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It Won't Wake Up!
According to the search function, I have not yet told this tale here.
It happened long ago, when I still worked for the big brown shipping company, in the teleservices department. I did not take this call, but it was a legend in the company. Please note that the SC's voice must be imagined in a very thick far eastern accent.
The customer was a female employee working in the shipping department of a small company. Some of these companies rented computers from us, loaded with our shipping software, as was the case here. We aren't allowed to send out a tech unless we owned the computer.
In the customer's defense, she wasn't stupid, just clueless. You'll see why soon.
T: Tech
C: Customer
T: Thank you for calling the shipping company. My name is Tech. May I have your shipper number, please?
C: *panicked* Help me, help me! My computer, it won't wake up!
T: *puzzled, and can't really make out what she's saying* Ma'am, please calm down, and I can help you better. What is the problem, again?
C: *still panicked, and almost crying* My computer! It won't wake up! Help me! I fed it and it won't wake up!
T: Your computer won't wake up, Ma'am?
C: Yes, yes! I fed it and it won't wake up!
The tech at this point thought she "fed" it a floppy (the computers weren't shipped with CD drives to prevent customers from installing games, which was against the TOS), and proceeded to walk her through the usual steps. These included wiggling the mouse, typing on the keyboard, telling her to press the button "on the box under the desk" instead of the monitor, even checking the powercord. Nothing worked, and she was getting more and more frantic.
C: I am going to lose my job! It won't wake up! I fed it and it won't wake up!
T: *still thinking she's talking about floppies* Please calm down, Ma'am, and I'll call second level support to help with this. May I place you on hold for two minutes?
C: Please! I need help! I fed it rice, and it won't wake up!
T: *light dings on* ... Ma'am, could you repeat that again, please?
C: I fed it rice, and it won't wake up!
T: *long pause* Ma'am, you fed your computer rice?
C: Yes, yes! I fed it rice and it won't wake up!
T: *twitching at the very thought of such hardware abuse, but somehow managing to stay somewhat calm* I'm going to send a tech out to your location instead, Ma'am. Can you confirm some information for me, please?
Customer confirms the information, and the tech includes a note to the field tech to let him know what happened.
Turns out, the woman was (apparently) a devout Shintoist, and believed everything has a soul, including her computer. Whenever it went into stand-by mode, she would feed it rice through the floppy drive to "wake" it up. She continued to do so til the computer finally gave up the ghost.
This was an old 486 box using Windows 3.11. Scarily enough, when the field tech opened the case, the floppy drive was full of rice (I assume dried, though the field tech never said), and *so was a good portion of the case.* The computer kept running until the rice burned onto the processor, and caused it to overheat.
The tech explained to the woman that computers did not like rice, and if she wished to feed it in the future, she should use floppies. I assume she learned her lesson or was fired, because when the tech who took the call checked the shipper number later, there were no further updates.
It happened long ago, when I still worked for the big brown shipping company, in the teleservices department. I did not take this call, but it was a legend in the company. Please note that the SC's voice must be imagined in a very thick far eastern accent.
The customer was a female employee working in the shipping department of a small company. Some of these companies rented computers from us, loaded with our shipping software, as was the case here. We aren't allowed to send out a tech unless we owned the computer.
In the customer's defense, she wasn't stupid, just clueless. You'll see why soon.
T: Tech
C: Customer
T: Thank you for calling the shipping company. My name is Tech. May I have your shipper number, please?
C: *panicked* Help me, help me! My computer, it won't wake up!
T: *puzzled, and can't really make out what she's saying* Ma'am, please calm down, and I can help you better. What is the problem, again?
C: *still panicked, and almost crying* My computer! It won't wake up! Help me! I fed it and it won't wake up!
T: Your computer won't wake up, Ma'am?
C: Yes, yes! I fed it and it won't wake up!
The tech at this point thought she "fed" it a floppy (the computers weren't shipped with CD drives to prevent customers from installing games, which was against the TOS), and proceeded to walk her through the usual steps. These included wiggling the mouse, typing on the keyboard, telling her to press the button "on the box under the desk" instead of the monitor, even checking the powercord. Nothing worked, and she was getting more and more frantic.
C: I am going to lose my job! It won't wake up! I fed it and it won't wake up!
T: *still thinking she's talking about floppies* Please calm down, Ma'am, and I'll call second level support to help with this. May I place you on hold for two minutes?
C: Please! I need help! I fed it rice, and it won't wake up!
T: *light dings on* ... Ma'am, could you repeat that again, please?
C: I fed it rice, and it won't wake up!
T: *long pause* Ma'am, you fed your computer rice?
C: Yes, yes! I fed it rice and it won't wake up!
T: *twitching at the very thought of such hardware abuse, but somehow managing to stay somewhat calm* I'm going to send a tech out to your location instead, Ma'am. Can you confirm some information for me, please?
Customer confirms the information, and the tech includes a note to the field tech to let him know what happened.
Turns out, the woman was (apparently) a devout Shintoist, and believed everything has a soul, including her computer. Whenever it went into stand-by mode, she would feed it rice through the floppy drive to "wake" it up. She continued to do so til the computer finally gave up the ghost.
This was an old 486 box using Windows 3.11. Scarily enough, when the field tech opened the case, the floppy drive was full of rice (I assume dried, though the field tech never said), and *so was a good portion of the case.* The computer kept running until the rice burned onto the processor, and caused it to overheat.
The tech explained to the woman that computers did not like rice, and if she wished to feed it in the future, she should use floppies. I assume she learned her lesson or was fired, because when the tech who took the call checked the shipper number later, there were no further updates.
) before I read it, otherwise we would've had the first monitor ruined.
From what I was told, her religion was well-known at that client company.
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