back to article Being an IT trainer is like performing the bullet-catching trick

I’m on stage with a gun pointing at my heart. There is the sound of nervous shuffling as those sitting in the stalls squirm in their seats. Then silence: the audience quickly falls still and holds it breath. The man armed with the musket is raising the muzzle to take better aim before slowly squeezing the trigger… He pauses. “ …

  1. Paul Kinsler

    "Captain Haddock cosplay contest at a Geography teachers’ convention"

    oh, very good.

    1. Known Hero

      Re: "Captain Haddock cosplay contest at a Geography teachers’ convention"

      Beat me to it, ^^ that was going to be my exact post :D

    2. Warm Braw

      Re: "Captain Haddock cosplay contest at a Geography teachers’ convention"

      Frolicking folicles!

    3. Arctic fox
      Coat

      Re: "Captain Haddock cosplay contest at a Geography teachers’ convention"

      Pardon? What? Could you say that again, I suffer from Tintinitus.*

      * I know, I should be shot for that pun, see icon.

    4. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: "Captain Haddock cosplay contest at a Geography teachers’ convention"

      It's certainly the only funny part of the article. The rest is baffling. And not funny.

      1. g00se
        WTF?

        Re: "Captain Haddock cosplay contest at a Geography teachers’ convention"

        I'm more worried than unamused - i think it's time Dabbsy went to see someone

        1. Anonymous Coward
          Anonymous Coward

          Re: "Captain Haddock cosplay contest at a Geography teachers’ convention"

          He did. They whisked him away for a surprise lecture where the sign out front said "Waiting on Windows Update for Dummies". This is the result.

    5. Manolo
      Joke

      Re: "Captain Haddock cosplay contest at a Geography teachers’ convention"

      Facial hair is for animals.

      1. Chemical Bob

        Re: "Captain Haddock cosplay contest at a Geography teachers’ convention"

        No, that would be butt hair.

        1. John Brown (no body) Silver badge

          Re: "Captain Haddock cosplay contest at a Geography teachers’ convention"

          "No, that would be butt hair."

          Lighting your farts can cure that. Or so I've heard. A friend told me. Yeah, a friend. Honest.

  2. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    I used to do training courses

    Then I realised I could bribe colleagues to fly in and run them for me.

    Couple of lunches and a dinner and it's sorted.

  3. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Reminds me...

    of when I was in the Army. I was qualified as a Regimental Signals Instructor, and I've got thirty halfwit Troopers sat in front of their terminals as we go through the ComBAT application for BLUEFOR tracking,plotting, etc, when one of the younger scroats puts his hand up and informs me that his isn't working properly.

    I go over and check, and sure enough, there's some real lag issues and a weird response input - the mouse isn't moving quite right and keypresses seem to be wrong or delayed.

    Took me a while to realise one of the other morons had unplugged that terminals keyboard / mouse and plugged his in (stupid long cabling because of the desk setups) and was responding as best he could to whatever he could see his mate doing.

    Arseholes.

    1. Paul Woodhouse

      Re: Reminds me...

      hmm... I had similarly amusing one, luser complaining that his password didn't work, reset it in AD... he still said it didn't work... reset it to something I knew in AD and tested it... straight in... switched it to must change on next log in and handed over for him to log in, it failed again... getting very strange now, so I log in, works for me, let him reset the password...

      he then complains that when he types M it puts N there and vice versa... and sure enough, a quick glance confirms that the keys have been swapped over on the keyboard, I touch type so was getting in no problems, he doesn't... at this point the guy sitting opposite ran off rather quickly for a fag.. that bastid...

      1. Loyal Commenter Silver badge

        Re: Reminds me...

        Sadly, can't do that with modern 'ergonomic' keyboards, as the keys are all different sizes and shapes. No more spelling the longest single word insult you can think of with no repeated letters on the top row of a coworker's keyboard...

        I think the best one 'we' came up with was 'dickbreath'

      2. Ken Moorhouse Silver badge

        Re: Reminds me...

        Numlock on a laptop without numberpad used to cause similar confusion. The numbers being embedded in the central part of the QWERTY keyboard.

    2. ChunkyMonkey
      Trollface

      Re: Reminds me...

      @AC But it is funny :)

  4. allthecoolshortnamesweretaken

    "... thrusting incubated fintech wankers ..."

    Wouldn't inbred be a tad more accurate?

  5. Prst. V.Jeltz Silver badge

    unplugged mouse because wire was in the way.

    Surely you could eject the "delegate" with a FAIL mark? but maybe its not a pass/fail situation you are just there to impart the knowledge.

