Fun with Email

Following on from my suggestions on computer etiquette, here's some suggestions for how to improve the flow of information from email.  If you do this right, maybe no-one will ever email you again.  And that can only be an improvement!

---

Flag all emails as "!Urgent!".  This will help people prioritise.

Always ask for a read receipt.  People love letting you know they've received your email which you only sent them "FYI".

Whenever you receive an email, forward it to ten other people, marked "FYI".  People like to be informed.

Work hard to be known among your friends (or at least your former friends) as "the one who forwards on email jokes".

Make sure you send on jokes that are as racist and sexist as possible.  People feel embarrassed being told these jokes in person, but once they're encoded into Ascii they suddenly become acceptable and amusing.

If someone sends out a company-wide broadcast, click "Reply to all" when you want to ask the sender for more information.

If someone sends out a company-wide broadcast, and some idiot clicks "Reply to all" when they want to ask the sender for more information - click "Reply to all" when you point out to them what they've done.

Let's Face the Music and Liturgical Dance (IV)

It turns out we didn't give up stupidity for Lent after all. This morning at breakfast, Edith Weston asked whether I minded if she performed a Liturgical Dance at Pouring Out of Beakers. I was momentarily distracted by the large pain au chocolat that Hnaef was getting round the outside of (because I thought we'd banned these for the Season) and must have nodded without thinking about it.

Arriving in the Moot House through the South East door, as is liturgically correct from Autumnal to Vernal Equinox, I was surprised to see that the Beaker People coming out of the Corridor of Uncertainty were falling over and sliding about as they entered the Moot House.  Turns out this was because of the ice covering the floor.  In the event, Edith's planned "Liturgical Ice Dance" was cancelled due to the large number of injuries.  We're not going to be allowing her to perform it this evening either, and all that refrigeration equipment's just going to have to go back.  And I blame Sally for giving her the idea.

Holy Computer Use

Nearly a week into Lent.  And you've probably learned to resist most temptation.  So now let's move onto the advanced stuff.

Now we all know that people's attitudes towards each other are far worse when they're driving than when they're face to face.  Unless, according to some stories, you are Prime Minister, in which case you're better off in a car because then any mobile phones you throw are liable to bounce off the car windows.

But there's another environment in which behaviour becomes even worse - the world of computing,  Consider an example from the world of IT incident logging systems.  Let us consider the interaction between an overnight computer room operator, who we will call for the sake of argument "Norman" and a C++ Developer, whom we will call "Jeremy".  "Jeremy" wears a T-shirt that he rarely washes, and that you can only find funny if you understand the concept of "recursion".  And if your name is Jeremy.  On the other hand, deep down at heart, he's a good bloke.  He wants the world to be a better place.  And so does Norman.  So how did it come to this?

---

NORMAN 04:45 - System gave disk space warning. Deleted archived log files and restarted process.  Warehouse Control System delivered all the lettuces to the deep freeze section.  Phoned Jeremy, who recommended we delete and recreate the Tote History File to re-initialise the pick routes.  Did this, restarted process and all now well.

JEREMY 08:44 - Just got in and system running smoothly.  Lettuces were unfortunately destroyed.  There's a doc in Sharepoint indicates that when there's a disk space warning, you should cancel the background Conveyor Router before deleting the log file - if you'd done this we'd still have the lettuces, lol.


NORMAN 08:51 - The Operating Instructions don't detail this document.  Can you update?  Maybe next time the lettuces won't have to die - you wouldn't want that on your conscience again ;)


JEREMY 09:01 - *My* conscience? The OpInst clearly says you should follow the "Out of Disk Space" documentation.

NORMAN 09:11 - We used version 1.1 of the "Disk Space document.  It didn't mention the Conveyor Router.

JEREMY 09:14 - There's a version A.  We moved to the lettering version control after the DC Swap-Out last month.

NORMAN 09:17 - Well, nobody told us.


JEREMY 09:18 - We held a meeting.


NORMAN 09:19 - Well maybe you developers did.  Perhaps next time you hold a meeting you should invite the Ops department as well.  THEN WE'D KNOW WHAT TO DO WHEN SOMETHING GOES WRONG IN THE NIGHT.

JEREMY 09:20 - WE INVITED THE HELP DESK.  WE EXPECTED THEM TO INFORM YOU.

NORMAN 09:21 - You probably invited the Help Desk because it's the only way you get to meet girls.  No wonder we never got the information - you sad acts probably just spent your time flirting with Vera.

