O J wrote:
Karen Chuplis wrote:

---------snip of O J's old TelCo stories----------
I have to pass these on to the techs in my company

OK, if you do, tell them this one as well.

The standard underground copper cables are composed of up to 3600
pairs of twisted copper wires. They're heavy, and to pull one from
one manhole to the next takes all the power of one of the heavy
lineman's trucks.

I had something of an intimidating reputation, my nickname was "The
Beast". I was something of a cross between a bear and a geek. I
could decipher any print and at one time all the old DOS portable
computers in South LA ran on menu batch files that I had written.

I was assigned to show an only moderately experienced craftsman how to
do a particular type of splice and I arrived at the location ahead of
him. I opened the hole to let it air out and, after having a cup of
coffee in my truck, decided not to wait any longer for the other
splicer to show up. When I got down into the large hole, I found that
the line crew had left an excess of cable.

Sensing the opportunity to play a classic prank, I cut off about
twenty feet of excess from the real cable, tucked the real end out of
sight behind a few other cables, and shoved about ten feet of the
excess up a spare duct. I then started to set up the fake end as if
it were the real cable, but in such a way that it looked a little
short.

When the other fellow arrived, he joined me downstairs and I began to
complain that the line crew had left the cable a little short and that
I would like to have a little more slack. I spit on my hands and
rubbed them together. I too several deep breaths. I grabbed the fake
end and started to pull. It was easy to move, but I did my best to
pantomime someone straining with all his might.

Slowly the fake cable started to move. I dragged about five more feet
of it into the hole and turned to look at my fellow craftsman. His
jaw was on the floor and an eerie look of disbelief was in his eyes.

"Well, that's a little more like it!" I said. "Now we can get to
work!" I carried on as if the morning's events were nothing special
for about another fifteen minutes or so before I let him in on my
little charade.

Life is short, you have to make your fun where you can find it!

Regards and Purrs,
O J

ROTFL!
--
Adrian (Owned by Snoopy & Bagheera)
A house is not a home, without a cat.