SETTING: In the hallway to the break room as I went to get a soda.

ZACK, the Network Operations Console guy having trouble getting a certain script to run on one of our racks: Hey! You're super-l33t ...
ME: (blinks) Why, thank you.

I have no idea how I managed to give off the impression that I know everything there is to know about everything. Some days I feel barely competent to do the job I have.

Now my boss is quitting, so I have ten days to become extremely competent, rather than spending my last 30 days in Houston muddling through and learning all I can about the business and tech sides of webhosting.

Help!

As the Network Analyst drove out of the parking garage, the Sport-Utility Vehicle she was following sped onto the street. Its roof rack clipped a pair of low-flying Doves who had just taken off from the curb next to the Apartment Complex across the road. The Doves' bodies flew in opposite directions and landed on the asphalt.

The Network Analyst pulled over, parked her sedan, and ran to the first fallen Dove. It lay on the ground, feathers ruffled, panting for breath. The Network Analyst looked closely, and saw no bleeding; nor did the Dove's legs or wings appear broken. She cupped the Dove's body in her hands and tried to prop it up on its splayed feet, but it fell over. Again she tried to get the Dove to stand up and move out of danger, but it refused to move. She turned and walked away.

The second Dove flapped and fluttered, falling on its side and even its head as it struggled across the roadway. Sometimes it fell still, but moments later it would get to its feet again. The Network Analyst stood over it, keeping traffic away from the injured Dove, for easily fifteen minutes. At first it moved closer to the edge of the road, then farther away, then closer again, until at last it came to rest against the curb. It stood there a few minutes longer, panting so hard the feathers at its neck were a blur, then hopped up into the grass and toddled away, head bobbing.

As the Network Analyst returned to her car, the Apartment Gate Guard who had been watching the entire scene called out, "Why were you so patient with the second Dove, but so dismissive of the first one?"

"I can't make a bird stand up," said the Network Analyst, and drove away.