JEREMY 09:22 - Yeah?  Well do you wonder where your girlfriendwas at 04:45 this morning?  Why do you think she's so keen on you working the night shift?  I bet she was round with the boys from Goods Inwards again.

HELPDESK 10:17 - Traced the problem with the Warehouse Control System.  "Overheight, Overweight" warning was due to Jeremy being strapped to a tote and fed into the Automated Crane Storage system.

---

You see how quickly things can go downhill if you only communicate in ASCII?  So a simple moral for the day - why not pick up the phone instead, ideally before someone gets delivered into an Automated Storage and Retrieval System?  You know it makes sense.

Homeopathy

I can't say how pleased we are to see that the NHS is going to stop funding homeopathy treatments.
It's the last thing you need in private enterprise, is state-subsidised competition.

Now roll up, roll up!  We've gallons of complete safe water, guaranteed free of side effects.  And we'll even put a label on it  - to say it's been slightly tinged with whatever you need, to put one over on the so-called "professionals".  And now each dose of homeopathic medicine comes in its own hand-moulded mini-beaker.

Take it home as a souvenir of your time with the Beaker People.  A bottle of traditional healing wisdom, and something which will live in your memory - until you have to be rushed into hospital for real treatment.

Disclaimer - Beaker Homeopathy is only recommended for people who aren't really ill.  If you're genuinely unwell, you'll be better off with a doctor.

A Rebuttal

Now, let's get something straight.  The Moot House has been ringing with claims that I am in some way a "violent, menopausal tyrant who throws phones at people that annoy her, before kicking them in the shins with her steel toe-capped boots."
Which is fair comment.
Let's face it, if you had to deal with the kind of half-witted, flower-and-pixie-loving day dreamers that I have to every day, you'd be inclined to go around smashing doors down with a wood-splitting maul and hanging Drayton Parslow over the M1 from the Ridgmont Bypass bridge by the ankles.
But the accusations that I am short-tempered are completely unfair.  No, if I have to inflict violence - in love, I hasten to add - I pray and meditate for days in advance.  And then carry out the sentence in a spirit of loving correction.  And "brooding"?  Where did that come from?  No, once I have the Beaker Folk back to a suitable attitude of fear and apprehension I feel remarkably relaxed.
Unless they really annoy me.  In which case I throw a phone at them.

As a mother gathers her chicks

Life is hard on chicks.
At birth, 50% of them are male.  But males don't lay eggs.  In the old days, you'd breed them up anyway and then eat them.  But today - you have meat chickens, and you have egg chickens.
So the boy chicks get liquidated.  Actually, in a factory farm they tend to get macerated.  Bit rough on them, but you can't make an omelette....

So maybe this image has been modernised out of relevance.  For the mother hen in Jesus' day, it was only the fox the chicks had to worry about - and Jesus had a fox called Herod.  But now - chicks have a much rougher time.  Does the simile hold?

So often I've wanted to gather you as a hen wants to gather her chicks - gather you from the maceration of humanity's industrial wars - gather you from the battlefields where you'll be slaughtered in your millions - gather you from the killing fields - gather you from the windowless sheds where Caesar's successors will once again try to wipe out God's chosen people - gather you from the torture chamber and the casual violence and the under-age sweat shops and the cut-price production lines and the indentured labour and the brothel-keeper.

One day.  One day.

Squirrel Theology

A recap from earlier today....

"Look at what I found growing on the wall of the cellar, Archdruid.  What do you think they are?"
"Well, they look and smell like mushrooms, Marston.  But I'd throw them away if I were you."

Based on the logic that I'm not him, Marston went off and fried said fungi with a little garlic and olive oil and had them on toast.

He now tells me that he's been appointed the "Second Prophet to the Squirrels".  The First Prophet was Mother Julian, with her famous "size of a hazelnut" comment.
According to Marston, God has given up on human beings - he quoted Hardy's famous words "after 2,000 years of mass we've got as far as mustard gas".  God now has a mission to the squirrels.  And the Reds are his chosen race.

