08:08 – We just realized that our move is actually complete. No more trips down to Winston to haul stuff back up here. All our stuff is out of the house in Winston, and the contractors are finishing up the work that needs to be done. It’ll go on the market in the next week or so. Our only remaining connection to Winston is that the corporate bank account is still at a credit union there, but we’ll get that changed over this coming week. It’s been a long, drawn-out process, but it’s finished now. We’ll still go down to Winston periodically for Costco runs and so on, but that’s it.
Congratulations. It’s been a while coming, but the next chapter in your life is starting.
Now, time for some sample chapters in the book!
nick
I’d certainly like to be able to read a copy of Bob’s prepping book if he ever finishes it. Maybe nick could collaborate with Bob on the prepping book. Or given the slow rate at which Bob has progressed on the book, maybe nick should write his own prepping book. In any case, I volunteer to read a first draft of either book and ask stupid questions.
ask stupid questions
There are no stupid questions, only ignorant questions which can be easily cured.
My replacement started and initial assessment is that it is going to be a difficult path. A small change was needed in the system and I would have been able to accomplish the same task in about an hour. Replacement has taken six hours and is still not done. Part of the difficulty is not being familiar with the system. But making simple queries on the database seems to be difficult. Also I am seeing some issues with actual logic thought processes.
Oh well, I will do what I can for the next two months and 17 days. After that it is not my problem. As I have told them before, if they need me it will cost them money, not a king’s ransom for certain, but enough to make it worth my time.
It is amazing how much knowledge you have in your head about a system that you developed from scratch, zero lines of code before I arrived. Massive changes in the database architecture and even the database server itself. Lot of knowledge of the organization acquired over time. How do you pass that on to the next person?
I try to ask leading questions, make statements that provide a hint. But it just is not working. It is early and hopefully get better as he gets more confident and learns more about the organization and the code structure. Still have to explain the RAY’S MOD 17 checksum used for links, a routine I have used for checksums from the middle 70’s. It will catch and can correct single character errors but nothing beyond that.
@Ray,
I’m looking for a new standard flashlight. Something more reliable than the cheap ones that Bob recommends, but not so expensive that I can’t easily afford six of them.
@ray, capturing the ‘institutional knowledge’ is very difficult. There are a number of really serious research projects and actual implemented attempts underway.
Think about something like defense contracting or aerospace… so much of the early learning isn’t available in any digital form and the guys are retiring or dropping dead, and the systems are around and need support for such a long time.
Large infrastructure has the same issue. AT&T loses intimate knowledge of what’s in the ground when field guys retire. Same for the power and gas companies, which contributes to the rise of GIS databases and mapping solutions. I can tell you that very few people are any good at maintaining ‘as built’ drawings though.
Documentation always gets short shrift.
Something like a wiki or mindmap can help, if you are disciplined enough to actually use it.
MS wants all that stuff to be captured in Sharepoint, but you have to be willing to go look for the info, and most people are not.
If I was still working in corp America, I might try keeping my notes in a wiki for each project. My current system is to write on a yellow pad throughout the day. Every day gets a new page. End of project, they all get scanned and stored. The big downside is searchability– there is none, except by Mark I eyeball.
I’ve seen with my own eyes designers making the same mistakes over and over, and reinventing the wheel, because the reasons for a particular decision get lost, or are never documented. I’d say that tracking the choices and why they were made is as important as tracking the end results.
On the other hand, even if you were critical to their functioning, they will find a way to continue without you. In my case, the company abandoned the market after I left. They still exist, and may even be prospering, but not doing the same thing in the same place as before. I’ve seen other companies die a slow (or sometimes quick) death when they underestimated the importance of a particular person.
It takes some time, usually much more than you think, to get over the job after you leave. I thought a couple of months would do it, but it was the better part of a year before I was completely mentally free of the job. YMMV of course.
It’s hard to see something you’ve built degraded, but you will get over it eventually.
nick
HAH @Dave!
