Heard Over Coffee

Years ago, there was a cartoon drawn by Al Capp called Li'l Abner. One of the characters in the strip was Joe Btfsplk, a little man who was constantly under a small, dark rain cloud. Joe Btfsplk was a jinx. Bad luck followed him wherever he went. One of the people I worked with a number of years ago, could have been Joe, because if anything bad was going to happen, it was going to happen to him. To protect his identity, I will simply call him Joe.

One day, I was at a customer site working on a computer system in a room that could only be described as an extended closet. It was about ten feet wide and fifteen feet long. At the end of this windowless closet was a table that was placed across the back wall with the main computer placed on it. Along the sides of the closet were several computer storage systems that were about four feet tall by two feet wide by four feet long. This back in the days before PCs so hard disk storage was rather bulky.

My job that day was to solder a small strap of copper onto the heatsink of the computer. Of course, it took three hands to perform this job. Not being so equipped, I had placed my soldering iron on the edge of the table, with the heated point extented outward and secured in place by placing part of the computer on top of it. I was then able to hold the strap in place with one hand and hold the solder in the other hand, while applying the heated end of the iron to the to the strap and solder. The purpose was to melt the solder in place and permanently affix the strap to the heatsink. All was going well until Joe entered the room.

Joe decided this was a good time to work on the storage drives. But Joe could never do anything by himself. Even if he could perform the task alone, he preferred an audience. He lifted the lid of one of the drives, propped it open, and began to peer inside. But, for some reason known only to him, he decided that his vantage point was not satisfactory. He wanted the top opened a bit wider but that required someone to hold it open. Who could come to his aid? He asked me to come over and hold the top open so it would not fall down while he looked inside. I tried to explain that I was in the middle of this repair job, but Joe would not hear of it. Finally, I got up from my chair, leaving all my tools in place (including a very hot soldering iron) and walked over behind the drive to hold the top open.

For whatever reason that was apparent only to Joe,  he still did not have an adequate vantage point, so he bent over and began to back up from the drive to get a better view. To this day, I do not know what he was looking for. But I do know what he found. Sure enough, Joe backed directly into my very hot soldering iron. He immediately straightened up, grabbed his smoldering backside and began to dance. Words cannot completely describe this comical sight, but suffice it to say, I began laughing so hard that tears were filling my eyes. He could not stop dancing and I could not stop laughing. I was trying to apologize but was having great difficulty appearing sincere since I was laughing so hard.

As you might imagine, Joe was hesitant to ask for my assistance after that.

Thank you for reading. Time to fill the coffee cup. Till the next time, keep your beans fresh.

Cuppa Joe