Clueless customers

[mm]

On Wed, 10 Mar 2010 21:52:38 -0800, Jeff Liebermann <jeffl@cruzio.com>
wrote:

I need to rant...

Welcome to life in the slow lane. I got an email from a customer
asking what type of contact cleaner to use on his laptop keyboard. I
grab the phone, call, but too late. He had already sprayed contact
cleaner all over (and under) the keyboard. Instead of a few "push
hard to operate" keys, he now has a dozen inoperative keys. He
logically proclaimed that the stuff was "contact cleaner" and that his
keyboard problem was obviously a "contact" problem. Ummmm... yeah.

So, he drags the laptop to my office. I remove the keyboard and dump
it into a glass baking dish full of 90% alcohol. A bit of thrashing,

I have the image of the evil explorer falling into a pond full of
pirhania.

brushing, and lots of air hose blow drying, and it's working again. I
was lucky and the keytop decals didn't dissolve.

This is the same customer that has a Dell 531 desktop with the
vertically mounted CD/DVD drive. About half the time, he puts the CD
in upside-down, and then calls me wondering why it won't install or
play.

That makes sense. The odds are that half the time he'll put it in
right-side-right.

Oh, that's the model they released *without* the cup holder, right?

It has a cup-holder. It just holds the cup sideways. Darn. Jeff
already said that.

Why me?

Hmmm.

 

[David Nebenzahl]

On 3/10/2010 11:54 PM Jeff Liebermann spake thus:

Another day in computer hell. Against my better judgment, I pickup a
customer at one of those lavish senior retirement housing projects.

[...]

Senior discount applied and I leave with the check. No problems.
However, she tells all her friends at the retirement home, and the
phone starts ringing with the most amazing collection of strange
questions and problems. I'm starting to question my own sanity.

Ah; I think the saying that applies here is "No good deed goes unpunished".


--
You were wrong, and I'm man enough to admit it.

- a Usenet "apology"

 

[Roger Blake]

On 2010-03-11, Meat Plow <Meat> wrote:

I gave up on PC repair because of the people who use them and don't
learn from their mistakes.

Most people are just too stoopid to be using a computer. They would be
far better off and everyone happier if they stuck to using a typewriter.

--
Roger Blake
(Change "invalid" to "com" for email. Google Groups killfiled due to spam.)
"Obama dozed while people froze."

 

On Thu, 11 Mar 2010 18:58:21 +0000 (UTC), Roger Blake
<rogblake@iname.invalid>wrote:

On 2010-03-11, Meat Plow <Meat> wrote:
I gave up on PC repair because of the people who use them and don't
learn from their mistakes.

Most people are just too stoopid to be using a computer. They would be
far better off and everyone happier if they stuck to using a typewriter.

I spent several years as an IT consultant and you are 200% correct. I
would much rather sit 8 hours in a NOC and monitor traffic and admin
routers and other ingress/egress equipment than to deal with an office
full of idiots.

 

[William R. Walsh]

Hi!

The real fun was when CD's arrived, and people were cramming
them into the 5.25" floppy slot.

But that shouldn't cause any *lasting* harm that turning the machine
off and tipping it forward to let the disc slide out...at least with
common 5.25" drive types. BTDT when my younger brothers stuffed a CD
into the 5.25" drive of my then-fairly-new 386SX.

I would agree otherwise, because there are some drives that could do
Bad Things to a disc and/or require extraction. I've got some drives
that have oddly-designed slimline mechanisms or electronic insert/
eject features.

William

 

[William R. Walsh]

Hi!

I need to rant...

alt.sysadmin.recovery is a good place too. There's an entrance exam.
(Sorry, but the FAQ for the group says you're not to drop hints.)

He had already sprayed contact cleaner all over (and under) the
keyboard.

Oh. Oh my. I think I'd have told him to just push it into the trash at
that point, or maybe that I'd come by to perform the autopsy.

This is the same customer that has a Dell 531 desktop with the
vertically mounted CD/DVD drive.  About half the time, he puts
the CD in upside-down, and then calls me wondering why it
won't install or play.