For everyday carry, I love my Pelican 1920 two AAA cell penlight. It’s super bright, satiny smooth, no sharp corners, no ‘blink’ mode, battery life is reasonable, and it tucks into the corner of a back pocket easily. Unlike their plastic flashlights, I can recommend it unequivocally.
nick
I’m looking for a new standard flashlight
The Costco packages of lights are quite good. You can get 6 (2 packages of 3) for about $40.00. They are fairly bright, have metal bodies, use AA or AAA batteries (the smaller lights).
but it was the better part of a year before I was completely mentally free of the job. YMMV of course
May be even worse for me. I developed their business applications from scratch over the course of 15 years. Letting all that go, into someone else’s hands is going to be difficult.
You miswrote FLASHLIGHT. Try to avoid that mistake in the future.
Also, never ask an alcoholic proctologist for FLASHLIGHT recommendations. You’ll get either a butt light or a crappy beer.
… have your data locked in the MS system until the end of time. Last time I checked, six months or so ago, there were utilities to import mediawikis and other database-held information into Sharepoint, but no way to get your sheaf of pages out of Sharepoint and into some other non-MS system. Par for the course, and the reason I refuse to use MS Office unless required by a client (in which case it’s their data and not mine, so I don’t care so much).
@nick WRT institutional knowledge — this is often only recognized too late.
I have been a sponge of institutional knowledge since I was a child, starting with my maternal grandfather and one of my paternal uncles. Whenever I got a new job I sought out the “grey beards” and built up a relationship as most were reluctant to give up their secrets. Unfortunately most of my efforts were not encouraged by management. On my last job I developed a wealth of information from engineers and craftsmen that had been with the Hanford N-Reactor from when it was a hole in the ground. I documented and archived everything. Long story short, after I was laid-off and the most old guys died the site needed to know they way things were at the beginning. True to form the DOE archives “lost” my files. I reproduced what I could, but still invaluable information was irresponsibly lost. All too typical of the gooberment and gooberment contractors.
Ditto, DadCooks. Finding out from the old engineers how things work was not only not encouraged, it was actively discouraged. “Al’s too important around here to be talking with you.” And then Al died young (heart attack, which could have been predicted from his weight and his diet, alas) and probably half of the institutional knowledge went with him. Worthwhile institutional knowledge — knowing how the company softball team stacked up against the other companies’ teams didn’t help much with getting the next contract, though it was vital in getting a pay raise once the office suck-up got promoted to boss.
I was fired from one of my jobs “for cause” — the “cause” being that I refused to work any more free overtime after getting screwed over by the employer. (That wasn’t the reason given, of course. My previously satisfactory work abruptly became inadequate.) I was contacted later by the company for some vital information. Words similar to “$200 per hour or you can fuck off” may have been presented in response, and they apparently decided that the information wasn’t so vital as to be worth paying for because they never contacted me again.
“…I refused to work any more free overtime after getting screwed over by the employer.”
Been there and done that, even at IBM, whereupon they grudgingly gave in and started paying us and then must have immediately gone about looking for ways to dump us for offshore drones in Slovakia, India and Mexico. Because we were all mostly gone a few months later. Sucks working for other people. Most of the time. I can count on one hand with a couple of fingers left over the decent jobs I had with good bosses, two of them back at EDS. And they’re both long since out of IT.
Another sunny day with blue skies and I’m off shortly for more fun errands and another sixty miles or so of driving, which is a lot easier than standing up anywhere for more than ten minutes. And I managed to get some piddly office reorganization done last night here before running outta gas. Tomorrow I gotta go get Princess again in Moh-ree-all and Saturday pick up Mrs. OFD at the airport from OK City. Their tornado warning changed to flood warnings the other night. Then she’s off to Concord, NH for three days. Not sure what her schedule is for next month yet but I suspect Kalifornia again and even more time with kidz and grandkidz.
And I’ve heard or seen vaguely that Bern is pretty much kaput, as Field Marshal Rodham has scooped up most of the delegates and probably electoral votes. Big surprise. But what are the Repub dicks gonna do about Trump? He’s all they’ve got now.
Nice article on why free college sucks, “Voting For Free Soup”:
https://accordingtohoyt.com/2016/04/28/voting-for-free-soup/
“It’s gotten to the point now, where we have people with phds working as baristas, and the fact our educational costs have gone straight up (having two kids who wanted stem degrees there was no option for “apprentice” them, or as older son put it “if you cut people without being a doctor, they arrest you.””
