The Table Topics Master addressed the Toastmasters gathering,
Today’s Table Topic is memories. We’ll invite Carla up first. Given the chance, what memory would you choose to banish?
Table topics is a exercise in speaking extemporaneously. You hear the topic for the first time and have two minutes to speak on it. I knew I probably wasn’t going to be asked to speak since I had a role later in the meeting. But, I considered the question anyway. What memory would I erase? What event from my past would I choose to un-experience? I had plenty to choose from.
Depths of Despair?
The very worst period of my life was during a brutal summer that I moved my family to Wisconsin. I had just been separated from my previous company. Really, it wasn’t a firing. I was president and my investors pulled their funding. I needed a new job. A former client in Wisconsin asked me to come work at his rafting company. He would make me a partner and let me build sweat equity. Some of my friends suggested maybe I should rethink the decision to move my family across the country from Utah on nothing more than a handshake.
I didn’t listen. I really wanted this job to work out. I needed it to work out. It didn’t work out. I spent $10,000 that I didn’t have moving to Wisconsin. I bought a house that I couldn’t afford. It required a propane tank to be installed and filled. I didn’t have the money to do either of those. And my “partner” turned out to be a liar and a crook. I went from making $100,000 per year to nothing. I had twelve of my thirteen kids living at home. Oh, and I was stuck 80 miles north of Green Bay, in the middle of the Great North Woods. I was a computer guy. No one within 80 miles of me really needed computer expertise.
It was horrible. The state fed our family, but winter was coming soon and I had no heating oil and no money to get it. My children looked at me with trusting eyes. They had a confidence that I didn’t feel. I wasn’t just discouraged, I was terrified. I was depressed, horribly so. The lowest point of my professional career, and one of the low points of my life.
Is that the memory I would expunge?
Death?
Two years ago, my daughter and her husband shared the thrilling news that that we were going to be grandparents for the second time. The pregnancy was uneventful. Ultrasound photos said it was going to be a boy. They named him Bruce. And then. . .
My daughter knew something was wrong. During her ninth month, just a few weeks before he was due to be born, she went to her doctor. He checked her out and found nothing out of the ordinary. The next day the baby was quiet. Alarmingly so. A visit to the hospital confirmed their worst fears. The baby, who only a few days before had been busy preparing for his entrance, was dead. My daughter and son-in-law were crushed. As her parents, there was nothing we could do to ease her pain. It was palatable. No parent should bury a child. That goes for grandparents as well.
Would I remove that horrific painful memory?
Stupid Mistakes?
I knew that calls got recorded at my first job. I just didn’t expect that my call would be recorded. Now, I was in a meeting with my boss, her boss and the HR representative. There printed out in black and white in front of each of us was a transcript of my conversation with one of our business partners. I was frustrated with how a project had been terminated. I was oversharing with the client. In fact I was doing more than that. I was telling them how my company had not fulfilled their obligation to the client. Disloyalty doesn’t begin to cover it.
I was embarrassed. I deserved to be fired. No one would have questioned the company if they had chosen to send me packing. Even if I saved my job, I was going to have a long path to rebuild trust in the organization. It was definitely one of the low points in my career.
Would I get rid of that painful experience?
Which of the three would you choose? Or maybe there was something even worse that trumps these. You might wonder which I chose, sitting there in my Toastmasters meeting.
None of them. It wasn’t because I thought of something even worse. As I considered each painful or embarrassing or painful event in my past, I simply couldn’t bear to part with them.
Mater: Oh, for a second there I though you was trying to fix my dents.
Holley Shiftwell: Yes, I was.
Mater: Well then, no thank you. I don’t get them dents buffed, pulled, filled or painted by nobody. They is way to valuable.
Holly: Your dents are valuable? Really?
Mater: I come by each one of ’em with my best friend Lightning McQueen. I don’t fix these. I wanna remember these dents forever.“Cars 2”
Escaping The Depths of Despair
It took a long time to overcome the problems I got myself into in Wisconsin. I had to humble myself and accept help from my mother. I ended up delivering newspapers from 2:00AM to 6:00AM. I had a repo truck sent out to collect my car. I installed satellite dishes for gas money. I escaped bankruptcy by just a couple of months. It took years to pay off my debts.
In the movie “Cinderella Man,” Russell Crowe’s character, James Braddock, after a series of setbacks that sees him going hungry so his kids can eat, gets a second chance as a professional fighter. He’s asked what the difference is between his earlier career disappointments and his current success.
James Braddock: This time around I know what I’m fighting for.
Reporter: Oh, yeah? What’s that Jimmy?
