Fek'Lar
(The Last Honest Geek)
The Crapolla According to Fek'Lar
You Know You're DOOMED When...
It's Monday morning and you're been volunteered to explain to the CEO what happened over the weekend.
You've stumbled onto another issue of The Crapolla, a journal written for software professionals. No not the managers; I mean the people who do the work.
This Crapolla is sponsored by...
In This Issue...
Parallels
It's interesting how disparate areas of your life can end up running in parallel. Three years ago, Mrs. Fek'Lar and I bought Casa de Fek. During the inspections, Section 1 damage was discovered in the master bathroom. For those of you who haven't bought a property, Section 1 damage must be repaired before the escrow can close. The previous owner of the Casa did what he was legally required, and nothing else.
Two and a half years later, the same problem came back. In other words, nothing was really fixed.
We not only decided to do the job right, we decided that since the floor had to come up, we might was well rip the room down to bare studs, removed all damaged material, and re-configure the bathroom to our liking.
We hired a contractor who came in, did the demolition and then proceeded to tell us what he couldn't do. This was after he said, "Oh sure" to everything we asked about before he tore the room apart. He decided to quit as we decided to fire him. We needed a new contractor.
Meanwhile at WTHAIS...
Things have gotten better at WTHAIS. Business is up. My group needed four new heads (hopefully containing brains) to deal with the new business. The Twinkee sprang into action and started looking at resumes on Monster and Craig's List. My job was to interview all of these people and find a few who knew what they were talking about.
250 resumes came across my desk. Some people I interviewed on the phone, some came in for face to face conversations. Meanwhile, Mrs. Fek'Lar was proving very talented at meeting contractors via recommendations of friends and running into others at Home Depot. Three or four per week would come by the house after work to look at the project and tell us their story.
At work I was hearing different stories. I would ask prospective hires a list of standard questions. Background in UNIX, OSI, protocols, ISDN, VPN, the air speed of an un-laden Swallow. The usual stuff. The trouble for a person like me, who is looking for four special people, is that there are so many un-employed people desperately looking for a job. Whatever I was looking for, they want to be it.
Contractors were no different. Whatever you want done, they want to do it. The trouble is, like the candidates, the contractors had different skill sets. Mrs. Fek'Lar and I had to learn construction just to find out who was full of shit. And then there was the issue of schedule.
Being people with tight schedules, we needed a contractor who would work weekends. Most of those who came to bid wanted a key to the house. One guy, when he realized that wasn't going to happen said he got the feeling we didn't trust him. Well he would be right. He immediately left.
Another contractor never spoke a word of truth the entire time. He started with telling me that Mrs. Fek'Lar's car had a loose cam shaft. Then he said the electrical box was vaporizing. He made sure to tell me what he had an IQ of 250.
At the same time, job candidates were trying to tell me their version of reality. I would ask what inetd was for, I would hear that the candidate used to know that. They would struggle over what ISDN (It Still Does Nothing!) meant for several minutes. There's a lot of science fiction in them thar resumes.
This interviewing both at home and at work went on for about a month and a half. It started at the same time, and ended at the same time. Four new people started at WTHAIS, and we found a contractor who knows the difference between jack and king studs who works weekends.
This Issue's Headline submission to the National Daily World Enquiring Globe.
U.C. Restricts Asian Enrollment Over SARS!
White Guys Might Pass A Few Classes This Year!
Let's play, "Who said this?"
Heard in the halls of various software companies.
"I have a feeling that 'Ouch!' is never used as a safe word."
"Why are you taking all of those drugs?"
"This is a Tech Support Cocktail, Vicodin, 800 milligrams of Motrin, Valium, and a Xanix."
"Remember, we only mess with the people we like."
"It kind of makes you want to get on the enemies list."
"The weather is going to be gray, rainy, and miserable. It's going to remind you of home."
Excuse Me
We need more Green Board.
Fek'Lar
(The Last Honest Geek)
Remember: The Crapolla contains my personal opinions. That's right they're mine, so get your own! And you kids get off my lawn! This whole mess is copyright © 2003 by LowComDom Performances, all rights reserved. Wanna send this to your friends? Go ahead and pass out the URL.
Hey, you can subscribe to this rag by sending a message to majordomo@lowcomdom.com. On the first line of your letter type subscribe crapolla. Unsubscribing is the same, just change the command to unsubscribe crapolla
feed available from http://www.lowcomdom.com/crapolla/index.rss
EOJ
<-- Read the previous Crapolla or Read the next Crapolla -->