nobodyknowswhy.com

Hurray!  I can see my contacts again!

My previous phone had lost the display.  So over 200 contacts - inaccessible.

Phone still worked, and luckily my family was still accessible via the one key speed dials.  Also they all had a different ring so i could tell it was one of them calling.

But how many people do you know who keep a printout of their contact list, so they can manually enter the numbers?  Yeah, i thought so.

Fortunately my new phone waiting period was up just 2 weeks after this occurred.  So this morning, a little bleary eyed, i went to the phone store and picked up a new LG Chocolate 3.  So far this is a really cool phone - and - i can see my contacts again!

It’s just pathetic we rely on these gizmos  so much.  Why, back when i was a boy . . . . well you know.  Let’s face it we all love (more or less) our phones, and especially the convenience.

Hopefully my next post will be more useful.  I just wanted to let someone know of my relief of having a new, cool WORKING phone.

Maybe i should get the insurance - but it just seems way overpriced to me.

Well how are you today/tonight/whatever?  I’m doing ok.

Let me tell you a little more about my new job.  It’s still a job.  If you are one who looks down on sales people as those who don’t work - you’re wrong.  This stuff doesn’t just happen by itself.  You know that old saying (very very very old) that says:

“Build a better mouse trap, and the world will beat a path to your door.”

Well that may have been true a really long time ago.  Probably only when there were no mouse traps, then someone invented it.  Presto!  There was the instant stream of mouse ravaged customers beating a path.  But the guy next door, he noticed the trap builder just sitting around half the time, and counting his trap money.  So the next guy goes into the trap business.  Then another. Etc.  Now you can have the best digital trap around, but you have to let your mouse infested public know a few things.

1 - Your trap is better, but doesn’t cost that much more - it’s a far better value.

2 - Yours has a better guarantee.

3 - You offer free shipping.

4 - You will take the competitors worthless busted traps as a trade in

5 - You will come and take the dead mice out for them.

If all this is true, but you don’t shout it from the rooftops, and the other guy has a bigger sign, the mouse public suffers, because they unknowingly buy his cheesy (Ha Ha!) traps and miss out on your better made, guaranteed, freely shipped, we empty units.  And then you go out of business because you have to keep a staff of emptyers ready, and people are dumping their own dead mice because they didn’t know that they didn’t have to.

SO, it’s my job to call and call and call and visit and call.  Quote, quote, quote.  Call, call, call.  Quote.

My mouse traps are better because . . . . . . . . . . . etc.

So anyway it’s still a job, but i like it better anyway.  I am getting past the confusion stage, and starting into the production phase.  I get to talk to people all day, instead of machines and myself as i make things work.  So far, so good.

I’ll keep you posted.

About a month ago i got myself a new cell phone.  I was able to get a new phone for free after sometime in July, but i waited while deciding.  Should i go for a pda / phone combo?  My clie is about 4 years old though it still works mostly fine.  The moto Krzr was looking pretty good, and finally i ordered one.  It arrived and the love began.

I ordered a belt holster, some foil stickies to enhance reception, a 2 gig micro SD card (it still amazes me that something about the size of my ring fingernail and the thickness of a matchbook cover can hold that much)  and loaded some mp3s up.  The player software is not very sophisticated but it works.

I started telling people my phone was like me - “Slim, Trim and Dead Sexy”.  Sad i know but it was fun.

While it lasted.  I was on my riding lawn mower.  I didn’t remember to take my phone off my belt.

You know what happens next - suddenly a BANG and i see something black in the wake - thinking, huh some kid must have left a toy there.  Till the next time around, when i spotted a piece that looked just like my phone’s back speaker slot.  Frantically i check my belt to find it gone, jump off the mower and there it is so TOTALLY  destroyed.  Could i even find the memory chip?  no nothing salvageable at all.  My beautiful Krzr now lies in its body baggie, i re-activated the old phone, and went into the mourning period.

Dudes and Dudettes, can you feel my pain?

Today i gave my 2 week notice. Pressed send receive. Goodbye cruel job.

I will miss most all the people i worked with. Great folks. 23 years. Sad - and yet glad.

