Maybe it’s therapeutic
This pilot fish is at a remote office to help a user, Barney, with a software problem, but he can’t help noticing that Barney periodically jumps in his chair. Fish finally asks Barney if he’s feeling OK, and Barney says he’s fine, but he periodically gets a mild shock from his desk.
It’s a mid-century steel-frame desk with a Formica top. This office has had some renovations, and fish wonders whether something was mis-wired. It’s not his area of responsibility as IT desktop support, but fish decides to just take a look.
Behind Barney’s desk he finds a large wire paperclip that had managed to contact the hot pole of a slightly loose plug in a power strip and the steel leg of the desk. As long as Barney’s contact was with the Formica desktop, nothing would happen, but when he brushed the steel trim around the edge, he’d get a shock.