Man, it’s been a LOOOONG time since I’ve done one of
these! I haven’t been blogging as much,
I think in part because I’ve been working
so much-teaching piano, helping with three kids’ homework, and, of course,
working at my Dad’s office doing cleaning and scanning.
Which brings me to today’s Memory Monday topic: scanner girl
memories. Oh, where do I begin?
I’ve done scanning on and off for a very, very long
time. I swear I was only 13 or 14 when I
started scanning there. It was my summer
job all through high school, and then again in college (summers of ’99 and 2000). Oh, and not to mention the time I worked
there when we first moved to Idaho Falls before I had Troy, so in 2005-2006.
So. When I was 13-14
years old, we had this REALLY old scanning machine. It had its own set of discs that were
humongous, and very unlike normal computer discs. It was probably 5”x5”, and an inch thick. Somehow
they were able to convert the Beast Discs into CDs or something. If we wanted the machine to read a page as
front-and-back, we had to put in a special paper with little squares colored in
for it to do it right. Same with if the
page was too dark or too light-same special paper, but with a different square
colored in.
At the time, the scanner was set up in the same room as the
kitchen area stuff, so we were right by the fridge. There was a lady that worked there at the
time who was addicted to Diet Coke.
During the time that we (we meaning my sister Karlenn and I) were there,
which was maybe half a day of work, this lady came down to the fridge to get a
Diet Coke about 5 times. And each time
she came down she would ask, “Having fun?”
Now, Diet Coke Lady wasn’t the only one to frequent the
kitchen area. She was there the most,
but she was not the only one. And each
person would ask the same question: Having
fun? We never quite knew what to
reply to that. “Yes, yes I am. Scanning is a dream job!” “No, not really. I hate being here.” “Not only am I having fun, but I’m working
hard, too! Two thumbs up!” I mean, what DO you say in response? So usually we’d just laugh a little, but I
think that egged The Question on.
At that time, we were TERRIBLE scanners. If it missed a page (sometimes the machine
would suck in two or three pages at a time), we would just let it keep going,
pull out the pages that it missed, and just stuck them in wherever it was most
convenient. I’m sure we missed backs of
pages a lot. And we had no idea what to
title things. I think at the time,
though, we would just put it under the client name and the year. So when the accountants went to find things,
I’m sure it was a nightmare, because there would be 10 different files all
under the same client and year.
Oh, and it’s not like you could just look it up any old way,
either. We had these printouts of what
was on each Beast Disc, and which Beast Discs were on which CDs. So we’d have to look at this teeny tiny print
to try and find out where the file was at, and then hopefully it was labeled
with the right year and the right client.
Good times right there.
The summer after my junior year, I was still working with
Kar. We were in the kitchen for part of
the time, but then we moved into an office across the hall when a dude moved
out. His name was Oak. Not even joking. My dad has had several randomly-named people
work for him: Clain, Oak…okay, I know there’s more, but that’s all I can
remember right now. Clain had a cool
last name, too – it was French, but I’m omitting it now for privacy purposes.
During that summer I was dating Ned. Ah, Ned.
More good times right there.
Anyway, our scanner machine totally broke. Just…wouldn’t scan, wouldn’t suck up pages,
nothing. So we had to call an 800
number. We reached a guy named Dave that
worked in Salt Lake for the Scanner Fixer Company. So he came up to fix it, and it was kind of
awkward. We just sat there and prepped
files while he cleaned the machine, etc.
By the way, he was really young, I think just fresh off his mission,
which at the time seemed really old to me, but whatever - I was 17. (I’m 17.
I’m 17! -What movie?)
After Dave fixed the machine, it broke, like, 2 days
later. We called back down to the
Scanner Fixer Company, and once again it was Dave that came up. This time it was way different. We totally talked to him, and kind of made
fun of him for being a tech nerd.
I’m pretty sure the machine broke again, because I remember we called the place again and requested
Dave to come up. Hm, maybe he was trying
to make the machine break so he could hang out with us. Because even though I was 17, my hot
sister was 19, so maybe he was trying to bust a move or something, though he
never asked her out.
You know what’s funny, though? A year or so later, Dave got married in
Logan, Utah, and he sent us an invitation to the reception! And…yes, my sister and I TOTALLY
attended! It was very awkward, trying to
explain to his new wife that he had “fixed” our scanner, and that’s how we knew
him.
One more point from this summer, and then I’m going to have
to make a Part 2. After we moved into
the other room, we didn’t have to deal with The Question any more, which was
nice. Our office was next to a guy named
Robert. We teased him ALL the time, just
by calling him nicknames. He’d be all, “My
name is Robert,” all deadpan. And we’d
be all, “Hey Bobby? Question for ya.” And he’d be all, “It’s ROBERT.” (Has anyone seen the movie-I think it’s
called Office Space? I caught it on TV
once. There’s a dude that’s all quiet,
and people always steal his stapler. At
the end he goes all crazy and, like, blows stuff up or something. I could totally be making that up, because it’s
been a long time since I’ve seen that movie.
Anyway. Robert was like that
dude.)
Okay, THAT tangent over.
Anyway, we gave him other nicknames like Bobert, Robbie, Rob, Bob, and
Robert Probert. The last one is someone’s
actual name that at one point had been a client of my dad’s firm. (Hm. Wonder if he’s still around
somewhere.) We thought it was really
funny that someone with the last name Probert would have no creativity and name
their child’s first name Robert. I mean,
come on! There was also a client named
Thomas Thompson. Seriously?
Anyway, since we moved into a more secluded room, we could
have a radio. We listened to a station
called Z103. We would keep tally of
which songs got played the most, aptly named The Most-Played Song of the
Summer. One of the songs that was big at
the time was called Butterfly Kisses. It’s
a REALLY cheesy song. So we were
listening to that, and we both started singing at the TOP of our lungs. “BUTTERFLY KISSES, in the blah blah blah!” Okay, totally don’t remember the lyrics
now. Anyway, a lady named Maggie that
worked upstairs paged down to us on the phone, and was all, “Um, we can totally
hear you up here.” So funny.
Another song that was in rotation at the time was a song
called “I’m a B----“. So one day my
sister started singing that one: “I’m a B, I’m a lover, I’m a child, I’m a
mother, I’m a sinner I’m a saint…” And
Robert came over, stood in our doorway, and just stared at us for a while. I think he was trying not to laugh, although
I couldn’t be sure, because I don’t know if he was capable of laughing. But it was totally funny.
Alright. This post is
CRAZY long, so I’m going to go. But don’t
worry, I have plenty more where that came from!
Oh, and enjoy this cheese-tastic blast from the past:
