monster sarcasm rally

Highlights from my mum's visit

Saturday. 14:00.

She absolutely insisted we HAD to go to Wick because that's where her great grandfather was born. When I said it was inconvenient, she said it was fine in a way that told me it was anything but fine.

So I booked everything: flight, trains, hotel... This involved booking and paying for flights to Inverness, 3 nights in a nice hotel, and train tickets from Inverness to Wick (4.5 hours each way). Throw in assorted cab fares, train tickets, restaurant meals, etc. Well, it adds up.

Upon our arrival in I asked 'now what?'

She didn't know.

So now we're at Wetherspoons. For those of you who don't know, Wetherspoons is like... Well, it's... Hmm... Er... Imagine if Swiss Chalet and the Whatever & Firkin pub chain got married and spawned thousands of resto-pub offspring.

Saturday. 15:55.

I am sitting on an unmoving train in the arse end of nowhere listening to an obese woman ineffectually harangue her two small children in the squeakiest, most grating voice imaginable. As near as i can tell, the children are engaged in quiet, peaceable playing.

Sunday. 08:25.

My mother has just finished complaining that she's too hot. I've thrown cardigans and jackets in a tote bag for later in case it gets chilly, as we're doing a Loch Ness cruise today.

S: Alright, let's go.
M: Okay, I'll just put my cardigan on.
S: You've just been complaining that you're too hot. Why are you putting another layer on now?
M: Because I'm wearing all black. I can't go out in all black.
S: ?
M: I'd look ridiculous. I have to have some colour. I can't wear nothing but black.
S: That's absurd. Let's go.
M: Okay, I'll just change my clothes. I'll meet you downstairs.

Sunday. 09:10.

We just asked our taxi driver where to go for breakfast. And That's how we came to find ourselves in (you guessed it) Wetherspoons!

Sigh.

Sunday. 21:35.

Oh, good grief. My mum's got me watching some show. A man just said to the lead female character, 'what happened between us was just so... (sobs) precious.'

PRECIOUS!

Close encounters of the naked kind

My mum is in town for a visit. This evening after she went back to her hotel I decided to jump in the shower.

When I turned off the water I heard my housemate talking. Strangely, it sounded like she was standing right outside the window, which is odd — what with it being upstairs and all.

I opened the window and stuck my head out. I found myself face to face with not only my housemate, but strangely her mum as well. She was leaned out of her window, holding her computer facing outwards. She was on skype with her mum and was attempting to show her our garden.

Instead they got an eyeful of me. Surprise!

Oops.

You can't handle the truth

I've now had interview numbers 3 (with the guy I'd be working for) and 4 (with HR). Meeting number 5 still to follow at an unknown future date.  

Mildly interesting bits of news gleaned from today's meetings.

No, there will be no promotion.

They hope to make a final decision at some point in the next month. Probably.

They should be able to give me an indication of the decision somewhat sooner than that (how very vague and non-committal). Hopefully.

My question of how many people are being interviewed at this stage was met with a teenage-style shrug and an 'I don't know' from the MD and a non-committal grunt from the HR woman.

If this position doesn't work out, there are corresponding roles in different teams within the same division of Initech that may (or may not) be available. This was actually volunteered without questioning from me. The maybe / maybe-not status came about when I asked for confirmation of what she'd just said.

How frustrating, yet mildly positive.

   

Single sign-on

Initech has this AMAZING system they call SSO, which stands for single sign-on. Now, if you (like me) assume that this means you sign on a single time every day and have access to all the Initech systems you might need, you clearly don't know Initech.  

SSO means that you have to sign on every single time you click a button, type a key, follow a link, or have a thought. And by that I mean you type your user name and password. Because heaven forbid your browser should be able to remember either of them... That would be unsafe.  

And of course, you are required to change your password every few weeks to avoid any possibility that you might actually remember it.  

For your convenience, you only have to change your password once, and it will flow through to all the other systems. Eventually. So, every change of your password is followed by a week wherein some of the systems use your new password, some use your old, and some won't accept either.  

I changed my password just over two weeks ago. All the systems should now have my new password in place. But one doesn't... The conference room booking system doesn't recognise either my old or my new password.  

I sent a request to the conference room booking system help desk (over-specialisation much?) to find out why I couldn't get into the system. Their answer to my problem: their system probably doesn't like my password. I need to change my SSO password to something else.  

Of course, this would mean my SSO password was out of sync with my network password. Because, you guessed it... That's something else entirely.

And also of course, please note that the system described herein and which Initech has named SSO conforms to the precise definition of what an SSO is not (at least according to Wikipedia).

When a good man goes to war

Hee hee hee! I was right! I was right! I was right!

River Song is exactly who I thought she was.