The Twilight Report

Went to a “Japanese” restaurant with some co-workers. If I were in the states and with my friends or family I would probably call it a “Sushi” place, but that didn’t seem to be the term used here^[1]. This place had a conveyor belt and you just picked up the stuff that you wanted as it went by. This concept has always seemed cool in theory, but also a little bit sketchy in terms of health, but the fish turned out to be quite fresh, and I would probably go back again.

The good news is that my co-workers are actually pretty cool. I keep telling people that there are no Jeffs where I work now (my adventures with jeff were chronicled here, here and here.

There are many things that I miss about working at The Company, but Jeff is not one of them. I do miss my collaborations with Adil, Tiffany, Ed and Ed a lot.

I was excited yesterday because my iPod finally came back to me. I wasn’t sure they would actually do it, but they replaced it, so this is actually my third iPod (I checked and it has a different serial number), my second replacement by the same warranty, so that extended warranty was actually worth it for once. Would I get another iPod? I’m not sure, I mean I love having the thing and it is super simple to use, but as far as reliability it doesn’t score well. My friend e and her husband both have iPods and both are giving them trouble at the moment (one sounds like it has died, the other is having the same sort of problems that mine did before it finally died). Theresa’s died recently too. In my own experience their ability to fix things appear to operating at only about 66%, and you only get a good result if you call up and yell at them. I was actually super courteous both times because Theresa used to work in a call centre and people who work in places like that don’t deserve to have abuse hurled in their general direction, you do (however) have to be insistent when block your path with red tape. On the other hand when I actually have a working iPod it is hard to imagine life without it! I think I would actually get another iPod, but I’d get the AppleCare Extortion Plan up front this time, because although there was more hassles than there should have been, they did fix things in the end. That does count for a lot.

1. I think traditionally Sushi refers to the rice or something, but Americans at least usually use it to refer to the whole thing

I have a recording of an old radio show wherein they referred to the Prime Minister as the Prime Monster. Would that make a regular minister a Monster of Lesser Degree?

1. you can still sign up for a no advertising free account, although I think this is no longer the default

I just wasted an evening installing software (Gentoo Linux… not worth it). I’ve come to the realization that software is never going to be exactly “right” for me, and the alternative of writing my own for every task in life is a loosing proposition. Everything is either too big or doesn’t have enough features. Nothing is, as Goldilocks would say, “just right.” There was this brief period in my life when I was completely happy spending my time taking photographs and pretending that I wasn’t a programmer anymore. I miss those days.

Speaking of Goldilocks, clichés and fairytales, mum was complaining the other day about someone at Sydney Uni who was using fairytales to justify his male chauvinism (it’s sad if you are a grown man and are using fairytales to try and understand how the world works). Her analysis was that she would be less likely to have to put up with such attitudes back in the states.

This was all happening at about the same time when I was reading a thread on slashdot (ug… which I am embarrassed to say that I have become addicted to) about crossing the gender barrier in an IT work environment. The question was asked: “How do you make it easier for a woman to enter in or interact well with gender cliques in an IT environment?” IT is of course (sadly) dominated by men, and I shouldn’t have been surprised that the /. crowed would be likewise dominated but I was shocked that the primary response to the question was: “I’d like to say ‘hi’ to women new hires, but if I did then I might get sued for sexual harassment and get fired, so instead I avert my eyes and walk the other way when I see them in the hallway.”

Does that actually happen? I mean in the numbers that would justify that kind of response? I suspect the number of men who have been unfairly dismissed from their jobs due to alleged sexual harassment is negligible. I think “some” people think they are victims because they are required to watch a one-hour instructional video once a year on stuff that should be obvious. Get over it.

I have a sort of love/hate relationship with technology, which I think is best summed up in this BOASAS:

Perfection is achieved, not when there is nothing more to add, but when there is nothing left to take away.

Antoine de Saint-Exupéry

1. Make a hot cup of tea.
2. Try to figure out how the object in question works.
3. If, by the time you are done or by the time you give up the tea is cold, then you are almost certainly dealing with technology.