Wednesday Morning, 9:00 AM
Chris was just getting settled when his phone buzzed with a new ticket. This one was from Jemma in HR. She was notorious for having a memory so short that it was the stuff of office legend. Rumor had it she once called IT three times in one day because she forgot how to turn her monitor on.
He took a deep breath and picked up the phone.
“Hey, Jemma, this is Chris. I got your ticket—what seems to be the problem?”
“Oh, hi, Chris!” she said, sounding cheerful. “I think my computer has amnesia. It keeps forgetting things I just told it to do. I save files, and then, poof! They’re gone. And when I try to get back in, it asks for my password again. I just told it my password!”
Chris glanced at the ticket details. Computer keeps forgetting saved settings and files—repeated password prompts. He felt a strange combination of amusement and dread. He was beginning to understand why Jack’s patience had worn thin before he’d left.
“Alright, Jemma, let’s take a look. Can you tell me exactly what’s going on when you log in?”
“Well, I log in, and then everything seems fine, but then I try to open my files, and they’re gone again. And then when I open Chrome, it asks me for my login info like it’s never seen me before!”
Chris suspected this had less to do with the computer and more with… user error. But Jemma had her quirks, and he needed to get to the bottom of it without making her feel like it was entirely her fault.
Solving the Case of the Vanishing Settings
“Alright, let’s try this. Open your Chrome browser. Now go to ‘Settings’ and check if it’s asking you to ‘Enable Sync,’” Chris instructed patiently.
Jemma hesitated. “Oh… I think I remember Jack telling me to do that once. But I don’t see it here now.”
Chris waited as Jemma fumbled through her settings. After a few minutes of guiding her through Chrome’s menus, he heard her exclaim, “Oh! Sync is turned off. Oops, I guess that’s why it wasn’t saving my stuff!”
Chris smiled, suppressing a chuckle. “No problem, Jemma. Just turn it on, and your settings will sync every time you log in. That way, your browser will remember you, and your saved data will appear.”
She laughed nervously. “Thanks, Chris. And… uh, could you remind me how to open a Word document again? My desktop shortcut disappeared.”
Of course, it did, Chris thought, fighting to keep his voice steady. “Sure, Jemma. Just type ‘Word’ into the search bar, and it should pop right up.”
Chris hung up, amused and exhausted. A few minutes later, his phone buzzed again. Another ticket. It was from Jemma.
“Hi, Chris! Just one more question—how do I enable Chrome sync again?”
Chris chuckled, resigned. This was just another day in IT, and Jemma’s 2-minute memory issues were part of the charm… or, as Jack might have put it, “occupational hazards.”
He opened his notes, typed a new entry: Jemma – recurring sync and shortcut reminders needed weekly, and clicked save.
With a sigh and a smile, he leaned back in his chair, ready for whatever quirky crisis came next.