Parallax Views

Recruiters 25a

2012-02-10T04:39:00.000-08:00

In recounting my experience with the agency recruiters earlier this week I forgot to mention that both PS & IM are actually working on-site at the client company in a contractor capacity. By that I mean they're not on-site account managers, they're getting paid to do a job for the client. One is listed in the directory as an engineer, the other as a program manager. That means they're pimping

Green & gold memories

2012-02-09T03:19:00.000-08:00

A friend of mine sends round this compilation of, well, History du Jour—historical events that took place on a particular date. & here was one of the vignettes for yesterday: “In 1693, a charter was granted for the College of William and Mary by co-sovereigns King William III and Queen Mary II of England to develop clergymen and civil servants for the colony of Virginia. The scholastic honor

Recruiters 25

2012-02-08T04:46:00.000-08:00

My latest close encounter of the recruiting kind has been straight out of a Dalí painting. My first contact with this agency was a few months ago when I was contacted by one of their reps after a conference call at work. My sole contribution to the call (& I’m not making this up) was, “Hi, I’m [Bas Bleu]. I work in XXX, & I’m wondering why I’m on this call.” IM, the recruiter contacted me a day

Bank of last resort

2012-02-07T04:57:00.000-08:00

I’m not saying that we’re going to hell in a handbasket, but here’s another example of the plummeting common denominator in the use of language in business: It’s a come-on for high schoolers to open checking accounts at a Chase Bank in a supermarket in Palm Springs. Not sure how much of the smaller print you can see, but here are a few random

Nuclear winter

2012-02-06T04:52:00.000-08:00

You’ll note from this photo that there’s a great gaping hole where the microwave oven should be. Last Wednesday evening I noticed that my egg wasn’t cooking, no matter what setting or for how long I had it in there. Thursday I called the property manager & Friday the repairman came out. (Not quite the service I had at the Apartment Megalopolis in San José; but this property management company

No kissing

2012-02-03T04:40:00.000-08:00

February is American Heart Health month here in the US. So let me bring you a story that’s associated with heart operations: the no-kiss, hard CPR method. & here to show us how it’s done is that master of vascular sensitivity, Vinnie Jones: The British Heart Foundation endorses the method, & created the Jones video. We’ll have to see how it flies this side of the Pond.

The bark side of Super Bowl

2012-02-02T03:41:00.000-08:00

Ordinarily I tune out commercials on TV, if I can’t fast-forward past them. (I’ve also trained my eyes not to see ads on web pages. All those billions of dollars spent on SEM just swirl down the drain as far as I’m concerned.) I also don’t watch sporting events. I used to like the Olympics before NBC got hold of them & turned them into xenophobic yak-a-thons. So the Super Bowl is a great big

Enough, already

2012-02-01T05:10:00.000-08:00

J.C. Penney’s new CEO is taking an interesting approach to the Applification of the retail giant. As of today, no more sales-du-jour; just consistent, low pricing. & when I say “sales-du-jour”, I mean even more than that: last year they ran 590 sales. I don’t know how they do that—sales on sales, I guess. But Ron Johnson led Target for some years before moving to run retail operations at Apple.

Muppet news

2012-01-31T03:42:00.000-08:00

Evidently it’s not enough to have Sunnis fighting Shiites, or Tutsis going at it with Hutus or Serbs taking on everyone in the Balkans. No—Fox News & the Muppets are now firing across each others’ bows. Not watching a whole lot of TV news, I hadn’t been aware that Fox’s Eric Bolling proclaimed that the latest Muppet movie indicates a “liberal media” bias that’s brainwashing kids against big

Calculated to bring you down

2012-01-30T04:13:00.000-08:00

A writer for Slate has come up with a Mitt Romney comparison calculator. It’s an algorithm that uses Romney’s income for 2010 (based on the tax returns he finally made public) & calculates how long it would take the Republican candidate to “earn” whatever you made that year. Then it tells you how long it would take you (at your income level) to amass what he does in a year. If you’re not

Woman's best friend

2012-01-27T05:59:00.000-08:00

This came around on the joke list at work a few days ago; seems pretty spot on: “Man is a woman's best friend. He will reassure her when she feels insecure and comfort her after a bad day. He will inspire her to do things she never thought she could do; to live without fear and forget regret. He will enable her to express her deepest emotions and give in to her most intimate desires. He will

Are you feeling lucky?

2012-01-26T00:58:00.000-08:00

There I was, minding my own business, with the TV on—which is to say, not really paying attention to the screen, when all of a sudden I saw some personage blathering about a colonoscopy sweepstakes. You heard me: colonoscopy sweepstakes. Don’t believe me? Take a look at the video here. It features Ozzy & Sharon Osbourne, so you know it’s legit. What I wonder is: what's second prize?

