The General Idea

This happened around 2002–2003. There I was, an Army systems admin wearing many hats, knee-deep in green-bar printouts, Windows 95 floppy disks, old Cisco network equipment, and balls of CAT-5 cable.

I got a special request: the general wants to move from a desktop to a laptop. He wants everything to be EXACTLY the way it was on his desktop, to include how his files are laid out, the background, etc. Keywords to this (three times): EXACTLY.

I was given the laptop. I took it from bare bones to standard and added it to the network. I then copied (remotely) everything from his desktop to his laptop and arranged it EXACTLY as it was on his desktop. How to ensure it was EXACT? Easy, change the general’s password and log in as him (with his permission). Logged into his desktop remotely and his laptop sitting on my bench at the same time and arranged everything so it was mirrored perfectly. The job was done; it was EXACTLY as he wanted it. I was getting ready to take it over when… 

The little brown-nosing boss decided HE needed to take it over and set it up for the general. I told him this was a General-to-Bilko project with no deviations (warning: inbound s*** show).

Two hours later, my phone rings:

Me: “Networking, SGT Bilko speaking.”

Little Boss: “I’m here in the general’s office, and this laptop is not working!”

Me: “It worked when it was on my bench. What did you do?”

Little Boss: “I plugged it in, and there is no networking!”

I know the general’s office and know the jacks behind the typewriter desk were the original CAT3 phone wire from when the building was built.

Me: “Where did you plug the network cable in at?”

Little Boss: “Behind the typewriter desk!”

Me: “And you did not use the patch cable that was there for the desktop that was plugged into another jack?”

Little Boss: “No! I cut that one up and threw it in the trash.”

Me: *Banging head against hard flat surface.* “Okay. I’ll be over to make a new patch cable, and we’ll get this done.”

I head to the general’s office. The general is p***ed. He gave this job to me, but Little Boss decided he would look awesome by taking it over and setting it up. He’s p***ed that a Major wasted two hours of his time.

I made a new patch cable and started to plug it into the correct jack.

Little Boss: “I don’t want to use that jack; I want the one behind the typewriter desk.”

Me: “It’s a CAT3 phone wire. It was never intended to be a network jack.”

Little Boss: “I want it re-wired right now!”

Me: “Oooookay. Let me get the ladders, a spool of CAT5, and pop the ceiling tiles in the CSM’s office and three colonels’ offices to get to the signal closet. This is going to take a couple of hours.”

Little Boss: “NO! I want it done right NOW!”

Me: “No. This is a two-to-three-hour job. You need to go to each affected office and let them know I’ll be moving ceiling tiles and they’ll need to leave.”

Little Boss: “No! I want it done now!”

Me: *To Little Boss.* “Okay. You have a choice. Two to three hours of ceiling tiles or this patch cable. What’s it going to be?”

General: “Patch cable. Get it hooked up and get out.”

[Little Boss] leaves. I plugged in the cable, had networking, showed the general his layout, and had him change his password. I apologized to the general for the actions of [Little Boss].

General: “No, you did exactly as you were asked to do. Your boss hijacked this to earn brownie points. Thank you.”