“Now, when your bachelor’s degree doesn’t get you much of anything and you start life in deep debt (which in turn means a population crash among many, many other bad things) I understand why people think “free college” will solve their issues, and why politicians on the make promise it.”
“Let me tell you, ladies and gents: it won’t be worth the paper it’s printed on.”
The slide into dystopia is farther along than I expected. There is a minister in Canada who is openly Atheist and fighting her denomination’s attempts to fire her. I’m not saying that being Atheist is wrong, I’m saying that the idea that you can be openly Atheist and the leader of a Christian Church is even more absurd than the Episcopal Priest who thought she could simultaneously be an Episcopal Priest and an Imam. The United Church of Canada must have diluted Christianity so much that they are now debating whether a member church can abandon their homeopathic Christianity and just drink tap water instead.
I’m not saying that just because I believe in Christianity, everybody has to do so as well. A church is a particular thing, and what this church in Toronto is doing is as absurd as a synagogue full of uncircumcised gentiles or a mosque having a pig roast.
The ECUSA and its mainline Protestant cousin churches have for a long time now assiduously and successfully gone about the business of making themselves not only irrelevant, but absurd and ridiculous. Laughingstock. ECUSA left me 20-30 years ago, as did the political Party. Time for Murkans and genuine Christians to grow up.
lol! The Redumblican establishment off the front page of Drudge:
“Trump has more votes than any GOPer ever”
“Boner: ‘Cruz is Lucifer Incarnate'”
No wonder the party is imploding. I guess it’s Mittens or implosion.
“Let me tell you, ladies and gents: it won’t be worth the paper it’s printed on.”
lol! See my day(s) ago post on “only 37% of High Schoolers can read and do math”. lol!
You’ll need a MA in Wimenz Studies to work at Starbucks soon.
This is just plain sad. OTOH, this is what it looked and sounded like on the stage. Watch the whole thing (longish!) and you will be cheered to see that the speakers steam-rollered the idiot protesters, who comprised only a minute part of an otherwise appreciative and friendly audience.
There is some hope for the future yet!
“No wonder the party is imploding. I guess it’s Mittens or implosion.”
That half of the Party is pretty messed up; the late Sam Francis titled a book after them: “Beautiful Losers.” According to Boner Cruz is Lucifer? But according to total wack job Glenn Beck he’s Epiphanes Manifest. And they’re just stupid/crazy enough to try to bring in Bishop Mittens or Jebster, too; they simply MUST lose to Cankles. Can’t take any chances; the fix is in and has been for a long time now.
“You’ll need a MA in Wimenz Studies to work at Starbucks soon.”
Ain’t dat da troot. A kid tells me today he’s got a BA I don’t wanna hear it. If he sez it’s a BS, I gotta know, is it in engineering, math, chemistry, physics? Otherwise, bugger off. Well, maybe the agriculture majors would be good, and of course medicine. My own BA is in English Literature with additional grad skool study in medieval stuff; how much more useless can ya get, other than maybe womynz studies or queer studies? Well, we’ll see; maybe it’ll pay off somehow in the future; His ways are mysterious indeed!
“There is some hope for the future yet!”
I remember Christina from the early 1980s when she was a philosophy prof at Clark U. in Woostah and I was a campus cop there. She was hot then and still is, kinda. She’s kicked some ass over the last three decades, too.
https://twitter.com/CHSommers
She was hot then and still is, kinda.
No “kinda” about it, OFD! As a practicing sapiosexual I say that with confidence!
ISTR that most Southern Baptist ministers are not believers. They’re just stuck being ministers because it’s the only way they can earn a living.
And I’ve never known a Jesuit who wasn’t an atheist. I’m sure there must be one or two, but if so I’ve never met him or them.
I’m sure there are far too many ministers in that predicament. They do their jobs and pretend that they aren’t atheists. I would argue that they could leave their jobs and get sales jobs. If an atheist can sell Christianity, he can sell anything.
I’ve been an ordained minister since the 70’s.
Credit to Dan Barker: when he couldn’t believe in christianity any more, he gave up the preaching gig.
“No “kinda” about it, OFD!”