Later in this thread, I believe you relent a bit. I like to see the
best in people, but really--they can't be "bothered" to make sure the
disc is put into place the right way every time? What else (whose
outcome might be significantly more serious) can't they be "bothered"
to concern themselves with doing correctly? Driving? Voting? Wiring
the house? Servicing potentially safety-sensitive equipment used by
the general public?

I start thinking some very BOFH-ly thoughts when this kind of stuff
rolls around.

William (sorry, think I got on a bit of a soap box there)

 

[LSMFT]

Jeff Liebermann wrote:

I need to rant...

Welcome to life in the slow lane. I got an email from a customer
asking what type of contact cleaner to use on his laptop keyboard. I
grab the phone, call, but too late. He had already sprayed contact
cleaner all over (and under) the keyboard. Instead of a few "push
hard to operate" keys, he now has a dozen inoperative keys. He
logically proclaimed that the stuff was "contact cleaner" and that his
keyboard problem was obviously a "contact" problem. Ummmm... yeah.

So, he drags the laptop to my office. I remove the keyboard and dump
it into a glass baking dish full of 90% alcohol. A bit of thrashing,
brushing, and lots of air hose blow drying, and it's working again. I
was lucky and the keytop decals didn't dissolve.

This is the same customer that has a Dell 531 desktop with the
vertically mounted CD/DVD drive. About half the time, he puts the CD
in upside-down, and then calls me wondering why it won't install or
play.

Why me?


That's nothing. Some morons are too stupid to shut the switch off when

the gas pedal sticks.

 

[Charlie]

"Jeff Liebermann" <jeffl@cruzio.com> wrote in message
news:uk0hp59knc6mgnd0sht0cd3q4mpr3nvfhn@4ax.com...

I need to rant...

Welcome to life in the slow lane. I got an email from a customer
asking what type of contact cleaner to use on his laptop keyboard. I
grab the phone, call, but too late. He had already sprayed contact
cleaner all over (and under) the keyboard. Instead of a few "push
hard to operate" keys, he now has a dozen inoperative keys. He
logically proclaimed that the stuff was "contact cleaner" and that his
keyboard problem was obviously a "contact" problem. Ummmm... yeah.

So, he drags the laptop to my office. I remove the keyboard and dump
it into a glass baking dish full of 90% alcohol. A bit of thrashing,
brushing, and lots of air hose blow drying, and it's working again. I
was lucky and the keytop decals didn't dissolve.

This is the same customer that has a Dell 531 desktop with the
vertically mounted CD/DVD drive. About half the time, he puts the CD
in upside-down, and then calls me wondering why it won't install or
play.

Why me?

I have read through the whole thread that is posted to date.
I am going to make a few observations.
First a bit of background. I am in a 55 plus community. I am more than 20
years on the plus side of that age requirement.

There are lots of seniors here. Some are computer savvy, some are really
trying to learn and some are absolute technophobes.
Computers here are used primarily for e-mail and web searching. I have
become the local PC fixer. I see most of all the little anecdotes in this
thread up close and personal.

Now a lot of these folks are part year residents owning a house here in
Florida and one up north. In their younger days they were smart enough to
amass enough money for this lifestyle without the need for computers. They
hired the people they needed to do that IT stuff and used their talents
elsewhere.

Some enjoy seeing the rest of the family using Skype, others get infected
with malware sort of regularly regardless how many times they were told to
update, update, update.

A lot of us have memory problems and refer to lapses as senior moments or
CRS (can't remember shit). For those in this newsgroup, who seem to be
demeaning, think about what you have to look forward to (if you are lucky
enough to get to the retirement age).

I am not apologizing for the silly things that some of us do. It is life and
I hope you last long enough on this side of the grass to be looked at by the
new kids coming up who think you are old fools because you can't keep up
with the latest greatest toys and tools.

So have a little compassion because what you see is where you are going.

A tradesman coming into our area said he hated to work with seniors. My
response was that, in that case, I hoped he did not live long enough to be
one.

So I wish you all my favorite thought. May you have health and wealth and
time to enjoy them. And be kind.

Charlie (who started out testing germanium transistors)

 

[Jeff Liebermann]

On Thu, 11 Mar 2010 13:17:48 -0500, mm <NOPSAMmm2005@bigfoot.com>
wrote:

I have the image of the evil explorer falling into a pond full of
pirhania.

