Hewlett Packard takes us back to 1981 with the recent revelations that they hired private eyes (clap clap), to watch their board -- they saw their every move. (It is totally time for the Hall and Oates revival to begin! They made our dreams come true!)

So this all started back in 1999, when former CEO Carly Fiorina moved forward with her controversial plan for HP to acquire Compaq, despite strong board opposition. After the deal went through, you may also recall that HP ended up having to lay off 18,000 people and its stock nosedived.

In reaction to this, board member George Keyworth (a science advisor to Ronald Reagan) started pushing for the big time VC Tony Perkins of Kleiner Perkins to be put back on the board, despite Fiorina's objections. Perkins then sat in on a gripey board meeting in January 2005 where everyone talked about how much they hated Fiorina, and afterwards, everyone claimed to feel better.

Shortly afterwards, though, someone leaked the details of the purportedly-secret Fiorina hatefest to the Wall Street Journal, and in February 2005, Fiorina got canned and Perkins got reinvited to the board. They then appointed Patricia Dunn as the new board chair. Here's where it gets crazy.