May 18 2013

The tooth fairy

English: Tooth

English: Tooth (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

“I can assure you, Mrs Bailey – he won’t feel a thing.”

The conversation happened above me. I lay reclined dwarfed by the dentist’s chair. The procedure the dentist was talking about was the removal of my last remaining milk teeth.

All but my eye teeth had come loose and had been carefully wrapped in tissue and placed beneath my pillow. The exchange rate at the time was 10p per tooth. The remaining nashers were worth 40p to me and I was all for their apparent painless removal.

“Is there anything else going on I should be aware of?” the dentist asked looking down at me.

I told him that one of the big teeth at the back of my mouth occasionally tickled when I ate.

“No problem at all. We’ll do that one too.”

A flash of concern crossed my mother’s face.

“You mean you’ll fill it?”

The dentist gave my mother a patronising smile as if speaking to an imbecile.

“Well, we could fill it, but in my experience, you fill them and fill them and fill them and eventually they have to come out, so let’s just short cut the whole palaver.”

Nervously, my mother nodded her assent and that was the end of the appointment. We booked the follow-up to remove the first two eye teeth and left the building. When we returned, the dentist was right. The roots on the milk teeth were so shallow that it took the slightest encouragement to remove them. There was no pain. We booked the follow-up to remove the second two. Again, we turned up and, yet again, there was no pain. A tiny bit of wiggling and the teeth came free. We booked the final appointment to remove the large tooth that tickled occasionally when I ate.

When we turned up, although nothing was said, something was different. Despite the lovely weather, the dentist closed the windows. He reached for a tool that looked much more industrial than any he needed to remove the 4 milk teeth. I started to feel afraid. He put the tool into my mouth and clamped down on my rear tooth. Hard.

Instead of the delicate wriggling of the previous appointments, he started to violently wrench the tool to and fro. There was pain and a horrible crunching noise deep within my skull. He brought his knee up onto my chest for leverage. I was terrified and cried out. I don’t know how long it went on for, but it felt like forever. Eventually, the tooth came free.

He held it aloft like a trophy. It dwarfed the milk teeth.

“You see – I said you wouldn’t feel a thing.”

I staggered out into the waiting room and as soon as my mother saw me, she knew something was terribly wrong.

To this day, I remain terrified of any dental procedure. Although they struck the dentist from the register, it’s no consolation to me or to anyone else he savaged through unnecessary and brutal work. I cannot wait for the day when everyone has invisible nanites toiling endlessly to maintain their teeth. Until then – I’ll just ask them to hit me over the head with mallet number 4 every time I need some work done.

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May 18 2013

You can’t be that fussy

English: Blonde girl Русский: Блондинка

English: Blonde girl Русский: Блондинка (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

I didn’t want to go out. I wanted to stay in and revel in my misery, but my friend was insistent. Having recently split up with my girlfriend, the last thing I wanted to do was go out and party. My friend tried every trick in the book to persuade me to go out and eventually, against my better judgment, I acquiesced. That first conversation set the tone for the rest of the evening.

We met a few friends from college in a bar and had a few drinks. My melancholy softened, but never entirely went away. It was ever there in the background throbbing away like toothache. As the night wore on, someone suggested we extend the revelry by paying a visit to the local night club, The Living Room. Again, like a reluctant mule, I dug my heels in.

I stood with my arms crossed and slowly said “I am NOT going to the Living Room”.

Everyone in the group looked at me. My friend came over, put his arm around me and again tried to persuade me to tag along. I explained that the place would remind me of her, my ex. Even as the words came out, I felt the misery rise from inside me, threatening to tumble out in tears. Again, my friend used his silver tongue to win me round. Eventually, against my better judgment, I acquiesced.

There was only one table big enough for us all to sit round in the nightclub. It was a large square surrounded by a padded horseshoe seat. My friend and I sat to one side of the horseshoe. We must have looked like the two masks of drama. He was in his element. I was drowning in sorrow. The music pulsed around us, making conversation difficult.

“What do you think of her?” My friend asked.

On the opposite side of the horseshoe sat a girl I went to college with. Her doe like expression was surrounded by a flock of blonde hair. She was pretty, but did nothing to dispel the notion of dumb blondes. Alongside her sat her very plain-looking companion.

“I assume you mean Donna” I said, indicating my college friend.

He nodded and went on to explain that the slow dances would be on any minute. He wanted me to ask the plain girl for a slow dance leaving the way clear for him to ask Donna.

“No way.” I said.

