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Welcome to another episode of SpiceQuest

In this series, we call out current holidays and give you the chance to earn the monthly SpiceQuest badge!

(Each task can be done at any time. They don’t have to be completed on a certain holiday.)

[Can you guys believe that it has been an entire year since we brought back SpiceQuest? Hurrah! Anyway, back to our regularly scheduled show.]

This month we are celebrating the following holidays:

1. Groundhog Day

Groundhog day is all about winter, shadows, and reliving your life over and over until you get it right. :slight_smile:

Related Task: Tell us whether you would like to see an early Spring, or 6 more weeks of winter, and why.

Alternatively, if you had to live one day from the past week over and over again, which one would you pick, and what would you do differently to try to break the cycle (or do you like the cycle and want to live the same day forever)?

2. Clean Out Your Computer Day

Clean Out Your Computer Day is celebrated on February 11th, and it is about cleaning out all those old files and emails we all collect over time. Just be careful, if you tell your users about it, make sure they don’t think they should be sending their computers through a car wash.

Related Task: Tell us what kinds of projects you think people should tackle on Clean Out Your Computer Day.

Alternatively, tell us how you promote clean computer habits with your users.

Alternatively, tell us a safe-for-work funny story about cleaning computers.

3. Valentine’s Day

Valentine’s Day is all about expressing your love.

Related Task: Express your love through a digital chalky candy heart, and post it here. Here is a site you can use, or you can design your own.

Alternatively, if your affection cannot be confined to a candy heart, express your love for something or someone by posting in the Huzzah thread, and link to it here.

Alternatively, if you just aren’t feeling the love, tell us what your plans are for the weekend of the 14th. Jigsaw puzzle?

4. Polar Bear Day / Chili Day / Pokemon Day

February 27th is Polar Bear Day, Chili Day, and also Pokemon day. I made a picture of Beartic (the Polar Bear Pokemon) with a stack of Chili bowls for the occasion, but since not everyone likes to combine their holidays, I’ll go easy on you and let you choose. If you like Pokemon, also feel free to participate in this month’s poll below.

Related Task: Tell us whether you would prefer to visit a polar bear in the zoo, eat some chili, or play some Pokemon, or some combination of the three (except polar bear chili is forbidden since they are an endangered species).

Alternatively, If you hate all of those activities, find some other February 27th holiday that you do like (or make one up), and tell us what other holiday you are going to celebrate instead.

5. Leap Day

There is just something about Leap Day that makes you want to celebrate… maybe because you don’t see it very often.

Related Task: Tell us what you are going to do with an extra day in your life. :slight_smile:

Alternatively, tell us what day you wish would come around only once every four years.

Alternatively, if your birthday or anniversary is February 29, just tell us that, and you get a pass on this one.

Remember to post proof of your completion of each of the quest challenges in the comments below, so that we can post a nice February SpiceQuest badge for you when the SpiceQuest is over. All entries must be posted by February 29, 2020.

Note: As always, all entries are expected to be safe for work.

Feeling nostalgic? Look back on old SpiceQuests HERE .

What are your favorite Pokemon?
  • Pikachu
  • Mimiku
  • Bulbasaur
  • Charizard
  • Gengar
  • Arcanine
  • Lucario
  • Umbreon
  • Snorlax
  • Eevee
  • Dragonite
  • Squirtle
  • Tyranitar
  • Groudon
  • Lugia
  • Yveltal
  • Mewtwo
  • Garchomp
  • Mudkip
  • Flygon
  • Ampharos
  • Charmander
  • Greninja
  • Kyogre
  • Jirachi
  • Darkrai
  • Keldeo
  • Manaphy
  • Salamence
  • Rayquaza
  • Teddiursa
  • Axew
  • Mew
  • Absol
  • Magikarp
  • Zoroark
  • Zygarde
  • Machamp
  • Smeargle
  • Scizor
  • Vulpix
  • Jigglypuff
  • Shaymin
  • Skitty
  • Togepi
  • Emolga
  • Dratini
  • Mareep
  • Popplio
  • Treecko
  • Chimchar
  • Rowlet
  • Torchic
  • Lapras
  • Victini
  • Litten
  • Aegislash
  • Rotom
  • Celebi
  • Oshawott
  • Arceus
  • Ditto
  • Beartic
  • Type: Null
  • Meowth
  • Milotic
  • Unown
  • Carvanha
  • Perrserker
  • One of the 800+ other ones–tell us in the comments. :slight_smile:
0 voters
60 Spice ups
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4 Spice ups
3

1. Groundhog Day

Related Task: Tell us whether you would like to see an early Spring, or 6 more weeks of winter, and why.