Dragon year for high tech

2012-01-25T04:36:00.000-08:00

Staying in the holiday spirit of the Year of the Dragon, here’s a story from the NY Times on why US companies are sending operations overseas. The focus is on Apple & China. Foxconn, highlighted in the story, also manufactures the telecommunications equipment for the company I’m working for (until Friday, when my contract runs out). I myself don’t like the idea that the people in Foxconn’s

Dragon year

2012-01-24T04:05:00.000-08:00

Happy New Year. Again. The Year of the Dragon roared in yesterday, with celebrations around the world. I rather like this video from Helsinki—a little heavy on the drums & then short bursts of dragon & lion dances. It’s meant to be an auspicious year. I hope so. You really have to hope for the best from a New Year’s party that lasts two weeks.

Bulken Balkans Part 2

2012-01-23T03:21:00.000-08:00

Ah, someone at the Military Channel must have actually watched the “Beast of the Balkans” episode of their “Nazi Collaborators” series. The one about the Croatian Ustasha officer Dinko Šakić. You’ll recall I noticed during the original broadcast that the banner across the bottom of the screen read “Beast of the Bulkens”: Well, I happened to catch a rebroadcast of the episode yesterday. (Yes, I

Darkness at noon, Part 2

2012-01-20T04:48:00.000-08:00

You should not be surprised to hear that Netizens in droves turned out to step into Wednesday’s Great Wikipedia Blackout void—& churned out masses of fake facts on Twitter. Some of my favorites: “Ferrets are a legume.” “Pluto is no longer a planet due to copyright claims from the Disney Corporation.” The exceedingly hopeful & time-bending “Arsenal has won the Champions League 8 times in the last

Tyger, tyger, getting high

2012-01-19T03:32:00.000-08:00

I know, Epiphany was a week & a half ago, so I shouldn't be bringing up any Christmas-related subject.. But I think this video of big cats reacting to cast-off Christmas trees like some really potent catnip rather transcends any particular holiday season: & given that we're heading round third base to the South Carolina primary, I thought we could all use something without any discernible

Darkness at noon (& the rest of the day)

2012-01-18T02:04:00.000-08:00

I hope you don’t need to look up anything on Wikipedia today; at least not in English. The online crowd-sourced encyclopedia has shut down its English-language pages for the day to protest proposed legislation in the US Congress. Ditto Reddit, BoingBoing & the Cheezburger Network, all of which are social media sites, without the presence of Wikipedia. (Although I know a lot of people who are

Silvered Seattle

2012-01-17T17:11:00.000-08:00

Brr—the Emerald City is under snow, with heaps more predicted for tomorrow. Given my own experience with how the area copes with the white stuff, all I can say is: Thank God I’m long gone from there. Chaos will not be the word.

Not Maru, Part 3

2012-01-17T02:39:00.000-08:00

You may have missed this in the run-up to the holidays, but apparently: 1. No. 10 Downing Street (official residence of the Prime Minister of Great Britain) has a rodent problem. 2. Instead of calling in exterminators (even humane ones) David Cameron adopted a rescue cat, which was expected to mouse for its keep. But Larry the Cat apparently was more interested in feline things like

Retailing history

2012-01-16T00:36:00.000-08:00

Weird times in retail. As you no doubt know, Sears has hit the skids, announcing just a couple of weeks ago that they’re closing 120 stores (both Sears & Kmart). Now, in the past few days I’ve seen TV commercials for the “Sears MLK Event”. That event would be a big sale on appliances. Yep—the erstwhile giant is marking the achievements of the Nobel Peace Prize-winning adherent of Ghandi by

Twinkie defense 2

2012-01-13T04:05:00.000-08:00

As follow-up to yesterday’s story on the possibility of iconic snack cakes (if there be such a thing) disappearing from the shelves due to the bankruptcy filing by Hostess, NPR has helpfully suggested ten uses for Twinkies. I think you could also use them in place of clay pigeons for skeet shooting. I bet they’d make a very satisfying splat when hit. What are your ideas?

Twinkies defense

2012-01-12T04:03:00.000-08:00

This has already been a tough month for childhood icons: first Kodak filed for bankruptcy, & yesterday Hostess has filed. The snack cake giant blamed having to pay out on contractual obligations to current & retired employees as the primary reason for its financial woes. Of course. Because it can’t possibly be producing a product line of food-like items without recognizable taste or ingredients

Connecting or not

2012-01-11T04:11:00.000-08:00

I was talking with James, the guy who cuts my hair, the other day. He’s a Bay Area native—grew up around Sunnyvale/Santa Clara, now lives in Milpitas & the salon is in Los Altos. So he’s got a broad perspective on the area. &, while he’s not a technocrat himself, he’s certainly adopted all the tech that has engulfed Gen-XY. I often ask him about local spots for exploration—where’s a good area to