Not this customers. However, I do have an occasional customer that
drops his laptops off when he visits the area. However, he's not
evil. He's a doctor that travels to some of the strangest parts of
the planet, lives there for up to about 3 years, tries to leave the
locals in better shape than when he arrived, and returns to
civilization every few years. The laptops have come back full of
fungus, green slime, mud, corrosion, and insect remains. I have to
disinfect and deodorize the laptop before tearing it apart for a more
thorough cleanup. A few years ago, it came back smelling of rotten
Durian fruit:
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Durian>
I stock replacement keyboards in anticipation of his arrival. Also
spare HD drives in case something dies. Most of the LCD's have the
bottom part of the screen trashed, where capillary action sucks water
into the LCD panel. Fixing his machines is like equipping an
expedition.

I got him to buy a 3 year warranty extension from Dell on the last
laptop (Dell Precision M4400). I haven't tried it yet, but I wonder
what Dell would think if I mailed them the smelly fungus farm laptop
for repair?

That makes sense. The odds are that half the time he'll put it in
right-side-right.

He has disk envelopes for most of his CD's. About half of them are
inserted with the data side facing the window, where he can't tell
what's inside the envelope. My guess(tm) is that the definition of
"right side up" depends on which way the disk is inserted in the
envelope.

--
# Jeff Liebermann 150 Felker St #D Santa Cruz CA 95060
# 831-336-2558
# http://802.11junk.com jeffl@cruzio.com
# http://www.LearnByDestroying.com AE6KS

 

[Jeff Liebermann]

On Thu, 11 Mar 2010 13:41:15 -0800 (PST), "William R. Walsh"
<wm_walsh@hotmail.com> wrote:

I need to rant...

alt.sysadmin.recovery is a good place too. There's an entrance exam.
(Sorry, but the FAQ for the group says you're not to drop hints.)

Been there, done that, and know the trick. (No, I'm not telling). The
problem is that most of the posting are for or about sysadmins doing
evil and dastardly things to customers and lusers. That's fine, but
not very interesting to me. I have no intention of retaliating
against paying customers. It's just that sometimes, I get a bit
frustrated and need to unload. Methinks a repair newsgroup is more
appropriate for a repair oriented rant.

He had already sprayed contact cleaner all over (and under) the
keyboard.

Oh. Oh my. I think I'd have told him to just push it into the trash at
that point, or maybe that I'd come by to perform the autopsy.

I gave it about a 50% chance of being able to recover the keyboard. I
was more worried about what was inside the keyboard that was causing
the intermittent connections and sticky keys. I guess the alcohol and
water washed it and the contact cleaner oil away.

Later in this thread, I believe you relent a bit. I like to see the
best in people, but really--they can't be "bothered" to make sure the
disc is put into place the right way every time? What else (whose
outcome might be significantly more serious) can't they be "bothered"
to concern themselves with doing correctly? Driving? Voting? Wiring
the house? Servicing potentially safety-sensitive equipment used by
the general public?

Good slippery slope theory, but it doesn't apply here. The customer
is quite wealthy. If I bothered to take his annual income, and divide
it by the number of hours that he "works", he could easily afford my
exorbitant rates instead of learning how to operate the computer by
himself. Let's just say he has better things to do.

I start thinking some very BOFH-ly thoughts when this kind of stuff
rolls around.

Sure. Biting the hand that supports my decadent and lavish lifestyle
is not good policy.



--
# Jeff Liebermann 150 Felker St #D Santa Cruz CA 95060
# 831-336-2558
# http://802.11junk.com jeffl@cruzio.com
# http://www.LearnByDestroying.com AE6KS

 

[Jeff Liebermann]

On Thu, 11 Mar 2010 09:12:56 -0800 (PST), "hr(bob) hofmann@att.net"
<hrhofmann@att.net> wrote:

Who provided the air hose??

Ummm... me. I have an air compressor in the office, in my Subaru, and
a big one at home. It's best to blow the dust and dirt out of
machines outside before I bring them inside. Much less dirt and dust
to clean up later. It's also useful for blow drying liquids and to
accellerate evaporation, such as for keyboard cleaning. Before I
bought the compressors, I used to blow out the dust with my breath,
which I decided was not very healthy when I discovered black dirt in
my nose and throat.