Cool thing, i actually only have 1 more week to work. Then my last week will use my last 5 vacation days wrapped around Labor Day.

Can’t wait to report to you on my new job!

Well today i had to drive from one jobsite to where i will have an all day meeting tomorrow. On Sunday nite, i planned out my route. Instead of going superhighway, which would be south then west, i took a state route across the middle. Through the mountains, past some lakes. The beauty of the trip was just great. I figure i saved about 1-1/2 hours, and had a fabulous ride.

I don’t like to spend time away from home. You already how i feel about it if you have read this or that. This trip will have me gone Monday thru Wednesday. But Tuesday afternoon, that was about the best commute i’ve ever had.

A good idea gone bad. Happens often these days it seems. One of the big (little) things wrong with my job - the idiot box. A little box i wear on my belt that micromanages my work life. I call it idiot box for several reasons. It’s pretty stupid. The software for managing my work life is slow, buggy and depends on a cell phone network. When i work somewhere the phone network doesn’t reach, the box uses it’s battery power searching and searching and searching, so later when you need it, its dead . . . . idiot.

Now the idea of using a digital device to record work, to eliminate paper - a good one. And the information being digital, instantly recored, searchable - even better. All very good ideas, good uses of technology. But even though the box started with good ideas, ideas that could save or even make money, i believe the opposite has happened. In order to record our work we need to use a stylus on a virtual keyboard - tap, tap, , tap, oops, undo, tap, tap - REALLY efficient. What used to take 5-10 minutes with pen and paper, now takes 20-30 minutes. Multiply that by a few thousand technicians all over the country - how’s that for manpower wasted? P.S. - they are handsomely paid folks. Expensive time to waste. Highly skilled people, that don’t need an idiot to tell them how to do their job.

Oh wait - it gets better. The stuff we generate often needs to be corrected by someone else. That’s right - due to glitches, stress, typos, whatever, the info needs to be redone to a certain extent by someone later on their desktop pc. Hey, why don’t we have that person do all the typing and save the other time - oh wait, that would be common sense. Can’t do that.

But wait, there’s more! We get measured on how we use the I.B. Someone in upper management is so concerned that we stay micro managed, that they have tools to manage the management. Then they ride heard on the supervision to ride heard on us. I wouldn’t be silly to point out the even higher paid waste of time with that, would i?

Now the basic instructions in the box have been around for years. Our company has had an ongoing dream of having the instructions to take care of stuff recorded, so it’s always done right. Another good idea. One that has never fully been done. They don’t want to spend the time to make it right. Through four or five different software packages, incomplete and mis-applied information has been ported forward again, and again. At one time a few years ago it seemed like they were going to get it all the way up to ok. A friend of mine was responsible for some of the data, and found a way to add custom stuff. That way you can make what you wanted, then apply it and have good information. Oh wait, stop! That time spent does not generate REVENUE. Yeah i know, without making money, you can’t stay in business, blah blah blah. But look - We have lots of good ideas, and little follow through. Why waste any of our effort, our time, money, energy if it never gets finished.

Instead we spend a fortune on hardware, to put the poor instructions into an idiot box, then force good people to waste precious time, and yell at them to keep on using it or else.

Great for morale as well.

No wonder i’m looking for another job - this corporation may go bankrupt with management like this in charge.

I went back to work today. Just took 4 days off - last Thurs & Fri (Wed 7/4 Holiday!) and Mon & Tue. So lets see, that’s 7 days off in a row. So today was the first work day for me. After 7 off. back to work oh boy. As a bonus i had a really long day.
Enough whining.

Did i tell you i got paid for 2 long scenic drives? Through the lush green countryside. Just beautiful. Yesterday i went on a job interview. Could be promising. Today i told some of the people i work with that i interviewed yesterday. That was almost as much fun as the interview. What a joyous day it will be when i have landed another job and give my notice. But bittersweet. I have worked there a long time and it really aggravates me that things have gotten bad enough to quit.

OK, lets try for some laughs . . . . . Ok at least a pleasant thought: Green is good. I don’t mean ecology (well yes but not like that). I mean red leaves are good in the fall, before they fall, but green is a great color for most of the year. Pleasant, soothing. Combine it with a good blue sky - wow! Peace for your eyes, for your heart and soul.

