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We had our ten-year-old daughter late in life, long after our two boys were born. She is the joy of my husband's life, but he is self-conscious about being an older father. He likes to jokingly tell people that by the time she graduates from high school, he'll be in a nursing home.
One day she asked, "Mom, you know how Dad always says he'll be in a home when I graduate?"
I nodded, expecting some sad question about mortality.
She continued, "Can I have the car then?"
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As Long as the Boss is Happy
Big defense contractor buys a small company, and the small company gets a
new IT boss just as work starts to integrate systems with the big outfit's
infrastructure, reports a technician on the scene.
And though the new boss has no computer skills or knowledge, she's still
the source of a steady stream of instructions for renovating the data center.
"This initially included installing a window into the data center," says
the technician. "She wanted to be able to see into it as she walked in
every morning and at every smoke break."
"It seemed strange, but I was happy if that meant I could keep her from
actually coming into the data center and possibly destroying something."
A week or two later, the boss tells the technician to install track
lighting over each row of servers lining the room. Then she requests dimmer
switches to control the track lighting.
"Weird assignments kept rolling in -- knock out a wall here, paint a wall
there, change the colors of the electrical outlet covers -- while I labored
with co-workers to get the real work done," he says. "Meanwhile, I endured
daily meetings with corporate managers to describe and explain any and all
progress made from the previous day's labors."
Then comes a major project: replacing the aging network switches. "The
Friday before we began, I let the boss know what we had assigned to us,"
says the technician. "She nearly had a cow. She immediately started calling
everyone she knew at company headquarters, ranting and raving that this
would be way too disruptive to the users and cause general havoc."
The project is pushed back two weeks, but then rescheduled. That Friday,
the boss tells the technical staff not to make any changes, no matter what.
"It was then that I finally got the real reason for why she wanted the
blinking switches to stay. She loved walking by several times a day and
looking through the window in the data center to see the pretty green
blinking lights. "That made her feel everything inside the data center was
working well. The green activity lights let her know there were no
problems, or they would have started blinking amber or red."
After our little talk, I spoke with the corporate folks and was told in no
uncertain terms that if this project wasn't done that weekend, I would face
serious consequences. I told them not to worry. It would be done by Monday
morning.
Over the weekend, the tech and a co-worker make the changes and remove the
switches. But they leave the old switch racks in place. "We installed
random-blinking green Christmas lights where the switches used to sit
behind the smoked glass doors," he says.
"To this day, my boss still thinks she won the battle to keep the blinking
switches in place."
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"Skipper," the sailor said to his captain as he saluted, "A special message just came in for you from the admiral. I have it right here."
"Read it to me," the captain ordered.
The sailor read, "You are without a doubt the most idiotic, lame- brained officer ever to command a ship in the United States Navy."
The skipper responded, "Have that communication decoded at once!"
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"Skipper," the sailor said to his captain as he saluted, "A special message just came in for you from the admiral. I have it right here."
"Read it to me," the captain ordered.
The sailor read, "You are without a doubt the most idiotic, lame- brained officer ever to command a ship in the United States Navy."
The skipper responded, "Have that communication decoded at once!"
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The Sailor and the Marine
An old Sailor and an old Marine were sitting at the VFW arguing about who'd
had the tougher career.
"I did 30 years in the Corps," the Marine declared proudly, "and fought in
three of my country's wars. Fresh out of boot camp, I hit the beach at
Okinawa, clawed my way up the blood-soaked sand, and eventually took out an
entire enemy machine gun nest with a single grenade.
"As a sergeant, I fought in Korea. We pushed back the enemy inch by bloody
inch all the way up to the Chinese border, always under a barrage of
artillery and small arms fire.
"Finally, as a gunny sergeant, I did three consecutive combat tours in
Vietnam. We humped through the mud and razorgrass for 14 hours a day,
plagued by rain and mosquitoes, ducking under sniper fire all day and
mortar fire all night. In a firefight, we'd fire until our arms ached and
our guns were empty, then we'd charge the enemy with bayonets!"
"Ah," said the Sailor with a dismissive wave of his hand, "all shore duty,
huh?"