Waves (test) 

Coming back

One thing I like about computers, HDDs and the intarnet, is that they seem to remember everything. Crashes aside, you write some sappy poem, a crappy email, or stupid blog post and 3 years later, you will still stumble upon it. I can't get myself to use a diary, but if I pull out a burnt 'My documents' CD, I get a real view into what was going on at that time. Kinda cool.

Updates

I will update this blog once deepestshadeofmushroomblue and mrmrspotatohead have updated their's

Head Office

I have always considered Head Office (HO) to be a place far removed from the daily reality that the rest of us contend with...on a day to day basis. It doens't matter if you work at McDonald's or IBM, somewhere someone, at HO, decides to do something that just doesn't make sense and the rest of us- close to, or on, the front lines- just shake our head.

I was recently charged with making an inventory program (for HO). My boss says that it should work something like 'this' I toil away, he sends it in, and HO responds. The email just begged to be responded to. So I did. I just didn't put an address on the To: line because I actually value my job.

Below is the email, with my responses interjected.

Personally I feel this is too complicated a sheet.
-You are entitled to your opinion

This is the same program that Joe had written and it had too many formulas and links which allowed for too many errors.
- 'IT' did. This one does not.

In addition, any time we had to add an item to it, just about the entire program had to be re-written.
-That is not the case with this program

Same for deleting items.
-Same with deleting.

Joe was spending approximately 10 to 15 hours a month to maintain this sheet.
-Joe was either padding his paycheque or doesn't know what he is doing.

Also, as someone at head office will be inputting the prices, they would need to understand this spreadsheet program in order to ensure that all pricing uploaded properly and also understand product cost to ensure the price breaks are correct.
- You want someone at HO to put in the prices now? Fine, but I can't help you make them understand Excel, product or price breaks.

I feel we should go with a sheet that simply adds up the column and multiplies by the price
-OK, how come this was not told to me BEFORE I did it another way?

This is easiest to maintain and easiest for the field and office.
- In your humble opinion.

One other suggestion is that the sheet needs to be page protected otherwise you will have managers in the field who are accidentally wiping out formulas and will be getting numerous calls to help them fix their sheets.
-Really? You think so? Well I am going to need 10-15 hours a month to manage
that 'page protect' thing

With a simpler sheet this is relatively easy to do but as soon as you link it to another sheet you begin to get into higher maintenance issues.
-Shit, I guess I low-balled that 10-15 hour thing. Now I will have to protect
MORE than one page

There is also 13 pages and items are repeated. I believe we wanted to get to a place where we only had each item written in once and then we counted it in all five possible storage areas. (column's at the top)
-You believe you wanted it that way, I believe I didn't hear about that until now.

I understand the amount of work that went into this creating this sheet and am not trying to dismiss it.
-That's cool.

I do strongly feel though that if we are going to make this simple we need to get really simple.
-That's cool too. Too bad you think that a bit of multiplication in a cell is 'complicated'

You may want to speak with Joe in Townsville to get a clearer picture of how difficult this sheet was for most of our managers to use.
-I don't think Mark wants to be talking to a person who doesn't pad his paycheque, and knows what he is doing. Additionally I don't care how hard the old program was, this one, while still containing 'cells' and a .xls is a different, better, easier program.

Thank you,
Jo-Ann
-Thank you,
Evan

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A friend deepestshadeofmushroomblue.blogspot.com/2004/07/weight.html posted about how he lifts weights and that the routine is a vacation for his mind.

Well he is pretty good about routines, me on the other hand....I love routines from afar.

I love the idea that your body is so homeostatic that you barely have to do something more than a couple times before you want to do it again. We all know this is true. You haven't been out running in years, go out once and you will probably go out again within the week. Start a garden get to weeding and not long later you are waking up thinking about what segment you have to harvest and what you have to weed.

There are two key things to be taken from this: One, your body can be made to totally improve itself but merely making a habit of working out, saving a couple dollars, reading a chapter before bed etc. These things after only a little bit of work now become second nature, no longer take mental effort to perform (as in the linked blog) and can actually be relaxing. Set up a couple new habits and you will be stronger, smarter and have more money.