Font of ignorance

2012-01-10T04:08:00.000-08:00

Last month, after I posted the doorway exchange on Comic Sans, I did a little research. It seems there’s quite the passionate campaign to ban Comic Sans. The movement (if you will) is going on for 13 years, now, dedicated to the proposition that a typeface should be in accord with & support the message it is communicating. I certainly agree with the principle, but I doubt it will succeed in

Corpus delicti 2

2012-01-09T03:31:00.000-08:00

Following up on the story about the discovery of a body on Sandringham estate on New Year’s Day, the deceased has been identified as a 17-year-old Latvian immigrant to Cambridgeshire, Alisa Dmitrijeva. She was last seen on 31 August; reported missing by her family a week later. Still no report of cause of death. I feel for the young woman’s family (although I wonder why it took a week to report

Happy families

2012-01-07T08:30:00.000-08:00

As we move into this Month of Primaries, it's nice to add a touch of classy ghoulishness to the ordinary variety we're seeing: Google has noted the 100th anniversary of the birth of Charles Addams with a daily doodle. It’s a welcome change from the inescapable street-fighting-dressed-up-in-$3000-suits going on in New Hampshire, South Carolina & all the other states.

Product oxymoron

2012-01-06T04:41:00.000-08:00

I don’t know how I came across this, because God knows I don’t indulge in energy drinks. I’ve never even so much as sniffed a Red Bull. But am I the only person who wonders how you can have a decaf energy drink? No, seriously—how does that even work?

Down with Skool--up with Searle

2012-01-05T05:12:00.000-08:00

I was rooting around The Telegraph looking for news on the body found at Sandringham, when I came upon the very sad news of the death of Ronald Searle last Friday. The utterly brilliant cartoonist & illustrator was 91. Searle had a wicked sharp artistic style, evident in all of his works; his wit was as sharp as his pen. In the inimitable British phrase, the guy could take the piss out of anyone

Corpus delicti

2012-01-04T04:10:00.000-08:00

Here’s my conundrum du jour: whether to comment on the Republican caucuses in Iowa or the female corpse found on the premises of one of Her Majesty’s royal properties. What to do, what to do? Nah—no contest. I’m going for the story with the lower stink factor. It seems that a dog walker out in the woods at Sandringham (the Queen’s country house in Norfolk) on New Year’s Day found the body

Sign of the times 2

2012-01-03T02:49:00.000-08:00

Oh, ya gotta love California. Where else but the Golden State would you find this: Sadly, it turns out that two businesses must have chipped in for a single sign. You can’t count on this drycleaner using the metaphiz biz to ensure that they never lose your interview suit or your little black dress. (If you're interested, it's on El Camino Real, ion Mountain View.).

Resolving 2012

2012-01-02T14:47:00.001-08:00

It’s the season of resolutions, & I’m working on my own program, but to get the year started out right, I’ve got conflicting guidance for you on how to go about it. First, what you’d expect—the whole S.M.A.R.T. schmear. Note that step 3 is “make it known”—blab it to everyone you know. Blog it. Tweet it. Slap it on your Facebook wall. &then, the counterintuitive approach: keep your resolutions to

Banished for 2012 & ever after

2012-01-01T17:06:00.000-08:00

I don’t wish to start out the New Year by appearing crabby, so I’ll just pass without much remark on the report of Lake Superior State University’s list of words to be banished from the lexicon for 2012. Just a couple of thoughts: how can they limit it to ten? I’d have gone for 100. & I’d include “transparency/transparent”—as in “the app should be transparent to the user” or (even worse) “

2011: The end is near

2011-12-31T15:56:00.001-08:00

I can’t let 2011 get away without Dave Barry’s annual Year in Review. He has the knack of putting everything into perspective. “Zombies on crack”, “rat mucus” & “hyperpartisan gasbaggery”. Yep—that pretty much sums it up. & even though 2012 is a presidential election year & thus by definition starts out in the hole, I hope it’s a happy & healthy one for you.

Recruiters 24

2011-12-30T09:16:00.000-08:00

Oddly enough, considering it’s “The Holidays”, I’ve had rather a flurry of recruitment activity this month. There are a couple that I’m quite interested in, a couple that would be okay, & several that, well, let’s just say that there’s not a bargepole long enough for me to touch them with. There was the wireless voice communications company that focuses on hospital settings. In speaking with the

Bookkeeping 3

2011-12-29T16:25:00.000-08:00

In my post yesterday I mentioned B. Dalton Bookseller, the progenitor of Barnes & Noble. You used to find a B. Dalton at every mall in America, along with a Kay Jeweler & a Victoria’s Secret. Eventually they were absorbed into B&N because the big box concept of quantity over quality overtook the book world. But I was disabused of the notion that B. Dalton was a suitable recipient of my literacy

Bookkeeping 2

2011-12-28T17:06:00.000-08:00

A couple of Saturdays ago I was in the Barnes & Noble store in Campbell, Calif. That’s where my non-fiction book discussion group meets; otherwise I’d be unlikely to go there, since B&N has always struck me as the heir-on-steroids to B. Dalton Bookseller: the literary equivalent of Burger King. I was early for the meet-up, so I spent some time in the magazine section. Eventually I picked up three

If the Nativity were today...