Braddock: Milk.“Cinderella Man”
That line resonates with me today in a way it never would have ten years ago. I like my current job, but even if I didn’t, it wouldn’t matter. The job is the thing. My manager and I recently disagreed with a decision. He offered me an “out.” “If it doesn’t work our, we can go back and do it your way.” My replay was, “Of course it’s going to work. I won’t let it fail.”
I remember what it felt like to go hungry so my kids could eat. I remember the sheer terror I felt as I desperately searched for something, anything that would get me even a few dollars so I could put gas in my car to continue to look for a job. I’m never going through that again. When I get frustrated with my circumstances in life, I think about that period of time. The lessons I learned were seared into my soul. I’ll never forget them. I don’t want to go back to them, but why would I want to give up those scars?
. . .And Life
When a woman loses a baby prior to 20 weeks of pregnancy it’s called a miscarriage. After 20 weeks it’s called a stillbirth. We had a funeral for my grandson. . .my first grandson. Our family is a family of faith. We believe families are eternal. The funeral was a sad experience, of course, but was also a time of hope. Our family pulled together. We honestly believe we will see Bruce again. I have additional grandkids now, including a grandson. But, Bruce is a part of our family. He will always be my oldest grandson. Why would I ever want to give up that? Who would want to lose a grandson, not only tn life, but in memory as well? Not this gradndfather.
. . .And Lessons Learned
I didn’t lose my job that day in the meeting with my managers. I got a warning and sent back to work. I never again forgot the lessons from that day. The most obvious lesson: Don’t bad mouth your company to one of your clients. Yeah, that’s a “no, duh” moment now, but when I was 23, it was quite a revelation. But, also I learned that the company is always watching. That’s not a creepy Orwellian thought. It’s the idea that when you are representing the company, act as if you are always being recorded. It’s part of the reasons I wear slacks and dress shirts when my company dress code allows jeans and shirts.
I also learned that managers must manage. My managers honestly didn’t know what they wanted to do with me when our meeting started. To their credit, they allowed me to make mistakes and keep my job. It’s a lesson I would draw on years later when I had to coach an employee who had made a serious mistake.
You’re not the only one who’s made mistakes
But they’re the only things that you can truly call your own“You’re Only Human” by Billy Joel
The man I am today isn’t perfect by a long shot. But, I’m the sum of my past decisions, including my failures. To the extent I am kind, or experienced, or maybe skilled at something, it’s because of the choices, experiences and mistakes I’ve made. I can’t seperate the lessons from the situations. I cannot shed the pain without also shedding the joy. My memories, like Mater’s dents are very valuable to me.
No, thank you. I’ll keep my memories, especially the bad ones. those are the most valuable of all.
Rodney M Bliss is an author, columnist and IT Consultant. His blog updates every weekday at 7:00 AM Mountain Time. He lives in Pleasant Grove, UT with his lovely wife, thirteen children and grandchildren.
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or email him at rbliss at msn dot com(c) 2016 Rodney M Bliss, all rights reserved
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You’ve played the first two games with three players. How about we give you Darin and you can have four and we’ll play with three?
No, I like playing on the team with 3.
I looked over at Nelson and smiled. Yeah, I liked playing on the understaffed team too. Nelson, Dev and I were the three. We were playing full court: the three of us against four players on the other team. We’d lost the first game 21-13. The second one was closer at 21-19. We play three games each morning. The other team was offering to give us one of their players for the third game. Nelson didn’t want him. And neither did I.
Why would someone willingly play on an understaffed team?
There’s a fascinating book about software development called “The Mythical Man-Month.” A man-month is the amount of work that one programmer can get done in a month. It’s an inexact measurement, but it’s sometimes the best that we can come up as project manager. “The Mythical Man Month” explains why adding people to a project to try to help it finish quicker, can sometimes make it take longer.
That makes no sense, of course. If I need to collect 20 widgets and you offer to provide 5 widgets, I can complete 25% faster. But, if my project has 20 man months left, and I bring on five additional developers, won’t I finish quicker? No, because the man-month is a myth. The book’s basic premise is,
One woman can have a baby in 9 months, but 9 women cannot have a baby in one month.
“Too many cooks spoil the soup.”
Software development teams are different than basketball teams, but they are teams none the less. Throwing a bunch of extra developers into a project will result in a lot of turmoil as the new developers attempt to learn the code base, and integrate with the team. Plus, existing developers have to stop what they are doing and help the new guys learn. That ramp up time often, in fact nearly always, eats up any efficiencies you get from more people.
Gideon was a Hebrew general during the conquest of Palastine by the Israelites. However, there was a problem when he went to attack the land of Midian.