Marston says that the invasion of the Gray squirrels from America is a judgement on the Reds, just as the Babylonian exile was a punishment for the People of Israel.  Although Marston is curiously reticent on just what iniquities can be committed by a squirrel - he thinks it may have something to do with nibbling lumps out  of conkers.  But just as Babylon fell to the Medes and the Persians, so the Grays are in their own turn being chastised for the iniquity of chasing out the Reds, under the thrall of the new Mutant Killer Black Squirrels.
Marston wants to preach the Good News to the Red Squirrels, telling them to turn from their iniquities and be saved.  He wants to tell them there's a place where the Squirrel and the Fox will lay down together, and their winter stashes of nuts will never be lost.  But he's rather stymied by his inability to learn the Squirrel language. Although he reckons that all squirrels speak the same language - as they have never attempted to build a giant drey that reaches up to heaven - the Grays and Blacks have an American accent.  But lacking anyone who is bilingual in English and Squirrel, he's in for a long haul here.

I hope the effect of the mushrooms wears off soon.  But not too soon.  He's currently coming in really handy for retrieving all the footballs and kites we've got stuck in the trees over the last few summer picnics.   And I'm hoping he may be able to nip up a drainpipe and clear out the guttering for us.

Things you don't want to hear a Preacher say

We don't like the concept of "preaching" really, at Husborne Crawley.  It puts the preacher in a power relationship with the preachees - implying that the preacher has access to knowledge and oratorical power that the preachees do not possess.  Whereas the evidence round here is that the preacher, on the whole, has none of these things.


Still, since the other alternatives to preaching - "oratory", "rambling", "musing", "facilitating an ongoing thought-enhancement and spiritual development process in a theological context" are all equally weak, we'll stick with "preaching" for the purposes of this discussion.
In any case, here's some things that may help all members of the Community to improve their inspirational aspirations.

"But enough about God.  Let's talk about how clever I am."

"So I've sketched out the socio-dynamics of the Essene fellowship, giving summary accounts of five or six of the most recent views of the archaeologists and theologians.  Now let's move to point one of this six-point sermon..."

"I've learnt that people remember more of what they see, than of what they hear.  So after that account of the sins of the Israelite men with the Moabite women, I'll be giving a demonstration of those sins with my wife.  Just as soon as we've put our teeth somewhere safe - we wouldn't like them to fly out...."

"So I hope I've been very clear on the spiritual damage you can suffer from hidden sin.  Now then - Hnaef has the roaming mic - who's the first to confess?"

"I am the god of hell fire!"

"I'm pleased to see that the use of the word "mercy" in that verse in Isaiah was the subject of my MA thesis.  So I'd like to read it to you now.  In full."

"You know, I'm really regretting that prawn curry last night.  And the beer seemed a bit cloudy as well.  Now, this pulpit is quite high so I'm quite pleased to see there's no-one in the front six rows."

"OK - I'm the one with the preaching gown.  I'm the one up here with the big book.  So everybody listen to me.  I'm right."

"I'm pleased to say that God gave me a direct message last night.  And oooh he had a lot to say."

"I'm afraid I'll have to preach the second half of this sermon extempore.  Not because I've had a sudden burst of inspiration.  No - the computer ran out of memory and crashed after printing off the first half."

"But I see it is time for the Evening Service to begin.  So in conclusion..."

"I really wanted to focus on "giving" this morning.  And it so happens that I have here the records of everyone's standing orders.  So, let's see... Albert Aldwincle - £20 per month...  Rhoda Benson - £15...."

"I've felt so inspired this morning that I'm going to issue an altar call.  The doors are locked, and no-one's going home until we've had twenty new converts."

If I ruled the world

 I'd be good and fair.

All things would be great.

People doing what they wanted.

Everyone equal.

Not evil.

They'd all just love me.

I'm sure they all would.

Of course, they'd want to love me.

And if they didn't

they'd have to.

Luke 4

A Beaker-ish, Hardyan, Lenten Thought

...he might have been seen on most days at this time trying the temper of the mortar by punching the joints with his stick, looking at the grain of a floor-board, and meditating where it grew, or picturing under what circumstances the last fire would be kindled in the at present sootless chimneys.

From Fellow Townsmen in Wessex Tales.  A superb collection of short stories.

"Remember you are dust".

The numbers game

"Outside Europe, numbers of Christians are rising at a phenomenal pace.

But in the West, they are falling."

- Diarmaid MacCulloch - A History of Christianity, BBC2


Comparative birthrates:

France - 12.2
UK - 12.0 
Canada 10.3


Democratic Republic of Congo - 49.6
Liberia - 49.6
Uganda - 46.6
Zambia - 39.3


New Atheism - like King Canute buying a canoe.  And telling himself how much cleverer he is than the tide.


(Birthrates per 1,000 people - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_birth_rate)