Thursday, January 19, 2006

Just an ordinary bathroom scale:

A company I worked at bought some computers from a nearby vendor. These computers were being used on a military project. One day the vendor sent one of their maintenance people to us with a bathroom scale. I escorted him to the room containing their computers. He placed one of their machines on the scale and weighed it. Then he drove back to his office.
I was really puzzled by this apparently inefficient task. After all, they could have asked me (or just about anyone who worked here) to bring in a home scale, weigh the computer, and email the results to the vendor. (I wondered if the weight might be critical for some military mission; but if so, why trust a bathroom scale?)
However it turns out that another prospective customer had asked a vendor salesman, “How much does that model computer of yours weigh, anyhow?” And sending someone to our place with a scale was the easiest way for the vendor to answer the question.
Go figure.

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