRESS@REALLYHARDTOREAD.COM is the same as thisfuckingemailaddress@reallyhardtoread.com. Really.
5. You do not need to borrow a book from the library to learn how to use "CutePDF Writer". It has a total of ten options in it's "Advanced Options", all of which are simple drop down menus with two options and I have already demonstrated their use. If need be, I can hold your hand while you run it for the first time, or show you several more times how to use it, but surely it cannot be that difficult. I'm sure you didn't manage to get your degree by looking at people with large piteous eyes all the time. If you need more help than that, a book will not provide you with the help you need.
   A lobotomy might.
6. Telling me that you never used to do any of the IT stuff, that you always left it to the "grunts" of the IT department and that you really can't afford to get involved in "nitty-gritty details like that" will not make me your good friend. If I do not wish to sit or talk to you during lunch-time and you do not understand why, then I guess not working in the IT line does not necessarily make you more humane.
7. I am not omniscient, nor have I traded my soul to Microsoft for infinite knowledge in the ways of their products. Telling me "Something is wrong with Outlook" and then standing aside to look at me as if I was about to pull Magical Problem Solving Bunnies out of my sleeves is not a good way to introduce a problem.
8. Shouting at me from across the room is not a nice way to get help of any kind, unless you are being eaten by a shark. In which case I do not think I would be of much help (except perhaps for cheering on said shark).
9. I am not your personal IT guru. I have other things to do than to spend time creating tacky email headers and pop-ups for you. I know your "previous IT guy could do it in 10 minutes", but you can't do it in a thousand, so don't compare. Anyway he left because he couldn't stand you and your continuous whining and pleading for MORE! MORE!, so looks like you're gonna have to settle for slow service, huh?
10. Telling me "I don't know - I didn't touch anything" when I can feel the sweat on the mouse from your sweaty grasp is a lousy lie, and demeans my intelligence, as well as yours. I will not scold you for uninstalling IIS on the web server accidentally, because I know it is not your fault that you do not read warning messages and that dialog boxes with prominent exclaimation-mark-icons are nothing but obstructions to you from opening your corrupted Word document containing a myriad of viruses that your friend sent to you because she too, has nothing better to do at work than propogate pictures of babies.
11. I don't care how cute the babies are - the email that they came in contained viruses (or at least some very hostile-looking macros). Don't open the file and don't ask me to spend an hour cleaning it for you just so you can see the babies.
    You want babies that much, go have sex.
12. If you "used to do some Photoshop, but it was a long time ago, so now I can't really remember anything, by the way where's the tool for drawing a line?" then you should not be putting down "Proficient in Photoshop" in your resume. Being good at "coordinating IT staff" does not come under the heading of "IT Proficiencies" neither.
13. It is the age of digital communications and shorthand has changed the way we speak and write, but even a "plz" will still get you very far. "Thks!" can also still be quite helpful. Being a Marxist-nightmare-incarnate and demanding that I DO THIS FOR YOU RIGHT NOW because it is YOUR JOB AND YOU HAVE NO CHOICE does not appeal to me, no matter how cold and inhumane you think that people in the IT line are.