Wed, 17 Mar 2010, 07:51 PM (-06:00)
1. Fallen Gobbledy-Gook Card
I opened a book the other day, in the evening when I was looking for distraction, something other than one of those books over there in that pile by the chair, books that I opened before when I was looking for distraction.
A piece of paper fell out. It landed on the floor, and I could see it was a computer punch card from years ago. I kept a lot of them as bookmarks, usually the cast-offs of someone else’s programs. (Since I learned to program at the cusp of the punch card / CRT boundary, I didn’t have many card decks of my own &mdash at least nothing worth keeping.)
The code across the top of the card read:
IF(RRMAX.GT.DIST(IKEEP)) GO TO 1425
There was a time when that was my world, when I had to figure out what some guy was thinking when he wrote such code, where he was coming from, where he was going to, and why. It was part of the reality of FORTRAN. I must say, it’s a lost skill (if I ever had it in the first place). I have no patience for such gobbledy-gook anymore, and I pity the (mercifully few) people who do.
2. Dodged Gobbledy-Gook Bullet
I had a job interview years ago. It was with a group doing cool stuff with a big program that automated a lot of cool things. They were planning to write the next generation of the program and were ramping up the effort. It sounded exciting, but as the (long) interview went on, it became clear that the job they were hiring for was someone to take care of the old program while the cool cats got to build the new one. I had visions of code like this punch card in my head, and the appeal of the place immediately tanked.
“It looks to me,” I said, “like you’re looking for a maintenance programmer.”
They looked at me in silence. And well, that was pretty much that. It was a very close call.
Wed, 17 Mar 2010, 08:49 AM (-06:00)
I was a grad student once. I believe perennial is the word. Last night I had a dream about it.
I was still in school, but it was becoming obvious that I needed to move on. I had flown to Los Angeles, because some people I knew out there had once offered a job interview. We talked tentatively about an interview date, and in this dream evidently I just booked a flight and went out there, assuming that they were expecting me.
The weren’t expecting me.
When I arrived (It was a university campus in the middle of the city with large white marble monumental buildings and guards deployed at the gates), I into the library and began looking for the offices of the people I needed to meet. I couldn’t find them, and the rest of the dream was a pathetic wandering search for someone to interview with. (Think: Are You My Mother?)
Somewhere along the line, I lost my notebook that had my technical portfolio. And I lost my camera. And I didn’t have a hotel reservation, nor did I know where the hotels were. And I didn’t think I knew many people there, except that I kept running into folks I did know: former grad school colleagues (who had graduated), people that I recognized from the library back home (and who vaguely recognized me, although they squinted to fetch up the recollection), and even high school friends (who I happen to know also finished their PhDs).
As the dream drew to a close, I had found a place to stay overnight. It was a tiny, dark place with a small living room in front and a bedroom in the back. A chair in the bedroom sat up against a narrow window that looked out on a small courtyard and the doors of the other rooms. I was sitting in the chair with the blinds drawn just enough so that although I could see out, no one could see me.
I was a grad student once. I believe perennial is the word. I don’t regret the time, far from it, but you sure wouldn’t be able to tell it from dreams like these.
Tue, 16 Mar 2010, 09:50 PM (-06:00)
1. Grokking Around. We go walking out to the soccer fields. He’s on a leash, pulling to reach that one magic spot along the chain link fence, that one spot that he always wants to check out. A pole comes between us, and he’s in danger of getting the leash wrapped around it. He stops, glances at the pole, turns around, and runs around my side so that he won’t get tied up and so he can get on with the business of the chain link fence. He must grok the concept of around.
2. Happy Grass. We’ve just come out of two years of deep drought. The creeks didn’t run for two and a half years, not even in the spring. The soccer fields had a hard time of it. Or rather, the soccer associations had a hard time, stuck as they must have been with massive water bills to keep the fields from turning into dust bowls. This year, the water barrels have been constantly full, and oh, is the grass happy. The soccer associations are probably happier.