Judges 7:2 And the Lord said unto Gideon, The people that are with thee are too many for me to give the Midianites into their hands, lest Israel vaunt themselves against me, saying, Mine own hand hath saved me.
Gideon had too many men. He had a lot too many.
Judges 7:3 Now therefore go to, proclaim in the ears of the people, saying, Whosoever is fearful and afraid, let him return and depart early from mount Gilead. And there returned of the people twenty and two thousand; and there remained ten thousand.
So, he cut his army down from 32,000 to a mere 10,000. But, that was still too many.
4 And the Lord said unto Gideon, The people are yet too many; bring them down unto the water, and I will try them for thee there: and it shall be, that of whom I say unto thee, This shall go with thee, the same shall go with thee; and of whomsoever I say unto thee, This shall not go with thee, the same shall not go.
5 So he brought down the people unto the water: and the Lord said unto Gideon, Every one that lappeth of the water with his tongue, as a dog lappeth, him shalt thou set by himself; likewise every one that boweth down upon his knees to drink.
I have to say that if I’d been with Gideon’s army, I wouldn’t have made the cut. Only the soldiers that lifted the water to their mouths were going to get to go fight the Midianites.
6 And the number of them that lapped, putting their hand to their mouth, were three hundred men: but all the rest of the people bowed down upon their knees to drink water.
So, he had an army of 33,000. He could have wiped out his enemies easily. But, instead he took a team of just 300. Why would someone willing be on the understaffed team? (BTW, Gideon’s men routed a much larger army by attacking at night and pretending that they were the entire Israelite army.)
I remember the first time my college roommate took me to a BYU women’s volleyball game. I didn’t want to go. He insisted it was exciting to watch. I’d played volleyball. The big lazy bouncing ball sailing high over the net until one side dropped it? No thanks.
Finally, I agreed. I was amazed. Collegiate volleyball is much different than what you played in gym class. The serves are in the 80 mph range for women. Men can serve at up to 100 mph. But, it’s the spikes and digs that are most amazing. No big lazy lobbing back and forth for these women. There are six people on a volleyball team.. . .unless they are playing beach volleyball. Then, you have two on each team. That makes no sense. How can two people cover the same amount of court as six players?
I enjoyed watching the Rio Olympics. I don’t have TV, but we stream the Olympis every four years. The beach volleyball was amazing to watch. How do two people manage to cover the same distance as six? It’s the same way that a smaller development team can outperform a bigger one, or how Gideon’s 300 were able to accomplish the same as his 33,000 would have. When there’s fewer people, each person very clearly knows their role and they know that they can move from one position to another without running into a teammate. The beach volleyball players knew exactly where their teammate was at all times.
Remember that guy in gym class who was just a little bit better than the rest of the class at volleyball, but thought he was a lot better? He was all over the court, running into people as he single-handedly tried to get to every shot. I think that guy was the inspiration for beach volleyball.
Louis L’Amore, the famous Western writer, typically wrote heroes that fought alone. Often, when asked if they wanted help, their response was,
No thanks. If I’m by myself, I don’t have to worry about anyone else.
What he really means is that when you are the only one on your team, everyone else is an enemy. Your small team can be more efficient. It be more nimble. It can coordinate and communicate with team members easier . And, like Gideon’s army of 300, it holds bragging rights over the bigger teams.
We started game three by jumping out to an early lead. One of our house rules is that the team with more people cannot run a fast break. Nelson ran like a gazelle. By being on the smaller team, he was free to streak down court on every position. We got a lot of fast break points. I’m not much of a scoring threat, but I love to play defense. On nearly every play, I ended up guarding two players. It’s a timing issue to know when to cut to the open man to try to pick off a pass. The final game was 21-15. We never trailed the entire game. As often happens, the understaffed team won.
Who would want to be on an understaffed teams? Clearly someone who understands teams.
Rodney M Bliss is an author, columnist and IT Consultant. His blog updates every weekday at 7:00 AM Mountain Time. He lives in Pleasant Grove, UT with his lovely wife, thirteen children and grandchildren.
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or email him at rbliss at msn dot com(c) 2016 Rodney M Bliss, all rights reserved
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A panda walks into a cafe. He orders a sandwich, eats it, then draws a gun and fires two shots in the air.
“Why?” Asks the confused waiter, as the panda makes towards the exit.The panda produces a badly punctuated wildlife manual and tosses it over his shoulder.“I’m a panda,” he says, at the door. “Look it up.”
The waiter turns to the relevant entry and, sure enough, finds the explanation.
“Panda. Large black-and-white bear-like mammal, native to China. Eats, shoots and leaves.”
“Eats, Shoots & Leaves” back jacket cover.