When I knew her she had long brown hair and gorgeous blue eyes; easily the hottest prof on that campus and for that matter, one of the hottest womyn there at the time. Plus, of course, smart as a whip. But married. Now she’s widowed.
“And I’ve never known a Jesuit who wasn’t an atheist.”
Some of us traditionalist Roman Catholics are starting to wonder about the current Pope accordingly.
“I’ve been an ordained minister since the 70’s.”
Which do you prefer, “Father Bob” or “Reverend Bob?”
Just back from my 60-70 miles of driving and errands; turns out a local firearms dealer who’s significantly older than me was in SEA roughly the same time as me but as a TOURIST. We had a nice little chat.
Either is fine. I just wish a couple would let me marry them.
“By the power vested in me by the Great Spaghetti Monster…”
And, “What I have joined, let no god put asunder.”
Re: Institutional knowledge. When I sold the family business, 15 years ago or so, I included the library. Not a large one, mind you, but probably 200 linear feet of manuals, references, catalogs, etc. Stuff that we had been building since before WWII. I certainly couldn’t quote chapter & verse on everything in that database, but I could certainly find anything that needed to be found. A month later, it was all in the dumpster. 🙁
WRT Jesuits: My daughters advisor at Gonzaga was a Jesuit, in fact he was the reason I encouraged her to go to Gonzaga and why she wanted to go. My daughter is an agnostic atheist (her description). We met him when we went up to Spokane to tour the campus and see if we liked the school. Several instructors and advisors served as hosts for each family, fate and luck of the draw paired us with this particular Jesuit. He told my daughter that it was right and necessary to question everything, and yes that meant even the existence of God. He also told her to seek as many viewpoints as she could, but be sure to carefully examine and question the fruits of that person’s life.
A month later, it was all in the dumpster.
I once wrote a four or five page manual for a small software system I developed and passed it along to the user. Her replacement apparently used the cover to jot down some notes narrated to her by the original user before she moved on. I know this because when the replacement later asked me to clarify (not her word) some of the finer points of the system, I replied that if she would give me the manual I would show her where the info was.
Some. People. Will. Not. Effin’. Read. 🙁
Consider that stolen, if I ever get an opportunity to use it.
“A month later, it was all in the dumpster.”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4XvI__yHNow
w/Spanish subtitles, the language we will all learn real good before we move on to Chinese.
“…it was right and necessary to question everything, and yes that meant even the existence of God.”
Better minds than mine have done so over several thousand years. The Jezzies were hot chit four-hundred years ago.
“Some. People. Will. Not. Effin’. Read”
So noted. Countless times over the past half-century. I have zero sympathy when they get hosed as a result. Used to have a Linux-oriented t-shirt that said “RTFM” but it applies to many things besides IT. Like firearms, radios, various tools, etc., etc.
““What I have joined, let no god put asunder.””
Reversing the letters of one word there and I wish we had made it clear to our two American Pit Bull Terriers many moons ago when we came home from work and found they’d torn the living room carpet to shreds.
I just wish a couple would let me marry them.
What, like a federally licensed three-way? I hope it’s not you, Cankles, and Huma. You won’t be getting anything.
Too bad your dogs were dyslexic. RBT could have straightened them out.
re manuals, logbooks, how-things-were-put-together-and-how-to-restart-the-system documents, and all the rest, yep, been there. I continue to make it part of what I promise and what I deliver, as appropriate on contracts, but there’s little point to bothering with it. It’ll be at best never read and more commonly trashed.
In theory I could use my own copy to help get the client up and running again, when they inevitably come crashing down and call for help. Even that, though, is pretty much pointless because they always want me to fix it for free because it was obviously done wrong, even though it worked fine for months or years.
A couple of times I’ve told the former client that I’ll do a double-or-nothing deal with them – I’ll go in and get it running, and if it was my screwup the fix is free and if it was their screwup they pay a premium over my normal rate. They never take that deal. Even without that, when I went in to look things over and found that someone had edited a config file or something, they still didn’t want to pay, which led me to not going in at all without payment agreement arranged in advance.
Given only the alternatives of a lifetime of sex with those two and a lifetime of celibacy, which would you choose?
