Subject: BASTARD OPERATOR FROM HELL #5 - REPOST

From: [email-masked] (Simon Travaglia)
Date: 16 Jun 92 19:18:25 GMT

BASTARD OPERATOR FROM HELL #5

I'm bored senseless, so I pass the time by reading users email.  I must admit
that today's lot is PARTICULARLY boring, not one good message in all of them.
I was expecting at LEAST some veiled reference to a grope in a storeroom, but
nothing.  So I'm bored senseless by the usual drivel about some relative's
surgery and how the weather is over the other side of the world - that sort
of crap.

To relieve the boredom, I remove a e-mail party invite from a user's mail
and post it under the senders username to to alt.singles.with.severe.social.
dysfunctions on news, and make a note in my diary to be there with my
camcorder.  Should be a blast!

  Next in line is the online medical records database, in which the company
doctors store the current medical histories of the staff.  I grep it quickly
for "herpes" and "syphillus" and sell the results to the local scum newspaper.
I cover my tracks by adding an entry to one of the doctor's online electronic
diarys for yesterday saying "$500, Med Recs To Paper"  I think that's all it
should take..

I move some tapes from the racks to the trolley to make it look like we really
use them, then start looking thru archie listings for a hidden x-gif site.  I
find one then start a batch job running under some user's account to get them
all back, charged to him.  I make sure he's got enough disk for the job by
removing any files not related to the task at hand.  Like all those "Doctorate
Final Report" papers that have got quite large in the last couple of weeks.

I go back to the mail now, as something's bound to have happened.  I do a grep
on all mail files for the words "pregnant" and "family way", and post them
anonymously to the local general interest newsgroup.

Then, before anything can happen, the power goes out!  The next second, the
phone rings.

"Hello?" I say, annoyed - the coyote was just about to kill roadrunner again!

"Has the comput.."

I hang up.  This is a matter of life or death.  Quick as I can I rip the
computer power cable out of the UPS and plug the TV in.  Damn!  Wylie missed
again!  

Meantime, all the alarms are going off like crazy as the disks spin down, but
that's ok, because my Mac and Terminal are hardwired to the UPS in any case;
and I'm at the Beer Factory level in Dark Castle too.

The phone rings, so I pull the PABX breaker on the UPS switchboard and it
stops.  Now to look like I'm working.  I break out the puck and the hockey
stick and play a little one-on-wall.  From the observation window it'll look
like I'm being blindingly efficient, as per usual.

10 Minutes later, the power is back and we're two HDA's down, but what the
hell, I haven't lost a man, I'm onto the final screen, and there's more
cartoons!

The phone rings, it's a luser.  (What a surprise)

"Computer Room" I say, being efficient

"Hello, when will the compu..."

I hang up.
I'm doing well in the screen, all I need do is get past the wizard who throws
spells at you and I'm in!

The phone rings again.  I put it on hands free

"Computer Room" I shout, still deep in the game.

"I've lost my files" a user whines over the loudspeaker

"You bet you have" I say, as my concentration lapses just long enough for
me to get zapped by the wizard.

"What was your username?" I say, all sweetness and smiles

He tells me, I look, and he's right.  Shit, and I didn't even do it!

Not to be outdone, I change his login directory to the null device, set his
path to "." and redefine the command "news" to execute a script in his old
login directory to send a nasty message to the equal opportunities officer,
then delete itself.

Now that's trying!
-- 

 +--------+ --+--        +         --+--                 Who needs X? I've got 
 | +----+ |   |          |           |                   a VT100 complete with
 | |    | |   | |  | `/` +--   --    |   ,--, `/` +\ /+  enhanced video.......
 | +----+ |   | |  | |   |  ) (  )   |   |--' |   | V | 
 | VT 100 |   + +--+ +   +--   --    +   `--' +   +   + Fax:  (064)-7-838-4066
 +--------+ Simon Paul Travaglia,  Computer Services,  University  of  Waikato
 [========] Private. Bag 3105,  Hamilton, New Zealand. [email-masked]

The best substitute for experience is being sixteen.