Let's Get Brainwashed.

The day after the Human Resources girls moved to another floor, the machines rebelled against us. First the cappuccino machine stopped working. Then the scanner refused to send images of our important documents to the network drive's folder. We learned to wait for the IT Department to fix our problems.

And then the printer became stubborn. It jammed every time someone sent a print job to it. And no one talked to each other, so when one person gave up on fixing it, a minute later, someone showed up to a surprise: the printer screen blinking red, and its door open like an unhinged jaw. I sat in front of it and heard it all, but said nothing. It wasn't my place to explain to the vice presidents that the machines were rebelling.

I called up the HR girls, told them the situation. They thought the machines were experiencing separation anxiety, and told me to pet the machines and say nice things. I said they should be good parents and visit more often.

The residents on our floor discussed throwing the machines out the window. We thought about re-enacting the scene from Office Space, where they bash the fax machine in a field. Instead, we found out the network paths to other printers, and overloaded those simple machines, so that they jammed too.

Then, we stopped printing so much. It wasn't a collective decision. One by one people stopped using the printers and scanners. The cappuccino machine disappeared and a simple coffee machine took its place. And instead of an ice machine with a cold water spout, we now have a water cooler.

The printer, no longer needed on our floor, reunited with its lady parents. The HR girls say they have no probems with it. I spied them once feeding it ivory paper and stroking its paper feeder like it was an itchy ear. The printer purred and plopped out perfect copies of presentations.