Early spring! It kinda bugs me when we’re in the dog days of summer and folks are complaining about the heat and they can’t wait for winter. Winter sux. Hard.

2. Clean Out Your Computer Day

Alternatively, tell us a safe-for-work funny story about cleaning computers.

I used to work in a computer repair shop. Someone brought in their computer saying it was shutting down after a while. We opened it up and the stench of cigarette smoke was overpowering. In every nook and cranny there was a film of tar. The tar had gummed up the CPU fan causing the CPU to overheat.

3. Valentine’s Day

Valentine’s Day is all about expressing your love.

Alternatively, if you just aren’t feeling the love, tell us what your plans are for the weekend of the 14th. Jigsaw puzzle?

I usually get a nice steak at the grocery store and a bottle of Wild Turkey American Honey. When people ask about my plans for valentines day, I say I have a date with a real cow and a little honey on the side.

4. Polar Bear Day / Chili Day / Pokemon Day

Related Task: Tell us whether you would prefer to visit a polar bear in the zoo, eat some chili, or play some Pokemon, or some combination of the three (except polar bear chili is forbidden since they are an endangered species).

I like seeing polar bears in the zoo.

5. Leap Day

Related Task: Tell us what you are going to do with an extra day in your life. :slight_smile:

Since that day falls on a Saturday, I’ll be watching Kentucky play against Auburn at 3:45 PM EST on CBS.

Go CATS!

4 Spice ups
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1 Spice up
5

Groundhog Day

Personally I wouldn’t mind more winter. It’s my favorite season. I’ve always been a fan of the cold, having lived in southern California, where the coldest it gets is around around 22C (low 70s in F), I got my first taste of a real winter when I moved to southwest Kansas. Now living in Guadalajara, the temperatures are akin to those of SoCal in the winter and the summer. I want cold… another Ice Age wouldn’t really bother me.

Clean Out Your Computer Day

We employ CCleaner at my place of business and instruct the users to execute the standard cleaning procedures (Analyze and then Clean) once a week. Aside from that the users are limited in what they’re allowed to install onto their machines (require admin password/privileges) so as not to needlessly occupy space or consume resources.

Where I used to work the cleaning staff (outsourced to a cleaning service that was contracted by the software company cluster) would regularly enter our offices and clean our spaces. The veterans would know which cleaners to use around our tech (special non-conductive foam/liquid cleaners, etc.) and would take the required steps of shutting off our machines if we didn’t take the time or forgot to do so ourselves; we handled all of the digital-side clean-up. There was a newbie once on the cleaning crew that was with us that month that either forgot or simply didn’t care to ask those with more experience. Monkey see, monkey do, basically, only this monkey used regular water in a spray bottle and a rag and went to town on a co-worker’s laptop. We ended up having to replace the unit as the repair costs would amount to about as much as a new machine. We saved the RAM and HDD but the rest went to the scrap heap.

Valentine’s Day

I currently have nobody to share that day with. Most of my friends and acquaintances are either married or in a relationship, and those that aren’t are planning on trying their luck at a bar or something. My plans for that day include a few rounds of CS:GO, some Prime Video and probably some take-out.

Polar Bear Day / Chili Day / Pokemon Day

Playing some classic Pokemon Blue on that day on my still-working GBA.

Leap Day

An extra day to use however? Unfortunately it falls on a saturday and I have to work; it’s a half-day, but still. What I wish would only come once every four years would be elections. Like, for every level (local, state, federal and presidential elections should happen on the same day every four years). Everyone would get that day off work to go and take care of their civic duty and then not have to worry about it for the next four years.