“I hope it’s not you, Cankles, and Huma. You won’t be getting anything.”
Worse: him, Cankles and Huma’s “husband,” the weiner guy.
“Too bad your dogs were dyslexic.”
They were pissed off we left them and went to work. Then they found out how pissed off the giant humans could get.
“…they still didn’t want to pay, which led me to not going in at all without payment agreement arranged in advance.”
Naturally. This is what I mean about working for other people; they’re almost always assholes to us. (someone’s probably being an asshole to them, too)
And whaddya know, now some other outfit is interested in hiring me…to do more IT drone support for a mixed bag of Winblows, Linux and Cisco stuff. Ah, I’ll do the due diligence, more for Mrs. OFD’s benefit than mine, probably, and go talk to them. It better be good, ’cause I’ve pretty much sold myself that IT for pay is over for me.
which would you choose?
Dr. Bob’s not normal.*
*That’s not a criticism.
Stop it. Wake Forest University School of Medicine are the only ones who believe I’m an MD.
I just had a former employee call me for a job. Of which, I have none available (my website lies) as I am being very careful right now. He left me ten years ago to go work at Siemens for more bucks but regretted that in a couple of years. Our sales are actually running 14% over 2015 to date but the new sales pipeline is almost nonexistent.
And two friends at church told us last weekend that their 20 person company may get shutdown when they complete their only job tomorrow. Normally they have several jobs in the queue but they have none at the moment. The company has been in business for 35 years and one of them has worked there for 34 years. They work in the upstream oil and gas market almost exclusively.
I am wondering if another round of layoffs is coming here to the Houston area. Upstream is almost totally dead, midstream is doing a few things, and downstream is blowing and going (cheap feed stocks).
“Wake Forest University School of Medicine are the only ones who believe I’m an MD.”
Ain’t that the same college that had the late Maya Angelou on board as a “professor” of something? Only she was never there. A very nice salary in the six figures but when you called the listed phone number, it was a janitor’s closet.
“I am wondering if another round of layoffs is coming here to the Houston area.”
I wish folks down there no ill will whatsoever, despite them bumper stickers y’all had a while back about Yankee bastards freezing in the dark. I know all too well what it’s like being outta work, despite one’s best efforts and record. On the other hand, it’s tough living and working in what is basically a one-industry town, city or region; many New Englanders found that out when the whaling fleets ended; when the textile mills sent their work down to the Carolinas; when the furniture makers did likewise; and when high-tech mostly got conglomerated or faded out in the Routes 128 and 495 areas of greater Beantown. DEC, Prime, Data General, EDS, etc., all gone, and I worked at three outta the four.
To clarify, they don’t mean manic-depressive, right? Because that’s the old term, and it’s probably a microaggression to use it these days.
BTW, Firefox (the somewhat dated version which forms the browser part of the TOR Browser Bundle) still doesn’t acknowledge microaggression as a word. I’m sure that constitutes a microaggression in and of itself, denigrating the trials and tribulations of the non-ciswhite-cismale-heteronormative demographic. Oh, wait, was that hyphenated description inclusive enough? Dammit, this social justice warrioring crap is difficult. I need a safe space!
I wish folks down there no ill will whatsoever, despite them bumper stickers y’all had a while back about Yankee bastards freezing in the dark. I know all too well what it’s like being outta work, despite one’s best efforts and record. On the other hand, it’s tough living and working in what is basically a one-industry town, city or region; many New Englanders found that out when the whaling fleets ended; when the textile mills sent their work down to the Carolinas; when the furniture makers did likewise; and when high-tech mostly got conglomerated or faded out in the Routes 128 and 495 areas of greater Beantown. DEC, Prime, Data General, EDS, etc., all gone, and I worked at three outta the four.
Bummer, dude. Those were good companies that got killed off by the PC revolution. Now the PC is being killed off by The Cloud. One wonders about all this. And, I am very hesitant to put all of my data in The Cloud. Accounting, source code, etc.
The scary thing is that the second highest employer in the Houston area is medical. I have no idea how many people work in medical related items in the Houston area but it is well over 100,000. It could be as many as 500,000 people, I really have no idea. And the feddies are paying for half of the medical expenses (Medicare and Medicaid). If that were to stop due to financial instability of the feddies, whoa.
