Commuting

Posted: Thu 13 April, 2006 | Author: | Filed under: Weirdness | 4 Comments »

Anyone fancy a 370 mile daily commute?

The only reason I can think of is that the guy is a total headcase…

Strange Request

Posted: Thu 13 April, 2006 | Author: | Filed under: Thoughts, Weirdness | 3 Comments »

Right now this will mean very little to anyone, but I need to do a bit of research, and I’ve no idea even where to get started.

So, the question is this :

How are people selected to go on jury duty? I don’t mean “what do you do on jury duty?”, but I actually need to have some basic ideas about how people are selected for a stint on a jury.

Is it random? Is there a method? Computerised? Or some bureaucrat sat in an office with a copy of the electoral roll, and a pen?

Simple, n’est ce pas?

Typical conversation…

Posted: Thu 13 April, 2006 | Author: | Filed under: Charm School, Work-related | 3 Comments »

This forms part of a typical conversation (over Google Talk, of which more rants later) with Arsehole Boss at the moment…

Arsehole Boss : i am going to clear it with [the CFO] to start deducting money out of your salaries for not using the messenger properly. please be advised.
-your status needs to be either ‘green’ meaning i am at my desk or ‘grey’ meaning away from my pc.
-please take this seriously
Yours Truly : I’m not away, although I have been – funny thing called lunch – Messenger is on and available, and has been all day.
-no idea why it was red, but if I’m unavaialble I’m not on the thing at all
-well, unless I forget to turn the cunting thing off when I go out for lunch
-changing the status doesn’t – to me – count as misuse

Good, isn’t it?

Motivational Debt?

Posted: Wed 12 April, 2006 | Author: | Filed under: Cynicism, Getting Organised, Thoughts | Leave a comment »

I’ve just re-found this piece, from the Observer back in February. I’d forgotten about it, until a conversation with Herself last night. There was one section in particular that agreed so much with my general philosophy about mortgages etc…

The usurers in charge have encouraged us all to get in debt by blanket promotion of a spend, spend, spend mentality, with ad slogans like “don’t put it off, put it on!”

Now, from an idler’s point of view, debt is an evil sister to the work ethic. It works as an invisible slave driver, a mill owner of the mind, driving us on to do jobs we don’t like in order to pay usurers the interest on objects we didn’t need.

It is rather like indentured labour. Work for seven years to pay off your debt. Then you will be freed. Debt is enslaving.

The entire piece is so well worth reading. Enjoy.

What Do I Want To Do?

Posted: Wed 12 April, 2006 | Author: | Filed under: Own Business, Thoughts, Work-related | 1 Comment »

Somewhere soon, I think work and I are going to come to a crunch point. Currently we’re back to the exact same point we were in a year ago when I joined the company. Arsehole Boss has returned, and the entire thing’s turning into a vanity project – the man wants his name under every role – CEO, CTO, Senior Developer, Senior Web Developer, and probably Chief Cook and Bottle Washer too, given the chance.

This wouldn’t be so bad if he actually knew what he was banging on about, but he doesn’t. Because he can “create a site” using some shitty-ass piece of crap like Mambo or WordPress (he’s used both, and they’re “proper sites”) he thinks he can write PHP, and know what he’s doing. I’ve seen the stuff he’s *cough* ‘written’, and man, it’s fucking bad.

Anyway, morale company-wide is at rock-bottom. They’re trying to move the office to a place that’s convenient for Arsehole Boss and Arsehole Boss’s Bitch (AB is based in Spain at the moment, but ABB seems happy to just do whatever AB wants) and is inconvenient for everyone else. The current place they’re looking at would increase my travel costs five times, which is a not-insignificant amount.

So I don’t know what’s going to happen at the moment. I’ve got a lot of irons ready to go in the fire, and I think now that the Easter weekend is going to be spent stoking those fires so it can all go ahead without too much hassle. I’m sure I’ll write more about it over the weekend.

The current work position isn’t quite untenable, but it does come down to “If I keep working for AB, the simplest way is to go with the flow, not argue anything, let him get on with it, and say nothing”. But I know that in that case, it’ll stress me out more than is sane (I don’t do “say nothing” very well, when faced with weapons-grade stupidity) and really, when all’s said and done, do I want to be another of AB’s bitches?

Yes, the money’s great here, but do I want to prostitute my sanity and ideas?

Some Mistake Surely?

Posted: Tue 11 April, 2006 | Author: | Filed under: Thoughts, Weirdness | 1 Comment »

It’s taken me a couple of weeks to remember to post this (and a post about Tesco Labelling from Blue Witch) but we recently had to go to Holland and Barrett to get some Omega 3 oil capsules for Herself.

Because Herself is vegetarian, she uses the gelatin-free capsules by Vertesse, and non-codliver oils. Which is fine.

However, we also noticed “Cod Liver Oil in Vegetarian (gelatin-free) capsules”, which seems to be pretty bizarre to me…

Driving On

Posted: Tue 11 April, 2006 | Author: | Filed under: Travel | Leave a comment »

Well, I’m back in the land of the living. Just.

Yesterday’s journey was fine – again, the two hundred and fifty miles (ish) went by smoothly, and it took me five hours door to door, including a half-hour break at some godforsaken services near Leicester.

Yes, I know, all service stations are godforsaken. It’s just that some are more forsaken than others – and the ones on the M1 are high on that list. Along with Knutsford (or is it Sandbach?) on the M6. That one just screams out for a small accident involving a juggernaut, the building, and no brakes whatsoever.

But yes, all things considered the journey went well, and my driving confidence has increased a huge amount. Now we just wait to see if there were any speed cameras I didn’t spot… *Grin*

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