2 Spice ups
6

  1. Day 3 in Maui. By this time, we’d been there just enough to really start getting into the groove of aloha. I’d had a few runs along the seashore and we’d found a great place for breakfast.

  2. Open up that bad boy and vacuum/blow-out. Because…damn.

  3. heart.jpg

  4. visit the zoo. We have a very cool zoo in our area, and we used to have a membership. I don’t play Pokemon.

  5. Watch “Groundhog Day”

2 Spice ups
7
  1. Tell us whether you would like to see an early Spring, or 6 more weeks of winter, and why.

Winter hasn’t been too bad in Houston this year, it probably wouldn’t be bad to keep rolling for a while.

  1. Tell us what kinds of projects you think people should tackle on Clean Out Your Computer Day.

Clearing off your desktop will probably go a long way.

  1. Tell us what your plans are for the weekend of the 14th.

We’ve got a big weekend of selling Girl Scout Cookies planned for that weekend.

  1. Tell us whether you would prefer to visit a polar bear in the zoo, eat some chili, or play some Pokemon, or some combination of the three (except polar bear chili is forbidden since they are an endangered species).

Polar bear at the zoo for sure, one of my wife’s favorite animals.

  1. Tell us what you are going to do with an extra day in your life.

Opening day of the MLS season so I’ll at the Dynamo/Galaxy game that day.

1 Spice up
8

1. Groundhog Day

Groundhog day is all about winter, shadows, and reliving your life over and over until you get it right. :slight_smile:

Related Task: Tell us whether you would like to see an early Spring, or 6 more weeks of winter, and why.

They are functionally equivalent.

2. Clean Out Your Computer Day

Clean Out Your Computer Day is celebrated on February 11th, and it is about cleaning out all those old files and emails we all collect over time. Just be careful, if you tell your users about it, make sure they don’t think they should be sending their computers through a car wash.

Related Task: Tell us what kinds of projects you think people should tackle on Clean Out Your Computer Day.

Cull those ISOs you’re never going to use. You’re not installing ESXi v5.5.

3. Valentine’s Day

Alternatively, if you just aren’t feeling the love, tell us what your plans are for the weekend of the 14th. Jigsaw puzzle?

[redacted for lack of fun]

4. Polar Bear Day / Chili Day / Pokemon Day

Alternatively, If you hate all of those activities, find some other February 27th holiday that you do like (or make one up), and tell us what other holiday you are going to celebrate instead.

It’s National Toast Day. YEAH TOAST

5. Leap Day

Alternatively, tell us what day you wish would come around only once every four years.

Paying taxes.

1 Spice up
9
  1. Groundhog Day

Definitely an early spring - I like winter & prefer cold to hot, but the dark nights are so depressing … if I can arrive and depart work in the light it helps so much!

  1. Clean Out Your Computer Day

I am more about backups than clearing out! I think people need to make sure their mobile devices are backed up - so many people have no backup of their photos/videos etc & as so few people actually print pics, they do so often lose them. However on a clearing out note, dear people everywhere - you do NOT need to keep every photo you take on your mobile device - choose the best & delete the rest!

  1. Valentine’s Day

I don’t subscribe to the whole “romance on 14th Feb” thing - I will be at work as usual on the 14th (important meeting with a supplier planned), but Sat 15th intend to spend that day doing exactly what you are joking about - doing a puzzle, reading a book & probably having a long soak in the bathtub! I will be at the end of a very busy week at work & will appreciate the down-time!

  1. Polar Bear Day / Chili Day / Pokemon Day

I’d like to see Polar Bears in the wild far more than Polar bears in the zoo, but the zoo will do if necessary as long as its a decent zoo & they aren’t in concrete surroundings … there are apparently 8 polar bears in the UK, 4 at each of 2 zoos. None are near to me!

  1. Leap Day

I am planning on spending 29th Feb with my elderly father - I don’t see him as often as I should for various reasons (my borther sees him daily & I speak to him regularly on the phone). I’d love to start some sort of 4-yearly tradition though … any ideas?