The subtitle to “Eats, Shoots & Leaves” is “The Zero Tolerance Approach to Punctuation.” Yes, someone wrote a book for the grammar Nazis in your life. Actually, it’s for the punctuation Nazis, but they’re close cousins. In fact, Lynne Truss, the delightful author of this little 200 page book, even describes herself as someone who wants to not only correct people’s punctuation, but inflict government sponsored harm on those who perpetuate such satanic sins as “for CD’s, VIDEO’s, DVD’s, and BOOKS’s.” If you immediately spotted what is wrong with that phrase, this book is for you. If you see nothing wrong with that phrase, this book is especially for you.
The book was originally written in Britian. By that I mean that it was written by people who take language much more seriously than we Americans tend to. But, it suffers not the least for being written in a foreign language. The American version seems to work just fine.
Before you jump into the actual text of the subtle nuances of apostrophes, commas, colon (semi and full) and question marks, be sure to read the introductory material: the forwards and prefaces. Truss talks about the surprising success of “Eats, Shoots & Leaves.” Who would have predicted that a book about punctuation would become a best seller? As a writer, I can understand the motivtion to write a book that won’t be popular. Not every book is destine to be the next “Harry Potter.” And, many authors create books that are a labor of love.
I have a book in library that discusses the infrared (IR) spectrum and how you can use it to communicate between computers. Before Bluetooth, we had IR. If you remember having to point the TV remote exactly at the right spot on the television to change the channel, you were probably using an IR remote. There were a lot of problems with IR. It had a limited range. Communication was impossible in sunshine. It had to have directly line-of-sight. It was an extremely secure, but that was not enough of an advantage to make it very popular. My friend, however, wrote an entire book on the protocol. He knew when he wrote it that the book would not sell a lot of copies. But, he was an author and IR was his passion.
Punctuation was Truss’ passion. And that passion comes through in her writing. Fortunately, she also has a great sense of humor and sense of the absurd. That also comes through in her writing. “Eats, Shoots & Leaves” is a delightful book. Whether you are a grammar (punctuation) Nazi or simply a casual reader. The book flows effortlessly from one topic to the next and you will find examples, good and bad, of your own writing and certainly of those writing around you.
What I Liked
I enjoyed every aspect of this book. Truss gives not just current usage rules, but historical context for some of our punctuation marks, and the writing process in general. Her voice is mildly self-deprecating in a way that makes you suspect that she knows how silly arguments about punctuation can be, but she’s going to pretend it’s deadly serious stuff. She covered apostrophes, commas, dashes, colons, semi-colons, the exclamation mark and even the question mark. I don’t know that my own writing has improved as a result of reading “Eats, Shoots & Leaves,” but I at least understand better that I’m butchering our mother tongue.
What I Didn’t
Honestly, there is very little that I didn’t like. Perhaps she could have delved into the history and usage of parenthesis, or braces, or the tilde. But, “Eats, Shoots & Leaves” does exactly what it sets out to do, give some context to our use, and misuse of those little printer marks that keep the words from running together on the page.
What It Means To You
If you are a writer, you will enjoy this book. If you are an editor, you will love this book. If you have ever walked past a sign and thought, “Is that how you use an apostrophe?” you will enjoy this book.
My Rating
Four out of four stars.
Rodney M Bliss is an author, columnist and IT Consultant. His blog updates every weekday at 7:00 AM Mountain Time. He lives in Pleasant Grove, UT with his lovely wife, thirteen children and grandchildren.
Follow him on
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or email him at rbliss at msn dot com(c) 2016 Rodney M Bliss, all rights reserved
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I don’t often reblog other people’s stories. But, today I’m making an exception. The New York Times wrote a very important article on the “Reply All” feature in email. As many of you know, I started my career supporting email products. The Replay All feature is both a blessing and definitely a curse. The Times article, gives an excellent explanation of how not to use it. The article is called “When I’m Mistakenly Put on an Email Chain, Should I Hit ‘Reply All’ Asking to Be Removed?” You can see the entire article here.
I’ve presented it here as well.
When I’m Mistakenly Put on an Email Chain, Should I Hit ‘Reply All’ Asking to Be Removed?
By Daniel Victor Sept 1, 2016
New York Times
I couldn’t have said it better myself.
Rodney M Bliss is an author, columnist and IT Consultant. His blog updates every weekday at 7:00 AM Mountain Time. He lives in Pleasant Grove, UT with his lovely wife, thirteen children and grandchildren.