Right on cue, the first slow record came on and couples started sloping off to the dance floor. My friend continued in his quest to persuade me. I continued to resist. The record finished and another came on. My friend went on and on until…

Eventually, I acquiesced. I stood, leaned across the table and asked the plain girl if she’d like to dance. She looked me up and down and said;

“No!”

I stood dumbfounded. I couldn’t believe it – No?? Before my brain could kick in and stop the words from tumbling out of my mouth, I spluttered;

“You can’t be that fussy!”

By this time, Donna realised what was underway and started whispering in her friend’s ear. I couldn’t hear the conversation, but it was obvious she was trying to persuade her to accept my offer. Eventually, she acquiesced and we made our way onto the dance floor for the most awkward slow dance I’ve ever had. I think we were both thankful for the fact that it didn’t last long.

On the way home, I remembered the events of the evening. For the first time since the break up, I laughed out loud.

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By bluedeckshoe • Posted in life
0
May 12 2013

The monster

Public domain image of an explosive device.

Public domain image of an explosive device. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

There was something bestial about it. As the man pulled down the switch, the machine shuddered and groaned whilst emitting an unholy noise. Although the switch was electrical in nature, the cacophony suggested something much more primal. Internal combustion maybe, or perhaps steam.

Either way, there was an enormous deafening construction in front of me. I never would have thought such a thing would have existed under a modern office block and yet, down here in the bowels of the building, it lived.

As well as being noisy, the room was dark and dusty. The sign on the side of the machine declared it a bomb scanner. My companion looked bored. I helped him load the heavy mailbags onto the conveyer belt so that they could be ingested by the gigantic machine. I felt so important. Here I was, heroically scanning the incoming mail for terrorist devices, risking my life to make sure that the employees of BP Oil (UK) Ltd were safe.

“Have you ever found anything?” I shouted expectantly above the incessant roar of the machine. He fixed me with a look and slowly shook his head. His movements suggested that this was a well trodden path. He told me that any modern bomb would be set off by the scanner anyway. My shoulders involuntarily sank.

So what was the point? There was probably a risk analysis somewhere that said that our company might be a target for terrorism. In the mitigation column, it would say that the incoming post would be scanned before delivery. Everyone could relax, safe in the knowledge that we had all bases covered. Except, as my grisly colleague pointed out, the terrorists were smarter than that.

It’s difficult to find reliable statistics, but several sites seem to suggest that there are roughly 3Bn air passenger journeys per year. Every one of these passengers will spend roughly half an hour of their life passing through security. All of them will have to separate out their liquids and many of them will need to take off their shoes. Not because of our advanced x-ray scanning machines, but because in the past terrorists have been foiled attempted to blow up planes using either liquid explosive or the contents of their shoes.

I’m glad these guys were caught, but we left it a bit late. I look forward to the day when the machines at the airport are so sophisticated, that you don’t even notice them. They just happen to scan you when you’re least expecting it. Maybe while you get out of the taxi or as you walk past the newsagents buying your reading material for the flight. They’re probably not even looking for bombs. They will examine behaviour, looking for anything remotely out of the ordinary.

Surely that must be more effective than lining everyone up and marching them through the obvious (and not particularly effective) bomb scanner.

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May 7 2013

Can computer programming be like literature?

example of Python language

example of Python language (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Programming a computer is unlike most other vocations which are generally considered professions. Writing code is a creative process. OK, the requirements specification lays down the overall dimensions of the playpen. There might even  be some coding standards somewhere on a shelf gathering dust. But within these constraints, the coder is generally free to craft the software any way they want. There is no right or wrong answer, and yet, computer programmers can be very critical of their peers’ programming style.

Some craft their code for brevity. To them, a single deviously, crafted line of code that performs umpteen operations is the pinnacle of the art. Others code for readability. They aim for such self-evident clarity that granny should be able to read the code and have a good idea about what’s going on.

Others code for performance, eking every last cycle of performance out of their composition, often at the cost of the former two. Some code from the hip, typing code in as quick as it comes into their heads. The backspace key is the first to wear out on their keyboard. Others take a long time working out exactly how to lay out the code before they ever go near a keyboard. The actual coding takes much less time than the planning.

I used to work within a team where one of my colleagues was a Christian. No problem with that, except he was a Christian with a capital C. When he introduced himself to people for the first time, he would include his religion in his first sentence. He used to update the comments in every routine he touched to include a verse from the bible. Often, they were poignant and very reflective of the code within.

