Year: 2009
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978-1-849680-16-5
For U.S. bands, the traditional way they would know they had ‘made it’ was when they were featured on the cover of Rolling Stone (witness Cover of the Rolling Stone, by Dr. Hook – yes, I’m embarrassed I know it, too…). For UK bands, it was when they performed on the now defunct Top Of The Pops. For me, I always thought that the pinnacle of achievement was getting a book published. Or, more specifically, getting a real book with an actual ISBN published. Many years ago, I worked on the Torchum Never Stops books, but these were self-published [by… Read more
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Hit (it) from behind
I guess it had to happen sooner or later, but I was finally involved in a car accident on the I-10. And no, it wasn’t my fault. I was driving home after a particularly stressful day at work (where I had to berate one of my direct reports for falling asleep at his desk – and I’m not really one for confrontation, so that was really tough for me), pootling along in the fast lane at just around the speed limit, when my car got hit from behind. I pulled over onto the shoulder (thankfully they have one on the… Read more
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Farewell Tour
I’ve just finished my latest work assignment – three years doing the documentation, training, change management and knowledge management for an implementation of SAP Retail. It was a really interesting project, and I’ve learnt more about retail operations than any sensible person would want to know. Being a contractor, it’s inevitable that at the end of the project I would be ‘dispensed with’. This is my fourth large SAP implementation, so the fourth time I’ve been let go. It’s always difficult (I suffer separation anxiety), but you get used to it. One of the activities I always go through is a… Read more
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All good character-building stuff
Recently, I’ve been thinking a lot about where I am in life (probably a mid-life crisis thing) and about my schooldays (probably because I’ve been in touch with a few of my old ‘schoolchums’, recently), but mainly about the correlation between the two. I’ve aways credited my school – the Duke of York’s Royal Military School – with helping me get to where I am, but the more I think about it, maybe I should credit my school with hampering me from getting to where I could have been. It could have all turned out so differently, if only I’d had a… Read more
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Gimme a T for Texas, a T for Trampoline
Last weekend Freya continued her path to Olympic Gold by competing in the Texas State Trampolining and Tumbling championships. For reasons best known to the organizers, this was in Lubbock, which is on the far North edge of Texas, so not really a convenient location for anyone apart from people who live in Lubbock – although if they live in Lubbock they have my sympathy and deserve every break they can get. Anyway, owing to my general aversion to air travel (and a $250 per person flight cost because I didn’t get round to booking anything up until the week of… Read more