TriumphAnt

Cycle Babble

(Wow, what a surprise! But just a brief couple paragraphs.)

Let me end any licence status suspense right at the outset for everyone seeking (read “praying for”) an end to this ongoing distraction. I’m still an M-1 because, apparently, I was too “tentative” to pass all the M-2 skills in the allotted time. (Although to my mind, if you have to fail a test, failing because you’re too cautious is probably the best reason.) But being an M-1 is just fine. It means I have to re-take the written exam every 90 days; it means I am restricted to daylight riding; I can’t carry passengers; if I register a blood alcohol reading of _anything_, the result will be an immediate licence suspension (and if it’s over .08, criminal charges as well) and I have to keep off the 400-series highways (those with posted speed limits of 100 km/h or higher). But since I have no desire to ride after dark and it will be a while before I am completely comfortable with the thought of moving 100 km/h on a motorcycle, I see none of those restrictions as a bad thing.

I’ve had the Triumph out several times – 250 km worth at this writing – and even goosed it up to 85 km/h one day in order to get myself past a slowly moving hay wagon that was streaming lots of little windblown bits of straw back onto my helmet visor.

It is a gorgeous machine to ride. Granted, it doesn’t “float” along the road like the massive heavily-shock-absorbing Harley-Davidson style of cruisers float – you do feel the bumps – but that, too is actually something I prefer. It helps keep me from lapsing into complacency. I’ve decided to give myself a year or so of experience before making another attempt to escalate my licence grade. And the good news for BD readers is, since I’m just shy of where I want to be, Cycle Babble is going on hiatus and I’ll let you know when anything interesting happens on two wheels. Period.

We now return you to our regular frivolous discontent.

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Bill Gates doesn’t always friggin’ know better!

In a recent online discussion, I posted a comment that included a media citation that ended with the date in parentheses. This meant that the last three symbols in my post were “08”, followed by the close parenthesis: “)”.

Later on, when I went back to pick up the progress of the discussion, I noticed that, in place of those two final symbols – the “8” and the “)” – one of Bill Gates’ little programs had taken it upon itself to decide that I really meant to end off my post with a smiley, and had auto-replaced those final two symbols with a smiley face! And not just a text-only, “emoticon” smiley, but a full-colour yellow graphic damned smiley!

It’s not the first time that’s happened, and it sure as hell won’t be the last time it really ticks me off, but what gives Mr Bill damned Gates the right to assume that not only have I made an error, but here is what I really meant so here let me just go ahead and “correct” it for you. No really, don’t mention it. Glad to be of assistance. Come again soon.

I don’t know what version of MSWord you’re running (or if you’re running Word at all – and if not, my congratulations), but try keying in, with no spaces, the three symbols for 1. open parenthesis, then 2. small ”c”, then 3. close parenthesis. Did the image of the copyright symbol suddenly replace what you had intended to be a small “c” in brackets? That one especially drives me crazy. I don’t think I have ever in my life sought out the characters that would generate a copyright symbol, whereas I have frequently desired to have a small “c” in brackets.

Occasionally when I tell people about this, I will sometimes find that I’ve encountered a software nerd (and I mean that only in a nice way) who will tell me, “Oh that’s easy to undo, just yadda-yadda-yadda… and Bob’s your uncle!” But I have two, no three, problems with that. 1. Whenever I shut down my computer and then turn it on again, I inevitably will find that the Gates-imposed defaults have all been restored; 2. “yadda-yadda-yadda” usually devolves in less than the wink of an eye to something that probably resembles Greek but I can’t be entirely sure since “ouzo”, “retsina”, “Fix” and “Melina Mercouri” – three of which are alcohol – pretty much represent all the Greek I know; and 3. Why in HELL should I be the one to have to UNDO something??? Why can’t the program leave me alone and wait for me to tell it – and only when I do so – to make a copyright symbol?

I suppose I should be glad I’m not named Farouk Q’teh or some such thing, because you just bloody well know that ever-helpful Mr Gates has already decided that every single damned time the letters “teh” appear onscreen the typist really meant to type “the” and oh here let me just change that for you. No don’t thank me; it’s the least I can do...

(And yes, just up there, where I typed “Q’teh” and “the letters ‘teh’”, I had to go back and undo my MSWord’s helpful conversion of both occurrences of “teh” to “the” – and right there again – which of course would have made the above paragraph even less comprehensible than usual.)

Thanks a bunch, Bill. You jerk.