Another colleague was a Black Sabbath fan. He used to replace any such biblical verse with lyrics from his favourite heavy metal tracks. Again, many were appropriate to the code. This silent coding warfare went on for years. Who knows how much mental effort and time went into the cleansing or infestation of the comments in this way.

To the rest of us, it was something to talk about and the contrast between the two sets of comments were often hilarious. But do I think that computer programming could ever be like literature? As much as I would like to believe it could be, I’m afraid I fear the answer is no. I just can’t imagine a book full of code would ever make the bestsellers list.

Having said that, here are some of the funny comments I’ve come across in my career in IT;


Options.batchSize = 300 // madness? THIS IS SPARTA



// I am not responsible for this code
// They made me write it against my will



// Dear future me, please forgive me.
// I cannot even begin to express how sorry I am.



double penetration ; // Ouch!



// I have no idea what this code does - I only changed line 1397


# To understand recursion, see the bottom of this file

...At the bottom of the file

# To understand recursion, see the top of this file



// I'm not sure why this works, but it fixes the problem.



// Somedev1 - 6/7/2002 Added temporary tracking of logic screen
// Somedev2 - 22/5/2007 Temporary my arse!



// You may think you know what the following code does.
// But you don't - trust me
// Fiddle with me, and you'll spend many a sleepless night
// cursing the moment you thought you'd be clever enough
// to optimise the code below.
// Now close this file and go and play with something else.



// Drunk, fix later.



// Magic - don't touch!



// Not to be used in a production environment
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May 4 2013

Changing course

Brighton Beach

Brighton Beach (Photo credit: dogfrog)

I never turn down a learning opportunity. I have no idea how much training and education I’ve had in the two and a half decades or so of my career, but I know it’s a lot. BP allowed me to attend college one day a week for six years and I went through every training course in the book. Temenos allowed me to take Open University courses for a further three years.

Among all of them, there are two courses that stand out; courses that changed my life. The first of these was the first course I ever attended. The title of the course was Putting People First. The whole company had to attend the course and when it came to my turn, it was held in Brighton. Everyone from senior executives down to tanker drivers and clerks attended the course.

The course was all about the importance of everyone’s job and how your actions affect those around you. Misery and happiness are both contagious and I know which I’d rather catch. The trainer used anecdotes such as a man asking two builders what they did for a living. The first said that he stuck bricks together. The second described the magnificent cathedral he worked on. I know which builder I’d rather be.

The course changed my outlook on life. The first thing it taught me is that I didn’t want to do the job I currently had. I wanted to do something with more significance. I didn’t know what at the time, but I knew if I studied hard, I was bound to progress. The day I returned to the office, I spoke to my boss about going to college.

The second course that changed my life was 2 decades later. It was a leadership course. It taught me the nuances of communication. It’s not just what you say, but how you say it is very important. Your choice of words, the medium, tone of voice, tempo and posture all have an impact on how your message gets received.

It also taught me about what motivates people. Why people do (or don’t do) what you ask of them. The course also asked a question which, for me, had no obvious answer. What makes you happy? I know when I am happy and when I am not, but the question of what makes me happy had me stumped for a long time.

Try answering it yourself. It might just change your life.

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Apr 28 2013

What kind of juice would you like today Sir?

Orange juice

Orange juice (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

I despise corruption. There’s something about a person entering an office which should be above reproach and abusing their post that really grates with me. In some countries though, corruption is almost a way of life. An Indian colleague told me a story about the corruption in his country. The subject material annoys me, but I liked the story.

He told me that when the police stop you in India, it is seldom for a particular traffic violation; they want a bribe. He rode home from work one evening and the police stopped him. To my colleague’s dismay, he realised how little money he carried. Getting stopped twice was not beyond the realm of possibility and he only had enough money for one bribe.

As he handed over the cash to the police officer, my colleague explained his predicament. For some reason, the officer sympathised with his cause and gave him the following piece of advice. If you get stopped again, just tell the officer you had orange juice this morning. My colleague went on his way, eager to get home.

On the way, another police officer stopped him. My colleague had no money to give this time, so he told this officer that he’d drunk orange juice this morning. To his amazement, the officer waved him on. My colleague could scarcely believe his luck, but he was thankful and thought no more about it.

A few days later, the police stopped him again. He had the money to pay the bribe this time, but he wondered if the orange juice phrase would save him having to hand it over. As the officer approached him, he repeated the pass phrase once more and yet again, the police officer waved him on his way. My colleague felt like he’d cracked the system. No more traffic bribes for him.

