Whenever someone without a security clearance visits our building, they must be escorted at all times.  The purpose of this policy is to ensure that the visitor doesn't breech security by entering unauthorized areas, taking pictures or videos, stealing documents, viewing classified material, and any other nefarious chicanery.  In a nutshell, the escort's job is to watch the visitor.

With that being said, I want to share an observation from today.

As I was walking past a new office being built, I noticed an escort sitting outside of the office.  There were carpenters inside the room, hence the need for an escort.  Upon further examination of the situation, I noticed the escort in question was Jill Adams.

You're probably saying to yourself - "ok, big deal, who is Jill Adams?"

Jill Adams is a very sweet lady.  She's always been nice to me and I have nothing bad to say about her.

Oh yea, she's also legally blind.

And she's serving as a security escort.

Did I mention she's blind?


I went to the security division and told them I had a security concern.  They got that "oh no, I might have to do some work" worried look on their face.  I proceeded to tell them about my observation, questioning the selection of a blind woman for escort duty.  They then breathed a sigh of relief, stating "oh, I thought you were serious!"  The matter was quickly forgotten.

Bob Smith had you   sign the copy of the hg112, do you have the copy of the hg112 that says you Received   in the laptop: with t he barcode of  G2342257 ???


I just sent your SST Mary the copy of the hg112  ,she asked me to send to her this AM,Gary, she should have it in her inbox,that is what the office has on file concerning this laptop, with G 2342257.

What laptop do you have paperwork on could I Please see that??? That you say is different then what we're looking for??? Thks.,

Charles VanBuren,JR.

User leaves a message, barely enunciating her name and only giving her first.

I call the # she left.

Jane - "HEY JIM!!!!  Oh wait, this ain't Jim."

Bob - "Yea, so who is this?"

Jane - "Jane."

Bob - "Jane who?"

Jane - "It's Jane Smith!" (clearly insinuating that she is the one and only Jane in our entire organization)

Bob - "Ok, and you just want to know if the printer is on the network?"

Jane - "Yea."

Bob - "Can you tell me if the printer has an ethernet-"  (she quickly interrupts)

Jane - "Say whaaaaaat?

Bob - "Yea, I knew that word was going to be an issue.  Does anyone near you know what an ethernet cable is?"

Jane - "No.  Not down here."

Bob - "Can you ask?"

Jane - "Hey y'all, anyone know what an ethernet cable is?"

(in the background I hear) - "Yes.  It's the cable that connects to the back of your computer."

Bob - "Who was that?"

Jane - "Lisa."

Bob - "Ok, just let me talk to Lisa."

Bob - What's the IP address for the website on our intranet to download the X software?

IT Supervisor - ftp://60.50.50

Bob - Umm, 60.50.50 what?

IT Supervisor - Yea.  60.50.50

Bob - I don't think that's going to work.

IT Supervisor - Try it.  I think that's it.

Bob - All I'm sayin' is you're completely missing an octet.  The chances of this working have got to be slim.

*Bob tries it*

Bob - Yea.  See.  Gonna need a 4th number.

IT Supervisor - Try 50.50.60

Bob - ....

Bob - No.  We definitely need a 4th number.

IT Supervisor - Ok, let me go look at my notes.

Just got a call from a lady who works here….

“Hey Bob, it’s Shaniqua. I got a friend here who is having trouble with his blackberry.”

“Ok”

“He’s saying (listens to what he says then repeats) he can't type numbers.”

“He can't type numbers?”

“You can’t type numbers? Yea, he can’t type numbers.”

“Has his phone been set up?”

“Has it been set up? No, he’s not sure.”

“Well it needs to be set up on our network.”

“Oh, he doesn’t work here, he’s just a friend of mine.”

“He doesn’t even work here?”

“No.”

“Is it the same phone we have?

“No.

(He gets on the phone)

“Yea, I don’t know what happened. I must have hit something in my pocket. Now all I get is letters and I can’t make phone calls.”

“Go to options.”

“Where is that.”

“It’s one of your icons.”

“How will I know which one is options?”

“It’ll say options under it.”

(He proceeds to read all 25 icons.)

“Brickbreaker?”

“What? No, you’re looking for options. Ok, you know what. Just take out the battery and reboot it. I can’t help you anymore.”

Voicemail from Linda – “My xxx account is slow, call me back.”

Bob – “We don’t support xxx so you’ll have to call yyy.”

Linda – “Ok, it’s just moving really slow.”

Bob – “Ok”

Linda – “Like I’ll click something and I’ll have to wait 3 or 4 minutes for the computer to respond.”

Bob – “Yea, sounds like yyy will be able to help you out.”

Linda – “And see, I just clicked this icon and it’s taking forever.”

Bob – “Ok”

Linda – “And when I type it’ll take a while to show up. Like I have to type a sentence out word by word to make sure I’m typing it correctly.”

Bob – “Allright, well like I said, if you call-”

Linda – "There we go. It finally came up. But it takes forever. I don’t know how they expect us to work like this."

Bob – “Ok, well I’m gonna go.”

Linda – “I just can’t believe how slow it is. This is ridiculous. So yea, you can see where this is frustrating.”

Bob – “Yea, I can def see where this is frustrating.”

Voicemail from Darlene – “I can’t get to my email, call me back.”

Bob – “Ok, what’s the problem?”

Darlene – “I click on Outlook and it says ‘Outlook Setup.’ It works on my other computer in Annapolis, but not this one.”

Bob – “Ok, that’s because you haven’t set it up on this one. We can set it up, or you can just log in to your email from the internet. The internet is probably easier.”

Darlene – “Ok, what do I do?”

Bob – “First, open up Internet Explorer.”

Darlene – “Ok…let’s see….Internet Explorer….Ok, I opened it….sighhhhhh….my email’s not here either.”

Bob – “Yea, we have to actually go to the website.”

Bob – “I have two users, Jane Doe & Sara Smith, who need their FFS activated.”

Amy – “I don’t know who those people are.”

Bob – “They are contractors.”

Amy – “I’ve never heard of them. I’ll have to get back to you.”

10 minutes later……

Amy – “They are assigned to D.C. so I can’t change them.”

Bob – “No, they are here in Baltimore. I called both of them on our internal phone system here in Baltimore.”

Amy – “Ok, let me figure this out and get back to you.”

10 minutes later……

Amy – “I just found out who they are. They are the girls upstairs. They are contractors.”

Bob – “Yea…”

Amy – “I activated them and they should be good to go now.”

Bob – “Thanks…”