I was unemployed for a while (due to living in a small town and there not being many jobs; most were part-time or you needed a qualification for), so I thought about learning to become a computer repairman/technician. I had been dabbling with PCs for years and knew quite a lot, so I mentioned this to the Job Centre.

I was eventually sent on a “computer course” which I thought would be a start to a new career.

Hooo boy was I wrong.

Red flags started popping up when I went in, and the class was full of middle-aged people and seniors (this was back in the late 90s/early 2000s). Then the teacher came in and started the lesson.

Teacher: “Okay, class, for this first lesson we will be learning how to properly use a mouse—” *He points to a picture of a mouse.* “—and Keyboard—” *Does the same with a picture of a keyboard.*

Me: *Surprised Pikachu face.*

After about half an hour of him telling us how to move the mouse and use the buttons, I walk up to the teacher.

Me: “Excuse me, what is the end goal of this class?”

Teacher: “So you can send emails and write letters using your PC.”

Me: “Uh huh, I know all that already. In fact, I build PCs, repair them, and install and troubleshoot peripherals in my spare time.”

Teacher: “So why the h*** are you in this class?”

Me: “I dunno, ask the job centre; according to them this is supposed to be a PC repair qualification course.”

He sent me home, and my advisor got a b*llocking for wasting his time.

This story reminded me of a time I also had to deal with an excessive printer.

I used to work at a community college computer lab, which mostly involved helping students with logging into their accounts and manning the two high-volume printers behind the desk. The premise, at first, was simple. Any of the 200 computers in the lab could print as much as needed, and the prints would come out of the machines behind me. I’d take the prints and lay them neatly across the long counter, and users would come up, search for their own, and head off. 

Eventually, there were the inevitable jerkwads who would take what wasn’t theirs, and after enough complaints, the school required us to keep the prints out of reach, and we’d ask people to name or describe their prints before we handed them over. It was a bit more work on our end, but overall, it was fine. 

There was no volume limit, either. With normal prints, that was not a big deal, though at the beginning of every semester, we’d have to ask people to only print the class list they needed and not the 130-page full catalog. Most of it was useless bureaucratic BS anyway.

Then, there was Cat P*ss Lady. 

She would come in every single night, usually about an hour or so before we closed, and she would take over an entire table of computers with bags and bags of stuff. She also had a walker, so she likely had some kind of disability. But she had to have been a student at the college because she had a login for the lab.

We didn’t really talk to her, though, because she absolutely reeked of cat urine. It was so strong that no one would sit within two or three tables of her. And she was mean. She muttered the foulest language constantly, and she would snap and yell at the lab techs at the end of the night when she finally came up to get her prints — which was always well after closing.

And she printed a lot, too. We’d go through a ream or two of paper just for her. A ream was 500 sheets of paper. 

What was she printing? Google searches. She would Google something and then print all the results, or at least until she got bored and Googled something else. Thousands and thousands of search results for the most random topics. I gave up even bothering to look when I pulled her prints off the machine.

We spent a solid year complaining to management about her abuse of the “free prints for students” policy with the intention of getting her removed from the building. But they were afraid to touch her. No matter how foul she was (smell or language), she was untouchable.

Eventually, just before I moved on to a new job, they implemented a pay-per-page system for the whole college. It left so many other students practically begging us for copies of their final papers and stuff because a lot of them were poor. All because of one horrible lady.

She didn’t stop coming, either. She just became far more abusive to the staff. I’m so glad I left.

Related:
Taking Advant-page

Back when I was working as a classroom technician for my local community college after I graduated, the college needed a technical scribe for a blind student. They needed someone who could not only provide direction of what the computer was showing on the screen that [Text-To-Speech Software] (software that audibly gave cues on what you were doing) was unable to but also had the technical skills to know how to work the software. I fit in perfectly, so I was hired on to do the technical interpreting for [Student] for the quarter.

The professor assigned the students to create a user interface that did some specific things. The paper that he gave out had an image with a general idea of what the students were to create. To help, but not overly help, I designed the general GUI (Graphical User Interface) and then let the student do the brunt of the work for how it functioned. I filled in the gaps by verbally cueing him on where he was and what to do next because [Text-To-Speech Software] wasn’t giving any cues. [Student] then turned in the assignment.

[Professor] asked us to come to his office the next day.

Professor: *To me* “I know you did the GUI part of [Student]’s assignment. It was the students’ responsibility to do their own interpretation of what I handed out.”

I was about to explain, but [Student] grabbed my arm, politely apologized, and said he would do as asked. Then, we left the office.

Me: *To [Student]* “What’s up?”

Student: “Can you edit the settings on those laser printers in the computer lab to print a page of nothing but black?”

Me: “Sure.”

I did so, and after that black page was printed out, we went back to [Professor]’s office.

Professor: “Well, that was quick.”

[Student] handed over the paper, and [Professor] was very confused.

Student: “You said for me to design a GUI based on what you printed. This is what I saw, so I am giving you my interpretation of the image that you printed for the class.”

At that moment, [Professor] had a light bulb go off in his head, realizing that he had required a blind student to give their interpretation of an image he printed for the class.

Professor: “I’m sorry. Your previous work will be counted. For future assignments, both of you proceed as you have been.” *Pauses* “Well played.”

Me: “Thank you for calling the box office. This is [My Name]. How can I help you?”

Caller: “I need to talk to somebody about my stove.”

Me: “Um… I’m sorry, ma’am, but you’ve reached the box office of [Performing Arts Center]. Were you trying to reach [Local Electrician with a sort of similar-sounding name]?”

Caller: “No. You’re over at the college, right?”

Me: “Well, yes, our facility is on the [Community College] campus, but we are a theater. We put on concerts and host the Symphony, plays, and—”

Caller: *Interrupting* “Yeah. And they teach classes on how to be electricians and fix stuff there, right?”

Me: “Yes, the college offers a variety of classes for various trade skills, but I’m not sure exactly what classes—”

Caller: *Interrupting again* “Right! So, they need to send some of those students over here to fix my stove. It’ll be a good lesson for them, and I need the burner fixed now. I can’t afford an electrician.”

I asked her to hold and transferred her back to the campus phone line to work her way through the automated options. I’m not sure how she found her way to me, or if she ever reached anyone on the educational end of things, but I sure hope she got her stove sorted out eventually.

Before I retired, I worked as a maintenance carpenter at a very nice community college in Southern California. I was also writing and drawing a comic strip about windsurfing that had been accepted by several publications, albeit briefly. I never made much money; I was doing it for fun.

One day at work, I was walking past a drawing class being taught outside by an instructor I was friendly with. He saw me and shouted out:

Instructor: “Hey, [My Name], maybe you should take my class and learn how to draw!”

Me: *Shouting back* “Well, [Instructor], my art has been published in four magazines on two continents. I think I’m doing okay. How about you?”

All his students turned to see what he would reply with. Silence.