Kev

So, to all my friends and family who remembered back in February how I mentioned that it’d be nice to travel a little for work again:

I remember too. You can stop reminding me now.

It’s very safe to say that my travel bug has been squashed.

My latest travels through SFO redirected me through GE’s EntryScan explosives detector as part of the pre-flight security screening. I don’t know if there is any selection criteria for folks to go through this test, and I’m pretty sure it was because the operator was bored as there were virtually no people going through screening at the time. In any event, I had to walk through it.

The machine at SFO is an earlier model, and is essentially a purple and grey arch with a little “walk/don’t walk” sign on the entrance and inside the machine. You step into the arch-both the entrance and exit are open throughout the process-the “walk” sign changes to “don’t walk” (kinda like a car wash), and you’re hit by a punch of puffs of compressed air which are sucked up by a number of ports within the arch. The working theory is that the compressed air will dislodge particulate matter from your clothes and/or body, and will be hoovered up for analysis. If there are compounds used in explosives, the operator will be alerted and the cavity searches will begin.

If you don’t have any bad mojo the little sign changes to “walk” after about 10 seconds and you’re done. I was wondering if the nextGen version would add automatic tasing on a positive result. Something to think about, I guess. 🙂

Ok, fuckit. I’m not going to complain in the channel. I’m not going to complain on IM. I’m not going to complain on the phone to anyone but Syl, because she’s the only one who will complain in equal amounts back. I may complain a little if I happen to be drinking beer within earshot of you.

I don’t do miracles, sorry.

So, this is where I’ll bitch. I’ll bitch at that other place still. I may put in a cohesive thought once in a while, but I’ve discovered that electronic communication seems to be bringing out the stupid in me, and I can no longer converse with thinking, breathing humans. Perhaps it’s because when I actually do corner them, I complain, so they run away, and my ability to engage slowly evaporates. It could also be that 6 months on the road with very little actual contact with people other than customers does that.

So, anyway, I’ll bitch.

First off – WHY THE FUCK DOES MY COMPANY MAKE ME GO THROUGH THEIR GODDAMN TECHNICAL SUPPORT LINE TO GET QUESTIONS ABOUT THEIR LESS-THAN-COMPLETELY DOCUMENTED PRODUCT ANSWERED?

I work in our consulting arm. When I have a question, it’s usually because I’m on a customer site and something’s not quite working the way it should. In any other company I’ve worked for previously, I pick up the phone and talk with my compadres in eng or product. Not here. I send an email to technical support and wait for them to get back to me. No access to internal knowledge bases, internal documentation, open buglists, nothing. Zip.

I’ve spent a ridiculous amount of time in the last two weeks tracking down undocumented procedures to make things work for a customer, and I am just a little sick and fucking tired of having to go through a 1-3 day email back and forth game to get questions answered.

Bah.

I’ve thought long and hard about it, and I really don’t have anything to say these days. So, I think I’m gonna pull things down.

Wait, scratch that. I have lots to say, I’m just tired of listening to me.

The end result is the same (can you tell Christmas is upon us?)

yet so funny, on multiple levels.

Jessica’s got nuthin’ on the gemale… err… housewife of the year.

Want bleach? Find yer own.

First it was gate agents, and now I have a beef with the equipment scheduler. The equipment scheduler is the person(s) who decide what type of aircraft goes on which route. Their primary focus is not customer comfort, it’s getting the cheapest to operate plane that will accommodate around the number of folks who want to fly.

I suspect these folks all use the same manual for figuring this out, as both Untied (sic) and Mapleflot schedule Airbus 319’s for cross-country journeys. I also suspect these folks have never had to fly cattle class in a 319. For those of you who haven’t had the pleasure, the 319 is kind of like the Honda Civic. Great to get around the city, not so great on long voyages.

