It's a few years before the creation of eBay, and the IT shop where this pilot fish works is upgrading one of its oldest machines with external tape drives.

"In order to do this, we had to obtain a certain type of SCSI card that had been stopped being made many years ago," says fish. "Our supplier managed to get the cards for $35,000 in the back of a warehouse in Sweden, and they were the last of their type available."

When the packages arrive, one of fish's colleagues takes delivery of them. His desk is a mess, so he puts them on the floor right next to it.

Next morning, they're gone.

A quick search doesn't turn them up. But someone mentions seeing a janitor heading to the trash bin with two boxes. And the bin is scheduled to be emptied that day.

To read this article in full, please click here