1 Spice up
10

1. Groundhog Day

Groundhog day is all about winter, shadows, and reliving your life over and over until you get it right. :slight_smile:

Related Task: Tell us whether you would like to see an early Spring, or 6 more weeks of winter, and why.

I always want an early Spring… get the gardens going and have fun with the (now 9) grandbabies…

2. Clean Out Your Computer Day

Clean Out Your Computer Day is celebrated on February 11th, and it is about cleaning out all those old files and emails we all collect over time. Just be careful, if you tell your users about it, make sure they don’t think they should be sending their computers through a car wash.

Related Task: Tell us what kinds of projects you think people should tackle on Clean Out Your Computer Day.

Empty their personal drives of unneeded/outdated files… it’s worse than the “deleted items” in outlook.

3. Valentine’s Day

Valentine’s Day is all about expressing your love.

Alternatively, if you just aren’t feeling the love, tell us what your plans are for the weekend of the 14th. Jigsaw puzzle?

Working in my Shop of course!

4. Polar Bear Day / Chili Day / Pokemon Day

February 27th is Polar Bear Day, Chili Day, and also Pokemon day. I made a picture of Beartic (the Polar Bear Pokemon) with a stack of Chili bowls for the occasion, but since not everyone likes to combine their holidays, I’ll go easy on you and let you choose. If you like Pokemon, also feel free to participate in this month’s poll below.

Related Task: Tell us whether you would prefer to visit a polar bear in the zoo, eat some chili, or play some Pokemon, or some combination of the three (except polar bear chili is forbidden since they are an endangered species).

Eat chili… no other option for me… don’t do Pokemon… don’t do polar bears.

5. Leap Day

There is just something about Leap Day that makes you want to celebrate… maybe because you don’t see it very often.

Related Task: Tell us what you are going to do with an extra day in your life. :slight_smile:

See comment on 3 above, I’ll work in my shop…

Alternatively, tell us what day you wish would come around only once every four years.

My birthday… :stuck_out_tongue:

1 Spice up
11

1. Groundhog Day

I definitely would rather have the early spring because I am not a fan of the winter/cold/snow. Plus, I may finally be buying my first house soon! And if I do, I’d rather not have to try and move everything I own through snow.

2. Clean Out Your Computer Day

Not necessarily a computer, but a phone (which is basically a computer nowadays) but I would say take this opportunity to clean out your camera roll! Delete all the pictures you took on accident and dump the rest to the cloud or a local PC backup and then empty out that camera roll and get some space back on your phone.

3. Valentine’s Day

I don’t have Valentine’s Day plans so to speak but the Sonic the Hedgehog movie comes out that day so I’ll go watch that I’m sure and then probably just come home and do the same thing I do every night: Try to take over the w- ahem I mean, play video games innocently.

4. Polar Bear Day / Chili Day / Pokemon Day

Visiting the zoo is one of my favorite things to do ever! Although eating some good chili or playing Pokemon are both pretty great ways to spend time too!

P.S. For some amazing chili, click here: The Absolute Greatest Chili in the World

5. Leap Day

My brother’s birthday is a couple days before Leap Day so to celebrate both I may take the name of the day literally and bring him skydiving for his first time for his birthday.

2 Spice ups
12
  1. Groundhog Day

Six more weeks of winter: I want the bugs and pollen to stay down for as long as possible.

  1. Clean Out Your Computer Day

I try and keep my cache, temp, and trash files cleaned on a daily basis. However, Archiving and saving old email from Outlook to PSTs is a great way to clean out Outlook and keep it running well.

  1. Valentine’s Day

3o0zed.jpg

  1. Polar Bear Day / Chili Day / Pokemon Day

Eat chili. It must contain beans and meat and be appropriately spiced.

  1. Leap Day

Watch Dr. Who and send losing thoughts to @caesar18 as I graduated from Auburn, WAR EAGLE! :slight_smile:

1 Spice up
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Oh, don’t get me wrong, Lucy. I love jigsaw puzzles. In college, my sister and I used to buy used ones at goodwill, do them, and then either toss them if there were missing pieces or take them back for someone else to do. We do thousand-piece puzzles (or larger) while watching Doctor Who whenever I am in Utah (she doesn’t get BBC America, so we binge watch when I am in town for her).