2011-12-25T01:05:00.000-08:00

...this is how it might go: (Thanks, & Merry Christmas, to the Pundit's Apprentice!)

Non-Handel on the holidays

2011-12-23T05:39:00.000-08:00

Okay—a somewhat different “Hallelujah”, but sentiments not entirely out of bounds in the holidays: Free hugs. In a shopping street.

Handel on the hols, Part 4

2011-12-22T05:10:00.000-08:00

Here’s another “Hallelujah” flash mob for your holiday enjoyment—this time at a food court at a Canadian shopping mall. I love watching the faces of the shoppers as they realize what’s happening around them. You just feel the spirits lightening.

Handel on the hols, Part 3

2011-12-21T05:20:00.000-08:00

And another take on “Hallelujah”—this time by a high school choir of “silent” monks. This one hasn’t the professional videography of the others I’ve shared this week, & is marred by the cackling laugh of someone in the audience (possibly the cameraman). & I have a quibble about the breaking up of “ever”. But, really—stunning execution on the part of the students—I don’t know what school, but

Working holidays

2011-12-20T17:29:00.000-08:00

Last Friday the place where I’m getting post-surgical physical therapy was holding its holiday party. They were actually closing the office at 1300 for the potluck & white elephant exchange, so the therapy sessions were running at quite a good clip as we approached the noon hour. But it got me thinking, as I was being simultaneously iced & electrocuted (okay, undergoing "electrical stimulation"

Handel on the hols, Part 2

2011-12-20T04:39:00.000-08:00

A friend brought this to my attention last year: Random Acts of Culture seeded the shoppers at the former Wanamaker’s flagship store with members of the Opera Company of Philadelphia & let loose with the “Hallelujah” chorus. If I thought a flash mob would show up & break out into “Hallelujah”, I might even venture out into a Macy’s Crank up the volume & enjoy.

Cat's in the cradle

2011-12-19T17:30:00.000-08:00

I don't know that this picture, making the rounds, needs any explanation. Especially not if you're acquainted in any way with a cat:

Handel on the hols, Part 1

2011-12-19T04:31:00.000-08:00

I myself never tire of Messiah. It never fails to lift my spirits, & I’m of the opinion that there is no such thing of a surfeit of the oratorio, particularly “Hallelujah” chorus. So this year I’m sharing various versions with you. First up: a presentation by the Kuinerrarmiut Elitnaurviat 5th grade class, of Quinhagak, Alaska. This is how much I love this: I’m not going to quibble about the use

Gifts galore, Pt. 2

2011-12-17T16:09:00.000-08:00

I’ll get around to other seasonal posts, but this topic came my way & I thought I’d pass it on in time for anyone who finds it useful to act upon it. It’s a passive-aggressive giving guide. Now, I’m completely aware that the world doesn’t need any more mean-spiritedness or bloody-mindedness than already exists. In the halls of Congress alone we have sufficient of both, combined with pettiness on

Gifts galore

2011-12-16T04:32:00.000-08:00

Apologies to one & all—I’m behind my time in sharing Dave Barry’s Gift Guide, without which there cannot be said to be actual, you know, Christmas. This year—well, I just cannot decide between the Toad Purse & the Martha Stewart Animated Snake Wreath. What to do, what to do?

Streets of seals

2011-12-15T04:35:00.000-08:00

Cute alert: HuffPost reports a New Zealand woman found a baby seal in her house, & has pix of the pinniped to prove it. What I want to know, however, is what is that blue metal mechanical thing on the sofa with it?

Workplace notes

2011-12-14T04:26:00.000-08:00

This came to me via a "humor" list at work. I was pretty sure it didn't originate within the corporation (it didn't), as it bespeaks an attention to detail in the written word as opposed to the transmitted one. If it had been me, I'd have objected to the surfeit of exclamation points.