--
# Jeff Liebermann 150 Felker St #D Santa Cruz CA 95060
# 831-336-2558
# http://802.11junk.com jeffl@cruzio.com
# http://www.LearnByDestroying.com AE6KS

 

[Jeff Liebermann]

On Thu, 11 Mar 2010 17:04:08 -0500, Meat Plow wrote:

I spent several years as an IT consultant and you are 200% correct. I
would much rather sit 8 hours in a NOC and monitor traffic and admin
routers and other ingress/egress equipment than to deal with an office
full of idiots.

The choice is dealing with things or people. I do better dealing with
things, but it's dealing with people that generates the most revenue
for me. I get bored easily and reading reports or staring at monitors
all day does not do anything for me.

Working in IT or as a corporate hired gun is very different from
helping individual customers and small companies with their computer
problems. One of the major differences is that I can fire an
individual customers if necessary. You can't easily do that in a
corporate environment when one user gives you a problem. I've been
doing this (and other things) since about 1983, and have only had to
fire perhaps 4 customers.

--
# Jeff Liebermann 150 Felker St #D Santa Cruz CA 95060
# 831-336-2558
# http://802.11junk.com jeffl@cruzio.com
# http://www.LearnByDestroying.com AE6KS

 

[Dave Platt]

In article <qfejp5p4n60fgvk56479js454ps8pcsr9s@4ax.com>,
Jeff Liebermann <jeffl@cruzio.com> wrote:

I have to
disinfect and deodorize the laptop before tearing it apart for a more
thorough cleanup. A few years ago, it came back smelling of rotten
Durian fruit:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Durian

Out of curiosity - does rotten Durian fruit smell any different/worse
than fresh ripe Durian fruit?

--
Dave Platt <dplatt@radagast.org> AE6EO
Friends of Jade Warrior home page: http://www.radagast.org/jade-warrior
I do _not_ wish to receive unsolicited commercial email, and I will
boycott any company which has the gall to send me such ads!

 

[Arfa Daily]

"Jeff Liebermann" <jeffl@cruzio.com> wrote in message
news:qfejp5p4n60fgvk56479js454ps8pcsr9s@4ax.com...

On Thu, 11 Mar 2010 13:17:48 -0500, mm <NOPSAMmm2005@bigfoot.com
wrote:

I have the image of the evil explorer falling into a pond full of
pirhania.

Not this customers. However, I do have an occasional customer that
drops his laptops off when he visits the area. However, he's not
evil. He's a doctor that travels to some of the strangest parts of
the planet, lives there for up to about 3 years, tries to leave the
locals in better shape than when he arrived, and returns to
civilization every few years. The laptops have come back full of
fungus, green slime, mud, corrosion, and insect remains. I have to
disinfect and deodorize the laptop before tearing it apart for a more
thorough cleanup. A few years ago, it came back smelling of rotten
Durian fruit:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Durian
I stock replacement keyboards in anticipation of his arrival. Also
spare HD drives in case something dies. Most of the LCD's have the
bottom part of the screen trashed, where capillary action sucks water
into the LCD panel. Fixing his machines is like equipping an
expedition.

I got him to buy a 3 year warranty extension from Dell on the last
laptop (Dell Precision M4400). I haven't tried it yet, but I wonder
what Dell would think if I mailed them the smelly fungus farm laptop
for repair?

If Dell U.S. is anything like Dell U.K. , they would just reject it. Friend
of ours sent his daughter's notebook back with a broken DC socket. They
rejected it under warranty, claiming that damage to DC sockets was a
user-caused problem, and not covered. They quoted him silly money to repair
it. He could have gone to the local supermarket and bought something similar
for less money than they wanted. It ended up at my colleague's repair shop,
where it was repaired for the cost of a socket from a fleabay store, and an
hour's labour. Companies like Dell do themselves no favours by having an
attitude like this. Up until this point, the friend used all Dell computers
both at home and at his (considerable sized) business, but he has now said
that he will never buy from them again ...