    Even then - I'd have ejected him for "Failing to meet course minimum requirements" - fees still payable.

  6. Nixinkome

    Footwear

    Aliastair [Meant],

    So MOOCs are better than live training courses. It depends on whether you're a degenerate - sorry, I mean delegate - or an expectant trainer.

    I'm still wondering how the Uzi also travelled to 1918.

    No music?

    I liked this until I saw it on:

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bk7RVw3I8eg

    He is beardless tho'.

    1. Alistair Dabbs
      1. Nixinkome

        Re: Footwear

        Alistair,

        TL:D Watch

        but read the comments instead. I did like:

        Jossefh Drummer2 days ago

        The best part was when He said: "Yuh-muh-nuh-muh!" :v

        then I heard, "Buy it now before supplies last forever".

        It's all Greek to me.

        1. Alistair Dabbs

          Re: Footwear

          It was a spoof pisstake on Disturbed.

      2. allthecoolshortnamesweretaken

        Re: Footwear

        Hmm... repetitive vocal phrasing, you say?

  7. earl grey
    Trollface

    AND a better picture...

    What else could we ask for?

    1. Mark 85

      Re: AND a better picture...

      I'm assuming the pic of Dabbsy. Interesting how he metamorphosed due to the time machine....

      1. allthecoolshortnamesweretaken

        Re: AND a better picture...

        I liked the 'Aleister Dabbs' pic better...

        1. Alistair Dabbs

          Re: AND a better picture...

          I'm disappointed no-one recognised the photo. It's Chung Ling Soo, the world-famous conjuror, who died on a London stage in 1918 while performing the notorious bullet-catching trick. He was an enigma: it turned out he wasn't Chinese at all but an American who maintained his pseudo Chinese disguise on and off-stage for years. The Christian Bale & Hugh Jackman movie "The Prestige" includes a sequence based on him.

          1. Loyal Commenter Silver badge

            Re: AND a better picture...

            You are a Fortean Times reader, AICMFP.

          2. Michael Wojcik Silver badge

            Re: AND a better picture...

            I'm disappointed no-one recognised the photo

            I knew it was familiar, for what that's worth, but I didn't bother reverse-searching it to pin it down. And I have heard the story of Chung Ling Soo. In any case, props for a fine cultural reference.

  8. Daedalus

    TTMR

    Dealing with droids, whether on the shop floor or the exec suite, is always a contest between doing the right thing and "take the money and run".

    Advancing age tends to push one towards the latter option.

  9. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    You had me at

    "thrusting incubated fintech wankers"

    1. witchy

      Re: You had me at

      Saw them at Glasto in '86.

      1. Tony S
        Pint

        Re: You had me at

        Saw them at Glasto in '86.

        If you were really there, you wouldn't have remembered it.

        1. This post has been deleted by its author

  10. Robert Carnegie Silver badge

    Good news,

    This is a dream! Wake up!

    And the bad news. Today isn't Friday, it's Monday!

    My last memorable dream involved having accidentally a mouse having got into my parents' old house... it was wearing fancy dress... possibly clown.

  11. jason 7
    Happy

    Always enjoyed my IT training days.

    I had two main methods to make it run smoothly.

    1. Identify the smart-arse know it all ASAP and set a trap for him in not giving him some important info (that would have been given later in the course) so he screwed something up when charging ahead. That always put them in their place.

    2. Always go at the pace of the slowest trainee. Yes it may annoy the smart-arse but it meant that the 20 people that turned up all went away trained and knowing what they were doing. Seen way too many courses where the trainer is a lazy arsehole that just panders to the two smart-arses and leaves the rest behind.

    1. allthecoolshortnamesweretaken

      Re: Always enjoyed my IT training days.

      Or make the smartass (there always is one, isn't there*) your assistant. Works quite well as long as they're not also an asshole. Also, he'll be the first guy they'll ask the next day/week/month after the training when they run into any problems.

      * Yeah, okay. Sometimes it's me, when I'm on the receiving end of any training. But technically it's not smartassery when it's true. And you can do it in a way that is actually helpful.

    2. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Always enjoyed my IT training days.

      Spot on. You've mastered the game. Are you available for work?

  12. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    My favourite training course was where I was told to teach WordPerfect to an audience of secretaries and such.

    The day arrives and HR come over, hand me a video tape, and say to play that instead, as it was an introduction to MS Office 4.x.

    The tape was duly played after lunch, and I got the lowest marks ever from participants. Well, those who could stay awake, at least...

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