As for a suggestion for your Leap Day, perhaps get him to tell you some stories from his childhood and record them? I have some Family History/Genealogy nuts in my family, and they are always advocating stuff like that. You might get to hear some awesome stories, the focus will be on him, and having those stories to transcribe or listen to for others could be valuable to others down the line. :slight_smile:

@lucy9840

1 Spice up
14

1. Groundhog Day

To be honest it’s 6 weeks until Spring anyway despite what the groundhog says. I’d rather have 6 more weeks of snow (no pitchforks from the mobs!) because I’d rather not deal with allergies coming too early.

2. Clean our your Computer Day

I would honestly pay people to take their computers through the car wash. XD The best way that we celebrate COYCD is when we deploy new computers out in the field for our employees is prevent every way of saving to the Root C:, my documents, and desktop and point it to the users drive on the server.

3. Valentine’s Day

heart.jpg

Making up plans for the 14th? I usually make it up as I go since I usually don’t think that far ahead or make plans honestly.

4. Polar Bear Day / Chili Day / Pokemon Day

Sounds like a good 5 alarm chili kind of day! Mmm…chili

5. Leap Day

What I am I going to do on Leap Day? I’ll be at guitar lessons jamming out to Shinedown but that’s about it XD.

1 Spice up
15

  1. Given a chance I’d repeat any day of the last week really. Being able tell both jobs to shove it and spend some much needed time with the wife without consequence would be awesome.

  2. I’m at a bit of a loss on this one. I’m responsible mostly for infrastructure, so I (thankfully) have minimal interaction with EUs and don’t get the chance to chastise them. I can’t even give an anecdote about myself. I’m one of those people that has chaos incarnate for a desk but an immaculate PC. I empty the recycle bin 2 - 3 times a day usually.

  3. I personally detest the existence of Valentine’s. The basic idea is fine, but why should I wait for that one day a year to express my love? The 14th will be business as usual for me, I’ll either be at work all day or with the wife.

  4. None of the three options are particularly appealing, so might I suggest we extend National Pancake Day (25th) in to a pancake week? Everyone’s local IHOP/Denny’s/Waffle House/etc could use some love.

  5. Given that it falls on a Saturday, I’ll only have to work a half day at worst. I think I’ll catch up on sleep before my keyboard becomes a pillow.

1 Spice up
16

1. Groundhog Day

Related Task: Tell us whether you would like to see an early Spring, or 6 more weeks of winter, and why.

Even though I live in Wisconsin (Milwaukee area) we have had a pretty mild winter so I would like to see 6 more weeks of winter. Snow is my wife’s favorite thing. (Next to me. I think)

2. Clean Out Your Computer Day

Related Task: Tell us what kinds of projects you think people should tackle on Clean Out Your Computer Day.

Please for all that is holy get rid of all the music and personal gif’s/pic’s on your PC’s. I don’t want “The Call” and I then have to wade through all of your personal stuff to find out that you actually are your own worst enemy. The whole time hearing you beg me not to delete it because it is “IMPORTANT” (Which is the case 99.99999% of the time. This one could have been avoided by just following the rule of no downloading)

3. Valentine’s Day

Valentine’s Day is all about expressing your love.

Alternatively, if you just aren’t feeling the love, tell us what your plans are for the weekend of the 14th. Jigsaw puzzle?

Romantic dinner for my wife. I make a mean stuffed giant mostaccioli. Home baked Italian bread with Tiramisu with a Netflix binge of The Office or we break out the DVD’s of Friends.

4. Polar Bear Day / Chili Day / Pokemon Day

February 27th is Polar Bear Day, Chili Day, and also Pokemon day. I made a picture of Beartic (the Polar Bear Pokemon) with a stack of Chili bowls for the occasion, but since not everyone likes to combine their holidays, I’ll go easy on you and let you choose. If you like Pokemon, also feel free to participate in this month’s poll below.