Arfa

That makes sense. The odds are that half the time he'll put it in
right-side-right.

He has disk envelopes for most of his CD's. About half of them are
inserted with the data side facing the window, where he can't tell
what's inside the envelope. My guess(tm) is that the definition of
"right side up" depends on which way the disk is inserted in the
envelope.

--
# Jeff Liebermann 150 Felker St #D Santa Cruz CA 95060
# 831-336-2558
# http://802.11junk.com jeffl@cruzio.com
# http://www.LearnByDestroying.com AE6KS

 

[Jeff Liebermann]

On Thu, 11 Mar 2010 13:33:33 -0800 (PST), "William R. Walsh"
<wm_walsh@hotmail.com> wrote:

The real fun was when CD's arrived, and people were cramming
them into the 5.25" floppy slot.

But that shouldn't cause any *lasting* harm that turning the machine
off and tipping it forward to let the disc slide out...at least with
common 5.25" drive types. BTDT when my younger brothers stuffed a CD
into the 5.25" drive of my then-fairly-new 386SX.

I don't recall the machine involved but it was in the days of
monstrous tower cases and space eating desktops. I vaguely recall
paying about $700 for the 1x drive and $100 for CD. I didn't think of
tipping the case and I suspect it wouldn't have done any good. I
carry a hemostat for moving jumpers around. I covered the jaws with
tissue paper and gently extracted the CD.

Despite my success at this repair job, I lost the customer. The
owners wife was the one that stuffed in the CD. I got the call on my
pager and returned her call on a pay phone. When she told me the
problem, I couldn't help laughing a little. That was all it took. She
assumed that I was laughing at her lack of computer talent (which was
true) and took it personally. Apologies were futile.

I would agree otherwise, because there are some drives that could do
Bad Things to a disc and/or require extraction. I've got some drives
that have oddly-designed slimline mechanisms or electronic insert/
eject features.

Those are really where you insert the credit card or dollar bills.
I've fished credit cards out of those CD/DVD drives (the one's without
a tray). Incidentally, I found a box of CD caddies buried in the
office. I've often suspected they were invented solely to prevent
users from shoving 5.25" floppy disks into the CD/DVD slot. Once
5.25" were safely obsolete, it was considered safe to release CD/DVD
drives without a tray or caddy. (Yet another conspiracy theory).

--
Jeff Liebermann jeffl@cruzio.com
150 Felker St #D http://www.LearnByDestroying.com
Santa Cruz CA 95060 http://802.11junk.com
Skype: JeffLiebermann AE6KS 831-336-2558

 

[Jeff Liebermann]

On Thu, 11 Mar 2010 21:39:59 -0800, dplatt@radagast.org (Dave Platt)
wrote:

I have to
disinfect and deodorize the laptop before tearing it apart for a more
thorough cleanup. A few years ago, it came back smelling of rotten
Durian fruit:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Durian

Out of curiosity - does rotten Durian fruit smell any different/worse
than fresh ripe Durian fruit?

I've never tasted or smelled the real thing, so I have no way to
compare. The rotted version smelled like a restaurant dumpster. It
also lingered in my office for several days and required washing the
workbench and laptop bag with alcohol. I eventually gave the entire
laptop an alcohol bath, which was a big help. I think the rotten
fruit was mostly in the keyboard. I also had to throw away the carpet
on the bench and a plastic trash can. I became somewhat accustomed to
the smell after a few days, but visitors to my office were far less
tolerant. How he made it through an international airplane flight,
with this stench bag as presumably carry on luggage will remain a
mystery. I forgot to ask.

There are some colorful descriptions of the smell at:
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Durian#Flavour_and_odour>

Deodorized Durian, which is most likely an oxymoron:
<http://en.wikinews.org/wiki/Thai_scientist_has_deodorized_the_stinky_%27king_of_fruits%27>

--
Jeff Liebermann jeffl@cruzio.com
150 Felker St #D http://www.LearnByDestroying.com
Santa Cruz CA 95060 http://802.11junk.com
Skype: JeffLiebermann AE6KS 831-336-2558

 

[Michael A. Terrell]

Jeff Liebermann wrote:

On Thu, 11 Mar 2010 13:33:33 -0800 (PST), "William R. Walsh"
wm_walsh@hotmail.com> wrote:

The real fun was when CD's arrived, and people were cramming
them into the 5.25" floppy slot.