Order in the court

2011-12-13T04:25:00.000-08:00

As another indicator that the court system is as much about idiocy as justice, here’s the story of a convicted kidnapper suing his hostage victims for breach of contract. Jesse Dimmick is claiming that Jared & Lindsay Rowley broke their promise to hide him as he was fleeing police. The alleged promise was made while Dimmick was holding a gun, & he’s seeking damages of $235,000. Plus legal fees,

Healthy it ain't

2011-12-12T03:35:00.000-08:00

The business unit at the company where I formerly worked, which had been described to me as “like a really well-funded start-up” at my interview, has closed down, & most of the people I worked with have been laid off. The corporation as essentially decided to get out of the healthcare systems business. They’re in the process of offloading the remainder of their enterprise clinical systems into a

Rat race & human race

2011-12-09T08:12:00.000-08:00

Two stories from NPR today that are worth thinking about: Researchers have discovered that a freed lab rat is concerned about a fellow rodent caught in a trap. So much so that the former will labor hard to get its cage mate out of the trap. & here’s the thing—given the choice of two traps, one with a pal & the other with a cache of highly-prized chocolate, the free rat will still liberate its

Surgical strike Pt Last (I hope)

2011-12-09T04:36:00.000-08:00

Last Friday I had my follow-up appointment with Arrogant Jerk, MD, the surgeon who performed the arthroscopy on my knees. Keeping in mind that this sports medicine practice is like the assembly line at Ford, & that all my interactions with everyone there (except with the MRI tech) has had all the warmth & humanity of installing an engine block, I was a little surprised to find that they had no

Serpents of the season

2011-12-08T01:44:00.000-08:00

Well, I was being sardonic when I referred to the holiday season & then directed your attention to the recent stories about cobras in the tax office & the windshield viper (sorry, couldn’t help myself)—the water moccasin that appeared on the windscreen of a family’s car as they were going at speed on a highway. But it turns out there really are ophidian aspects of the holidays this year: at least

Pearl Harbor 70 years on

2011-12-07T01:05:00.000-08:00

Today marks the 70th anniversary of the surprise attack on Pearl Harbor. It might be appropriate to pause in your holiday activities & think of the thousands men & women at Ground Zero in 1941, as well as the millions who took on the fight against fascism. In this past year the final known living soldiers of World War I died, & the survivors of Pearl Harbor are also dying off. The Pearl Harbor

Bonfire of the vanities

2011-12-06T01:36:00.000-08:00

No doubt you’ve heard the news of what’s being called the costliest car crash ever: a 14-vehicle crash on a highway in Japan. It involved varying degrees of destruction of eight Ferraris, three Benzes & a Lamborghini. Evidently there was this convoy of high-end cars headed to a meeting of sports car enthusiasts in Hiroshima when the driver of one of the Ferraris tried to change lanes. He crashed

Sunnyvale sites & sights Part 1

2011-12-05T03:37:00.000-08:00

I like walking around my Sunnyvale neighborhood. Within a mile or so of my place there are Latino, Indian, Korean & other ethnic markets, seriously low-rent trailer parks & even a few remnants of the orchards that used to be here before it was Silicon Central. The area is strictly lower- & middle-class cheek-by-jowl, although many of the unremarkable 50s to 70s ranch houses fetch well over $700K

More snakes alive

2011-12-02T04:27:00.000-08:00

As we enter the season of Advent, let me just say this: nothing says “holiday spirit” like letting loose a few score poisonous snakes in a tax office to protest officials demanding bribes, as reported in the Telegraph. The story itself is weird enough; what makes it really striking (so to speak) is the video. I’m not quite understanding why there are still people in the office—I would certainly

Spray art

2011-12-01T05:52:00.000-08:00

Another Internet meme hit the global browsers when a University of California, Davis, campus cop was caught on video pepper-spraying Occupy protester, who were seated & not engaging in behavior any more threatening than planting butts on sidewalks. Barely had the uploads made it to YouTube than Lt. John Pike started popping up in more images than Princess Beatrice’s Royal Wedding hat. Keep

Flying to hell

2011-11-30T04:38:00.000-08:00

I drove into work yesterday morning hearing the news that American Airlines parent company AMR has filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy. It seems that their senior management took longer than anyone has expected to run the business into the ground, although their brand-new CEO blames labor costs, fuel prices & everything in the universe except their own boneheadedness. What this does is allow them to

Shedding light

2011-11-29T04:20:00.000-08:00

I know times are tough, & businesses are trying to cut costs wherever they can. & my current place of employment has certainly had its problems recently, resulting in not only laying off more than 10,000 employees but also (even worse) senior management embarking on “transformation initiatives” to try to save the corporate bacon. (You’ll recall that this is the company that needed five layers of

Bulken Balkans

2011-11-28T05:05:00.000-08:00

So I’ve been watching this Military Channel series on people who collaborated with the Nazis. It’s called, amazingly enough, “Nazi Collaborators”. & it is actually imparting some interesting information. There have been episodes about Pierre Laval (France), Chaim Rumkowski (the Łódź ghetto) & the Arajs Kommando (Latvia; their expert was a doctoral student at the University of North Carolina).

