The help desk manager I often work with on high level issues were talking the other day about a problem she had with a user. The problem the user was having had been her laptop was turning on briefly and then shutting down for no apparent reason. The reason the topic even came up was due to the user throwing a childish tantrum at the help desk manager’s desk about how IT had purposely done something to her laptop. Of course the second it happened everyone was IM’d and we all walked over to hide and listen to the display of unprofessionalism. I have to add the user was another manager. This is how we handle things like that. Basically laugh about it collectively or we all know the stress would be overwhelming. So the problem turned out to be the user had been plugging a space heater into a power strip under her desk. This is the same power strip she plugged her laptop power supply into. The space heater literally fried the power strip thus causing the laptop to not charge. *sigh* Luckily my “in case of complete disaster” planning didn’t have to go into affect due to this moron burning down the building.

Imagine what could have happened if she plugged the heater into the wall.

Of course no face-to-face apologies were done by the user. I think the story we have now was more than enough thanks though.

Warning!!! There is a reason they don’t allow space heaters in most office spaces. Listen to the warnings!!!