Follow him on
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or email him at rbliss at msn dot com(c) 2016 Rodney M Bliss, all rights reserved
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A very merry unbirthday to all
To all
A very merry unbirthday to all
To all– The Unbirthday Song, “Alice In Wonderland”
No, today is not my birthday. But, one year ago, on September 1st, I set a goal. The nature of the goal isn’t important, but it was something that I’d been struggling with for a very long time. I finally decided that it was crazy that a grown man who managed to raise a bunch of kids, marry someone much smarter than himself, and have a successful business career couldn’t change this one thing about himself. As a project manager, I’m familiar with setting deadlines and then building a project plan to deliver results by that deadline.
So, I set a goal. My goal was to change my behavior and do it for a year. I gave myself an “out.” After a year, if I really decided I wanted to go back to my old habits, I gave myself permission to. It was an odd conversation with myself. Because I could see how my actions were causing me problems. I didn’t really want to keep the bad habits, but I also knew that emotionally I was using those habits as a crutch. If I told myself “Never again!” (as I had in the past) it would be too overwhelming and I’d never have the courage to go through with it.
So, 365 days ago, I promised myself that if I would give up my bad habits for a year. If I chose, I could take them up again starting today, the “birthday”of my new habits.
It was hard. At times over the past year, I’ve had to constantly remind myself of what my goal was. At first I set a intermediate goal of a month, “Just make it one month.” I didn’t promise myself I could go back at the end of a month, but I did try to convince myself that I could last one more month.
When I was a teenager, I was really sick. I was diagnosed with Crones disease. It’s a devasting disease. Basically, your intestines start failing. Patients at their worst have to have operations to remove ulcerated portions of their intestines, and the worst cases have to go through life with a colostomy bag. I was one of the lucky ones. It eventually went into remission and I’m now symptom free. But, when I was 14, I was one sick kid.
Because the disease attacks the digestive track, doctor’s visits focused on examining my gut. As a young man, many of these exams were not only highly uncomfortable, but extremely embarrassing as well. Crohn’s is aggravated by stress. Few things in my life were as stressful as the thought of a male doctor giving me a rectal exam. But, I knew that it was necessary and temporary. I developed a technique to get through not only the exams, but the worst of the pain as well.
This will take less than 15 minutes. I can endure ANYTHING for 15 minutes.
By reminding myself that the pain and discomfort were temporary, I could convince myself to endure it for a limited time.
I can do ANYTHING for 30 days.
That became my new mantra. I didn’t have to practice these new habits forever, or even for a year. I only had to do it for 30 days. Each month came and went, and it really did get easier to stick to my new good habits and avoid my old bad habits. As August 1st came and went I had to start thinking about getting to the end of my goal.
In the IT industry there are project managers and program managers. Their responsibilities are are very similar, but they have one important difference. Both own projects or programs. However, the project manager’s projects have an ending date. The program managers’s programs are ongoing. I had constructed my “habit change” as a project. It had an end date. I don’t think I would have been able to convince myself to go through with it if it didn’t.
So, as the end date approached, I had to consider what I wanted to do. I had given myself permission to take up the bad habit again if I really decided I wanted it. But, I had hoped that I would simply leave it in the past and it would no longer be a part of my life. Would I see September 1st as the finish line in the 100 yard dash, or would it be mile marker 5 in a marathon? Was it the dawning of a new day or the sun setting on the past one?
As today approached I considered the possibilities. Avoiding my bad habit was no longer a constant struggle. I’ve changed my life in such a way that I often barely even remember that it was something I’d been bothered by. The thought of taking it back up is not even really a consideration. But, I also don’t feel any sense of success as the 366th day dawns. Yes, it’s the anniversary of setting my goal, but the goal has become a part of daily routine. It’s now part of who I am. Who I see myself as. I don’t need a celebration to commemorate what has become an integral part of me and my actions.
It’s not so much a birthday as it is an unbirthday, just like yesterday was and just like tomorrow will be.
Rodney M Bliss is an author, columnist and IT Consultant. His blog updates every weekday at 7:00 AM Mountain Time. He lives in Pleasant Grove, UT with his lovely wife, thirteen children and grandchildren.
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or email him at rbliss at msn dot com(c) 2016 Rodney M Bliss, all rights reserved
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Two men were working in a quarry. I asked the first man what he was doing.
“What’s it look like? I’m cutting rocks.”
I asked the second man the same question. He paused, wiped his brow and with a beaming smile declared,
“I am building a cathedral!”
The tasks were the same. It was the attitude of the two men that makes the difference. Who wouldn’t want to build a cathedral? And who would willing sign up for cutting up rocks?
I recently saw a Facebook thread that encouraged new artists to create a Facebook group and then add in an established artist that they would like to work with. The person who started the thread considered it a good way to get collaboration from established writers and cartoonists. The authors and cartoonists that I know thought it was a terrible idea. I understand the motivation. If you want to be successful in an area, who better to help you than someone who is already successful? One commenter, in support of the thread said, “Nothing beats networking.”
