<strong>Your Name: Joe King</strong><strong></strong>

<strong>Today’s Date:</strong> 2008/01/16[Week 2]

<strong>Day(s) worked or described:</strong> T Θ

<strong>Total hours for week: 6
</strong>

<strong>The School:
</strong><em>Fiske</em>

<strong>Kind of Work:</strong> Tech general, Project Prep

<strong>Main Report or Narrative: </strong>

This week was... interesting? When I arrived on Tuesday everything seemed pretty normal--there was one computer with a bsod in the 200 lab which I switched with one of the unused ones in the 300s lab (I can look at it later, but it wasn't clear what was causing the blue screen so I'm assuming it's old hardware, and since we're hopefully replacing all of these I just put it with the ones we're not using--it has a note on it), and then started to install some shiny new fax machines for the two offices downstairs...

Here's where the fun started.  I got the faxes installed properly save for getting them hooked up to the computers, and then I started on that procedure in Ms. Miller's office.  There were about four warnings that I should install the driver before plugging in the printer, so I followed the instructions and started doing that.  At some point it said to plug in the usb from the fax, so I went to do that, but as I plugged the usb into the computer, the instant the metal touched sparks flew everywhere (and I mean LOTS of sparks--the room spelled like smoke afterward and the usb cord looked visibly burnt).  Now I've seen some strange things when working on computers, and I've done a lot of building myself, but I've never seen anything like this.  One time I remember installing a usb port incorrectly into a motherboard as a firewire port, but that only managed to fry the first usb device plugged into the port...

So at this point I'm standing in Ms. Miller's office over her smoking computer freaking out.  It's turned off, and I can't get it back on.  The amount of energy that sparked was pretty massive, and I'm seriously worried that I've fried it.  I unplugged it for a few minutes, hoping the thing would discharge somehow, but it didn't work.  I showed it to Mr. Miller, and eventually we decided it was a loss. (Ms. Miller was out that day)

Fortunately, I'm apparently amazingly lucky, because by the next day it had discharged whatever was left in there and booted again intact, so I did not in fact destroy the principal's computer!

I still honestly have no clue how this happened, I'm pretty sure I was following the instructions perfectly (there were so many warnings I felt I should--I don't normally follow instructions when I'm plugging in a usb...) but I'm assuming I messed something up.  I know the static wasn't from me--there was way too much, and I'm very sensitive about that particular issue since I work a lot on my own builds.  Anyways, we've decided to not enable printing on the fax machines for now (at least until I test it on one of the old dying computers).

Thursday was better, since I walked in thinking Ms. Miller would shoot me, and then found out I was somehow saved.  I spent most of the day taking pictures of teachers for the blog (although about half of them made up strange excuses as to why I couldn't take their pictures...), and I did some beginning of the year things like a new sign up sheet for tech help and a few minor concerns teachers had.

All in all, the most disturbing week I've had...

<strong><em>(Additional notes to include, only if applicable)</em></strong>

<strong>My regular schedule at this school has changed, to become: Tuesdays 1-4, Thursdays 1-4</strong>

(I ended up staying late on Tuesday due to this issue, so I left a little earlier on Thursday so I wouldn't overbook hours (so this week it was 1-430 and 1-330)