It takes a village to raise a MacBook from the dead

My work computer crapped out completely as soon as mandatory work from home began. It caused me enormous stress. The idea of the virus was still new to me then (after all, it was 82 days ago), and I didn't know how I could do my job without a laptop loaded with the proper programs.

I went downtown that day, even though we were told to stay home. I went to IT, still there with a skeleton crew, and all three of them agreed my computer was "dead." With all the chaos caused by the pandemic, there wasn't anyone available who could authorize a loaner. Fortunately I brought my personal little MacBook Air with me -- it really is that light! -- and they loaded what they could onto it.

Flash forward to now: Over the next two weeks, we're all supposed to go in and clean off/clean out our workspace of personal items so maintenance can do a deep clean. This is in preparation of the office beginning to reopen next month.

I sent an email to Mr. Man, the head of our agency, asking him if he could arrange someone to be onsite to give me a new computer. I pointed out that three months' of wear-and-tear on my personal laptop isn't fair, and for security reasons I should do client work on an agency laptop. I closed by kissing his ass: "If you can't authorize a new computer, no one can!"

No one can. He put the head of IT on the case, who does not want any of his staff coming in to the office "prematurely" to give me a new laptop. He assigned Stephen to help restore my laptop. Over the phone.

Stephen was not at all optimistic. He kept saying, "Don't get your hopes up."

Well, it took four hours over two days, but we got the old piece of shit up and running! I can access all my old files (yea!) and email, but that's it. It's not capable of Zoom or WebEx meetings ... for some reason. It won't let me access certain websites ... for some reason. Stephen said that, if he were able to actually handle the machine and play around with it, he might be able to find a solution to these problems, but for now, this is the best he can do.

I can use it for work, Monday through Friday, and give my MacBook Air a well-deserved rest. I'll have to switch back to my personal machine for online meetings, but what the hell.

My takeaway in all this is that Mr. Man is not really in charge of our agency, he just thinks he is. IT runs the world.