My Job is Pointless, or How Many Cogs Does an Engine Really Need

I'm a tiny cog in a giant multi-million government-funded IT project (oh yes, another one of those – 2 years late and £120 million over budget, but that's a different story; later my darlings…) to roll out an Oracle ERP for the provision of back-office support to a group of govt owned organisations via a single Shared Services Centre (I do rather feel that I've given the game away, but on we trot)… A large, but equally ominously ignored/poorly-implemented/(insert an appropriately split infinitive here) element of such a massive project is Change Management, the mainstay of which is of course the Change Log. This is where I come in, or, perhaps more appropriately, where I don't.

Each release has, attached to it, a Build Manager who, one assumes, is responsible for various elements of, let's say … ooh, the build. A huge portion of that build is comprised of the Change Requests contained in the aforementioned Change Log (we have so many changes mostly because nobody thought to properly spec said ERP system from the outset). Unfortunately, due to the hiring protocols, the end result is that bodies are brought in to do a specific job and are then let go. During their tenure, they do just that – exactly what they were asked to do - and nothing more. Then, of course, once they've fudged the deliverables, they're off like a shot (government cheque in hand, jigging all the way to the hedge fund). It would therefore seem that having the build manager actually use or refer to in any way shape or form the Change Log is somehow beyond the given purview. Needless to say, once the dust has settled, questions will be asked of yours truly regarding what was deployed and what wasn't. This will be the third time that I've been placed in the seemingly unending toilet swirl of embarrassment of not being able to answer such questions. It seems that "I asked your overpaid Build Manager (contractor) to update me a number of times before he left – he singularly failed to do so" simply doesn't cut it as an answer…

"You don't know? What do you mean you don't know? I don't pay you not to know! That's what I pay Jenkins for, isn't Jenkins?"

"I don't know, sir"

"Good man, Jenkins"

It looks like I'm living proof that not all cogs in the engine are necessary. Until, of course, the smoke comes billowing out of its arse, and the transmission (along with the driver's reputation) lies smouldering on the carriageway…

The Power of Outrage

It started with a kiss… no (I'm doing it again), a tweet. The first I saw of it was a fairly subtle and obscure tweet from Stephen Fry (it could have been that I just couldn't see through the fog of intellectualism, but hey – that's why we love him so much) saying that someone somewhere had written something horrid. I was hooked, and the floodgates suddenly proceeded to open. Jan Moir (lascivious hack from that well-known breeding ground of all hacks, the Daily Mail) had penned a not only poorly-thought but particularly vitriolic (can I use lascivious again?) piece about Stephen Gately's death. This type of hack (there I go again) journalism - no, wait, it's anything but journalism – does the industry no credit whatsoever, and it's been wonderful watching the way the web has been able to convey the abject disgust felt by all and sundry.

Apart from all the sniping, sarcasm, and wonderful put-down humour, my favourite has to be the fact that the headline this Moir creature used started life as Nothing 'natural' and suddenly jumped to Strange and Lonely and Troubling in a heartbeat. Almost as quickly as most of us out here hope her career is ending…

I now see that someone has written what I want to but can't (the constant switching of active windows in an otherwise busy office is taking its toll on me being able to string a coherent paragraph together). This is terrific: http://enemiesofreason.blogspot.com/2009/10/why-there-is-nothing-natural-about-life.html

Just another weekend in France

"We're back!" I shouted, with undisguised glee. Well, I sent a text – not quite the same, I realise, but inside I felt like a small blond child... no, wait, that's not what I mean at all ... inside, I felt like I was leading the hoards of the underworld stomping up the garden path to the front door of an unsuspecting country, singing some long-forgotten old-time religion song. No wait, it wasn't that either...

I do love France; I just can't stand getting here. I'd rather spend an hour and a half in the Strictly Come Dancing audience, listening to Brucie in all his drivel-ridden glory, than travel via Ryanair ever again. Three hour drive to the airport, 4am start, adverts dropping like bombs on Belgrade, and a landing that should have earned the pilot the nickname of "walk away" (well hey, they say that any landing you can walk away from is a good one). And all for one quick weekend in the everything's-closed-cos-October's-out-of-season countryside of the Haute-Vienne! Seriously, you thought Sunday's in France were 'quiet'? Try a Sunday in October out in the rurals! Nope – the next weekend is going to be somewhere with a little more verve.

Win7 Free Upgrade? - it's a money-grabbing SCAM, is what it is...

... well, ok, so "scam" may be a bit harsh, but here's the thing. If you buy an eligible PC/Laptop between June 2009 and March 2010, with Vista on it, you're entitled to a free upgrade to Win7. Go check it out. I'll wait... OK, so you saw that, and we've established a fact. Good. Now try and get it ... get it "free", that is. I bought a Compaq laptop a couple of weeks ago, and over the last few days I've ended up in a bit of a flame-war with HP (they own Compaq) Customer Service over their £21.99 charge for the "free" upgrade. Yep - £21.99! It's a DVD data disc, no doubt with some fluffy paperwork telling you how you've just upgraded to a cool OS (i.e. this one might just actually work properly), but even so... I emailed them and asked how they justified charging £21.99 for something that is advertised everywhere as free.

Now, I understand that they are perfectly entitled to cover costs of shipping/handling - no problem, I'm comfortable with that, so I asked how come it cost this much to ship a DVD. They said that it comes directly from Microsoft in America (what - they couldn't burn a few thousand DVDs here in the UK?) via a "third party" (er, that would be the postal system). I went to the Royal Mail web site just to see how much it would cost to go the other way... In order to actually spend £21.99 sending something to the US, it would be the size of a small stack of glossy magazines, and weigh over a kilo. Oh, and I get insurance (£500) with that, too, along with a "sign-for" service. To anywhere in the US.

When you consider how many DVDs will ship, and how many instances of £21.99 that equates to, this is nothing short of profiteering. Now, I know some of you will be thinking "£21.99 for an OS? - Hey, that's pretty good value", and you'd be right to think that - I think that. I will, of course, shell out the bloody £21.99, but what sticks in my craw is the fact that it's being touted all over the tinterweb as a free upgrade. It's not, and this needs shouting from the rooftops (or at least in my kitchen, at my girlfriend, or anyone else who'll stick around for me long enough to rant at them).

Swindon Samba

Yep - we have a Samba band - it's only a startup at the minute, and it's fair to say that the collective rythm/syncopation is a little on the under-developed side, but there we are:
http://www.parsonscreative.co.uk/swindon-samba

Sunset Vigil

- by Staff Sergeant Andrew McFarlane

The news is spread far and wide
Another comrade has sadly died
A sunset vigil upon the sand
As a soldier leaves this foreign land

We stand alone, and yet as one
In the fading light of a setting sun
We've all gathered to say goodbye
To our fallen comrade who's set to fly

The eulogy's read about their life
Sometimes with words from pals or wife
We all know when the CO's done
What kind of soldier they'd become

The padre then calls us all to pray
The bugler has Last Post to play
The cannon roars and belches flame
We will recall, with pride, their name

A minute's silence stood in place
As tears roll down the hardest face
Deafening silence fills the air
With each of us in personal prayer

Reveille sounds and the parade is done
The hero remembered, forgotten by none
They leave to start the journey back
In a coffin draped in the Union Jack

FaceBook Breaches Canadian Law? So give them bogus gen...

FaceBook Breaches Canadian Law: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/8155367.stm

So, before you delete your FB account, change every piece of personal information about yourself - BoB, name, email tel#, everything. That should do it...