I’m betting that the third highest employer in the Houston area is restaurants. We’ve got them on every corner, sometimes all four at an intersection. Those are high paying, stable jobs (not!).
We are definitely heading to some difficult times. Trump says that he can balance the federal budget in eight years and get rid of the debt. Federal bankruptcy, anyone? Could be exciting.
Geeze, you should tell successful companies, pay me or I’ll go to work for you.
all gone, and I worked at three outta the four
Geeze, you should tell successful companies, pay me or I’ll go to work for you.
OFD should go to work for a Cloud company …
https://www.pair.com/company/careers/openings/
“Now the PC is being killed off by The Cloud. One wonders about all this. And, I am very hesitant to put all of my data in The Cloud. Accounting, source code, etc.”
Well, the Cloud sits on physical, bare-metal servers inside locked data centers, with varying degrees of physical and network security. Your humble correspondent has been learning about cloud security, and yes, Virginia, it can be done. But just try convincing the usual PHB mangler suspects to spend a second’s thought or a dime on it.
“Those were good companies that got killed off by the PC revolution.”
The late Ken Olsen of DEC, brilliant engineer that he was, used to say there would never be a computer/PC in anyone’s house. Then they came out with the DEC Rainbow, around the same time that HP came out with their Touchscreen, and I had the former and my next-younger brother had the latter….in our houses.
“We are definitely heading to some difficult times. Trump says that he can balance the federal budget in eight years and get rid of the debt. Federal bankruptcy, anyone? Could be exciting.”
More like Federal DEFAULT. They’re kicking that can as far down the road as they can but eventually they gon run outta road. Indeed, difficult and exciting times ahead, which none of us on this board really need at this stage of our lives. But there it is.
“Geeze, you should tell successful companies, pay me or I’ll go to work for you.”
Laff of the day so fah, thanks!
“OFD should go to work for a Cloud company …”
I don’t do “help desk” gigs.
And I ain’t movin’ to Pittsburgh. But thanks for the thought!
My ideal gig is remote/work-from-home OpenVMS or RHEL network security. Face-time via Skype or whatever. Maybe once a month show up and stun them with my brilliance and wit. (assuming four-star accommodations and travel paid for upfront).
Several interesting points here on what the media chooses to cover or not cover, and how the outraged-by-the-latest-outrage game gets played in what’s left of this country:
http://takimag.com/article/deface_of_the_currency_david_cole/print#axzz47BCpWeGe
Meanwhile, as the writer shows, serious and ongoing REAL issues get short shrift, if any shrift at all. And we’re all distracted by TODAY’s bullshit “story,” having forgotten last week’s entirely.
“No wonder Nathan was eager to hang. He’s still thanking God he didn’t live long enough to see what happened to the country he gave his life for.”
Amen, Uncle Taki.
http://takimag.com/article/with_apologies_to_nathan_hale_taki/print#axzz47BCpWeGe
I usually tell my “Christian” and religious friends that I’m definitely NOT an atheist, but rather a “meta-agnostic”. That tends to shut them up. Most don’t have a clue what that means.
http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/agnostic
Simple Definition of agnostic: a person who does not have a definite belief about whether God exists or not
Full Definition of agnostic: a person who holds the view that any ultimate reality (as God) is unknown and probably unknowable; broadly : one who is not committed to believing in either the existence or the nonexistence of God or a god
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meta
Meta (from the Greek preposition and prefix meta- (μετά-) meaning “after”, or “beyond”) is a prefix used in English to indicate a concept which is an abstraction from another concept, used to complete or add to the latter.
Of course it can mean whatever I want it to mean, since I’m the one who made it up.
But one Christian friend says I’m still a “heathen”* !!
So you really just can’t ever win such arguments.
* a person who does not belong to a widely held religion (especially one who is not a Christian, Jew, or Muslim) as regarded by those who do.
Quite frankly, I’ve seen more common sense and reason here from professed atheists and agnostics than from some of my co-religionists, including Roman Catholics. Many of whom voted for Obola twice, for example, and who have basically swallowed the libtard kool-aid on most subjects and issues.