Week after week, whenever the police stopped him, he trotted out the same old line and he paid scarcely a rupee in traffic fines. He couldn’t believe it and it saved him a fortune. It was almost a month later when one fine day, a policeman stopped him. My colleague was in a hurry, so he shouted across to the officer that he’d had orange juice this morning. The policeman smiled and said “Oh no sir. It’s apple juice this morning.”

So if you’re ever stopped by the police in India, just tell them you had some random kind of fruit juice. You never know you’re luck!

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Apr 24 2013

A sense of perspective

Eye death

Eye death (Photo credit: @Doug88888)

On paper, I was very ill. The trouble was, I right at that moment in time, I didn’t feel very ill. Locked inside the hospital with the dead and the dying, I was akin to a caged tiger pacing around. I bore quickly at the best of times. After 3 days of medical confinement, I contemplated digging a tunnel.

In the TV room, there was a guy about my age, which was unusual. Most inmates could claim at least 3 decades on the pair of us. We were already on nodding terms. As I sat down on the sofa beside him, he asked me what was up.

I told him how frustrated I was with the continued confinement. I went on about the boredom, the tedium, the mind-numbing routine of it all. I was sick of the food. The TV set only had a dozen channels and what I wanted most of all was to go home. My diatribe must have lasted 5 minutes or so.

“Yeah – it’s no fun.” he replied laconically.

I looked at him properly for the first time. “How long have you been in here?”

“3 years.”

At that instant, I realised how stupid my frustrated speech must have sounded. I realised how selfish and insensitive I had been. Altogether too locked up in my own misery, it didn’t occur to me that the other people must have stories of their own. We spoke for an hour. He told me that he spent most of his life in and out of hospital. Born with a congenital problem, he had a lifetime of hospital treatment to look forward to.

I returned to the ward and for the first time, spoke to the guy in the next bed. A fellow patient now, not just one of the dead and the dying. He told me of his wife, how they’d been happily married for 60 years. Then a short while ago, someone decided he was no longer fit to drive so they withdrew his license and with it, their independence.

It wasn’t long before someone else decided that him and his wife could no longer cope and committed them to a care home. Unfortunately, for some bizarre reason, they were housed in different care homes. Together for 60 years, separated in a heartbeat, he quickly fell ill. It was a tragic story and I doubt it has a happy ending.

I will always be grateful to those people. They taught me a lesson I will never forget.

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Apr 22 2013

Stress!

English: Jump! Deutsch: Spring!

English: Jump! Deutsch: Spring! (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

If you ask anyone if they think they lead a stressful life, the chances are a large proportion will say yes. With the hectic lifestyles of today, we put ourselves under enormous strain. The stress is not in the situation, however, it’s in the person. Two different people placed in an identical situation will experience different stress levels, based on their background, training and perception of the situation.

I received a salient lesson in stress once. I don’t mean the kind of stress that makes you want to throttle someone or the stress that gives you a slight headache. I mean the stress that keeps you awake at night, every night. The sort of stress that renders you close to tears the whole time. When you start to wonder if you can ever see the light at the end of the tunnel, stress starts morphing into a slow seeping despair.

I was project manager for a large software rollout. The project was in the late stages leading up to go live. In the closing stages of the project, my boss phoned me to tell me he was to step down and that I would have to fill his shoes. He had a lot of responsibility on his plate and this represented a doubling of my workload. At the same time, a couple who were close to us went through a messy separation.

These three things don’t seem like much when I write them down now, but at the time, each one was enormously stressful. Combined, they were too much for me to take. I didn’t realise at first. Stress makes a stealthy approach, crawling through the long grass before it pounces. Before I knew it I was wrestling with it and the damned thing was winning.

It wasn’t a pleasant experience, but I learned a lot. If you don’t want to be kept awake at night, keep a to do list. Once you write something on this list, your brain will allow you to forget it. Otherwise, your brain will keep coming back to the problem, day or night. If you are struggling, ask for help. It seems so obvious, but it’s amazing how many people struggle on when all they need is a nudge in the right direction or to share out some tasks.

Talk to someone about the stress you feel. It helps. Try and get a sense of perspective about what’s on your plate. If you don’t complete your work, will someone die? Will you go bankrupt? Will you lose your family? There are remarkably few situations when distilled down to their simplest are really that critical.

There is another remedy which I hesitate to relate.