Yes, something does beat networking. And that’s actually doing the work. Most artists are not jealous people. If you like the latest Marval Superhero movie, does that mean you are not going to go see the new Star Wars movie? If you enjoy Clive Cussler novels, does it mean that you wouldn’t read John Grisham’s books? Of course not. In fact, if you read one author’s books, the odds are you will read more books. You are more likely to become a fan of other authors if you already read.
So, artists and writers are not trying to keep others out of the industry. However, they understand that there is really no substitute for practicing your craft. No amount of networking, or help from established artists is going to be as helpful to your career, as simply writing, or drawing, or composing.
I have several friends who are successful authors. I’ve talked about Howard Tayler, the creator of Schlock Mercenary. Howard wasn’t always a cartoonist. When he started, 16 years ago, his drawing was by his own estimation “not great.” But, he didn’t let that stop him. While working as a software development manager, he continued to draw, and write and create. A little over ten years ago, he’d improved to the point that he took a big chance and left corporate America to become a full time cartoonist. Today, his drawing is by his estimation, “less bad.” His legions of fans and colleagues rightly accuse him of being too modest. He is an award winning cartoonist with a dozen books in print, and is a sought after speaker and convention guest.
Howard has also inspired numerous people to pursue their dreams of being writers, or cartoonists, or artists. It is easy to look at where he sits today and say, “I want to do what he does. I want to be a professional cartoonist.” Unfortunately, you can’t. By that I mean, you can’t decide one day to quit your day job and start a career as a professional artist. And that’s the reason that the Facebook group idea misses the point. It’s not about access, or who you know. It’s about work and what you can do.
My friend Dave Farland is a New York Times bestselling author. He created the RuneLords series. There are many aspiring authors who would love to have even a fraction of Dave’s success. However, like the barriers to entry for the cartoonist, the same barriers exist for the author. Dave as spent decades honing his craft. He also worked in the software industry while he was learning to be an author. His first book, “On My Way To Paradise” took him over a year to write. It was a successful book, good enough to get him a multi-book contract. But, Dave had to spend a lot of time learning to be a good author. Ironically, he also teaches writing. The access that the Facebook poster wanted to gain by forcing an online connection, is actually available. But, it requires work. It requires that you not only practice as Howard and Dave did, but also study and learn.
Being an author with a best selling book, is a great goal. But, author is a role that only comes after spending time in another, much less glamorous role: that of writer.
If you want to be an author, practice being a writer.
Rodney M Bliss is an author, columnist and IT Consultant. His blog updates every weekday at 7:00 AM Mountain Time. He lives in Pleasant Grove, UT with his lovely wife, thirteen children and grandchildren.
Follow him on
Twitter (@rodneymbliss)
Facebook (www.facebook.com/rbliss)
LinkedIn (www.LinkedIn.com/in/rbliss)
or email him at rbliss at msn dot com(c) 2016 Rodney M Bliss, all rights reserved
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Do it right the first time.
We’ve all heard it, right? Not only “Do it right the first time,” but, “If you don’t have time to do it right, what makes you think you will have time to do it over?”
However, there are times were that is exactly true. I often don’t have time to do it right the first time and I figure I will just do it over.
First, let’s talk a little about degrees of precision. I work in an industry where results are often measured to two or three decimal places. When we talk about system availability, for example, I create reports that show our results to “three nines.” That means that I can tell you if we were 99.999% available. There are 44640 minutes in a 31 day month. That means that 0.001% of a month is 45 minutes. Anything more than 45 minutes of downtime and I’m into a penalty situation. My systems are designed to allow me to meet this level of expected uptime. I have redundant systems, and extra capacity, and failover systems, all designed to keep me at less than 45 minutes of downtime in a month.
Suppose, I decided to be extra vigilant. Suppose instead of “three nines” I decided to shoot for “four nines” of availability? 99.9999% available. That would be better, right? I mean if I’m holding myself to that higher standard then I’m easily going to meet the client requirements of 99.999%.
No. It’s a terrible idea. To achieve 99.9999% availability, I would need to have less than 5 minutes of downtime every month. It takes about 7 minutes to reboot a server. So, if I had even one unscheduled reboot, I would miss my goal. And in order to achieve a 99.9999% uptime, I would have to purchase thousands of dollars worth of additional redundant equipment. If for some reason I wanted to go to 99.99999%, (referred to as “five nines”) I would need millions of dollars of extra hardware. Five nines availability means less than 5 minutes of unscheduled downtime per year. It’s possible, but very, very expensive.