3. The Planets. How is it possible that a high school student doesn’t know how many planets there are? Ok, you might be off by one, given the recent controversy at the fringe of the solar system. But, six planets!? Turn off the game console, man. I know I’m not exactly objective, but you’re in serious dark ages territory, here.
4. Box Ack. He got a Valentine’s Day box with some clothes and a card and some M&Ms. But that was last month. This month, I send another smaller box with miscellaneous things: microfiber towels to clean lint off a laptop monitor, Thin Mints, another card, a Lego kit as an inside joke. A message comes back late last night. One sentence, four words: Thanks for the package. I shall be thankful for small things.
Wed, 10 Mar 2010, 05:12 PM (-06:00)
The sun is shining. The sky is blue again after a brief rain at noon. A breeze is blowing in thru the window beside me, a window that wasn’t functional a year ago, a glorious breeze coming in here and going out the back.
A moment ago I was hot and sweaty. Now it is cool. This is why we replaced the windows late last spring: for days like this.
The Irises are blooming. The Four Nerve Daisies and Blackfoot Daisies have put out their first blossoms. And the Salvia Gregii. And the Agarita. And the Holly bush The Oaks have buds on them straining to poke out. And the Possumhaw has already begun.
75 degrees. Sun. Blue sky. And a cool breeze blowing thru the house.
I’d say a run is in order, wouldn’t you? Time to … step away from the keyboard.
Mon, 8 Mar 2010, 08:33 PM (-06:00)
A Cardinal talked to me Sunday morning from the branches of a leafless tree. I was bent over, pitching forks of chipped tree branch mulch into the wheel barrow in a kind of meditative stupor when I heard it singing overhead.
Tweeeet. Bit-twoo, bit-twoo, bit-twoo, bit-twoo.
The sky was grey, and there was a slight drizzle in the air. I stood up and leaned on the pitch fork and looked up into the branches to where it was perched. It was bright red against the greyness all around.
I’m not quite sure why I’m telling you this. No… that’s not right. The fact of the matter is that I’m not talking to you. I’m talking to my grandmother, just letting her know about a singing Redbird in the upper reaches of my Ash tree. She would have wanted to know.
Mon, 8 Mar 2010, 01:14 AM (-06:00)
I know you saw me reaching for the cookie after we finished dinner last night — that half a chocolate chip cookie you saved from lunch.
It was wrapped in cellophane, and I struggled to get it out, yet you just kept reading the newspaper and eating your enchilada, ignoring my furtive glances in your direction, since after all it was your cookie I was unwrapping, and certainly you’d object. I struggled with the cellophane and glance up at you and struggled and glanced, but still you kept doing what you were doing, and my act of petty thievery went unremarked.
So when I finally held the partial cookie in my hands and ate one half of it and looked longingly at the other half and glanced back up at you only to see you still reading the paper, I had no choice but to say something.
“So can I finish the cookie?” I asked.
You nodded. Or mumbled. Or maybe you just said, “Yes.” But whatever you said, it was clear that you knew all along what I was up to, that I was busted without even being busted.
But here’s the thing: I got to eat the rest of the cookie.
And here’s the other thing: I am so awash in guilt. Guilt for having taken your cookie. Guilt for having eaten not just part but all of what remained. Guilt for having thought that you didn’t know what I was doing when of course you did. And guilt for being up so late on a school night making this confession.
Sat, 6 Mar 2010, 01:02 AM (-06:00)
It’s dark outside. And quiet. Not a sound in the house. Just the dim glow of the lamp beside his bed. He holds a book in his hands on his chest waiting for sleep to come. The chapters go by, but it does not come.
He closes the book and sets it on the table. Sets it on a pile of other books from other nights. There are several such piles in the house — a sign, perhaps, of something. He doesn’t want to think about that right now. He rolls over and turns off the lamp.
The room is dark. And quiet. Not a sound in the house.
