April 2013

Technique

Part of what I’m dealing with at work is that it’s difficult explaining to people that just because there’s been upheaval, doesn’t mean that you have to revamp everything. Watch a TV show about food, and you’ll hear one of the judges/critics chime in about someone using “good French technique.” When a new chef comes in to a restaurant, he doesn’t need to retrain his cooks on how to chop onions.

Just because the old chef sucked doesn’t make the techniques wrong. Maybe his ingredients did. Maybe the recipes he’d chosen just weren’t that good. And so on…

It’s frustrating to sit in a meeting, and hear people just pulling things out of thin air to do something different. In my situation, “French technique” is codification of ITILv3. Whether or not I really like it is unimportant; we’ve been told to use it. Someone spent copious amounts of time developing processes and procedures with its principles in mind. Use it.

Maybe I’m worng. If I am, cite something to show why you’re right.

In somewhat-related news, two shootings and a stabbing at the Oceanfront in Virginia Beach last night. You want an example of a model that’s no longer working? I’ll cite Virginia Beach. For both the gangland that is the “tourist-friendly” Oceanfront, and for the suburban sprawl with incredible traffic.

Accessibility

I’ve enabled the plugin Albert told me about, but it doesn’t seem to help much with the editor, here.

So, what else is going on? I’m settling in to my job. More of the same, but some of the persistent ideas are gone. Maybe, just maybe, it’ll be possible to deliver a good product again. (Unlike my blog, which does suck, Dana, even if I took the 58 to the 95 to the 10, and all the way across….)

Physically, I suppose I’m doing okay, despite being in the office again. I don’t miss driving to one at all. It’s a little of a pain actually being in a building, but…… (I’m sure whoever reads the access logs is a little surprised by my entry logs, but it is what it is.)

But, back to the work thought (and, no, this isn’t “brain fog” kicking in), been thinking a lot lately about what it means to change. I find it interesting to listen to politicians profess change, but there’s things that are always off the table. “Reform the tax code,” means preserve treasured breaks for many people, and soak the well-to-do.

Sometimes you do have to start from scratch. Maybe everyone won’t be happy with having to make some sacrifices. Maybe the outcome is completely different than anyone could have ever imagined. But if the choices made are the ones that make the most sense, you can sleep at night.

But maybe you don’t get re-elected.

Whatcha got?

See what it is, then use it.

Trying to convey that sentiment at work; it’s not working as well as I’d like, but I’ll keep trying.

It’s important to use what’s there; maybe what you create isn’t exactly what you were expecting to make, but….

Reminds me of watching Anthony Bourdain in his travels. How many of the amazing cuisines throughout the world are the result of colonists using their native techniques with the ingredients they find wherever they end up?

Would Vietnamese food be as interesting if the French hadn’t been there? How about Brazilian without the Portuguese?

Disjointed pondering, perhaps.

In somewhat related news, Cure is back open. Glad to see them again. Glad Sarah enjoyed her sandwich. Glad there weren’t any panini press marks…. Wish I could have had a beer, but Rebif night.

Lessons in etiquette

To a half-blind guy, who doesn’t anticipate the actions of sitting passengers.

After a trying day at work, I waited probably twenty minutes for the seventeen bus, then waddled my half-disabled butt over to the Monticello Station, to catch the Tide home. Today, unlike my other recent waits at the station, it was hot. My diaphragm and legs aren’t working well, because of that.

Since I need to cross the tracks to get to the sidewalk at my stop, I sit near the front of the train, so I can cross the tracks before the train departs my station.

I saw the train coming, waddled to where the door would be, held the button to enter for a good ten seconds, the door opened, and I got on. As I waddled into the car, up the aisle to the door I’d opened, comes someone with a very large stroller, who got off. I went left to avoid the parent, and went up the stair to one of the higher seats up front. Our paths didn’t really cross.

The train departs, and I hear from the back of the car, “should have let the stroller get off first!”

Then one of Tidewater’s finest environmentally-minded cyclists, complete with long, unkempt hair, and a sleeveless shirt, walks up the stairs to lecture me about not letting the stroller off first.

Really. You can’t make this stuff up. What’s the polietest way I can tell this guy to go …? I know, Mr. Eastwood, he can’t do that to himself, but I appreciate the sentiment.

Stay awesome, sleeveless biker. Public transportation would be a much worse place without you.