Unknowingly Embracing My DIY Tendencies

Consider this a “forest for the trees” moment. There’s half a continent between now and what “used to be” which has brought some focus. I didn’t really notice something before, like my DIY tendencies because, at the time, it seemed the logical thing to do.

Apparently I have very strong DIY tendencies, and without fully noticing, I’ve embraced them. My brain has been in rewind, or perhaps drudging, unearthing memories of office environments I had forgotten about since, well, I haven’t been in an office environment in three years. As an example, my first job out of college was with a Taiwanese international shipping company. I worked in its Export Documentation department which was pretty straight forward, and rather interesting. I knew nothing of container shipping, wasn’t even sure what that meant but the job provided some skills and knowledge that still serves me well today.

During the first couple of weeks, while I was learning about the company, the industry and what I would be doing, I was slowly getting rotated into answering phones. I took the easy ones, like verifying information or confirming receipt of something. Then they wanted me to start making calls, too, to verify information or confirm something. The problem was, the keys on my phone were sticky. Not like food sticky, but old, gunky sticky. The 9 and the 5 button especially.

So I took the phone apart and cleaned it. I was about half way through when my boss wandered over and asked what the heck I was doing. I told him the keys were sticking, making dialing tricky and since they keys worked, they just needed to be cleaned. So I was taking the phone apart to clean the keys. He disappeared and returned a few minutes later with a new phone. I had already cleaned and put the phone back together, and was testing the buttons. He swapped the phones anyway and said next time I could just ask for a new phone. They had extras in the back.

DIY tendency. The phone wasn’t broken, it just needed to be cleaned.

This has become a recurring theme. And to be honest, I didn’t think of it in DIY terms before. I thought of it in terms of logic. There is something preventing me getting from Point A to Point B so what’s the logical method to overcoming the obstacle and getting from Point A to Point B? Technical writing fits nicely in that kind thinking. And technical writing can be very DIY. You have to translate the developer jargon into every day English for the end user, which can often me doing the same tasks yourself, and writing it all down.

Being back in an office environment has made my DIY tendencies clear to me. It’s just how my brain works, it seems. “All sane and logical,” to borrow a line from 311. And again, it had to do with a phone. And this time, the phone just didn’t work.

We use IP phones, which are really pretty nifty gadgets. Telephone technology has advanced considerably from my days at the shipping company. And you can certainly argue you don’t even need a phone today because you can make and receive calls via your laptop or desktop computer. I do that, too.

Alas, I digress. Back to the IP phone.

There’s a little bit of setup required, but first you need an Internet connection. And me being me, generally the odd one out or the guinea pig, there wasn’t an open Internet jack. Oh, and “wirless,” like “paperless,” is a misnomer. There were all kinds of wires, just no open Internet jack. I’m used to not having a phone, so I didn’t think much of it and let it be.

Except it kept gnawing at me. Surely there had to be a way to hookup the phone. There was another jack, somewhere, and sure enough there was. But the phone still didn’t work. Something else was wrong. I let it be for a couple hours, got some work done and, at the end of the day, went back to it.

Normally, these phones don’t require a power adapter. You just plug’em into the Internet jack and viola! Alas, I am not so lucky. Technology and I often have a misunderstanding, and, I kid you not, technology doesn’t work when I first come within spitting distance. It hiccups and adjusts to my presence. This was demonstrated at #ABATECHSHOW last year. One of the developers was trying to use his WiFi connection, and despite working five minutes ago, suddenly stopped working. I had arrived. He laughed when I said it was probably me, so I took a few steps back and sure enough, his WiFi worked again. Needless to say, I’m not allowed near the server room.

Anyway, so generally these IP phones don’t need a power adapter, but this IP phone has been assigned to me. Plugging in the power adapter turned it on, which meant I could program it. That was a challenge, mostly because the programming directions were poorly written. Tell me where to go to do something, not tell me to do something and then where to go. And the directions left out a rather important step: how to change the keypad to accept letters instead of just numbers.

Phone programmed. Quick email to the phone guy to do what he needs to on his end and it oughta be good to go. Except, ahem, user error. Easily fixed. Phone up and running. W00T!

Now, to me, that’s just a logical progression to get from Point A to Point B. I have since learned that most people simply wait for someone else to show them how to get from Point A to Point B and are thus often left, well, waiting.

I hate waiting. I’ve clearly done a fair amount of it. Waiting is a large part of the visa application process. And that, too, is another example of my DIY tendencies. I’ve been hearing from lots of people lately, now that I’ve moved, and they all seem impressed by what I did.

DIY tendencies. A problem solver. Or, more bluntly, “drawing the fucking owl.” Been drawing lots of owls lately, it seems. Considering them sketches, practice perhaps, for the real deal. Whatever that may be.

Suffice to say, my DIY tendencies seem to fit in quite well in these parts.

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