100,000 Likes
My heart skipped a beat when I opened the Email from Dean Windar. “I need to see you URGENTLY in my office at 2 PM TODAY.” No friendly, chit-chat, just a summons-and with capital letters, which was shouting in the on-line world.
I wracked my brain trying to figure out what this could be about. After our “meeting” a few months ago concerning my budget overages, I had kept a very tight control on expenses, to such an extent that my staff had taken to calling me “Scrooge McBarb” when I asked them if they couldn’t pull out staples and re-use them. I didn’t think it could be that.
So what could it be? I was approaching the Administration Building, so I supposed I would find out soon enough. My stomach was in a bit of a knot as I got into the elevator and pressed “11” for the floor where the high mucky-mucks had their nice offices, with views of the whole campus, along with the river and the corporate skyscrapers downtown.
I walked nervously down the hall and presented myself to Dean Windar’s secretary, an older woman with teased blond hair named Margaret. “He’s expecting you, Dr. Moore,” she said, with what seemed a note of mockery in her voice, though perhaps my paranoid brain was imagining that. I maneuvered past her desk and knocked at the door.
“Come in,” I heard. Dean Windar sounded displeased, and, when I opened the door and went in, I could tell even from across the room that he looked displeased. “Have a seat, Dr. Moore,” he said, brusquely. No chit-chat about the weather or the Twins’ prospect for the upcoming baseball season. I sat.
“Dr. Moore,” Dean Windar said, glancing at me sternly. “Are you familiar with the University policy on internet use?” He pulled a stapled sheaf of paper from the top of a pile beside his right hand and slid it towards me across the polished wood surface, with which I had acquainted myself during our meeting about my budget a few months ago.
I didn’t like where this was going. I picked it up and shuffled through the pages, pretending to read it. “I’ve seen it,” I replied, trying to be non-committal.
“Are you familiar with a website known as the CruxForums?”
“Oh, shit!” I thought, my heart now pounding. I tried to calm myself. “I’m not sure,” I replied, trying to sound nonchalant, though doubting that I did.
“Not sure?” Dean Windar replied. His eyebrows looked kind of cute as they rose up. “IT was doing a review of traffic through the University server and they came upon an unusual amount of traffic to that site, not one that our staff normally uses to conduct their research, I must say. They traced it to your computer. Isn’t that interesting?”
I coughed, stalling for time, trying, quite unsuccessfully to think of something I could say that would help. I didn’t think blaming Xyulo - wanted by criminal international court in The Hague and his merry band of hackers would go over very well.
“I suggest that you have a look at page 4, towards the bottom, paragraph 22” Dean Windar continued. I saw that he had a copy of the document in his hands and had underlined the appropriate paragraph in yellow hi-lighter. “Perhaps you would be so kind as to read it aloud, Dr. Moore?”
My hand was shaking so hard that reading was a bit difficult. “The print is very small,” I said, stalling for time.
“Dr. Moore,” Dean Windar admonished, “The University has an excellent vision plan. Perhaps you should have taken advantage of it.”
Finally, I was able to steady my hand and my nerves enough to see the text and read from it in a tremulous voice, “It is forbidden for staff to use university facilities to access pornographic web sites. Sanctions can include suspension and dismissal for repeated violations of this policy.” I felt sick. I imagined myself disgraced, looking for a new job. With the Republicans trying to get rid of Obamacare, I wouldn’t even have health insurance, unless they managed to screw the repeal up, which seemed almost impossible.
“I may have glanced at that site a couple of times, just out of curiosity,” I said. It sounded foolish as soon as it came out, but it was the best I could think of in a pinch.
Dean Windar chortled loudly. “Your screen name there is Barbaria1, is it not? Pretty flimsy cover, considering your first name is Barbara, I should say.”
“Barbara is a pretty common name, Dean Windar,” I said. I wasn’t under any illusions about how lame this sounded.
He turned to the computer on his desk and clicked the mouse, then typed something in. “Nice avatar,” he said. “It does resemble you. Very much so, I should say. I think you are far too smart to try to argue that isn’t you, given that I have seen all of you.” I blushed, remembering how I had stood before him naked at our budget “meeting”.
“It says on your profile that you have 100,000 likes. You are obviously a popular young lady there. That doesn’t seem like someone who just glanced at the site a few times out of curiosity, as you put it. ” I squirmed in my chair. This was far and away the most embarrassing thing that had ever happened to me. OK, my last meeting with the Dean was pretty embarrassing too, but this was even worse, because it involved my private activities and fantasies.
I was getting desperate now. “Dean Windar, there are a lot of brilliant and knowledgeable people there and I have learned a lot that I use every day here at work. We discuss history and medical esoterica and literature. In fact, I would say CF shouldn’t be considered pornographic at all, but rather a research resource.” God, I was reaching. “And I have polished my writing skills there with all those stories, which has made me better at my job here.”
By now, Dean Windar seemed to be having a hard time stopping himself from laughing out loud. “Dr. Moore, if I wanted to hear rank nonsense, I would tune in to Sean Spicer. The fact is that you have violated University policy willfully and repeatedly and put me in a very difficult situation. I feel like I may have no choice but to recommend termination.”
“Dean Windar,” I began, trying to control my emotions, but failing. “I don’t know, it’s just such a good web site and I just started looking at it and the people there are so great that I became addicted. It’s like a drug,” I sobbed, tears rolling down my face. “I need help, please, I’ll get counselling, go into rehab, whatever I need to do to beat this.” He passed me the box of tissues. I took a couple and dabbed at my eyes.
He waited until my sobbing had abated. Very gentlemanly of him. “Dr. Moore, do you remember how we handled the situation related to your budget overages?”
“Geez, how could I forget?” I thought. “Yes, Dean Windar, I do,” I replied.
“This is much more serious, I’m afraid,” he said. “Fortunately, unlike last time, when I had to use the tools at hand, this time I am prepared.” He got up from his chair and walked over to the closet next to the door where he hung his coat. He rustled around in there for a moment.
When he turned around, I was stunned to see what was in his hand. It was a long cane of bamboo or rattan or some god-awful material. It looked to be as thick as my little finger, if not a bit thicker, and at least as long as my arm. He swished it through the air as he walked back to the desk. The sound sent a chill down my spine. “It’s amazing what you can find on line these days,” he said, smiling broadly at me. “And this time, I don’t have to rush off to a lunch meeting. We have all afternoon.”
... so here goes: 
