Juveniles with admin privileges

Our IS department is often frustrating, which is the case at many companies I'm sure. But here's an example of a really extreme case of IS stupidity.
We're an engineering company, and many of our engineers use their personal laptops in tandem with lab computers and their desktop computers. As such, there is oftentimes a need to transfer files from one computer to another.
While they could transfer the file to a network share and then browse to that share on the other computer to retrieve it, it is much easier to use a flash drive, especially for large files on our crappy network.

Oh, and by the way, if you think I'm just kidding about our crappy network, come visit me sometime and I will show you what I'm talking about. I thought the MSLC at SPU was bad with its CAT 3 network, but it doesn't hold a candle to this.

Anyway, a 1 GB flashdrive is about $10 now. So, several engineers requested that our Admin Assistant procure some flashdrives from the IS department. Seems like a simple request. Oh how I envy your ignorant bliss.

She was told that the engineers needed to provide a justification for such a piece of equipment, they wanted to know exactly what it would be used for, etc.

For a $10 flashdrive.

At an average rate of around $45-50 per hour for a salaried exempt staff engineer, if the engineer spends more than 12 minutes writing a justification email to get his flashdrive, the company has already invested the cost of the drive in his wasted salary. And that's not taking into account the time wasted by the Admin Assistant.

So, we decided to take things into our own hands, we just submitted a purchase req, bypassing IS completely. I also generated this letter of justification that we signed and stamped. Enjoy.

Why I need a thumbdrive

When in the course of human events it becomes necessary for one person to remove a file from one computer and to transfer it to an additional computer, a process to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God entitle them, a decent respect to the needs of mankind requires that the IS department should supply them with thumbdrives which impel them to the file transfer.
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all data is created equal, they they are endowed by the program which created them with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are checksums, proper permissions, and the pursuit of bandwidth. – That to secure these rights, departments are instituted among companies, deriving their just powers from the consent of the company executives, that whenever any department becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the Employees to alter or abolish it, and to acquire their thumbdrives through material requisition forms, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form delivered to Kim Sop, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.
We, therefore, the Representatives of the Component Engineers of the Engineering Services department of Aviation Technologies Corporation, Assembled, appealing to the Supreme Vice President of Engineering of the company for the rectitude of our intentions, do, in the Name, and by Authority of the good People of this engineering department, solemnly publish and declare, that these united cubicles are, and of Right ought to be Free and Independent Cubicles, that they are Absolved from all Allegiance to the IS department, and that all Flash, Random Access, Synchronous, and Hard Disk memory connections between them and the building on the other side of the street, is and ought to be totally dissolved; and that as Free and Independent Cubicles, they have full Power to buy thumbdrives, SD cards and memory sticks, and to purchase all other forms of temporary and permanent file storage which Independent Cubicles may of right do. And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of Divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our network shares, our wireless mice, and our sacred flat panel monitors.

Specific grievances nailed to door upon request

-The Krunchy Krab

I have succeeded as a father

Seahawks vs Bears. Start of the third quarter. Seahawks have the ball in the red zone. Hasselbeck dishes it in to Burleson for a touchdown. The crowd on TV goes crazy.

As I start to pump my fist, my 2 year old daughter standing on the other side of the room shoots her arms into the air in the standard official touchdown signal and yells, "Yay! Touchdown Seahawks!"

It's a perfect Sunday afternoon.

-The Krunchy Krab

Words will not suffice, so I will use pictures instead.

Is there anything in the world better than this, about 1 hour after it came out of the oven?









Of course there is. This is better. Except that there is now only 3/4 of a pie left. That's sad.

-The Slightly-less-Krunchy-because-he-just-ate-some-great-pie Krab

My wife thinks I'm crazy.

I have begun decorating the house for Christmas. I know, I know. I'm also one of those people who gets annoyed when Target puts back to school supplies out July 5th. But I have good reasons. It all started about 10 days ago, with a day which I knew would be one of the last clear dry days of the year. So, I decided to go do the roof part of the job, hanging the icicle lights across the edge.
I intended to just put them up, but then the bug hit. I've added a little more every day. Next it was the icicle lights on the catwalk outside the living room window. Then I put blue lights in the one evergreen shrub/tree by the sidewalk. There was no turning back. There are now lights in the junipers, 6 spiral trees in the main part of the yard, three more trees and a reindeer in the side yard. I have 6 mini trees in the garage, one more large spiral tree, two more reindeer, and 200 feet of icicle lights waiting to go out. There's another reindeer in the shed, three blue spotlights, two sets of snowflakes (20 flakes) and some more mini lights. Then I hope to somehow tastefully incorporate the blue and white ropelights in the basement.
Of course I'll have to add to my display this year. I'm just not sure what to add yet. I've also got two cool red tinsel cardinals with lights... those will look neat on the catwalk.
Sorry honey. At least I try to keep the display tasteful. You know I've always wanted one of those giant snowglobes on the roof.

I'll put some pictures up once it's all assembled.

-The Krunchy Krab

You know you've succeeded as a parent when...

We were sitting at the table this evening, eating our dinner. Here are a few snippets of our conversation:

(My daughter pulls up her shirt and puts her hands under it)

Me: What are you doing?
Her: Putting my hands in there!

We have been working on teaching her to keep all her food on her plate, instead of moving it onto the table surface...

Me: Why is your pizza on the table?
Her: Because I didn't put it on the floor!

Made sense to me.

-The Krunchy Krab