How do I tell the boss....
Discussion
... to shove his Blackberry?
I got into work this morning and was told to hand over my trusty old Nokia (no, not the 'brick' that was the subject of one of my posts a few years back) because I was to be 'Blackberried'.
I did try asking why and was advised that it was so that I could keep in touch by all means at all times
Now you could probably understand that some captain of industry might conceivably need to have his finger on the pulse of business, but one of those I am certainly not. I'm a techie. I fix things. Sometimes I design things, I even build things (like the thing I just knocked up for the Royal Navy, but I can't tell you about as it's Top Sec... oh, damn) but mostly I fix things.
I get paid a certain sum for a certain working week, and it doesn't bloody well include sitting in a hotel answering emails. FFS I don't even get my own emails when I'm away; why should I get works ones?
So our service manager comes out with 'image'. What feckin image?! I'm a bloody techie! Most of our clients couldn't give two sh!ts if I turned up ballcock naked as long as when I leave, their equipment is working.
I'm a tubby, grey-haired, middle-aged git with specs and a surly attitude. But so are most of the staff who work for most of our customers! Why the fudgenuts do I need to be any different? FFS they'll have me wearing company overalls and handing out business cards next.
All this aside, I'm a techno-buffoon. I remember my mate telling me about this new means of communication called 'email' and me asking what the point was. It'll never catch on, I remember saying. So here I am with a Blackberry, all feckin icons and bloody 'choons'. It's a p155ing kid's toy. It's electronic jewellery. It's this week's fad for the attention-deficit masses. It has a keyboard that Herve Villechaise would have struggled to use. A paedophile, that's who designed this thing. Gary furgling Glitter. I have techie's hands for christ's sake, I cover 3/4 of the bloody keypad with my little finger. What chance do I have of sending a meaningful text or email when every touch produces pl2Fk&EE>...? I'll be quoting customers $270000 for a 15w lightbulb, or £11.50 for a new factory.
It reminds me of when I first saw Windows XP. It's all cuddly and safe, nice little boxes of help popping up everywhere and pictures of clouds and grass. P155 off! I want black icons on a black background. I want text that I can read without an electron microscope. I want a keyboard I can stab at with huge stumpy fingers and manage to tell 'er indoors that I'll be home in ten, whilst holding the phone in my pocket. I want... I want my old phone back. It was a techie's phone: businesslike, clunky, simple. Sure, it didn't play a whank-tastic trumpet fanfare when a text arrived. I couldn't take high resolution photos of my c0ck in the hotel shower. But I could feckin well read the screen. I could find and dial a number in two seconds. I could text 'Ok' in respone to whatever earth-shattering emergency had befallen Rolls-Royce or Lufthansa. I didn't have to do some kind of Vulcan death-grip to get the keyboard to unlock. I could put it in my arse pocket and not find it had dialled Sydney, Australia or texted 'Slut' to 87633. I could leave it lying around and be fairly sure it'd still be there when I came back. I can almost hear the chav burglars scratching at the windows: they can sniff the bling, I know it. It's 'moving with the times', quoth the boss. No it's not, it's you trying to get me to do more work, in my own time, for no more money. Next you'll be 'touching base' with me, running things up the blue-sky flagpole and getting our ducks in a row. Well he can poke it. Emails can wait till the next working day. Texts will get the same curt answers I've always given. And the sooner I can find a way to lose/break/sell it on Ebay, the sooner my blood pressure will get back to normal.
Blackberry? Shove it up your ar53.
I got into work this morning and was told to hand over my trusty old Nokia (no, not the 'brick' that was the subject of one of my posts a few years back) because I was to be 'Blackberried'.
I did try asking why and was advised that it was so that I could keep in touch by all means at all times
Now you could probably understand that some captain of industry might conceivably need to have his finger on the pulse of business, but one of those I am certainly not. I'm a techie. I fix things. Sometimes I design things, I even build things (like the thing I just knocked up for the Royal Navy, but I can't tell you about as it's Top Sec... oh, damn) but mostly I fix things.
I get paid a certain sum for a certain working week, and it doesn't bloody well include sitting in a hotel answering emails. FFS I don't even get my own emails when I'm away; why should I get works ones?
So our service manager comes out with 'image'. What feckin image?! I'm a bloody techie! Most of our clients couldn't give two sh!ts if I turned up ballcock naked as long as when I leave, their equipment is working.
I'm a tubby, grey-haired, middle-aged git with specs and a surly attitude. But so are most of the staff who work for most of our customers! Why the fudgenuts do I need to be any different? FFS they'll have me wearing company overalls and handing out business cards next.
All this aside, I'm a techno-buffoon. I remember my mate telling me about this new means of communication called 'email' and me asking what the point was. It'll never catch on, I remember saying. So here I am with a Blackberry, all feckin icons and bloody 'choons'. It's a p155ing kid's toy. It's electronic jewellery. It's this week's fad for the attention-deficit masses. It has a keyboard that Herve Villechaise would have struggled to use. A paedophile, that's who designed this thing. Gary furgling Glitter. I have techie's hands for christ's sake, I cover 3/4 of the bloody keypad with my little finger. What chance do I have of sending a meaningful text or email when every touch produces pl2Fk&EE>...? I'll be quoting customers $270000 for a 15w lightbulb, or £11.50 for a new factory.