The second key is actually getting off your stupid fat broke lazy ass and setting up these habits. I guarantee people all the time that I can make them loose weight, all they have to do is eat exactly the way they always do, just write it down and give me the paper at the end of the week. I won't judge or comment, I just need that piece of paper. Do you think a single person has given me that paper? Not one. Writing down "Bagel, Coke, Sandwich" is not in and of itself a difficult task, but remembering to do it, having the paper around, not forgetting what you had is a habit they aren't in to. They get discouraged that they haven't written it down after a couple meals and drop it entirely.

You can run a marathon within a year if all you do is start by putting on a pair of running shoes and walking to the end of the road and back. From this you slowly work up to the actual running, but no one makes it to putting on the friggin shoes. They are too busy, they forget, they do it tomorrow, they don't have the right shoes.

How many of you actually have to set time aside to brush your teeth? Most people don’t' even realize that you are so used to brushing your teeth that it would actually be difficult to stop doing it for a week. It’s what you do. You do it when you wake up, with your eyes still half closed. (Some people don't have this habit and their dentist knows it)

I thought about this whole "becoming better by tricking your body into repeating something enough times that it becomes habit" thing and thought that one area I would like to improve would be meditation. I would start meditating a bit each day so that one day I would be Zen (whatever the hell that means) Meditation in my mind was sitting still, eyes closed, and relaxing while focusing on something. Pretty tough huh? Well you guessed it, I couldn't bring myself to actually do it once and day and gave up. Inner peace, improve academic and physical performance out the window because I couldn't remember to sit still for a couple minutes a day.

A buddy started to go to the gym in September, I decided that would be a good time to start the gym thing again. (I am persistent) I went for a couple weeks, so did he, we talked about how we would make sure we didn't have anything to do at 1:00pm Mon, Wed, Fri. It was cool, I was getting into a habit. Then one Monday was a holiday, I was drunk, Wednesday was a write off too (I drank ALOT) by Friday I had forgotten about they gym. Not consciously but next week I wasn't there either. December rolls around, I see buddy and he is noticeably large, says he feels awesome, and I go back to wondering why my girlfriend can beat me up.

This not to say that all routines are good. I am sure we can all think of a couple destructive paths that we lead ourselves on, knowing where it’s going to end up, why it is bad but doing it anyways because we are used to doing it.

So, strive to create good habits, once you have created them you don't have to strive anymore.

Channels

How's this for messed up: I just wrote two very long rants and deleted them. No one reads this blog, and still I chose to not share things that were actually on my mind that I believe, with the two people that will be reading it. Who do I feel I can tell these things too? Are there people who trust no one like that? Is the person you marry supposed to understand these fucked up things in your head or is it cool to have a vent that isn’t' that person. Is it vanity that keeps me from illuminating certain aspects that are at this point in shadow? I am who I am, am I stronger or better for not showing the weakness? Is it a belief that the weaknesses will one day be conquered and by not mentioning them they will die silently without anyone knowing they were there? Am I weak for feeling that these issues should be discussed? Can I even change these things within me? What if I can’t? Is it better to accept your flawed self or get angry but never have it change?

Am I stronger for having written this, or weaker?

First Post, Info, Test

Hola, Evan Frame coming at you from the end of a long shift. 11 hours. 7 days in a row.

Funny how we as people are so homeostatic (http://dictionary.reference.com/search?q=homeostatic) you have this idea that has been put in your head that 5 days at 8 hours a day with a half or full hour for lunch is the standard work week. If you work but one more hour, bring the total up to a startling 9 hours, you bitch and you complain and you seek a drink after work to help you deal with the additional work load you are dealing with. 1 flippin hour. But if you get promoted or change jobs and are told that your week is now segmented into 5 days at 10 hours a day, you don't bat an eye. 2 full hours more you are working and its completely fine, you relish it and the money, but once that 11th hour comes, oh boy, 'now' you've had a long day.

I have an idea, shut the fuck up and do your job, if you don't like it enough to open your mouth and bitch about it, don't fucking do it and I would be glad to take the extra hours from you and fire your ass in the process.*

*Appears as though the last paragraph wasn't as abstract as I meant it to be. :)

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And that concludes our opening post. Anyone want to start the over/under on when the last post will be?