Friday, February 09, 2007

I don't need to prove how big mine is because I don't have one!

So, I've apparently been drawn into a pissing contest. Over the stupidest thing. And I certainly didn't start it and have no intention of continuing it. But I've been drawn into it nonetheless.

Here's the deal. We're migrating email servers, and because of this, everyone has been told to reduce their mailboxes to below 200mb. With some of these people, this will be impossible, but that's not where I'm going. Anyway, during our Division meeting yesterday, we were chatting about ways of reducing, saving, downsizing, etc. At a certain point, MBE (the director) looks for Patsy (he's supposed to be our IT point of contact), and asks a couple of questions. Then she looks to me (who has been an unofficial point of contact for several specific people in the Division, including MBE) and asks me a few questions about setting up local folders and whatnot (something I did for her a long time ago). After a little bit of conversation, she asks me to research the problem further and to have a chat with our office IT person and get back to the Division. Now, during the entire time of our conversation, Patsy is sitting behind MBE kind of grumbling to himself - I'm guessing he was upset that I was asked to do something he technically was in charge of.

Anyway, I shoot off an email to the IT manager for the office and await a response. Before I get a chance to talk to the IT manager, Patsy has sent an email to the Division on the subject about which I was asked to research. No sooner had I read his email (and was laughing my ass off since it was clear what he was trying to do), did I get an email from the IT manager to come have a chat. To make a long story short, everything that Patsy had just advised everyone to do, the IT manager said was not advised (unless there was no choice) for a variety of reasons. As a result, I had to send an amendment to his email, explaining everything I had just spoken to our IT manager about.

I had a feeling that it would not end there. And I was right. When I got in this morning, there was another email in my inbox from Patsy. All I could do was laugh. It basically gave everyone advice about reducing their mailbox size (which I had briefly outlined in my email) and a reiteration of what the IT manager had stated and what I had already sent in the previous email:

"Having said all of that, local folders are still okay, but it should be stressed not to move then entire contents of your email over to it. If you’re close to 200MB, you could set up a local folder and move some info into it for items that you may not want lost during email migration, etc., but please refrain from moving too much. As J------ stressed, IT folks are worried that users will back up their entire inbox onto a local folder.." (J----- is the IT manager)

The reason why I find this hilarious is that everything that was in his email was already in mine, but written in a tone which made it seem like it was either new or insightful because he wrote it. The other reason is because, when I amended Patsy's email with the correct information, I responded to it, keeping the original copy attached so that people would know what I was referring to. His email this morning had all other previous responses deleted.

I have no intention of continuing this idiocy. I didn't realize I was dealing with a 5 year old. I thought this kind of shit stopped in junior high. Why is it necessary for a 28 year old man to jump up and down, waving his hands screaming, "Look at me! I can do it better!!"?

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