Wednesday Morning 08:30, February, Moorgate, London.

I'm fascinated by some people who feel that the rules don't apply to them. The guy I just had to walk past, bathed in a cloud of smoke of the almost-enclosed lobby with its clear "it is illegal to smoke here" signs, the young lady using her personal stereo in the quiet carriage of the train on Sunday evening, and the guy in the same carriage who was making a mobile phone call. "I'm on the train" he shouts; actually, we all knew even before he told us, and we could all have told him that he was in the one carriage where calls are strongly discouraged!

I get grouchy at times, I'm afraid; there are elements of me which are definitely "Victor Meldrew" - the grumpy old man from the Sitcom "One Foot in the Grave". There are also times that I'm tempted to follow through with things that irritate, rather than just letting them wash over , but I have learned to let most of them wash over with me. Or rather to think about what irritates me, hold up a mirror, and say "I hope I don't irritate people in that way". But I'm enough of a realist to realise that there will be times that I overlook in myself things that I would critisize in others, and that I probably have my own special ways of doing things which are fine to me, but irritate the living daylights out of others.

Is this a negative post? It's looking a bit that way ... but I can turn it around and add two positives. The first is that something I saw pointed out the other day - that the Victor Meldrew types actually still have all there marbles about them - they're likley to be healthier of mind that the people who just 'roll over and accept it' as they're getting older. And the second is that in and along with those negatives come the positives - the staff member at Aldgate East on Sunday who let me out of the disabled barrier because my luggage was heavy - with a lovely smile that brightened up the end of a rough journey. The check out person at my hotel this morning. And the great bunch of delegates I have on this course.

---

The text above was written on Wednesday, but during a course where I wasn't able to have my machine on line. It's posted this morning as a quick "stock article" ;-)

I have another very busy day today - Friday - working now in South London; it's a rare pleasure to be able to have two jobs roll into each other without the need to go back to base / restock / wait a weekend somewhere. But even here I have to remember that each customer is King, and that I must not let the fact that I have adsurdly too much hardware doe my Thursday / Friday work interfere with it, not could I restict my provision on Monday to Wednesday due to the fact that having lots of extra stuff would be inconvenient (to put it mildly!) later in the week.

(written 2010-02-05)

 Z801 - Pettifog
  [52] International awareness - (2004-09-17)
  [87] Too sittings - (2004-10-13)
  [90] Rude old people - (2004-10-16)
  [323] 1 in 48 steel - (2005-05-24)
  [439] You cant - (2005-09-08)
  [471] And it gets even better - (2005-10-21)
  [478] Watch what you wear - (2005-10-26)
  [519] New Road - (2005-12-06)
  [562] Smoke and mirrors - (2006-01-12)
  [600] It costs nothing to say THANK YOU - (2006-02-11)
  [638] A pile of sand? Where do we stand? - (2006-03-08)
  [783] Good follow up ... my thanks - (2006-06-28)
  [791] Strange housewarming - (2006-07-03)
  [815] Time trickles like water through a sieve - (2006-07-27)
  [826] Fighting illegal net use by imposing download limits - (2006-08-09)
  [1170] Smoking, or no? The law insists we spell out the obvious - (2007-05-01)
  [1337] A series of tyre damages - (2007-09-08)
  [1349] Cash is not an acceptable way of paying - (2007-09-13)
  [1741] Age Concern - (2008-08-07)
  [1783] Think before you send - (2008-09-02)
  [1839] Job application - (2008-10-13)
  [1862] Remember your units - (2008-10-31)
  [1972] Pettifog and forum boards away from public view - (2009-01-03)
  [2122] Commission Creep - (2009-04-08)
  [2193] Excellent product, excruciating customer service. 3 Mobile Broadband - (2009-05-21)
  [2761] A small business, facing a big government questionnaire - (2010-05-12)
  [2788] Cost of Sales - (2010-06-01)
  [2937] The cat in the dustbin - (2010-08-27)
  [2944] What others cannot do in 10 months takes Virgin 10 minutes - (2010-09-03)
  [3013] Audio equipment - (2010-10-24)
  [3030] Liquorice allsorts and Dolly Mixtures - (2010-11-05)
  [3084] Can you trust the big brand names? - (2010-12-12)
  [3302] Are you a half full or half empty person? - (2011-05-25)
  [3749] Removal of water safety equipment, and how to use a lifesaver ring - (2012-06-04)
  [3835] The Information age - not yet truly with us? - (2012-08-12)
  [3900] The Xxxxx Guest House in Xxxxxxxxxxx - my stay reviewed - (2012-10-20)
  [4140] Riots in Melksham - (2013-07-13)
  [4167] The important customers are the majority, not the celebrity - (2013-09-08)
  [4282] On tipping - and the expectation of a tip - (2014-07-10)
  [4304] Please do not ask me to be the chair! - (2014-09-25)
  [4354] Wiltshire Police - assuming someone is guilty just on the say-so of a member of the public? - (2014-12-16)
  [4630] The story behind the bus cuts, and what they could mean - (2016-01-24)
  [4651] Pressure selling in the fire safety business - (2016-02-19)
  [4720] Celebrating our diversity rather than discriminating for it - (2016-11-02)

Back to Skyline and looking up in London

Previous and next or Horse's mouth home

Forward to On Malachite Green

Curly braces within double quoted strings in PHP
An example of an injection attack using Javascript
Saturdays out from Melksham - to Oxford, to Didcot or to Swindon
On Malachite Green
Both feet on the same pavement
Skyline and looking up in London
Object Oriented Ruby - new examples
Handling unusual and error conditions - exceptions
Ruby collections and strings - some new examples
Direct access to object variable (attributes) in Ruby