It reminds me of when I first saw Windows XP. It's all cuddly and safe, nice little boxes of help popping up everywhere and pictures of clouds and grass. P155 off! I want black icons on a black background. I want text that I can read without an electron microscope. I want a keyboard I can stab at with huge stumpy fingers and manage to tell 'er indoors that I'll be home in ten, whilst holding the phone in my pocket. I want... I want my old phone back. It was a techie's phone: businesslike, clunky, simple. Sure, it didn't play a whank-tastic trumpet fanfare when a text arrived. I couldn't take high resolution photos of my c0ck in the hotel shower. But I could feckin well read the screen. I could find and dial a number in two seconds. I could text 'Ok' in respone to whatever earth-shattering emergency had befallen Rolls-Royce or Lufthansa. I didn't have to do some kind of Vulcan death-grip to get the keyboard to unlock. I could put it in my arse pocket and not find it had dialled Sydney, Australia or texted 'Slut' to 87633. I could leave it lying around and be fairly sure it'd still be there when I came back. I can almost hear the chav burglars scratching at the windows: they can sniff the bling, I know it. It's 'moving with the times', quoth the boss. No it's not, it's you trying to get me to do more work, in my own time, for no more money. Next you'll be 'touching base' with me, running things up the blue-sky flagpole and getting our ducks in a row. Well he can poke it. Emails can wait till the next working day. Texts will get the same curt answers I've always given. And the sooner I can find a way to lose/break/sell it on Ebay, the sooner my blood pressure will get back to normal.
Blackberry? Shove it up your ar53.
My brother's girlfriend had one of these for work and it was forever beeping with new messages even when she was at home, and they expected her to be answering them.
I think if I got given one it would be left in the desk drawer at the end of each day. Some employers don't seem to have any concept of 'not at work'.
I think if I got given one it would be left in the desk drawer at the end of each day. Some employers don't seem to have any concept of 'not at work'.
Hey Wedg1e, welcome back (well its been a while) 
Maybe you should send them a reply which contains all the lyrics of Bohemium Rhapsody late on a Friday night?
I had exactly the same thing with my BT Tone pager when they first came out. I was 26 at the time and just in the process of buying my first house at 6pm (literaly at the estate agents and signing the papers when the b
d went off for the first time). Naturally I ignored it, like you do, but it was a very important job and it wasn't until some hours later that I realised that I would be well and truly in the st unless I could think of a sterling excuse as to why I didn't answer it, so it got me thinking. I would blow it up by over-voltage. Ok, so it runs on a 1.5v battery, so connecting it the wrong way round to a car battery charger should do it right? Er no. It worked perfectly afterwards. Right then, I will connect it to a truck battery charger on boost charge, the wrong way around. Erm, no it still works! Ok, I will connect it to the mains 240v supply using a LEN block and blow it up that way. Nope: still works 
How the fk does it work then?? Answer - radio signals, so what is the biggest radio signal I can subject it to 
Microwaves!
So 3 seconds on re-heat and a little pop noise later and I take it out. Switch it on and .. nada. I rang it - silence ah
The next day I stroll into work, the boss throws a large one, and I iterate that that the pager did not go off at all. My boss opens the draw and pulls out a box of new batteries, and after a fresh set, guess what it still doesn't work
So: if you have a piece of electronic reportage that is going to call you in, PUT IT IN THE BLOODY MICROWAVE AND PRESS REHEAT FOR 3 SECONDS cos the repair centre will have seen every type of malfunction in the world except this one
Maybe you should send them a reply which contains all the lyrics of Bohemium Rhapsody late on a Friday night?
I had exactly the same thing with my BT Tone pager when they first came out. I was 26 at the time and just in the process of buying my first house at 6pm (literaly at the estate agents and signing the papers when the b
d went off for the first time). Naturally I ignored it, like you do, but it was a very important job and it wasn't until some hours later that I realised that I would be well and truly in the st unless I could think of a sterling excuse as to why I didn't answer it, so it got me thinking. I would blow it up by over-voltage. Ok, so it runs on a 1.5v battery, so connecting it the wrong way round to a car battery charger should do it right? Er no. It worked perfectly afterwards. Right then, I will connect it to a truck battery charger on boost charge, the wrong way around. Erm, no it still works! Ok, I will connect it to the mains 240v supply using a LEN block and blow it up that way. Nope: still works How the f
k does it work then?? Answer - radio signals, so what is the biggest radio signal I can subject it to Microwaves!
So 3 seconds on re-heat and a little pop noise later and I take it out. Switch it on and .. nada. I rang it - silence ah
The next day I stroll into work, the boss throws a large one, and I iterate that that the pager did not go off at all. My boss opens the draw and pulls out a box of new batteries, and after a fresh set, guess what it still doesn't work
So: if you have a piece of electronic reportage that is going to call you in, PUT IT IN THE BLOODY MICROWAVE AND PRESS REHEAT FOR 3 SECONDS cos the repair centre will have seen every type of malfunction in the world except this one
got a mobile, chose it myself as the old works one died and they wanted £70 handling fee to get me a new phone, nokia 2610 i recall, seems ok 
at the end of the day, it gets turned off, does not matter if at hotel or at home, work keeps trying to get personal mobile, but it is on a need to know basis and they not need to know
at the end of the day, it gets turned off, does not matter if at hotel or at home, work keeps trying to get personal mobile, but it is on a need to know basis and they not need to know
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