The Coffee House

[Gary A.]

I do construction management for government jobs on a consulting basis. "RFI" is my middle name.

 

[NancyMoranG]

Ahhh, a pond. We had one at our house before we sold everything in '07 and bought the RV.
It was soooo peaceful. We put Koi in it and they grew big time. Then 1 night we found all the fish in 1 end and couldn't figure out what the heck....then, an otter appeared in the deep end!!!
It came up,from a nearby creek and was eating our koi
Anyway, we had the power go out a couple of times, but hubby is a fisherman so he had a small pump for keeping bait alive. Worked out til we could fix regular pump.

 

[Designer]

.. they were trying to get 5 memory slots into a design that could only accomodate 2.

I don't know why, but for some reason that does not surprise me.

Looking for the "duh" emoticon. I guess this one will do.

 

[Designer]

I do construction management for government jobs on a consulting basis. "RFI" is my middle name.

I've inspected job sites where the contractor had apparently NEVER OPENED the specifications. When I asked to see the book, he didn't know where it was.

Another contractor left his on the floor of his pickup, covered in mud.

 

[limr35 4]

Your pond/waterfall reminds me of a time when I worked for a fellow who designed the large end at the top and the small end at the bottom.

I asked him; "what happens when the pump shuts off?"

He said: "It never shuts off."

So then I asked him: "What about a power failure?"

He had nothing to say, but continued with his stupid design.

About a month after I quit working there, he told me that they had to rebuild the pond/waterfall system to make the lower end larger than the top end.

I don't think he ever understood why.

You got it.

Early in my career, I was hired as a Software QA manager for a large multinational, the third QA manager they hired to try and get a showcase project delivered (it was a year behind schedule and something like 20M$ over budget (on an original budget of $30M). Over a hundred Ph.D level developers working on it. After a while I realized what the problem was - the chip design they were using (this was in the 1980's) had a limited memory space, and they were swapping out memory in segments. The problem was, after looking at all the data and code allocation, they were trying to get 5 memory slots into a design that could only accomodate 2. Just could not be done. But for some reason, until I came along, no-one worked through exactly how the memory allocation and swapping would work. The company ended up writing off all the development costs on that project, AND paying penalties to the customers to whom they presold the technology.

These are your versions of my quotes from student essays, aren't they?

 

[pgriz]

Yeah, I guess they are. Prior to that career, I spent a year being a teaching assistant in one of the university labs. The job was to demonstrate how to do various experiments (mostly physiological), assist the students in the performance of the lab, and then grade the resulting lab reports. Basic structure of the reports was: 1) objective of the lab, 2) description of the experimental setup and procedure, 3) hypothesis being tested, 4) table of experimental data, 5) analysis, 6) conclusions. Simple enough. Despite this being a 3rd-year course (of a four-year program), it was not uncommon to have 80-90% of the first two or three lab reports achieve a mark of 20-40%. I would mark up the report with red ink, and sometimes there was more red ink than original writing. Of course, after one or two of such evaluations, people got serious, and by the end of the course, most were getting marks in the 80-90% range. Still, given that many of these students were going on to med school, you had to wonder what they were thinking, in submitting work that was abysmal in its quality.

 

[snerd]

Evening, Hosers! Today I bought new wiper blades for my car, bought a clothes rack for the back seat, checked all fluids and tires, then started to pack for my road trip. Breakfast at iHop, 3 cups of their coffee, around 2:00pm. About ready to hit the hay. Be safe, everybody............ the last minute shopping rush has hit!!

 

[Gary A.]

Bon Voyage snerd. (You sure there's no room for Leo and me?)

 

[limr35 4]

Bon Voyage snerd. (You sure there's no room for Leo and me?)

Yeah, I've never been to Little Rock before!

 

[Gary A.]

Ahhh, a pond. We had one at our house before we sold everything in '07 and bought the RV.
It was soooo peaceful. We put Koi in it and they grew big time. Then 1 night we found all the fish in 1 end and couldn't figure out what the heck....then, an otter appeared in the deep end!!!
It came up,from a nearby creek and was eating our koi
Anyway, we had the power go out a couple of times, but hubby is a fisherman so he had a small pump for keeping bait alive. Worked out til we could fix regular pump.

Ponds are all about relaxation. We have Koi, turtles and schools of minnows. A glass of wine while watching the koi cruise about goes a long way in unwinding.

No otters around here, but I've had smaller ponds cleaned out by raccoons and egrets. The new pond has a deep end a little under four feet, safe from both bird and beast.

 

[snerd]

Gary & Lenny are more than welcome to join me! But only if ya can meet me there, I think you're both further away than me! It's a 7 hour drive from my house to there.

 

[snowbear121 52]

Evening, Hosers! Today I bought new wiper blades for my car, bought a clothes rack for the back seat, checked all fluids and tires, then started to pack for my road trip. Breakfast at iHop, 3 cups of their coffee, around 2:00pm. About ready to hit the hay. Be safe, everybody............ the last minute shopping rush has hit!!

Safe trip.

 

[Warhorse]

Good morning all, enjoy your visit snerd.

My bride and I are hopefully taking a four hour drive downstate to spend Christmas with family. I say "hopefully" because we were supposed to have left last Wednesday, but postponed it instead.

 

[snerd]

Good morning all, enjoy your visit snerd.

My bride and I are hopefully taking a four hour drive downstate to spend Christmas with family. I say "hopefully" because we were supposed to have left last Wednesday, but postponed it instead.

Better late than never!!

 

[snerd]

Evening, Hosers. I'm all packed, car is full of gas, and I'm turning in early tonight. Oh, who am I kidding?! I'll be up until 1 or 2 as usual lol!!

There are some angry members about, handing out reality sandwiches. Don't let them scare you off!!!