Black day in the stores

2011-11-25T03:27:00.000-08:00

Black Friday has descended upon us, as it does every year on this day. As you may know, Black Friday traditionally marks the beginning of the Christmas shopping season. It’s the day after Thanksgiving Thursday & is also the turning point for American retailers—the day that they move from the red to the black in their account ledgers. (First of all, I don’t get that—how is it possible that

Turkey du jour

2011-11-24T05:21:00.000-08:00

Ah, Thanksgiving. & in addition to the inevitable “worst day in the year to travel” stories, the media are churning out “tips for a safe holiday” pieces like this. Ref: the turkey hazards, a few things come to mind. For the longest time I really, really hated the traditional Thanksgiving meal because the turkeys of my childhood were always overcooked. (Plus, I never liked gravy, cooked stuffing

Not Maru, Part 2

2011-11-23T04:31:00.000-08:00

Not sure why but everything seems to be turning up cats these days. Here’s the latest: a hair-dressing kitten. Personally, while I give the guy props for holding it together for the camera, I suspect he smeared tuna on his head.

Super-duper

2011-11-22T04:38:00.000-08:00

I know you’re expecting me to express my disgust at the shocking, utterly shocking, failure of the soi-disant Congressional “super-committee” to come up with any kind of plan to deal with the federal deficit. But you can get that from anyone. Here’s something to rival the super-flop: a soi-disant “doctor” with issues of his/her own in Florida has been arrested for (& I swear I am not making this

Feline furnishings

2011-11-21T04:04:00.000-08:00

Following on the feline theme of last Friday, it has come to my attention that there’s at least one company that sells kitty-related furniture. I understand the cat shelves & kitty condos (AKA towers). But this one, the “Kitt-In Box” just doesn’t work for me. Anyone who’s ever been remotely associated with a cat knows that it’s going to park itself where it wants to park itself. Regardless of

Not Maru

2011-11-18T04:59:00.000-08:00

These feline amusements have come my way, & I thought I’d share. First: Bing as kitty-TV. You know, Microsoft’s search engine landing page du jour, which certainly looks better than Google’s. Although Google probably doesn’t care, given its market share. Second: the family cat gets to the phone before the answering machine. They’re not Woody Allen, & they’re not Maru. But still, it's Friday.

Consequences of cool

2011-11-17T05:24:00.000-08:00

I have an Android phone, so I’m unfamiliar with the Siri application. I suppose it’s swell. However, someone has taken the “Tell my wife I’m running late” use case & taken it a few releases further. One can dream.

Recruiters 24

2011-11-16T04:31:00.000-08:00

Had a phone screening yesterday afternoon with a recruiter for a major enterprise software company. Went through the usual drill & then we came down to The Question: what’s your current salary? Now, first of all what you’re earning from your current employer is only mildly relevant to what the prospective one should be paying you because each situation is different. Your role

Surgical strike Pt 5

2011-11-15T03:33:00.000-08:00

I finally got the sutures out of my knees yesterday, thank God. They were driving me nuts—itching & catching on fabric. (They’re some sort of stiff plastic thread.) & one of them actually came out on its own. I can’t think why they don’t use the self-destructing stuff that vets use on our four-pawed friends. Both my PCP & my physical therapist are impressed at how well I’m doing. I’m actually

Royal carriage

2011-11-14T04:08:00.000-08:00

Interesting license plate frame, spotted on El Camino Real in Mountain View. (BTW, El Camino Real is literally "The King's Highway"; originally the route of the Franciscan friars who built the missions along it. It's also the main drag through the Silicon Valley's several counties.) The driver actually was a woman, but I didn’t notice any signs of royalty or even nobility in her mien or her

11.11.11 In service

2011-11-11T04:37:00.000-08:00

Living in the Silicon Valley, which is at some distance from any military installation, there’s nothing here except department & furniture store sales to remind one of Veterans Day. Without a big federal workforce, the traffic won’t even be lighter than usual. But I’m still thinking of the men & women who do the dirty & dangerous & dreary jobs that encompass providing for the common defense.

Business box

2011-11-10T05:03:00.000-08:00

I’m not going to be able to hear the beaten-to-death biz phrase, “think outside the box” without picturing Business Cat’s take on it. Actually, every time I hear another bit of jargon endemic to the organization I work for—like “deep dive” (for “go into detail”), “solve for that” (like we’re in a chem lab instead of yet another bleeding con call), “tee up” (instead of “prepare”), “decrudify” (

Recruiters 23

2011-11-09T04:26:00.000-08:00

In the past few days I’ve been contacted six times by recruiters about an "urgent requirement" for a part-time contract product manager position with Adobe. Four of the emails have come from a single job shop. Two of them were from the same recruiter, each time as though he’d personally just discovered me. (Here's the sad thing: even part-time, with the rate one recruiter said it would run, I'd