I’ll stick with my 99.999% and try to keep away from more than 45 minutes of downtime in a month. This is exactly why I say that I often have time to do it over, but not to do it “right.” If “doing it right” means never having to endure a 7 minute server reboot, then I’m not going to do it right. I’ll set up my servers so that I can afford to “do it over,” reboot them and take the outage hit.
It’s not just computer systems that lend themselves to a “do it over” philosophy. I scibble down these thoughts every day. My writing process is not particularly structured, but I tend to follow a pattern.
- Write rough draft
- Do an editing pass
- Add pictures
- Do final editing pass
- Publish
While I’m writing the rough draft, I’m not too concerned with where the pictures will go. I know that I’m going to come back later and add them. I’m also not too worried about spelling and punctuation mistakes. Sure, I’ll correct them if I find them, but if I’m typing along at 50 or 60 words per minute, I’m not going to spend too much time stopping to change a “teh” to “the.” (Why don’t all editorial programs turn “teh” to “the”? Who ever uses the word teh?)
So, when I write, I don’t worry about doing it right. I know that I will have time to do it over. There are plenty of times where it just makes sense to do it over rather than do it “right.”
Rodney M Bliss is an author, columnist and IT Consultant. His blog updates every weekday at 7:00 AM Mountain Time. He lives in Pleasant Grove, UT with his lovely wife, thirteen children and grandchildren.
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It’s supposed to be one of the hardest interview questions. I think it’s been asked so often that it’s become a cliche. When I worked for Microsoft, it was common to ask oddball questions. Some of the ones that were used:
- How many gas stations in the United States?
- How do they get the coating on M&M candies?
And, of course, the manhole question.
The point of the questions is to figure out how well the candidate thinks on his feet. The interviewer is less concerned with the actual answer than they are with the thought that went into it. Unfortunately, for me, I look at them as real questions with real answers.
The manhole cover was my favorite. There are four reasons that I’ve heard of for why manhole covers are round.
1. They are round because the circle is the most efficient form. You get the most usable space with a circle. It’s also the strongest geometric form. Your circle is going to provide equal support against the manhole collapsing.
2. They are easier to move. A manhole cover can weigh between 90 and 150 lbs according to Government Security News. That’s a heavy, not to mention bulky object to attempt to move. But, if it’s round, you can move it simply by tipping it on its edge and rolling it.
3. A round manhole cover cannot fall into the manhole. It’s physically impossible for a manhole cover to fall into the manhole if it’s round. And at potentially 150 lbs, getting it back out of a hole would be challenging.
However, my favorite answer has nothing to do with geometry or physics.
4. They are round because the makers decided to make them round.
Of course, I haven’t been asked this question in years. But, if it comes up in conversation, I’m ready.
Rodney M Bliss is an author, columnist and IT Consultant. His blog updates every weekday at 7:00 AM Mountain Time. He lives in Pleasant Grove, UT with his lovely wife, thirteen children and grandchildren.
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or email him at rbliss at msn dot com(c) 2016 Rodney M Bliss, all rights reserved
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Should I upgrade to the new version of Microsoft Windows?
I don’t know, Mom, what would the new version do that you can’t do now?
Nothing that I know of.
Then, I would wait.
When I worked for Microsoft, I would get a call like this about every six months or so. It wasn’t always about Windows. Sometimes it was about Office, or some other Microsoft product. Even though I worked for the company, I was a late adopter when it came to recommendations to my family. Especially since I was their first call when it came to technical support.
I haven’t upgraded to Microsoft Windows 10. Like you, I’ve been bombarded with the ads. I’ve seen those spam-like messages.
YOU’VE WON A FREE COPY OF WINDOWS 10. CLICK HERE TO CLAIM YOUR PRIZE
I’m pretty careful to not click on every “Prize” notice I get. I have friends who either couldn’t resist or they like being early adopters. At work, we are mostly a Microsoft shop. I joined an online meeting a few weeks ago and heard this.
Where’s Alex? Didn’t he schedule this meeting?
Yeah, but Windows 10 screwed up his copy of Office. He’s rebooting to see if that will let him join.
Alex is an early adopter. Personally, I’m running Windows 7 on my work laptop, Windows Vista on my home lap machine, and I still have a few copies of Windows XP running on some old, but still running computers.
Windows really did kill a friend of mine’s business. For a lot of years, he realized that Windows XP was a solid program that gave people just about all they needed if all they needed was to surf the web and use Office. He bought and refurbished old hardware and sold computers for $75 that were these barebones systems. When Microsoft killed support for XP, after more than a decade, his business model was no longer sustainable.