Wed, 3 Mar 2010, 09:04 PM (-06:00)
I bought a car. Red. Compact. Wagon. Without the ton of features most of them come with. Another VW Jetta.
I hated it — buying the car. The negotiating. The trade in. The trips the salesman made back and forth between where we were sitting to some sales manager in the corner. I just hated it. But the car was what I wanted, and so I finally nodded and said yes.
I was shaking when I got home.
That was Friday. Monday it was supposed to arrive, my little red wagon. It was supposed to arrive from some other dealer somewhere with some unspecified number of miles on it.
Monday came. No car. In the afternoon, the salesman called. The other dealer sold the car. There are no others like that one. Maybe I’d like a black one. Or maybe one with a sun roof. Or … do you only want red?
I bought that car. Or rather I was going to. But no.
Well, at least the interior of my old car is now brand-spankin’ new looking … kinda.
Wed, 24 Feb 2010, 08:42 AM (-06:00)
It’s cold outside today, as cold in Central Texas for the weather curmudgeon as it is in northern Ohio where he imagines his son might be trudging across campus soon. (Although the weather curmudgeon privately acknowledges that he hasn’t the faintest idea about his son’s schedule.)
The weather curmudgeon stands at the patio door surveying his backyard. Here and there, snow lies on the lawn left over from yesterday. The raised garden bed closest to the fence is still covered in white. So is the pile of logs. And a blanket left outside in a chair.
The weather curmudgeon remembers the morning yesterday and the predicted wintery mix. When the snow started falling and the flakes got bigger and bigger. When they fell from the sky in clusters so big that even the weather curmudgeon was amazed. Some were as big as half-dollars and fell to the ground like leaves. Others were picked up by the wind and swirled around. The sky was thick with them.
And when the weather curmudgeon opened the door on that snowy yesterday, the air was full of a crunching/clicking sound of the snowflake clusters hitting the ground. He stood on the patio and gasped aloud.
“Holy cow, ” he said, shouting to his fair and industrious wife who was across the house getting ready for work. “I’ve never ever seen anything like this, Trudy!”
The accumulation never did amount to the four inches the weather men predicted. But with this exclamation coming from the weather curmudgeon (who grew up in northern Illinois ice skating, building snow forts, having snowball fights and trudging across campus in knee-deep snow for an 8am Dynamics class), we know it really must have been something.
Tue, 23 Feb 2010, 06:52 PM (-06:00)
When it rains, my car gets wet, the inside and the outside. And after a while of course it starts to smell. This has been a problem for a while. Trouble is, we’ve just come out of a two-year drought, and by the time I figured out I had a systematic problem that the dealer’s repairs had not fixed, the warranty had of course expired.
“You need a new car,” my brother says, as he quietly listens to my story. (He’s shockingly patient when I share such complaints — the physician in him no doubt.)
“This might be a good time to buy a Toyota,” he says, referring to all the recalls Toyota is issuing and the public spanking they’re getting in the press. Prices are sure to fall. A perfect opportunity for a picky cheapskate like me.
But there’s one problem.
Not only am I cheap, not only am I picky, but I believe in science and the scientific approach to problem solving. I believe in collecting data and forming a hypothesis that explains the problem and in testing your hypothesis against the data. But Toyota evidently believes, like so much of the rest of our culture, that science is not so much about hypotheses and data but rather about new-and-shiny stuff. Science to them seems to be more about how to plausibly deny responsibility (or worse, conceal it) without really fixing anything.
So no. I on second thought this is not a good time to buy a Toyota. Not because I would fear for my life if I were in one, but rather because in my not so humble opinion, their behavior represents everything in our 21st century culture that has run so completely off the rails.
Life is not all about PR. Life is not all about spin. Facts are important. Words to matter. And I hope they get raked over the coals when they go before Henry Waxman’s committee.
In the meantime, I will not buy a Toyota. And as a result, I’m back to breathing deeply the gathered gloom in my car, because right now outside it’s raining snowing.