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I recently sent an e-mail to a few friends in the wake of receiving the following message (and my message to them was “So what’s the point of tickets?”): I’m posting it here for the benefit of the vastly wider audience (at least double!) represented by BD regulars. (And don’t even get me going on a rant about how the emphasis on official public service bilingualism should be equally weighted towards those whose first language is French.) I quote:

"Hello everyone,

As mentionned in this email below, there will be a breakfast served on September 10th (this Wednesday) here at Phase 4 to support the Government of Canada Workplace Charitable Campaign. I have six tickets to sell at only 5$ each.

Please let me know if you are interested to buy a ticket. Please note that you can also buy directly your breakfast for the same price of 5$ at the event. No ticket needed.

Thank you"

One of my friends who received the message pretty much nailed it when he sent this reply shortly after receiving my query:

“It gives ticket makers and ticket sellers something (differently) irrelevant to do!”

= =

And under the heading of sentences that make you either desperate to know more, or cause you to throw your gingham apron over your head and run away shrieking (like Mrs Dilber when the nightshirt-clad Scrooge – in the Alastair Sim version of A Christmas Carol – put his “I must stand on me ‘ead” desire into action), I submit for your consideration this sentence from a Telegraph.co.UK online story about a new Harper Collins book:

“While different Aboriginal communities have varying ideas on what will or will not happen to a woman who touches the didgeridoo, most seem to agree that it is the man's role to play the mostly ceremonial instrument.”

(To save the desperate among you the trouble, the book, “The Daring Book for Girls”, was intended to offer suggestions for interesting experiences in aboriginal education – and for girls, obviously. But in aboriginal culture, it turns out that it is taboo for a woman to play the didgeridoo. Harper Collins has promised to delete the offending chapter from future editions and has apologized.)

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A really cool thing about the internet is the ability to enter it via a subject of interest and, in perhaps mere minutes, find yourself a million miles away from where you came in.

I was recently hunting down a version of the thumping old rock song (which I know I’ve mentioned here before), “I Fought the Law” on You Tube and was surprised by how many people have performed it – and been filmed doing so. I wandered through thundering, screaming, pounding versions by musicians like Bruce Springsteen, Bryan Adams, The Clash, and (the original by) The Bobby Fuller 4 until, eventually, I found the one I had been looking for to satisfy a friend’s request – it’s on the soundtrack of The Trailer Park Boys movie and features Geddy Lee of Rush on guitar, and a screaming vocal by a woman named Care Failure (probably not her birth name), who fronts a band called Die Mannequins. Browsing further, in short order I was taken away from “I Fought the Law” to a stream of live-in-concert recordings by the Irish band, The Pogues, and several different versions of what I think is either one of the funniest Christmas songs you’ll ever inflict on yourself, or it’s near-suicidally depressing. (I suspect one’s own mood will play a heavy hand in how one sees it.) It’s called "Fairy Tale of New York".

Thanks to You Tube, I was amazed to find that there has been a video story version done of it – in addition to the many in-concert captures that pretty well mark all the other versions. The late, wonderful Kirsty MacColl is there, decked out as a 19thC courtesan (“late” because she died – heroically but way too soon – pushing her son out of the path of a speeding motorboat after the pair surfaced from a scuba dive in Cozumel), as is Shane MacGowan, The Pogues’ (then) lead singer, and a man who singlehandedly sends both Alcoholics Anonymous and the world’s dental associations running – Mrs Dilber-like – for cover. (He rarely performed sober, in fact rarely was ever sober. For the full grim picture, his Wikipedia bio makes especially compelling reading, if only to make you feel really good about yourself.) But the consequent concert effect is to make it ridiculously easy to sing along with the Pogues – as any of the You Tube concert takes will attest. Just (a) be heavily Guinness-fueled, and (b) hit within a note or two of the tune as you roar out random, but vaguely rhyming animal sounds.)

The Pogues certainly are not for everyone. They’re like blue cheese, black olives and Guinness in that there’s no middle ground for your affection – you either love them or hate them.

But here is probably the most… uh… well… frankly unclassifiable Christmas song you’ll ever hear. (For extra fun, hunt down the lyrics on Google.) Unlike previous times where I’ve apologized for posting a You Tube link, with this link a “sorry” is due to everyone – as in the past to those whose computers are not You-Tube capable and so cannot light this up, but this time also to those with full access and who will have no problem at all viewing it.

“The boys of the N-Y-P-D choir were singin’ ‘Galway Bay’
And the bells were ringin’ out for Christmas Day.”

