I hate printers. No, really.. i.hate.printers. As heavenly as computers may be, the Devil is the Lord of Periferals.
Today I needed to print stuff. I'd already added all the printers I'd found on the Network, and knew where two of the three printers are on this floor, so decided to print to the default printer and see where it ended up.
I sent a one page document to the default printer. Then went to see which printer had spat out my page. I checked the printer by the kitchen, and then the printer down the other end of the office, but neither had my document.
Time to ask, because I needed to print stuff today. I asked Snugly [he has a real name too, but not here, not today] to help me print, and so he gave me a quick [and simple, because lets face it folks, it IS simple] Training Session: Printers 101. He showed me how to know which printer I was printing to, and even showed me how to collate, staple and other groovy things with the printer.
Sweet.
Back to my desk, I sent two jobs to the printer. Waited a few minutes, trying not to look too eager, then went to retrieve my documents.
Nothing.
Okay, something. There was evidence of printing there but not mine.
I looked, and opened a few trays and looked again but couldn't see my printing.
Bugger.
Time to ask Snugly again. In-for-a-penny in-for-a-pound, I reckon. It was high time he knew that I had Islands of Stupidity that could be found in the Periferals Section of my Universe.
I met Snugly coming out of his office as I was barrelling in. I said "I'm having Printer problems. If we take the fact that I'm a moron as a given, could you please help me find my printing?" to which he said "Snugly? you call me SNUGLY??"
*sidenote* while I might be braindead in the Periferal Dept, I am rather hyper late in the day when it's a long time since lunchtime and dinner's not too far away. I tend to write um.. excitable emails around the end-of-business and had, in fact, told Snugly I called him Snugly on an email late the day before. *end of sidenote*
So I came clean and admitted I'd given him a nickname - named for a line he used in Induction my first week when he said that the cables needed to "fit snugly" into the back of the modem, to which I thought "lucky Snugly" and promptly got the giggles for about 15 minutes and the name for him stuck in my head.
So, Snugly walked me back to the printer and picked up a stack of paper from the OUT tray of the printer. He was about to help when I realised the stack of paper he was holding was, in fact, my print job. And, now I thought about it, it had been there the entire time.
So he rolled his eyes at me, and left me to it. DJ (another trainer here) who was in the kitchen told me about the different trays, and what spits what to where when he mentioned A3.
A3? it prints A3?? yay.
I just happened to have made a flowchart earlier in the week A3 and was hoping to print it.
Sweet.
I went back to my desk, and opened up my Freehand file with the A3 flowchart, and proceeded to send it to the printer to make 12 copies. Waited a few minutes, trying not to look too eager, then went to retrieve my documents.
The printer was beeping. The screen read "Tray 3 out of paper". Sure enough, Tray 3 was out of paper, and there was no evidence of refill paper in the vacinity. I looked around and, there was Snugly, talking to some CSRs so I bugged him again.
He's a patient man, it seems. He showed me to the storeroom, and I came back to the printer with a stack of A3 paper and fed the machine. It happily started up again printing my work.
I filled other empty'ish trays while I waited because I'm nothing if not helpful.
I checked the machine. I saw the stack. The stack of A3 copies. Now, I don't know much, but I know what more-than-12 looks like.
Keeping my head (i'm nothing if not calm in a crisis) I start pressing STOP STOP STOP button on the touchscreen of the printer. It didn't stop, it didn't even try to stop, it just kept printing. I'm glad I saw Madagascar because I employed the same technique the penguins used to break the code onboard the Tanker but with a tad more urgency, and finally got the machine to stop printing my job.
I don't dare count how many copies I have. I am thinking it was printing 12x12 but I hate to think. I have so.much.paper I don't even know what to do with it - the recycle bin only takes A4.
Such.a.dork.
I worry the entire time about how many copies of my A4 print run it will do but am completely relieved to only have the 12 I ordered.
It's just gone 11am and I have my printing done, plus enough scrap paper to last me the rest of my contract.