On Call By the end of the working week, it's natural to feel the walls closing in a little, which is why every Friday morning The Register frees things up a little by publishing a new installment of On Call – the reader-contributed column that shares your tech support stories.
This week, we present another story from a reader we recently Regomized as Carl, who in the early 1990s took a job doing desktop and local area network support at a US police department that operated a prison.
Carl arrived to find an enormous to-do list and a very busy IT team who were strangely unwelcoming.
Not long after starting, Carl was assigned a job in the prison. As it was his first visit, a colleague named "Mike" showed him the ropes.
Carl found it disconcerting.
"I was introduced to various guards and went through the first security checkpoint," he told On Call. "The heavy iron door slamming behind me was a bit nerve-wracking. The second wasn't so bad."
But when he encountered orange jumpsuit-clad prisoners, who per procedure stopped their daily chores and moved to stand against the nearest wall when civilians entered the prison, Carl knew he wasn't in Kansas anymore.
Carl and Mike eventually arrived at the problematic PC. A little effort showed the issue was actually with a mainframe, so another team reset a terminal session and the PC started behaving again.
Job done, Mike introduced Carl to some more guards and then told him to make his own way back to the IT team's office, a journey that involved a turn to the left and a short walk.
Carl did as he was told and found himself in a dim hallway in which he suddenly saw movement on all sides as prisoners shuffled from the back of small cells and approached him. Some started making obscene remarks. Others removed some clothing and propositioned him.
Yes, dear reader, Mike had pranked Carl by directing him into the holding cells where recently arrested female prisoners awaited their fate.
"Mike and some of the guards showed up, laughing so hard they could barely speak," Carl told On Call. "It turned out this was a standard hazing routine for some new employees."
Carl took it well enough and received many slaps on the back.
But he was still stunned by the experience.
"All I could say was 'I didn't know anyone could get tattoos like that,'" which just made Mike laugh even harder.
Have you ever participated in hazing rituals, unwittingly or by design? If so, join the On Call contributors club by clicking here to send us an email so we can tell your story on a future Friday. ®
Source: The register