04
Jul
Photocopy, Xerox, Zap, whatever you call it
At my workplace, we have a photocopy machine in the common room outside the office. That machine is shared by another department which rarely uses it. Maybe they are geeks who send e-mail to their colleagues in the cubicle next to them.
In any case, the photocopy machine sits silently until someone from my department decides to do some — guess what — photocopying! At the command of a finger, the machine rumbles to life, blinking its many status lights like a disco machine.
Most people understands what those blinking lights mean, but even with prior experience messing up the brand new copier in my office during my National Service time, I still had to resort to trial and error with the numerous settings on the LCD screen.
It felt like my first foray into the world of geekiness, except that I feel years older now. The machine beeped happily at me while I experimented with the “Duplex” setting.
The first piece of paper was a failure. It tried to print a portrait oriented copy onto a landscape paper, but there was a nice smell that reminded me of one of the chinese Siew Mai. It made my mouth water just taking in the smell, and I had just taken my lunch!
I mentioned it to a colleague, who remarked that I had the face and sound of an acute narcotics addict. It was tempting to mince the paper in my mouth, but I couldn’t do it in front of one of the geeks in the next department during one of their rare forays out of their lair to use the photocopy machine.
Do you have a photocopy machine that spews food onto paper? It really makes the stomach growl like a bear.
on July 11th, 2006 at 12:00 am
Let’s have some “siew mai” back in the officer again.
Oh Keh!!
- J
on July 11th, 2006 at 12:03 am
Crap. Guess we worked too much. I just typed officer.
Oh god..
- J
on July 11th, 2006 at 10:22 pm
Correcting the error: it is “operator”, not “officer”.
on August 9th, 2006 at 10:19 pm
We have a new photocopier at one place I work which is so complicated nobody knows how to use it. It is amazing. It has so many buttons, and is so HUGE, that it looks like if you hit the wrong button it might go into orbit.
It never occurred to me that it might do food.