Boss at this big mobile-phone service provider tells IT pilot fish to go to a cell site and let the exterminator in to spray for bugs.

“Bug man sprays in the cell site, then goes into the generator room,” fish reports. “All of a sudden, this big bug flies into the room where he’s spraying with his wand.

“He wands the bug away, and as he does that, the wand hits the Halon sensors. Which in turn discharge the Halon in both the cell site and the generator room. Which in turn shuts down the generator, which causes alarms at the network operations center.

“Eight hours and $8,000 later — and a lot of bosses coming through the cell site — when I finally get to leave, I tell the bug man, ‘That was one @#$%! of an expensive bug spray.’”

Sharky will debug your true tale of IT life. Just send it to me at sharky@computerworld.com. You can also subscribe to the Daily Shark Newsletter and read some great old tales in the Sharkives.