It's getting to the point where when I talk about what I do at work all day, most people won't understand it, though the result of my work are things most people in America use every day, like telephones and the internet.

It's like, I try to explain a concept, and most people, even many of the technical ones I know, are hearing:

So today I *bla bla blahed* this on our telephone switch, then *bla bla bla bla bla bla bla*, and then my network had a *bla bla bla bla bla* issue that was corrected quickly, which is a result of our excellent monitoring systems. Then I had to deal with *bla bla bla bla bla bla bla* and as a result accidentally disconnected our ability to call radio station contest lines in the *bla bla bla bla bla* area. (not that anyone would notice that for such a small duration of time!) All of that and *bla bla bla bla bla bla*. But we also *bla bla bla bla* ported *bla bla bla* phone numbers that we *bla bla bla bla* accidentally from another carrier.

Today I also *bla bla bla* website *bla bla bla* and soon we'll be able to fully market in the next state we're entering. We just have to *bla bla bla the industry jargon bla bla bla bla* and then poof, we'll clear all the regulatory hurdles.

Oh, and I drank a lot of mountain dew and sent emails.

Hopefully tomorrow I'll get to rickroll the Oakland County Central Dispatch while we're doing 911 test calls. Though that probably won't happen until Monday.

(See this *bla bla bla 911 jargon* formatted file entry, with some parts randomly removed for cleanup reasons:
C24857476001287 S COMMERCE RD WALLED LAKE MINEVER GONNA GIVE YOU UP NEVER GONNA LET YOU DOWN CLEARRATE TEST 20WXXXXXX0462485747600 0640 8 CRC 48390

When I make the test call, the dispatcher will see:
CLEARRATE TEST
1287 S COMMERCE RD
NEVER GONNA GIVE YOU UP NEVER GONNA LET YOU DOWN
WALLED LAKE, MI 48390

as my address on the screen. It's okay, because we're doing 911 test calls and pretty much anything goes as long as the trunk works and they know it's a test. It's coordinated with the dispatch center so they know to expect wacky things. ๐Ÿ™‚

That's today's story, in layman's terms. See, I'm doing cool stuff, but I just don't know how far down the rabbit hole to go. Ideas?

11 thoughts on “”

  1. fun game

    Sounds like an entertaining day.

    On a side note, instead of using blah blah blah, we can turn this into an Ad Lib game. Insert your own adjective or verb.

  2. This post is how my boss speaks except where your using blah blah blah as a place holder for actual words, he'll actually say blah blah blah. Leaving everyone in the office to go WTF? and not have any idea of what is going on.

      1. I work in the Siemens Network Repair Center (NRC) which is located in the 26th St. CO building. DC1 is not my gear specifically, but the techs I manage handle all AT&T Siemens EWSD and Genband DCO switching in 22 states.

        It's a new gig for me, I don't know much about the switches. I came from AIN in LD, all this local stuff is new to me… yet somehow familiar.

        1. hah, awesome. I always wondered what you did.

          I talk to the nortel and 5E trunk provisioning center all the time over in Livonia, MI. I only see siemens as end office class 5 gear (at least in MI) and since I don't have any DEOTs I've never had to talk to your group.

          I've talked to 5-10 year veterans of the TPC who still get interlata meet points and local/intralata trunks mixed up occasionally all the time so all i can guess is that you'll get used to it. Local has a lot of wacky pieces, like choke trunks, e911, local/intralata, meet point, and other interesting novelties rolled into one thing, and if parts break, it all gets a bit funky. But when it all works right it's amazingly cool to watch. Sometimes I like to just watch the call detail records on our network scoll by while I think.

          1. This group used to handle some trunking and other things, but with all the mergers things are being streamlined. We're going to be 100% switch hardware repair and maintenance by the end of the year.

            But yes, sometimes it's amazing it works at all.

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