Surgical strike Pt 4

2011-11-08T04:19:00.000-08:00

Arthroscopy report, continued: As the saying goes, so far, so good. As long as I don’t put weight on a leg & then twist it, I’m fine. No problem using the clutch in my car. (Oddly, I had to shift the position of my right foot on the gas pedal because I had it at an angle from the ankle, which must have put some torque on the knee. Once I straightened it out, I was fine.) Which is good, because I

Money games

2011-11-07T02:24:00.000-08:00

I have to say that I don’t get Zynga—they’re the instigators of those God-awful –ville games that infest Facebook. FarmVille, FishVille, MafiaVille—whatever. Until FB enabled blocking the damned “I need a sack of manure for my farm” & “I iced t’ree hoods” status updates my only recourse was to block the people who sent them out with unbelievable frequency. (& does it seem odd that FB regularly

Surgical strike Pt 3

2011-11-05T18:35:00.000-07:00

Report on arthroscopy: I rode to surgery in a C-class Benz; my driver is one of the owners of the company that manages the surgery centre (& others in the Bay Area). The place is a freaking assembly line, but I suppose that’s pretty much the case for all such organizations these days: maximize the ROI, keep the product coming through, cut & move on to the next one. My procedure was scheduled for

Surgical strike Pt 2

2011-11-04T03:30:00.000-07:00

Okay, ready for arthroscopy. Turned down the opportunity to rent (at my own expense—insurance companies won’t reimburse) a cold therapy unit. 1) The description of how it works kind of scared me. 2) I don’t know how I’d haul it up two flights of stairs while on crutches. 3) I have plenty of ice bags & bags of ice & I know how to use both. Finally (after several calls) connected with the driver

Surgical strike

2011-11-03T04:46:00.000-07:00

Some time tomorrow, I’ll be in a surgical centre, having arthroscopy to repair torn menisci on both knees. Imagine my joy. I live in a third-floor walk-up. But it has to be done, & as long as that’s the case, better get them both fixed at once to minimize the time spent hors de combat. Also—better to have the procedure while I’m still covered by the best health insurance I’ve ever had. It’s

Post-Halloween "treat"

2011-11-02T04:36:00.000-07:00

I’m not looking forward to this holiday season at my current place of employment. Here’s what I found between the color & black-&-white printers this morning, obviously left over from some Halloween party yesterday afternoon: Leaving aside the fact that I find even fresh pumpkin pie repugnant, isn’t leaving a custard-based dessert substance out overnight a health hazard?

Scary season

2011-11-01T05:53:00.000-07:00

Since we’re still in the cusp-of-eternity period (it being el Día de los Muertos), I figure it’s okay to report that in Saint Louis, if you want to get treats you have to tell a joke. It would be hard to make that work around here, because the treat-giver would need to be able to take in jokes in Farsi, Hindi, Urdu, Spanish, Mandarin & Vietnamese. But it’s a nice idea.

Christmas in October

2011-10-31T17:52:00.000-07:00

Ugh—it’s 1744 on Halloween & I’ve just seen my first Christmas TV commercial. No, not for a salad shooter, so not completely official. But it was a Chex Mix with red & green bits, & had that dingy-dongy “Carol of the Bells” music in the background.

Not primordial ooze. Maybe

2011-10-31T02:49:00.000-07:00

All Souls. Día de los muertos. Samhain. Halloween. All Saints. The hours from 31 October through 2 November are just chock full of us looking over our shoulders at mortality, whistling in the dark, building bonfires to push back the night, dressing up as someone or something we aren’t, communing with the departed & generally displaying our defiance at the Last Unknown. Night is taking over day &

Love & crime in Colorado

2011-10-28T05:31:00.000-07:00

File this under the heading of “you just can’t make this stuff up”: A Colorado Springs man (& I use the adult-male designator loosely) sought help from the police when his online & offline love lives collided at oh-dark-thirty Wednesday night. His wife got home earlier than he’d expected & when his Craigslist conquest showed up for their assignation, Kevin Gaylor, 24, resolved his dilemma by

Sweet & spicy

2011-10-27T04:24:00.000-07:00

As I mentioned yesterday, Diwali involves—among other things—sweets. (According to one of my colleagues, in general Indians are really big on sweets. He should know; he’s from India. But that’s also borne out by the number of Indian fast food places around here that have “sweets & snacks” in the name.) Anyhow, that being the case, I made a batch of garam masala-spiced pecans & left little

Holiday sweetness

2011-10-26T03:49:00.000-07:00

The festival of Diwali is upon us again. I have to say that I can get behind any holiday that celebrates the triumph of good over evil, light over darkness. But this year I’ve learned another reason to set candles ablaze & leave the doors & windows open for Lakshmi to enter & bring with her prosperity for the new year (in the Hindi calendar). It turns out that sweets form a major component of the