Related Task: Tell us whether you would prefer to visit a polar bear in the zoo, eat some chili, or play some Pokemon, or some combination of the three (except polar bear chili is forbidden since they are an endangered species).

All three together at the same time. Milwaukee has a really nice Zoo.

5. Leap Day

There is just something about Leap Day that makes you want to celebrate… maybe because you don’t see it very often.

Related Task: Tell us what you are going to do with an extra day in your life. :slight_smile:

Unfortunately that is the day we are implementing a new Warehouse system so I will be stuck at my desk and or on the warehouse floor with some kind of issue.

1 Spice up
17

  1. I would like early spring. I am tired of the cold and am also tired of clearing the ice and snow off my windshield.

  2. I think they should clear out their email mail. There’s nothing more frustrating than a user that complains about slow Outlook only to find that their email box is almost completely full. I try to do this on a regular basis. So when we migrated to )365…My mail box was 285 MB (Yup…you read that right).

  3. Sort of an inside thing…heart.jpg

  4. I wouldn’t mind seeing the Polar Bears again at the zoo. I like chili too…but agree that Polar Bear chili wouldn’t be a good thing.

  5. Since it’s on a Saturday I’ll probably spend it doing the same things I try to do every Sat…checking things off the Honey Do List.

1 Spice up
18

  1. Groundhog Day
    The weather is going to happen no matter what. If it’s six more weeks of winter, then I up my chances of getting enough snow to go snowshoeing. If it’s an early spring, then bring on camping.

  2. Clean Out Your Computer Day
    I had a user who tested how water-proof his rugged hand-held computer was by dunking it in a pail of cleaner. Spoiler Alert…it didn’t make it.

  3. Valentine’s Day
    Love isn’t about a day. It’s about showing it all year long by doing little things just to make someone’s day smoother. Scraping frost off your SO’s windshield so they can just get in and go. Having a plate ready for them when they get home from work late. That kind of thing.

  4. Polar Bear Day / Chili Day / Pokemon Day
    Can I play Pokemon Go at the Polar Bear exhibit at the zoo whilst eating chili?

  5. Leap Day
    A bunch of Scout Groups in my area are holding a pinewood derby on the leap day. I’ll probably end up there.

1 Spice up
19

  1. Not sure I care whether we get more winter or spring. Except for one really cold week I don’t really feel we got winter. And spring here is… milder temps but generally soggy. (rain + snow melt) So… both are ok but my “true love” is Autumn. cooler temps, but generally dry, and often sunny… great for outdoor life. (And the bugs die down).
    If I had to redo a day… Saturday. I could use more rest and and chance to do some baking.

  2. I generally try to stay ahead of the mess on my computer, so it doesn’t become a huge task to deal with. I think that would be a good thing for the staff here to do as well. I know there are some emails you need to keep, but people here seem to hoard old emails and files like they are made of dragon’s gold or something. There are days I’m tempted to “archive files” as in make sure they were successfully backed up and then delete them from the network drives. See if anyone notices. Ever. :smiling_imp:

  3. heart_2020.jpg

  4. Well, I like wild animals, but not a big fan of zoos, too many horror stories about treatment of animals. Chili… I’m a vegetarian. (I do make a mean “fake” chili) I could use the exercise though, so maybe some Pokemon Go would be a good idea. :slight_smile:

  5. As this will be “Day 1” of my staycation… I’ll likely be in nap mode that day.

1 Spice up
20

1. Groundhog Day
More winter, please. No bugs, fewer people out on the roads, no people biking down my street taking up the whole street. Thou I dont like to shovel snow; rain is much better.

2. Clean Out Your Computer Day
I try to have people use their shared drive and not their desktops. Mine isnt the best but its not wall to wall icons.

3. Valentine’s Day
My day will be at work and after Ill be going grocery shopping, and after that home. No one special for me.
heart.jpg

4. Polar Bear Day / Chili Day / Pokemon Day
Love to play my Polar-bear Pokemon and eat some buffalo chili while doing it.
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5. Leap Day
Seeing as its a Saturday have some weekend fun. Thats what I want… what Ill probably do is clean and be an adult.

1 Spice up