#806: Tech Support

[[Person is on the phone, and holding up some networking hardware.]]

Person: … restart my computer? I know you have a script to follow, but the uplink light on the modem is going off every few hours. The problem is between your office and the modem.

Person: My computer has nothing to do with … okay, whatever, I “restarted my computer.”

Person: It’s still down, and even if it comes back, it’s going to die again in a few hours, because your–

Person: I don’t HAVE a start menu. This is a Haiku install, but that’s not import–

Person: Haiku? It’s an experimental OS that I … oh, never mind.

Person: I’m sorry, but this won’t get fixed until I talk to an engineer. Can you look around for someone wearing cargo pants, maybe a subway map on their wall?

[[The tech support person on the other end is wearing a headset, and looks around.]]

Tech: There’s a chick two phones over with a stuffed penguin doll and a poster of some bearded dudes with swords.

Person: Perfect. Can you put her on?

Tech: Sure.

[[Person is now talking to the engineer.]]

Person: Hey, so sorry to bother you, but my connection–

Engineer: Yeah, I see it. Lingering problems from a server move.

«type type»

Engineer: Should be fixed now.

Person: Thank you SO MUCH.

Engineer: No problem. Hey, in the future, if you’re on any tech support call, you can say the code word “shibboleet” at any point and you’ll be automatically transferred to someone who knows a minimum of two programming languages.

Person: Seriously?

Engineer: Yup. It’s a backdoor put in by the geeks who built these phone support systems back in the 1990’s.

Engineer: Don’t tell anyone.

Person: Oh my god, this is the greatest–

[[Person wakes up.]]

Person: Wha–

Person: … DAMMIT.