Friday is the 15th annual SysAdmin Appreciation Day. Pictured above is a related poster created by and featuring the IT department of the Launch Federal Credit Union, which serves Florida’s Cape Canaveral region.

“We didn’t feel appreciated enough last year,” writes a Launch FCU sysadmin on a SpiceWorks message board, “so we sent this email to all employees and displayed 20 of these posters in visible places in every department.”

In case you can’t make out all the words in the picture, the key sentence reads: “So appreciate an IT person today and we may allow you to use your computer tomorrow.”

There’s a smiley face at the end of that sentence.

The even smaller sentence not visible in the picture reads: “Also the I.T. Dept. will be closed from 8:30 a.m. – 6:00 p.m. in recognition of this holiday.”

A number of participants in the forum asked if the poster was a joke.

“It depends on what you mean as a joke,” the sysadmin replied. “We actually sent this email out to everyone and put posters everywhere. Fun is actually encouraged around here :)”

So you can assume that the thing about using computers and the other thing about the department closing were both jokes. I had already assumed as much; only a killjoy would assume otherwise.

And I’m also assuming that SysAdmin Appreciation Day will be quite properly celebrated this Friday at the Launch Federal Credit Union.