On a dark and stormy night a few years back... I got a request to troubleshoot a PC that had died. The user was shall we say less that Martha Stewart for keeping his workspace tidy so could be many different things. The need was urgent because not only was the user down, the group he worked in was down too. Coming over it was a dark and scary cubicle. Rain was coming down outside and a late fall day not long before Halloween. The power outage, weather and decorations set the frightful stage to make it a dark and rainy night... well... late afternoon. Facilities soon had the breakers back on again and I was looking over the employee's workstation stuffed into the back corner. It had overheated a few times and the last tech had taken the side panel off and left it leaning against the case for better air flow. Moving some of the clutter out of the way I unwrapped the mystery... moving the panel to the side to get a better look inside... it was a rat's warren inside, dust, droppings, dust bunnies... and... a literal rat. unbeknownst to the user his dietary habits and leftovers had attracted the other IT and cord loving bunch who had setup shop and conveniently removed one rat infestation challenge by connecting the terminals, shorting out the station, and tripping power leaving the group in the dark and a slightly smoking corpse. Needless to say, the employee soon had a brand-new workstation, the mystery was solved. If it wasn't for those pesky kids and their snacky habits.. they would have gotten away with it too. -Darren Cannon
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