Take time to look at green a few times a day. Just stare at it and clear your mind. If possible touch the cool grass. Yes, green is good.

A vacation day.  A good thing.  But the corporation has it’s hooks in me.  Even on my day off i had to spend some time doing their work.  This shouldn’t be.  Part of the reason i’m looking elsewhere.

My search is going, well, i’m not sure how.  It’s difficult to say.  Great jobs aren’t exactly hanging off trees.  Then again, there are some out there that sound like they could be ok or better.

I don’t want to take too much of a pay cut, just to find myself worse off than i am now.  The old “Out of the frying pan and into the fire” scenario.  So i proceed slowly, letting some people i trust keep their eyes open as well.

Humor.  Lets make some.  After all, this is a day off.

Why do elephants paint their toenails all different colors?  So they can hide in the M&Ms.  Have you ever seen an elephant in the M&Ms?  No? Pretty effective eh?

Sorry about that, i was forced to come up with something quick.

Had a great day yesterday.  Outdoor gathering at a friends, with all the traditional summer stuff.  Hope your weekend was good too.

Rain and Thunder.  This morning we had a thunderstorm in the early morning.  Rather unusual.  We will likely have more this afternoon.

Due to lack of funny stuff, i will close rather than continue to bore you.  Bye for now.

This is the story of a kitchen faucet. It began it’s life in a faucet factory. Like the rest. It is happy to be a brand name faucet. You would likely recognize the name instantly if you live in the US and are older than say 22. You have heard and seen the company advertising for years and now they are a part of your subconscious. That is the purpose of advertising, to take over part of your mind. We’ll discuss that at a later date.

This particular faucet has been in service a little over a year. Barely broke in from a lifespan viewpoint. I mean you would expect a brand new faucet to last let’s say around 20 years or so. Someone, recently, has done it wrong. The working theory is they lifted the handle a little too hard. Apparently there were no eye witnesses to verify exactly what happened. Then there was some water leaking out of the bottom of the faucet where the spout joins the base.

Over the course of a few days the “little water leak” has changed to all the water now comes out the base, none actually makes it out the spout. This is where i come in. It has been assigned to me to fix the faucet. So we begin to take it apart. Remove decorative cover, loosen screw - handle is loose but will not come off. Call the 800 number.

Note: Though i of course cannot name the faucet company, it is a good company. I guess most people like their products, or they would not be a company anymore. And they do have the 800 number available for help. So i call it. After a choice or two, the recording says it’s less than 5 minutes wait, but wants to call me back so i won’t be hanging on hold. How nice, but it makes me suspicious i will never get called back. Then they do call back in about 2 minutes, verify with the name i recorded when i called and i press 1. Now i am in the real waiting cue. I guess they do this to keep phone spammers out?? I’m not sure.

After about 5 minutes a person picks up. The reason i couldn’t get the handle off is the screw is not just a setscrew, it’s over 1/2 inch long, goes through the handle and must be completely removed. I keep turning it past the locktite that they applied at the factory and now off comes the handle.

Fast forward past all the boring details of faucet disassembly and re-assembly. There were no broken parts, only a broken design. The main bottom o-ring does not have a deep enough groove to keep it in place. I predict i will need to return and repeat this same task again. I can hardly wait.

My thanks to the guy on the support call, couldn’t have done it without him.  Paul, you rock.

Oh Boy - back to work. I really love my job. Yeah right. Well i can’t go there or we won’t have anything amusing today, will we? Monday.

The weather here was great today. Wish i could think of something to encourage you with. I dropped off my resume this afternoon at a cool company, very high tech. If you don’t like the situation you’re in then do something about it. You can change your reality. Not in a mystical way, but in a practical action. Make a decision.

Remember the saying that “Insanity is doing the same thing yet expecting different results”. I know, that’s not exactly the way it goes but you get the drift.

If you want things different, do things different. Yes, you can. I look forward to reporting to you how i have changed my situation.

But work lately does depress me. But luckily i have the whole internet, and in particular this website, to soothe and entertain me. I have this platform to rant and rave from - TODAY SUCKED, TOMORROW WILL SUCK TOO!!

