At my primary job, I wear my badge on a lanyard. That way I can find it easily and not worry about losing the darn thing. It’s long enough to reach over for a reader to let me into the vital areas I need to enter Apple. After work, I continue wearing it until I get home. Then I hang it on a hook we have with the keys. Easy to locate. Recently I decorated the lanyard element will these cool pins from Waterloo Records and Freebirds. Most are favorite bands: Roxy Music, David Bowie, Dead Weather, Deathcab For Cutie and T Rex.
I often still have it around my neck when I go shopping before home. This only becomes awkward when I’m at Waterloo Records. Occasionally other shoppers ask me questions, thinking I’m an employee. Flattered, I show them the Apple element and tell them, thanks but I can just offer an opinion.
Today I didn’t count on being approached for technical support by complete strangers yet I think this shirt is to blame. Firstly, it’s red which probably wasn’t a smart move at Target. The other was it saying “Nerd.” Thus, the one older lady asks me, “are you a nerd?” Puzzled, I said, “No. I just like the cartoon character.” Unfazed, she continues to ask me about getting a backup solution for her new computer. Somara is busy shopping and I’m not having any luck finding what I was interested in so I figure, sure, I can try. “What do you have?” It goes downhill from there. “A Dell portable with Windows 7.” I explain that I’m probably not a good source being an Apple employee; the best solution is get a refund, buy a MacBook and an external hard drive, problem solved. However, I quiz her further. It seems in order to save dough, Dell blasts the drive and tells their customers they need to immediately image the contents, OS and all. There’s no restoration media, OEM version of Windows, zilch. I lead her and her friend to the hard drive aisle. I find a decently priced Maxtor hard drive which is 1 TB in size. The box states it includes software to do what she wants (I have no idea if it works though). This results in a comment of, “I work at UT so I can get that cheaper down there.” Fist of Death is rising now. I closed with a suggestion, “Why don’t you ask ACITS (what UT’s IT department used to be called when I had friends working there) and see what they use?” I follow it up with a quick lecture on the importance of rescuing what’s vital since I listed the most common files my friends’ recovery business gets. I close with the caveat about backing up what she doesn’t want to lose or it’s $400.
Was I wasting my time? Probably. It reminded me of the futility on helping my mother with her Mac regarding anything. At least my father had a clue being a real IT/programming person.
Next time I wear my cool Dexter’s Laboratory shirt, it needs a corollary like this one.