The wired network is being upgraded at the company where this pilot fish works — and her cubicle is right next to a main conduit for the wires.

"I came in one morning and noticed that the new wire had been pulled, because all the faceplates for the connectors were pulled out of the conduit," says fish. "The old wires were still plugged in, with the new wires lying next to them.

"I booted my laptop and it didn't come up the way I expected."

Fish figures a cable was jostled during the installation process, so she calls the outsourced help desk and explains the situation. The help desk insists that she follow their step-by-step troubleshooting procedure on the laptop, even though she explains that it worked fine at home and the trouble is probably with the new network cabling.

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