After I left the power plant and went to work for Dell on August 20, 2001, I wrote letters back to my friends at the plant letting them know how things were going. This is the one hundredth letter I wrote.
6/18/04 – Supporting Dell
Dear Sooner Plantonians and other noble figures,
I have returned from my vacation and I am happy to say that everything went well. I was able to see the Pope, go to the top of a mountain and ride on trains, so I’m happy.
When I came back I found myself in my new group. I am only here because the support team found out that I could cure computer problems by just laying my hands on the monitor or waving my “Elvis Presley Face” wand over it.
So I am now supporting a bunch of applications that I otherwise had no knowledge. This reminds me of the week I first became an electrician. I remember that I had only been an electrician about a week when people were all of the sudden asking me about different ways to wire their houses, and they were bringing ceiling fans in for me to rewire, etc. as if I was all of the sudden endowed with the supreme electrical knowledge of the “Good Ol’ Boy” Electrician.
That’s how this week has been. I’ve been responding to trouble tickets all week and people have been calling me up asking me how to do things with all these programs that I hadn’t even heard of before this week.
So I tell them things like, “Have you tried turning your monitor around so that it is facing the back of your cubicle for about 10 minutes? Monitors hate being put in time out and after doing that a few times, they will make sure that your programs stop messing up on you.”
I have even ordered a new headset so that I can talk all day on the phone while my hands are free to type, or twiddle my thumbs or pick my… well. Whatever I might need for them to do. (I was going to say “teeth” — pick my teeth. What did you Think I was going to say? Geez!).
I found out the other day that while I was away, our Vice President had an “All-Hands Meeting”. They held it at some amusement park called “Austin Park and Pizza” or something like that.
Anyway. The Vice President gave me the “Vice President’s Award for Customer Experience”, though I wasn’t there to accept it. I am still wondering what it means that I win the award for best Customer Experience by going out of town for two weeks. I guess when I left, everyone felt like I had given them some sort of a gift or something by my absence.
I heard they said a whole bunch of nice things about me, but I don’t know what they were. That is sort of like when you die and people all of the sudden come out of the woodwork to say nice things about you, only you aren’t there to hear it. I’ll let you know what they said when I find out.
I can only imagine what they said…..
“Kevin was always considerate. He would leave us alone for days at a time without bothering us with needless rambling conversations about things that we really don’t care about.”
“Kevin on occasion would take a shower before coming to work, so that we would be able to freely breathe the air without hindrance.”
“Kevin would floss his teeth on the first of every month so that we would be able to look at him grinning after he told a joke that none of us understood, and we would see only his pearly whites instead of his previous month’s combined collection of meals.”
See what I mean? All those nice things people say about you when you’re gone.
Well. I see that it is beginning to get late and it is Friday, so I had better get ready for the weekend. — I’ll be in training all of next week (Learning more about Oracle PL/SQL), so I won’t be checking my e-mail regularly, though I will probably be looking at it in the evening.
Write and let me know how things are going.
On a serious note. I heard that Diana Brien’s father has passed away. I am sorry to hear that, though I know he has been suffering for a long time now. My prayers are with her and her family. I only met Diana’s father twice, and I found him to be a very kindhearted person. He must have been a good father. Just look at how well he raised his daughter.
Until I write again…. Work Safe.
Your friend from Dell,
Kevin James Anthony Breazile
_____________________
Kevin J. Breazile
Global Financial Systems I/T
Dell Inc.
(512) 728-1527
Power Plant Men 