The 319 is a short-medium haul airliner, designed for flight durations of 60-180 minutes. The seats are cheap-ass and uncomfortable, and are laid out for high-density passenger seating. You can stay relatively (ha ha) comfortable in them for a couple of hours, but anything more than that is pretty god-awful. San Fran to Toronto or Philadelphia is five to six hours. For those who skipped math, that’s 2-3 times longer than what the 319 was designed for.

Unbelievably uncomfortable, and my butt and legs will take a day or so to get back to normal.

Stop. Using. This. Piece. Of. Shit. Airplane. On. Long. Hauls.

Use an A321, or a Boeing 767 . They were designed to run a little longer and offer similar economics as the 319. They are also comfortable enough to keep your customers from wanting to slit your throats and wishing the flight would end, please god, end now aiiiiiegggggggghhhhhhh….

Whew.

No 319s. Unless I’m going to Toronto, New York, or Chi-town.

Thank you.

While most of the US knows him as “John Roberts”, it’s nice to see that he still has a little JD left in him.

Ah, supply and demand. It’s the justification companies use when they’re fucking you without your consent and you’re telling them to stop while they say “hell no”. Gas companies have long played this game in Canada, with prices starting high on Friday afternoon and dropping over the weekend. It was not uncommon before all the silliness that you’d see a 5 to 7 cent per litre fluctuation over the course of the week.

There’ve been numerous probes by various levels of government, and they’ve always resulted with the conclusion that it’s just market forces at work. There is no collusion amongst the three major and two or three minor players in the Canadian market. That’s the theory, anyways, and if we foud ourselves needing gas on Friday or Saturday we’d walk away from the pumps with our ass hurting a little more than normal.

I’ve noticed that the rules have recently changed. Some genius has obviously taken a look at when during the day most people fill up. I’m sure it won’t surprise you to know that most people fill up first thing in the morning, before their day gets going. The gas companies have stumbled on to this, and nowhave modified their pricing strategy somewhat.

Over the last couple weeks I’ve noticed that the price of a litre of gas can vary 5-10 cents per litre over the course of a day. It has been this way since gas dropped to the $1/l range and below. Currently gas starts at around 90 to 93 cents/litre at 6am, and starts to drop around 11am reaching a low of around 83 cents/litre by midnight and staying there until 6 where, all of a sudden, everyone’s price increases back to 90 to 93 cents.

But it’s all about supply and demand, not taking advantage of when people typically buy gas (and yes, I understand you could make the argument that it is supply and demand at work, but I’d argue a fair bit with you on that being a technicality of scope).

Fuckers.

So I was finishing off my day, and decided to read kj’s blog. Understand that I feel like a character in some alternate, older, Judy Blume universe these days because of a lot of things I won’t get into, but was having a decent day. Then I read kj’s post.

It’s nice to know that I’m officially “creepy old”, which kinda opened some sluices in my mind.

*sigh*

I got censored. And I’m feeling like shit because of the giftof a cold my nephew probably gave me. And I’m tired. And I’m fat. And I forgot to eat dinner. And the fucking delivery men stripped the threads of one of the legs on my brand new couch. And I wanted to play ulty and run but can’t because my foot hurts so much I can’t walk properly, which in turn is screwing up my knee. And I don’t want to hear about Christmas. And I wish the fine, upstanding students who covered my driveway with broken glass at 4am this morning would hurry the hell up and flunk out. And I don’t understand why the only person who knows how to fix the self-serve cashes at home despot is operating a till at the other end of the store. And yes I was pissed when I got stood up last week by a good friend, and I still am a little. And of course every coffee table I saw in the catalog this weekend that I liked was discontinued.

And… and… and… it’s been that kinda day, and there was nary a beer to be had. I tried to rectify that, but was thwarted by the hordes of Asians filling up the parking lot trying to get to the new uber ethnic grocery that shares a parking lot with the Beer Store I was trying to get to, to the point the lot was impassable… I then understood it was time to sit on the couch and watch tv, which I did.

At least I finished painting my living room.