Cold Work Letters

Being an Eskimo

What a week this is turning out to be and one cannot say all is in complete order as the brook that runs beside my office complex is already frozen over, my bowler hat is having more of a showing - hardly a fashion statement; I am looking one shawl short of an Eskimo – it is dreadfully cold here and snowing in Spain – more like Global Cooling to me.

We had a meeting on Friday where I more or less offered a draft job description for a new role they are considering me for. So far, it looks like the carrot too far off for the giraffe to have a sweet gnaw – the last day at work might well be Friday.

Since, I have hardly had time to myself, we might just make that Thursday, I have left it too late to plan a decent birthday buffet at work, taking the day off might just help me prepare better for my holiday – sometimes, I wonder how I ended up on a flight leaving at 6:20AM – some things just pass you by even if you are deep inside the detail of the event.

Two minds on one job

Besides, I find myself with two understudies having lost my trusted sidekick to a long indisposition and work piling up like the Three Gorges Dam robbing us of all that is good in nature – I still have my deliverables to manage as I have to do this, comment on that, advice on something and letting nothing get me livid with rage - difficult!.

The difference between a national headquarters and international headquarters in the Netherlands is simple; there is hot water in the lavatories of the latter. A visit there earlier today confirmed what we knew all along, our Oracle developers have to solve a performance problem that have tried hard to foist upon us.

Indeed, there was once a performance problem on our systems, but that has since been patched away, the pre-existing Oracle performance problem has persisted through our transition and not been resolved.

That is my problem with developers, they are fanatical, fundamentalist and believe themselves infallible in thought, deed and code – such delusion hampers productivity and holds up the business as others have to conclusively prove that the problem is squarely with rotten code in production serving the function of helping run the business – Shocking!

Credit Crunch Reprieve?

Meanwhile, amidst the Christmas cards and early birthday cards in the post, I am expecting a letter that would never arrive.

Was it not cheap credit first and lies that got us into the impending 2008 recession (imagined or debunked) and the current credit crunch?

But rather than stand up for fiscal rectitude and tough monetary policies the central banks in Europe, the UK, Canada, Switzerland and the US are offering cheap loans to banks to help them trust each other enough to lend to each other. See illustration of the sub-prime crisis here .

Now, in the light of such laxity and lack of backbone, one would expect my mortgage company to offer a double-whammy present for my birthday and Christmas with the title – Credit Crunch Reprieve, the message being my mortgage rates have now been refrozen to the rate I had in November 2005 for 5 years. Fat Chance!