But that shouldn't cause any *lasting* harm that turning the machine
off and tipping it forward to let the disc slide out...at least with
common 5.25" drive types. BTDT when my younger brothers stuffed a CD
into the 5.25" drive of my then-fairly-new 386SX.

I don't recall the machine involved but it was in the days of
monstrous tower cases and space eating desktops. I vaguely recall
paying about $700 for the 1x drive and $100 for CD. I didn't think of
tipping the case and I suspect it wouldn't have done any good. I
carry a hemostat for moving jumpers around. I covered the jaws with
tissue paper and gently extracted the CD.

Despite my success at this repair job, I lost the customer. The
owners wife was the one that stuffed in the CD. I got the call on my
pager and returned her call on a pay phone. When she told me the
problem, I couldn't help laughing a little. That was all it took. She
assumed that I was laughing at her lack of computer talent (which was
true) and took it personally. Apologies were futile.

I would agree otherwise, because there are some drives that could do
Bad Things to a disc and/or require extraction. I've got some drives
that have oddly-designed slimline mechanisms or electronic insert/
eject features.

Those are really where you insert the credit card or dollar bills.
I've fished credit cards out of those CD/DVD drives (the one's without
a tray). Incidentally, I found a box of CD caddies buried in the
office. I've often suspected they were invented solely to prevent
users from shoving 5.25" floppy disks into the CD/DVD slot. Once
5.25" were safely obsolete, it was considered safe to release CD/DVD
drives without a tray or caddy. (Yet another conspiracy theory).

I've seen hundreds of PCs with a caddyless CD-ROM drive and a 5.25"
floppy drive.

Some data services continued to use caddies to ship & protect their
data. A friend used them at a garage where he worked to find service
data and replacement parts. He got one or two new caddies with disk
every month, and had to return the disks & caddies they replaced.

--
Lead free solder is Belgium's version of 'Hold my beer and watch this!'

 

[Jeff Liebermann]

On Thu, 11 Mar 2010 23:02:47 -0500, "Charlie" <left@thestation.com>
wrote:

I have
become the local PC fixer.

You have my simultaneous admiration and sympathies.

I'm 62:
<http://www.LearnByDestroying.com/panorama/jeffl.htm>
(Move mouse around the picture after it loads)

One of my friends (now deceased) was kicked out of a retirement home
for running a successful printing and publishing business in his room.
Incidentally, we have a local organization that deals with teaching
computers to seniors:
<http://www.seniorcomputer.org>
I'm not involved and really don't know anything about what they do.

Some enjoy seeing the rest of the family using Skype,

Yep. Besides email and web surfing, Skype is the next major
application. The few that can't handle it on the computah get either
a Skype Phone, or a real SIP phone for endless long distance calls.

Today's Skype anecdote (not from a senior). I get a call from a
customer indicating that the new Toshiba laptop I arranged for them to
purchase works fine, but the built in camera is very blurry and otto
focus in Skype. Such cameras are fixed focus so I'm starting to think
about warranty returns and other logistical nightmares. After a few
seconds thought, I ask if they had removed the protective clear
plastic film from the camera lens area. Nope. Problem solved.

others get infected
with malware sort of regularly regardless how many times they were told to
update, update, update.

I do fairly well with Microsoft Security Essentials and MalwareBytes.
The problem is explaining to permanent beginners when to click "ok"
and when it's really some spyware trying to install itself. One lady
had her expert tell her to say "NO" to everything. Two years later,
her machine had never seen a single update, and still was full of
spyware. I don't have a fix for this problem as Microsoft's solution
of asking even more dumb questions is an obvious failure.

Another senior anecdote. I was hired by a couple in their 70's living
in a local retirement home to setup their new computer. Their
daughter had bought them a computer so they could exchange email. I
got it setup, and patiently demonstrated and explained how to use now
ancient versions of Netscape and Eudora. They seemed to be taking it
in, but also seems rather distracted. I was asked a few random
questions about myself instead of about computing. When they were
satisfied I was fairly trustworthy, they asked "Where's the
pornography". Now I understood what the computer was really going to
be used for.

