The Algorithm Life

Not many people are cut from the IT cloth, but I believe that the hurdles most people face when dealing with computer problems are largely psychological. There is something about computers that seems like it should require some insight more mystical than Google to solve. Now I’m not saying that the average person will feel confident in setting up an LDAP server, but there are a lot of small maintenance tasks that everyone has to go through just to bring these silicon beasts to heel. Nearly every day I’m faced with questions that leave the users looking sheepish over the simple tasks that just took me a minute to do.

On the other side of that coin, IT people sometimes take what is an easy problem and try to solve it through more arcane processes when a “normal” person would easily solve it. While solving a simple problem earlier I was handed one of the wireless handset phones our users carry with them. After a bit of confusion we decided it was one that didn’t belong to anyone present at the moment, so I took it and said I’d find the proper owner. I looked at the number on the phone’s display and compared it to the dead tree directory list on my desk, but failed to find the owner. My next thought was to log into the cisco administration server for the phones, and I proceeded to try to find the number there. Strike two. finally I looked up the phone’s IP address on the handset and started to look up IP’s on the server. It was only then I realized all I needed to do was call my desk phone from the handset and look at the caller ID for the owners name.

So, next time you see your IT guy struggling with some simple task please remember, he’s probably looking for the most difficult way to accomplish his goal.

ELO as a transition point

Music means a lot to me. In high school I learned that it could be used to mitigate aspects of the worst of my mood swings. I’d listen to Judas Priest to burn through my rage, Pink Floyd’s “The Wall” as some sort of lyrical commiseration for alienation,  and  Oingo Boingo gave me somewhere to redirect surplus energy. Music got me through a lot of tough times, and still holds a near-mystical power over me as it does with most people, I imagine.

We had a small record player when I was very young and some kids records that I think came from the childhood of my mother. Disney singles of Cinderella’s “Bibbidi bobbidi boo” song and the like. My sister and I listened to them often and eventually we were allowed access to the bigger stereo in the living room and my dad’s LP collection.  Oddly enough, other than the occasional Christmas album, I really only listened to a Roger Miller LP and the soundtrack from “Paint Your Wagon”. Still, it was enough to get me hooked and I began to feel the need to build my own collection.

By the time I was old enough to have an allowance I would usually spend some of it at the record store in Fashion Place Mall when my mom would cart us off shopping. Eventually I had a growing collection of 45’s. I vividly remember approaching the checkout counter at The Music Stop at the mall with the single for ELO’s “Turn to Stone” when I was about 10 or 11. A tall guy* waiting in line noticed what I was doing and  asked why I was just buying a single when for the price of a few singles I could have the whole album. I remember feeling like I got caught doing something wrong. After about a minute I put the 45 back and started looking at the whole “Out of the Blue” album. I think it cost $8 and it was a real hit to my child’s velcro wallet, but I did have that much. I remember kind of sucking it up and making the decision to go with the cassette of the whole album.

You might have guessed that I’ve just finished listening to “Out of the Blue” for the first time in decades. I seem to have a couple of ELO compilation albums, but somehow “Out of the Blue” never made the crossover from cassette to CD. It seems to be beyond my abilities to get over the power of music to transport me across the ages. I haven’t heard (or thought of) “Night in the City” since my teen years, yet I find my mind leading the music by a half a second anticipating the lyrics.

My morning class in my freshman year in high school had a pair of talkative girls, probably seniors, who liked to tease the shy little freshman that sat across the table from them**. One day they asked me what my favourite band was and I told them ELO and they laughed at me. Ever since then when I admit to liking ELO I feel a bit ashamed, and sometimes even apologize.

That one little interaction from those girls as well as the one from the guy ahead of me in line at the record store both had huge repercussions in my life. I’m forever altered by something so seemingly insignificant that happened in passing. I have no doubt that anyone but me involved in those exchanges has any inkling of the conversation’s existence, much less their impact. Listening to the album today brought both instances back to mind and has made me wonder how often I’ve off-handedly reacted to something that’s had similar repercussions for someone else. My thoughts tend to roll off the tip of my tongue without much consideration, and I imagine I’ve done my share of damage, though over the last half of my life I’ve tried to excise any mean spiritedness from my personality.  Hopefully, as clichéd as it sounds, I’ve had a net positive result. Although it’s possible I wouldn’t feel too bad if in 40 years someone feels a little ashamed of admitting to liking One Direction because of something I said.

* He could have been 16 or 36 for all I could really tell at the time
**When they noticed him at all, which, mercifully, wasn’t often.

War Dream

I had another one last night, one of those dreams I can’t quite shake. There was some kind of war. I had my .22 pistol on me and a small machine gun that took the same ammo as my familiar sidearm. I was a little dismayed at having such a small calibre weapon. We were taking cover behind cardboard boxes stacked loosely behind some rail fencing about 15 yards apart from the enemy. They had similar ineffective cover, and I seemed to know who they were. I was laying on the ground hiding in vain behind my box and watching a soldier, someone who had been my friend, training a browning .50 calibre machine gun on a tripod on me diagonally to my left. We were at the park just downhill from the University on 1st south, below the tennis courts.

There were soldiers on both sides calling to keep calm and point weapons in a safe direction, but everyone was nervous. Most of us were trying to comply, but a sudden move would bring the weapons back to bear and several times we came within a hairs breadth of opening fire only to return our weapons to pointing at the ground. I was checking my ammo supply when someone opened fire. It was quickly suppressed and I saw that one of the guys across the fence from me had been shot up, but not killed. They were angry and started to train their guns on me, anger in their eyes. I opened fire.

In these dreams I don’t ever seem to be able to deal lethal damage, and this was the same. I put several small slugs into the chests of a couple soldiers in front of me with my machine gun. They opened fire on me, the dirt spraying up and holes chewing through my cardboard box. The soldiers all around me were getting cut down by superior weapons. Most of them fled back and to the right towards an amusement park. I realized I couldn’t stay as the enemy quickly crossed between the two fences, so I jumped up and began to retreat also, but turning left instead of right.

I began to take fire and was struck in the head by a small calibre bullet just above and behind the ear. It hurt so bad. I took several more in the shoulder, right side, and one in the right elbow and wrist. I fell down and played dead. The enemy solders walked past me making for the amusement park and I was afraid for the civilians in their path. I got up and began to inspect my wounds. I could feel the bullet that struck my head just below the skin. There wasn’t much blood from any of the wounds, but I didn’t know if I could get far. I thought I was going to have to walk myself clear down to the hospital, but I was scared for my wife.

I began to walk towards the amusement park and found Debbie playing with a class of small children in the amusement park by a carousel and ferris wheel. She didn’t seem to concerned about my wounds but thought I needed to get to the hospital. She couldn’t leave the children and the soldiers seemed to be nowhere around so I began the long walk to the hospital. Again I started to probe my wounds because I couldn’t understand how I was still alive.

I awoke right after that, about 4:30 in the morning, but I could still feel the pain in my head, wrist, and elbow and the dream stayed with me for several minutes. The little Stella cat had come in earlier than she has lately to sleep against my feet. I disturbed her as I sat up halfway in bed and she came over and laid down on my shoulder as I fell back on the pillows and hoped to not dream anymore.