Fairy Tale of New York, by The Pogues with Kirsty MacColl.

And by way of make-up, here’s a much more classic Irish footstomper from the same boys: “If I Should Fall from Grace with God.”

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What’s wrong with government? – Yet another in an ongoing series.

At work, I receive a daily e-mailed report in the morning entitled “Evening Media Activity Report”. It briefly reviews who in the media has called the department, what the questions were about, and what the department did / is doing to answer them.

Most government departments do variations on this report for the simple reason that advance knowledge of media work in process can often serve as an excellent radar alert of what the public is about to read / hear, and so enable the media-fearing Minister’s Office handlers prepare the necessary follow-up so as to be able to deal with the expected reaction. (Obviously, this is viewed to be most valuable when the line of questions suggests that the resulting article might be less than friendly.)

But read this brief note from a recent activity report (sources have been anonymized; “MRT = Media Relations Team”):

"MRT Officer/Agent D'ERM: (name omitted) / Details & Context/Détails et contexte: Student paper wanted to interview someone and have the student loans and repayments explained to them. Interview not granted but rather link [to website] detailing new student services, including a new student loan Repayment Assistance Plan (RAP)."

This bothers me for several reasons, not least of which is that it appears as if my department is blowing off a student reporter with what looks for all the world like a bureaucratic version of the old generic IT hot line staffer’s advice, “RTFM” (for “Read The F-ing Manual”).

Maybe I’m alone in the world, but usually when I’ve reached the point in my information search where I’ve decided that an actual phone call is necessary, it’s because I’ve climbed all over a website and still haven’t found the answers I‘m looking for.

(To give one – very thin – benefit of a doubt, the flow of communication from government falls off dramatically during an election because the bureaucracy tends to be vigorously over-protective of its desire to avoid being painted as helping the incumbent governing Party by keeping its information machinery in action. But I have also heard enough “Here we go again” election campaign-related department communication warnings to understand the difference between a politically loaded investigation and a simple request for information.)

And if that above report summarizes the student reporter’s questions accurately, this was a simple request for information. Considering that it comes at a time when the mighty engines of academia are just winding up to run at full throttle, for the government entity responsible for managing the student loan program in Canada to be asked to provide an explanation of its complex financing system hardly seems, to me, to be step one into a political minefield. And it certainly does not seem to be carrying any partisan baggage.

Reading this brief report made me somewhat embarrassed for my little niche in the vast Canadian bureaucratic catacombs.

(Footnote: Recently I spoke to media officer who fielded that particular request. After generously favouring her with my professional opinion, I was happily surprised to find she agreed with me. But she ended our conversation by telling me that she had also received a personal note of congratulations from our director for the “entirely correct” manner in which she handled the request.)

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Heavens to Murgatroyd, how WILL they keep would-be attendees from beating down the doors in the rush to capture the front seats? Here is the scintillating promotion we received recently intended to attract people to another in a series of supposedly listener-friendly “CaféCOMM” seminars:

“Join (name omitted) Principal and Founder of (company omitted) in a highly practical workshop on developing a meaningful, results-based Communications Performance Indicator Matrix. The session will demystify communications measurement by introducing a powerful, proven methodology to systematically isolate, track and report on indicators linked to corporate and communications results. The workshop will provide you with a 360° perspective on communications indicators. It will also help to untangle the jargon around objectives, outcomes, indictors and measurement tools to give you a new focus and confidence in high performance communications.”

I love the promise to “help untangle the jargon around…” In-class exercise 1 will surely be helping to untangle the jargon of this hopelessly baffling piece of promotion.

(With all due respect to the unfortunate speaker, I suspect she's already thinking that agreeing to let the department develop this kiss-of-death promotion was probably not her smartest decision – communications-wise.)

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Things you forget (1)

Offspring is settling into Year 1 as a university undergrad. She just phoned to let us know that she’s bought her first two required textbooks and they rang in at a combined total of $350 (!!) (At least now I don’t feel so bad for what I’m paying for a soon-to-be-received photography book: “Edward Steichen in High Fashion: The Condé Nast Years 1923 – 1937”)

Things you forget (2)

It doesn’t matter how honest-to-goodness good is Elmer Bernstein’s theme for the also-honest-to-goodness good movie “The Magnificent Seven”, when one’s life experience includes hearing it played day in and day out over the sound system of Walt Disney World’s Wilderness Lodge for a week, one still cringes painfully as the music kicks in at the very beginning of yet another replay of the movie.

À la next time.