Skipping & slogging

2011-10-25T03:34:00.000-07:00

The WSJ recently ran a frisnic on reading styles—in depth vs. skimming. (Or, as Cynthis Crossen clarifies, skipping.) When I was being paid to read books & scripts for film & TV companies in Hollywood, it was clear to me from the “coverage” (basically, book reports) of other story analysts that many of them flew through the “properties”, barely touching down every six chapters or so to pick

Diagnostics

2011-10-24T03:52:00.000-07:00

I can’t believe I’d ever hear these words coming out of my mouth, but Friday I had my annual mammogram & the experience took up entirely too little time. (If you’re apprehensive of TMI, you may want to leave this post now.) I got to the Valley Radiologists Imaging facility early, on account of having to fill out that poxy paperwork. & I wasn’t heartened by the fact that some of their magazines

Another one bites the sand

2011-10-21T02:48:00.000-07:00

Yesterday was a weird news day. First of all, Muammar El-Qaddafi was reported killed by Libyan rebels who’ve had a remarkable run over the past few months. If true, the world’s a better place for him being out of it, although I’m not sanguine about democracy setting in to a country that has no experience of it. & it’s appropriate that a dictator who styled himself the über-revolutionary was

Cat burglary, Brit-style

2011-10-20T04:27:00.000-07:00

Alright, it’s a few weeks old, but it makes a bit of a change from Republican whack-job tax “plans”, riots in Greece &mega-banks getting risibly low “penalties” for committing massive long-term fraud on their depositors, their investors & the US taxpayers. The estranged wife of a British Lib-Dem MP has been convicted of catnapping. No, no—not sneaking a snooze on the job. Feloniously ferreting a

Seriously, Netanyahu?

2011-10-18T23:57:00.000-07:00

You don’t think this is going to come back to bite you in the butt? 1027 times?

Exercise non-routine

2011-10-18T05:39:00.000-07:00

I'm not sure how I feel about this; especially about the claim to have burnt 2000 calories in this short a time. But I share it anyway.

Express bus to India

2011-10-17T04:05:00.000-07:00

You have to understand that Silicon Valley is like Really New Delhi; the South Asian population in this area is upwards of 250K, & a UC Berkeley report indicates that one out of three engineers here is from the Sub-Continent. Where I am in Sunnyvale, you can’t swing a cat-toy without hitting an Indian restaurant, sari shop or jewelry store. (I need to find out what it is about the jewelry.) & in

A scoop of the past

2011-10-13T16:44:00.000-07:00

I was somewhat sad to hear that Friendly’s filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy last week. Friendly’s is a—well, it’s a down-market chain of restaurants with an emphasis on ice cream. & they had me at “ice cream”. But it seems they’re caught between the fast-food & sit-down market segments & just haven’t been able to capture much of either. I freely admit to having contributed very little to the

Taking the cake

2011-10-13T04:15:00.000-07:00

I still don’t get the whole cupcake thing. I mean, I don’t see how you can make a living selling nothing but overpriced cakelets. (& the ones I had in Seattle—brought round by the department admin to celebrate some non-event back in the days before budgets were a burden—were truly gagworthy.) But here’s something that boggles the mind even further: shops that sell nothing but bundt cakes. I was

When the meeting actually pays off

2011-10-12T05:09:00.000-07:00

A while ago a friend of mine sent me this pastiche of elevated terrorist alert warnings. She’s right—it has been around before, but it’s worth running again. Last week, in fact, one of my standing meetings at work turned out to have no new information to process (it’s order assurance, in case you’re interested; I’m not explaining what “order assurance” is), so the two other people on the call

Every body to get from street...

2011-10-11T03:44:00.000-07:00

Last Thursday in the Silicon Valley the news of the death of Steve Jobs competed with the taking down of a gunman who killed three coworkers at a local quarry. & by “taking down” I mean “shot full of holes & dead, dead, dead.” The interesting thing to me is that I first found out about it via a voicemail from the local authorities on my home phone, alerting all local residents that the alleged

Global communication

2011-10-10T06:34:00.000-07:00

In case you’re in need of expressing yourself both forcefully & non-verbally, I give you this collection of international rude gestures from The Atlantic. They may be of particular use if you, like me, spend a lot of your working day on conference calls. Just make sure that you’re not sending video. I not only turn off the capability, I’ve taped over the web cam on my laptop & blacked

Mother of chaff

2011-10-07T04:50:00.000-07:00

It’s Ada Lovelace Day again; time to honor a woman in science who inspires admiration & achievement. Lovelace, you’ll recall, was a progenitor of computer programming—way long before Steve Wozniak & Bill Gates. In past years I’ve written about computer science pioneer Grace Hopper & Rosalyn Sussman Yalow, a Nobel Laureate in physiology & medicine. This time round I present to you Joan Strothers