Off Key

Off Key
Originally uploaded by 365 Things

What: Key for laptop cable.
Origin: Corporate loss prevention program.
How long kept/last used: Pre-December, 2007.
Why kept: Out of Sight, Out of Mind.
Destination: Trash.

Confession: This was in a cosmetic case (which used to be in my office drawer in my last corporate gig) in my bathroom linen cabinet.  The cables were issued by my employer, so that laptops wouldn't be stolen from our desks at work --  which was possible but not probable. The cables weren't well-designed, either.  One end looped around the leg of the modular desk, the lock itself turned a little metal device that clicked into a small hole in the plastic laptop housing.  By policy, we were required to use them at all times.  Practically, I could see that the laptop housing was weakening around the lock; it would have been a simple matter to rip it out. I locked the laptop in a drawer when I left my workstation for lunch or long meetings.

Our office was shuttered prior to the financial crisis, as the bank imploded via bizarre and ultimately unsuccessful merger, so there would be no hope of merging this lonely key with its equally ill-conceived partner.