Anonymous Professor and the Evil University IT Department

Just for fun, I called the IT department again for help with accessing my university email. After a half hour of verifying my identity, the woman on the other end said that she could help me. (She must be a jaded veteran of the IT Defense system. The kid I spoke to the other day didn’t put me through the same headache.

"What's your password?"

--- What do you need my password for? Just tell me what the problem is.

"I'm sorry, but we cannot determine the problem unless we can see what's showing in your mailbox. For that we need your password".

---  I can't access my account. How will YOU see what's in my mailbox when I can't even see what's in my mailbox?"

"I'm sorry, sir, but that's how we fix this sort of problem."

--- Okay. 'Splain it to me, Lucy. How will you gain access to my email with my password if I can't gain access to my email with my password?

PAUSE

"There could be something in your mailbox that's preventing you from opening your mail."

I was waiting for the plain English bubblegum and turnstile metaphor.

 --- Like what? A huge boulder? Why in hell do you need---

"We have filters to stop spam, pornography, objectionable material from being passed within the system, as well as objectionable material entering the system".

"GoodGodAlmighty!  Do you think for one second that I---"

"Never mind. There's another way for me to check your email. Please hold."

Have you ever noticed that you can never find a nuclear weapon when you need one? It was bad enough that she asked for the password that the IT department begs us not to  share with anyone and to change frequently to make our accounts more difficult to crack, but it was even worse when she said that there's another way for her to check my email--- just like the kid told me the other day.

She came back on the line to tell me that the problem was fixed. I tried to sound conciliatory.

--- What was the problem?

"I'm not quite sure. Maybe something got stuck."  (What? The bubble gum and turnstile thing again? Maybe not. This one seemed more like the Biblical Catastrophe type.

I wasn't going to pursue it. Sometimes you're better off not knowing certain things. Ignorance is bliss (which explains the happy expressions on some of my students' faces).

The IT department is rumored to be in a basement below the library--- which would make sense if the library had an accessible basement. Nobody knows where the library's basement or the IT department is actually located. All anyone knows is that one needs a special key in order to get off the elevator at the alleged bottom-most floor.

Maybe there's a missile silo down there. God knows. Maybe there are two Criminal Justice majors armed with side arms to blow off the head of the other guy in case he divulges important information such as where the hell my email went.

I asked some pointed questions.

--- Where are you folks located?

"Who?"

--- You and the rest of the people in the IT department. Where the hell is the IT department?

"I'm sorry, but I can't divulge that information."

I get it now. The university has outsourced the IT department to a foreign government, probably in some war-torn hell hole that nobody has ever heard of. I felt like blowing the IT representative's cover by asking her who is played in the Superbowl this year, but I thought better of it. I thanked her and hung up the phone to go get some coffee in the faculty lounge. I’d have made coffee in my office, but I needed to rinse out the carafe.

Outside, several lecturers and professors were standing in the hall. Their phones weren't working. I had just gotten off the phone, but I thought I'd check to see if mine was affected.

Sure enough. My phone was dead too and I had JUST GOTTEN OFF THE PHONE WITH THE IT DEPARTMENT! I suggested that someone call the phone company.

"No. This is something that the IT department handles."

--- Send them an email.

"The email is screwed up too."

I decided against that cup of coffee. This was a crisis, the solution to which was a nap on the couch in my office. That’s one of the perks of tenure. You get to have a couch in your office and you can lock your door to take a nap. I don’t think the lowly adjunct--and-no-insurance lecturers’ offices even have locks. If they do, they shouldn’t. They haven’t earned the right to privacy.

I thought that a nap will do me some good. Who knows? Maybe I’d sleep a little too long and miss the damned department meeting at three o’clock.

That's another perk of tenure—not just missing a meeting, but being able to lie about why you missed the meeting and (usually) not being challenged about it.

Everyone seems to be a lot happier when I miss a meeting. 

I try not to disappoint.