But of course they think I’m way out on the Fringe; traditionalist Latin Rite Roman Catholic and politically to the right of Pat Buchanan and a Patron Life Member of the NRA. There’s probably a half-dozen like-minded souls here in Vermont and that’s about it, if that.
In other news, Mrs. OFD will be doing a teaching gig down in Concord, NH this coming week and her colleague-partner is a retired police SWAT commander. He’s been diagnosed previously with severe depression, has allegedly attempted suicide once in the past couple of years, and his mom just died and her funeral was today. If we can get Princess to take the dawg and check on the cats, I’ll go down with Mrs. OFD and hang out with him, see if I can be of any use/help, having spent an inordinate amount of time over the last few years with combat vets in-crisis-mode and suicidal. He apparently thinks I’m a pretty good guy, though where he got that notion escapes me, so I’ll give it a shot.
I was born and raised a Catholic, but renounced it after I reached the age of reason (early teens) and learned about the crusades and Inquisition. Yet I still believe in the right of freedom of religion that this country is founded on. So long as it’s not forced down anyone else’s throat.
My karma long ago ran over my dogma !! 🙂
I will just say there are various historical interpretations of the Crusades, of which there were a more or less continuous series over a very long time, and the Inquisition. Some of the interpretations were derived from violently bigoted anti-Catholicism from Protestants and others from the more contemporary PC academics and public skool educrats, ditto the Inquisition.
Two quick suggestions:
“The Politically Incorrect Guide to Islam (and the Crusades)”
And this short review:
http://anotherpoliticallyincorrectblog.blogspot.com/2015/12/the-spanish-inquisition-historical.html
I generally refuse to put a name to my belief system. When asked, I was raised a Baptist, and my views on society generally reflect that. My children are being raised as Catholics, as that is my wife’s belief. When they come of age, they’ll make their own decisions.
I am as offended by efforts to purge religion from public places as I am by efforts to force religion down people’s throats. Religious tradition was the framework upon which common law was built. “Thou shalt not kill” pretty closely corresponds to “Don’t commit murder”. I recognize that as a part of our history. It’s as simple as that.
I acknowledge no god other than myself. Or, as I’ve phrased it a couple times to islamorrhoids, “There is no god but Steve and Steve is his prophet.” (I’m pretty sure I’d have been attacked at that point, if they’d thought they could beat me.)
“Quite frankly, I’ve seen more common sense and reason here from professed atheists and agnostics than from some of my co-religionists, including Roman Catholics.”
Probably because religion has nothing to do with common sense or reason. OARN, in college I read the Greene and Hudson translation of Kant’s Religion within the Limits of Reason Alone. I couldn’t imagine anyone doing a better job, but Kant ultimately failed because there *is* no religion within the limits of reason alone.
But one Christian friend says I’m still a “heathen”* !!
I proudly tell others that I am a heathen.
Just so’s you’re not talking about me there. I don’t do common sense. I do cheap insults and fart jokes.
ref RBT’s “OARN”, I liked how Rene Descartes rebuilt morality on a basis of pure reason and ended up with … Christianity! It’s a miracle!
Morality, like all human characteristics, has its basis in evolution. “Do unto others…” is not a religious concept, let alone a Christian one. It’s rational self-interest.
As I mentioned earlier, when my daughter was in college at Gonzaga I developed a friendship with her advisor, a Jesuit. He and my son had several lengthy discussions regarding the Crusades, when the Jesuits were the baddest MFers around and then got tired of fighting and turned to education.
That is the very short story of how the Jesuits came to be what they are today.
However, our Jesuit friend laments that most of today’s Jesuits have ceased seeking knowledge and have been turned by the dark side of the progressive/(regressive) movement.
It amazing to see that in the few years since my daughter graduated from Gonzaga that now it is a school I would not recommend she or anyone else attend. Obuttwad had a major roll in putting the final nails in all of education and the seeking of knowledge.
“There is no god but Steve and Steve is his prophet.”
You’re the Bi-God(tm)! Take the meaning as you like.
I have no idea how many people work in medical related items in the Houston area but it is well over 100,000.
