I did a job which involved configuration and migration of a key piece of infrastructure the week after 911 in D.C. for an entity that managed all IP addresses for a large segment of the internet backbone.

I can remember getting in the cab at Dulles and discovering the cab driver was Afghan. Oh Joy!

All information provided to me was on a need to know basis. Determining workloads as necessary to make performance and capacity configuration decisions was difficult.

Incidentally, the day before I flew up to DC, I got into a bar fight, and had two black eyes. I looked like Rocky Racoon. Before you ask, let me just say, you should have seen the other guy.

I remember a discussion around potential need to setup ICM, (Internet Cluster Manager) for mail server, and was told they could not provide me key information I needed to make model that out against infrastructure capacity , and I can remember telling them something like , "look, I have the admin passwords for the servers, if I wanted to I could destroy them. Don't you think it's a bit ridiculous that your withholding information I need to do my job. They lamented and gave me what I needed.

The most unusual thing was that I had to work in a fishbowl like room surrounded by armed guards who never took their eyes off of me. When I had to go to the bathroom, an armed guard escorted me to the bathroom and stood there while I did my thing.

When I got to site, I was searched, and when I left I was searched, and I mean searched like that dude where the cop ask, "what is this", and the searched said, "That's my penis man."