As soon as my wife realised the stress I was under, she took me straight to the local spiritualist shop where she bought me some stones. She bought me a lump of quartz to stick on my desk (to absorb all the negative energy) and some bits of tourmaline to carry in my pocket to absorb all the stress. I don’t believe in such mumbo-jumbo, but I took the stones. I’m absolutely positive it’s a coincidence, but ever since, I have felt less stressed.

I don’t believe a word of it and yet, those stones are still there.

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Apr 21 2013

It’s a classic

Classic car

Classic car (Photo credit: vpickering)

“What on Earth possessed you to buy this?”

As the freezing cold rain dripped off my nose, I couldn’t think of a sensible response. Somewhere deep inside me, an indignant voice screamed out that a roadside rescue man should not be so insolent, but such was my misery that I couldn’t bring it to the fore.

I simply looked on as he struggled to inject life into my crestfallen steed. It was a Jaguar, a series III. Magnificent in every detail except the fact that it wouldn’t go. I considered his question. Why indeed had I spent a load of money, which I couldn’t afford, on such a fragile artefact?

When I first saw it, I fell in love. Those smooth lines, the opulence of the interior, the effortless performance of the 5 cylinder engine. It was a 6 cylinder engine when it left the factory, but one of my cylinders had given up the ghost. Whenever the damn thing was moving I had the biggest smile on my face ever. Whenever it stopped, I looked miserable.

I can’t help it. I am an absolute sucker for a classic car. If someone bottled the scent of an old car, they would make a fortune from people like me. That heady mix of stale sun-baked leather together with the aroma of walnut dashboard is how I imagine Heaven smells. When you add the sight of the industrial strength rocker switches and the Smiths industries instruments, I challenge any man to resist.

There are three types of people in the world. There are those who are blissfully ignorant of classic cars. They might make a passing comment such as “that looks nice” as a priceless example of automotive history rolls by. These people are fortunate. The idea of buying a piece of our motoring heritage would never occur to them. Blessed are they.

The second type knows their way around an engine. As they walk past, a sensitive nose might just detect the faintest aroma of engine oil. They know their big end from their crankshaft. They are perfectly suited to buying a classic car. If anything goes wrong, they are in with a fighting chance of remedying the situation without descending into ruination. Blessed are they too.

I belong to the third type: absolutely clueless idiots who fall in love with classic cars, but would struggle to know one end of a spanner from another. They are destined for a life of misery. They will spend their days desiring complex machinery that they have no hope of maintaining. They will buy something stupid and be stranded on the side of the road. They will be miserable.

But during those few moments that their trusty steed is firing on all cylinders on a sunny day, they will be the happiest people on Earth – and that is worth all the misery. I don’t currently own a classic car, but occasionally, before I board a flight, I buy a classic car magazine and allow myself to dream.

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Apr 15 2013

What do you want to be when you grow up?

When I Grow Up (Pussycat Dolls song)

When I Grow Up (Pussycat Dolls song) (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

After I filled in the questionnaire, the computer considered my future. After a short pause, the printer chugged into life and rattled out line after line of career suggestions on green and white piano paper. Once the clattering came to a halt, the careers officer ripped off the two feet or so of suggested vocations. As he checked the printout to make sure it was OK, he asked me what I thought I wanted to do.

As a young child, it was obvious. I wanted to be a train driver first. Then I decided that I would have much more fun as an astronaut. No, maybe a scientist or a spy. As I went through school, I dismissed such fanciful ideas and came to terms with the fact that I had no clue what I wanted to do in the future.

I scanned down the piano paper at the list of jobs. I could not see any common thread connecting them. They looked like a random list of careers plucked from a hat. Some of the selections made sense and I noted with some amusement that most of the fanciful posts I’d whimsied about as a small boy were present and correct – with the notable exception of spy.

The careers officer said to think about which entries on the list appealed and told me there was an upcoming careers evening where I could find out more. I went home baffled. How do you decide what you would like to do from a list of things you’ve never experienced.

During careers evening, I wandered from booth to booth to see what they had to say. A GP told me all about his job. You study hard for seven years and then you get to sit behind a desk whilst sick people visit you. Hmmm – no thanks. Someone told me about a career in education, but I didn’t really want to stay at school even if I would be on the other side of the desk. The only job that floated my boat was on offer by the navy, ironically enough.

Their offering was a life on the ocean waves as an engineering artificer. During a five-year apprenticeship, you learned about maintaining all the military technology they had at their disposal and all while sailing around the world. It sounded adventurous. I often think about how different my life would be if I chose to take that apprenticeship.

So what do I want to be when I grow up?  I’ll let you know closer to the time.

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