There are over 106k employees at the Texas Medical Center alone. That doesn’t count all the doctors with offices around the city, the outlying hospitals, doc-in-the-boxes, etc. The metro area has about 360k in “health and education” according to the feds.
Besides the layoffs in oil, there has been a small downturn in IT employment (a few hundred jobs).
OFD wrote:
“https://twitter.com/CHSommers”
Yeah, she’s aged well, like me… 🙂
There are over 106k employees at the Texas Medical Center alone. That doesn’t count all the doctors with offices around the city, the outlying hospitals, doc-in-the-boxes, etc. The metro area has about 360k in “health and education” according to the feds.
Like I said, somewhere between 100,000 and 500,000 medical jobs in the Houston metropolis. Somebody has got to take care of the 8,000,000 of us.
Besides the layoffs in oil, there has been a small downturn in IT employment (a few hundred jobs).
I know one IT layoff. One of my friends got a choice between layoff and early retirement last week. He chose early retirement (he is 62). I suspect the IT RIF is more than a few hundred, that may be Chevron alone.
I’ve got friends at exxon, and they are hoping to ride out this round of cuts. One is just holding on ’til retirement or a buyout….
Wife is starting to see canceled projects, delayed projects, and cut backs.
A big new development near my house, 4 million sqft of class a office, lost their oil and gas anchor tenant. The project is on hold until they can find another anchor.
Developers are still throwing up townhomes inside the loop though.
Houston diversified alot after the previous oil crashes. We have the port, a good deal of manufacturing, the medical stuff, and the O&G.
nick
A big new development near my house, 4 million sqft of class a office, lost their oil and gas anchor tenant. The project is on hold until they can find another anchor.
The new 400 acre Exxon campus by the Woodlands is four million sq ft of office space. That is seven office buildings (3 or 4 story). Are you sure that new development is that large?
Houston diversified alot after the previous oil crashes. We have the port, a good deal of manufacturing, the medical stuff, and the O&G.
I agree with this but O&G is still the biggest employer (I would add chemicals/downstream to O&G though).
yup, 4M plus commercial retail and hospitality.
South of Clay Rd and inside Beltway 8, big undeveloped parcel. Currently has cattle grazing on it.
And half a million just outside the belt right there too.
nick
yup, 4M plus commercial retail and hospitality.
South of Clay Rd and inside Beltway 8, big undeveloped parcel. Currently has cattle grazing on it.
Doesn’t that land have three foot of water on it right now?
4,000,000 ft2 X 300 $/ft2 = $1.2 billion. That is a very serious investment. Not many banks gonna step up for that right now.
Northwestern Regional Medical Center up here, north end of the “city.”
“Somebody has got to take care of the 8,000,000 of us.”
Somebody has got to take care of the 8,000 of us. lol.
The big job places up in this greater AO? University of Vermont plus their Medical Center, Global Foundries (formerly IBM and now up for sale again, currently actually owned by whatever nabobs in the Emirate of Abu Dhubai), state gummint, Fed gummint, Chittenden Bank, and GE Aircraft Engines. Ben & Jerry’s has a plant up here in Saint Albans but the Eveready Battery plant is kaput and empty and for sale.
Biggest employer here in the village is the Town Hall, i.e., Saint Albans Town. Second would be the pub and the Shell station.
Traffic jams? Nope. Hordes of immigrants swarming the landscape? Nope. And no venomous reptiles, no floods, no tornadoes. Pesky and irritating and un-Constitutional gun laws? Nope.
Off to Moh-ree-all tomorrow afternoon in two cars, so we can drop hers off for Princess, and wife can drive mine down to NH on Sunday and I’ll be left with MIL’s rickety Saab for a few days. Pah for the course here.
I’m actually looking at bicycles and will be taking a freebie course at a bike place down in Burlap the first week of June. Later I’ll probably sign up for a longer bike mechanics course there. Most of this AO is either flat or gently rolling and may not actually kill me if I work my way up to riding regularly. Also gonna learn horseback riding while wifey learns the firearms real good. Gotta get out in the AO, take a real good recon look around.
No water, maybe local puddles. We’re almost on the ridge between White Oak and Buffalo bayous, kinda the high point.
The development was driving up house prices around here like CRAZY. Prices are already slowing down.
nick