There, that’s enough of that. How are things with you - have you thrown anything out the window lately?

Even the window of your mind? Right now i am throwing a small something out the virtual window. Because it’s so small, i am throwing it from a very high window so it will break nicely into approximately 273 pieces. I care about the folks below so first i yell “LOOK OUT BELOW” then hurl the little something down with as much speed as possible, as if it had actually fallen from even more height than my minds eye can fabricate stories of the imaginary building. With a satisfying ‘pop’ it disintegrates into fragments no larger than 1/2 inch - most are smaller. Large trucks grind the remains into grit, that gradually washes into the storm sewers during the rains.

Remember the rain in “The Matrix”? The pouring rain when Neo was in the car, and he decided not to ‘take the highway’? Like that rain, a gully washer comes, and it removes the last trace of the small something.

OK, let’s get down to it. Time to tell all (actually only some, there’s no way i could know all) about the company i work for. NO i will not name the company. A few reasons:

1 - I can’t afford the loss of paycheck and especially the slander lawsuit that would come next.

2 - If we keep this nameless it will

2a - go better with my own namelessness.

2b - sound a universal chord with many others who are experiencing the same types of treatment in the name of misguided decision making.

3 - If i don’t name a company, no company will come after me and make me stop.

At this early stage i will only be addressing the issues that affect me directly. It’s alot like whining. To the whole world. This is going to be fun!

Lets start with the basic issue: it’s called HR. Some of you may remember when the part of a company that dealt with the people was called “Personnel”. That sounded alot like people - it sort of implied the company, was composed of people, who worked for it. Maybe they actually cared for the people that made its income appear. All the people, not just the execs at the top (who didn’t used to make obscene incomes).

But somewhere along the line, things changed. Now every organization calls that department “Human Resources”. This never bothered me until recently, when i really thought about what it meant. Resources are something you make something out of. Like a tree trunk - you make it into 2 x 4’s. A Human Resource is a human who is a resource. Not really a person anymore. Just something for the company to use. I liken a human resource to something similar to a computer. It is something the company buys and then uses. The difference? The human resource costs the company more, so they expect it to produce more revenue. And these days they are finding new ways to get more out of their resources.

We’ll talk more later.

Hey wait - i’m supposed to be entertaining you, hopefully with humor. Let’s see if we can end on a high note.

What happens when you get so fed up with your work that you throw your pc out the window? If you decide to try this i suggest you have some one film it with their cell phone. And be careful - flying computers can kill! Also you had better be the owner of the company or in a really good disguise. And may i also suggest you do not throw CRT monitors? Loads of broken, flying glass would be dangerous.

There, that should do the trick for entertainment - even if it’s just virtual (in your imagination - just picture how much you suddenly want to do this!!)

Welcome to my website. Due to circumstances not yet under my control, i cannot tell you much. For example, i cannot tell you who i am. I cannot tell you what i am, male, female, age, etc. This if for my protection from the corporation. I can tell you about them, and i will, don’t worry.

This website is here for both you and me. For you hopefully i will be providing a daily chuckle. Perhaps a full fledged laugh. At least make you think, have you say “yeah that’s right”. That will be my goal. As you may know already, laughter is the best medicine. I want to provide you with laughter, or at least fun, some amusement to make your day better. And maybe something to think about on the serious side.

What do i expect in return?? Well your support. Especially the rah rah stuff. If you like it, tell your friends to check it out. Tell between 29 and 176 friends. If you don’t have at least 29 friends, borrow some from the friends you do have. Or rent some. Because this is serious. I really need your support. BTW if you see something that interests you, click on it. Or even buy something if you really want to. If you really don’t want to buy anything, that’s ok. This is a no obligations site.

See i need support both moral and financial. Hopefully this website will allow me to escape the clutches of the corporation. But your goodwill (moral support) is far more important than the monetary.

If you, and you, and you all like it, then the rest will take care of itself.

So my job here is to entertain. To make you want to hear what i think. The better i do that, the better i do overall.

Have a great day — and wish me luck, i will likely need it (its a big internet out there)