The real point for me, is that computers are tools. They should help us to accomplish some task. I have tools that my grandfather bought when he was young. A few of those tools are obsolete. I’ve eliminated them. A few of them have worn out. I replaced them. But, many of them are just as good as they wore60 years ago. I’m not going to buy new tools just because the manufacturer releases a new version. A wrench is a wrench.
I treat computers and software the same way. I’m not going to upgrade just because the manufacturer says I should.
Oh, and the headline to this post? “Windows Killed My Grass”? Doesn’t have anything to do with Microsoft. But, it got me thinking about the destructive power of Windows both the software and the hardware kind.
Here’s a picture of my lawn.
I assumed that brown spot, which only shows up in the late summer, was a result of not enough water, or not enough fertilizer. Nope. It’s windows that killed it. That side of my house faces West. In the afternoon, during the hottest part of the day, that section of lawn gets twice the sun as the green grass next to it. My neighbor pointed it out.
Here’s a picture of the lawn from a different angle.
Not only is my lawn getting the direct sunlight, but that brown patch also gets reflected sunlight from the windows.
Windows is killing my lawn. I blame Bill Gates.
Rodney M Bliss is an author, columnist and IT Consultant. His blog updates every weekday at 7:00 AM Mountain Time. He lives in Pleasant Grove, UT with his lovely wife, thirteen children and grandchildren.
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or email him at rbliss at msn dot com(c) 2016 Rodney M Bliss, all rights reserved
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Well early in the morning
I’m a giving you a warning
Don’t you step on my blue suede shoes
Hey diddle diddle
I’ll play my fiddle
Aint’ got nothing to lose
Roll over Beethoven
And tell Tchaikovsky the news“Roll Over Beethoven”
When it was being written by Chuck Berry in the 1950’s and later recorded by the Beatles in the 1960’s it was just rock and roll. Today, we’d added the word “classic” rock and roll. I recently found the “classic” rock station in my town. (103.5 The Arrow in the greater Salt Lake City metropolitan area.) I often have it on when my teenagers are in the car. It’s been interesting to watch them hear some of the songs of my youth for the first time. Recently we were driving back from Southern Utah with a van full of scouts.
Hey Dad, can we access the playlist on your iPad?
Sure. Why?
We want to listen to Queen.
Paul McCartney was once asked what type of music people would be listening to in 20 years. He replied he didn’t know about 20 years, but he could tell you what they’d be listening to in 100 years: Beethoven, Mozart, Chopin. In other words, McCartney didn’t feel that rock and roll was going to replace traditional classical music.
So, what makes something classic? Or classical?
I have a 1996 Lexus ES300 that I call Iron Man. (It’s currently on blocks in my driveway getting the heads reground, but the coloring is still red and gold, so sort of Iron Man.) The car has been more of a project car than anything, constantly being one step away from needing a major repair. This year, I could get special plates that designate it as a “classic.” I’ll stick with the IRONMN plate that’s on it now, but the point is that after 20 years, a car becomes a “classic” at least to the DMV.
There have been some pretty bad cars over the years. The Edsel, the Pinto, the Gremlin. And yet, today, they are classics. Time does that.
Look at this watch. It’s worthless – ten dollars from a vendor in the street. But, I take it, I bury it in the sand for a thousand years, it becomes priceless.
Rene Belloq “Indiana Jones, Raiders of the Lost Ark”
And yet, twenty years later, those cars are classics.
When I was 16, I went with my dad to help his friend move. My dad’s friend was there with his father to help his grandfather move. The grandfather was in his 90’s. He was old. But, my dad’s friend’s dad was also old. In fact my dad and his friend were old. My dad explained that “old” was anyone that was 15 years older than you are.
The brilliant Douglas Adams, of “Hitchhiker’s Guide To The Galaxy” fame said,
1. Anything that is in the world when you’re born is normal and ordinary and is just a natural part of the way the world works.
2. Anything that’s invented between when you’re fifteen and thirty-five is new and exciting and revolutionary and you can probably get a career in it.
3. Anything invented after you’re thirty-five is against the natural order of things.– “The Salmon of Doubt”
1. Classical Music – part of the natural order
2. Computers and the Internet – yep, made a bit of a career out of it
3. . .GET OFF MY LAWN
Rodney M Bliss is an author, columnist and IT Consultant. His blog updates every weekday at 7:00 AM Mountain Time. He lives in Pleasant Grove, UT with his lovely wife, thirteen children and grandchildren.
Follow him on
Twitter (@rodneymbliss)
Facebook (www.facebook.com/rbliss)
LinkedIn (www.LinkedIn.com/in/rbliss)
or email him at rbliss at msn dot com(c) 2016 Rodney M Bliss, all rights reserved