Let me take you back. Back to when I was younger and certainly more naïve. There I was, a spry lad of 20, working for an unnamed ISP in the American midwest. It was a quiet night and I was answering the phones while surfing around the internet, using the state-of-the-art IE 4.0, a happy-go-lucky kid with big dreams. And then the phone rings.
It’s a normal call - we were having problems in the Northeast, with a major fiber cut having taken out most of our sites through Massachusetts and Connecticutt. The woman I was talking to was rather vehement about her need to get online. I didn’t have many options, of course, but I did what I could, offering her numbers in a service area we knew to be working (long-distance charges applying) and our 800 number at $10 an hour or something, I really can’t remember the exact usage rate.
She then, to put it politely, snapped and went somewhat apeshit. I did what I could to keep her calm, but she became so apopleptic that she handed me off to her husband. He was a nice guy, and understood that we were doing what we could, but it was largely out of our hands. The wife, disgusted with his lack of rage in the face of her apparent digital oppression, took the phone back and began going after me while simultaneously (from what I could tell) emasculating her husband.
This is where it all comes together.
She finally, in what I could best gauge as “barely supressed rage”, explains that she needs to get online, because otherwise, she will miss an IRC séance with her deceased father.
Let it all sink in.
There you go.
So, do you think dear old departed dad uses mIRC, or do the dead get a better client? I’d love to know.