A lot of us have memory problems and refer to lapses as senior moments or
CRS (can't remember shit).

No kidding. Getting old is not for sissies.

For those in this newsgroup, who seem to be
demeaning, think about what you have to look forward to (if you are lucky
enough to get to the retirement age).

Yep. When I was 20, I was going to live forever, rule the world, and
was indestructible. That worked fairly well until about age 50, when
I started falling apart. If I knew I was going to live this long, I
would have taken better care of myself.

I am not apologizing for the silly things that some of us do. It is life and
I hope you last long enough on this side of the grass to be looked at by the
new kids coming up who think you are old fools because you can't keep up
with the latest greatest toys and tools.

Yep. I've been fighting computahs since about 1983. I've survived
several economic downturns (formerly known as recessions). Every time
the local high tech companies have a layoff, a pile of new business
cards appear at the local electronics store:
<http://www.santacruzelectronics.com>
Mostly, they're former engineers, technicians, and specialists looking
for something to do between jobs. Computer consulting seems easy. The
average was about 6 months before giving up and blundering into
something else. Most know more about computahs and technology than
I'll ever know. Many have a wall full of certificates and
certifications. Too bad nobody ever taught them how to make the
customer happy, how to cheat on taxes, fair billing practices, and how
to run a small business.

So have a little compassion because what you see is where you are going.

I've seen worse. My father was in a convalescent hospital for about 9
years. Two of my customers are local convalescent hospitals. It
takes me about an hour to recover after visiting one of these.
Retirement homes are wonderful compared to those nightmares.

Incidentally, I used to give the local 13 year old aspiring
delinquents a tour of the oncology ward at the local hospital if they
were caught smoking. I didn't have to say much as the patients with
emphysema or lung cancer did most of the work. My father did the same
to me with a lunch visit to the Union Rescue Mission in Smog Angeles
when it appeared that I was becoming a lazy bum. It worked for me,
but my batting average on smokers is only about 50%. If we can show
people their future, many attitudes, and bad habits change rapidly.

A tradesman coming into our area said he hated to work with seniors. My
response was that, in that case, I hoped he did not live long enough to be
one.

Careful. What they say and what they believe may be quite different.
Complaining (kvetching) is considered part of the profession.

So I wish you all my favorite thought. May you have health and wealth and
time to enjoy them. And be kind.

Thanks. "Live long and prosper" (Mr Spock). Fixing health problems
is usually what causes premature senior impoverishment.

Charlie (who started out testing germanium transistors)

I still have some CK722 transistors. Also, Ge is making a come back
in the form of SiGe.
<http://www.sige.com>
<http://www.eng.auburn.edu/~guofu/sige_intro.htm>
I got my start in the womens wear biz, but I won't go there.



--
# Jeff Liebermann 150 Felker St #D Santa Cruz CA 95060
# 831-336-2558
# http://802.11junk.com jeffl@cruzio.com
# http://www.LearnByDestroying.com AE6KS

 

[David]

In article <te8hp5p5tl7a6dlsvb4t49lfvqo5bumkbe@4ax.com>,
Jeff Liebermann <jeffl@cruzio.com> wrote:

..... > He's not a dummy. He just doesn't care about

computers and uses one only when there's no effective alternative. I
have other customers with the same mentality. They don't want to
waste any time dealing with the technology or doing battle with the
machines. They pay me to do that. For example, if they need to burn
a CD with a few files, I get the phone call and walk them through it.
When done, they immediately forget everything I tried to teach them as
they probably won't need to do it again for several months. One
customer suggested that it was futile learning how to do anything
because it all changes every few years.

Customers can be strange - back in the stone age when I was running a
HiFi store one customer would call me out about every month or so to
balance the tone arm on his turntable.

Always gave an 'explanation' (the wife or the kids, or the cat etc) of
how it became unbalanced.

I showed him over and over again how he could do it himself, but no - I
would get a call a month or so later to come and rebalance it again.

A real dummy hey? No. He was a doctor!

Anyway, it was a nice little earner I guess - $30 a time was good money
back then

David