Power outages are so much fun. Our network has had essentially nothing invested in it for the past three years, in spite of near continuous growth in the overall organization. Well, essentially nothing, except for the quarter-million dollar website that the previous Executive Director thought was far more important than, like, ensuring everyone got paid. Which is why he isn't by us anymore.

At any rate, by now the network compares favorably to Enterprise at the beginning of ST III... it can fake being a real network, as long as you don't bang on it too hard. Even then, as long as I'm in engineering, you can still bang on it a bit, as long as you ignore the screams coming from my office.

But when the extra-helpful folks from Virginia Power & Light dropped a large branch on some power lines while trying to clear them, the network got far more than just a solid thump. With a loud "BANG!!!", power dropped to the entire building, and most of the rest of the block. Four days from our annual convention. In an office full of excitable social-work majors. It was such a lovely evening.

The next morning was spent re-lighting various electronic pilot lights. Even then, the shambling mound of bailing wire and ductape that is my network had nooks and crannies of darkness that required someone else stumbling over the furniture to find. So the rest of the day was spent finding these poor lost souls, throwing the breakers required, and leading them to safety.

Which brings us to the point of the post. My organization serves people who, on the best of days, can be rather fragile of mood and quirky of personality. Having a severe illness can turn you into an object of compassion, but it can also turn you into a gold-plated pain in the ass.

So I definitely rolled my eyes a bit when the operator told me QLZ was on the phone. Nice guy, as long as you were willing to follow the lines of his hypercubed personality:

Me: "Hello, QLZ"

QLZ: "Hello, Scott, how are you?"

Me: "Oh, fine, just fine... how are you?"

QLZ: "Well, turns out I have cancer."

For once, someone else got to listen to my train of thought derail and skid into a nearby oil refinery.

QLZ: "Yeah, kidney cancer. But that's not why I'm calling. I can't get [a trivial section of an infrequently used website] to work... what's up with that?"

It's times like that I realize why I'm there. Most of these folks are even less clueful than a Kerry campaign staffer confronted by a Swift boat veteran. One of them left a brand new computer in its box because he literally couldn't figure out how to get it out.

But dammit, it isn't their fault. Their brains went south on them, usually just as they were beginning "real" life. Their heads get caught in Doom3 sometimes, but they can't hit save, can't just push away from it when it gets too much. The pills that pop them out of that horror don't fix it, they just tone it down enough for them to hear over hell and rejoin the human race. But even then, some of them can't escape.

Which is why, pain in the ass or no, I did what I was supposed to. I fixed his dinky little problem, and wished him a nice day.

I made a goddamned difference.

How many of you have today?