Sadly the rats were taken on their last trip to the vets yesterday. Both had developed tumours on their mammary glands. One had become so large that the rat was struggling to cope with it. Well they had a good innings and fun lives. Both will be missed.
Wednesday, June 27, 2007
Sunday, June 24, 2007
Blink
Both the children and I are fans of the recent Doctor Who episode Blink! Jake has made me a T-shirt that proclaims, "The Angels have the blue box," and I took a trip into a nearby cemetery to see if I could find any Weeping Angels. While the picture was taken with a bit of fun in mind I rather pleased with how it's turned out on an artistic level too. Remember; Don't blink. Don't look away. But especially don't blink!
Saturday, June 23, 2007
Shift Work II
Well I've come to the end of another week on the new shift and have, effectively, a three day weekend in front of me. This is nice, but it would help if my employers had been kind enough to pay me the extra money they offered me for working this shift. Unsurprisingly the accounts department have screwed up. They obviously thought I was coming in late and working until two thirty to make up my time! Three day weekends and day-times at home do not make up for missing my kids and pushing through to the wee hours. I'm famously short tempered when it comes to money. Never having any helps. If it's not sorted by the next pay packet I'm back to days whether my employers like it or not. I've watched too many mates argue for months over new pay or working conditions, while the money earns interest in the bosses bank account.
On another level it seems my employers want to sack all their key staff! A new rule has been passed down from above in reaction to an alarming rise in bodged jobs and unhappy customers. To supplant a perfectly adequate grievance procedure they have invented a set of rules that is being called, "Five strikes and you're out!" Essentially each error that makes its way to to a customer will initiate a witch hunt to track down a scapegoat. The unlucky soul found guilty of being totally responsible will then receive a strike. Dependant on a rolling score that starts with each persons first strike one of five punishments is then metered out; starting with an official verbal warning and ending with the termination of contract. I've never heard of such nonsense! Clearly the sign of weak management. This means that if I have more than 0.0125 jobs wrong in 100 I'm in deep trouble. The numbers are quite scary; I do a lot of jobs in a year and just five missed typos could lose me my job!
The daft thing is it is all so unnecessary. Everybody knows who the weak links are. The ones who hold their positions due to nepotism or long penetrating tongues down their superiors backsides. Get tough and use the existing rules to lose this baggage, and stop firing shots across the bows of the good guys.
On another level it seems my employers want to sack all their key staff! A new rule has been passed down from above in reaction to an alarming rise in bodged jobs and unhappy customers. To supplant a perfectly adequate grievance procedure they have invented a set of rules that is being called, "Five strikes and you're out!" Essentially each error that makes its way to to a customer will initiate a witch hunt to track down a scapegoat. The unlucky soul found guilty of being totally responsible will then receive a strike. Dependant on a rolling score that starts with each persons first strike one of five punishments is then metered out; starting with an official verbal warning and ending with the termination of contract. I've never heard of such nonsense! Clearly the sign of weak management. This means that if I have more than 0.0125 jobs wrong in 100 I'm in deep trouble. The numbers are quite scary; I do a lot of jobs in a year and just five missed typos could lose me my job!
The daft thing is it is all so unnecessary. Everybody knows who the weak links are. The ones who hold their positions due to nepotism or long penetrating tongues down their superiors backsides. Get tough and use the existing rules to lose this baggage, and stop firing shots across the bows of the good guys.
Tuesday, June 19, 2007
Canon Fodder
When I chose the alias of Canon Fodder I really did not put a great deal of thought into the process. I was getting slaughtered in Unreal; I figured that the name would fit while I was still a noob and if I ever got good... Well lets say no one likes being told, "You were killed by Canon Fodder."
But I got lazy. Which is not such a deviation from my usual personality type. So from that point whenever I got asked to supply an online nickname I gave Canon Fodder. So while I am not the sole user of the handle, (I'm not even the only Jason Long) there is a fair chance if you meet a Canon Fodder online it'll be me. So obviously I blog under the name, I also use it on Flickr which has become a little embarrassing; as I now own a Nikon. I had to explain the origin of the handle when I joined the Nikon D40x users group.
I've taken a quick look at some of the other users of the name. It's quite a varied bunch;
First off there is a Wikipedia entry for Canon Fodder which to my ignorant delight was a 2000AD Comic character! I enjoyed reading my friends issues of 2000AD in the past and while I am a fan of such characters as Strontium Dog and Judge Dredd I never new their was a Canon Fodder. The Character has his own page on the 2000AD Website.
There is a sports blog using the name as well as the url, but I do not understand why. It is American, so there may be no reason.
Delightfully Trekies or should I say Trekers have entitled the page where they debate and fix continuity issues Canon Fodder
There is a slide show using the name. Once again I am clueless for the reason.
Finally a fellow Blogger has used Canon Fodder for his Blog He/She seems obsessed with reading a great big list of books. Once again no specific reason is given for the title. But I suspect the may be a play of words going on here. Canon with only one n is not a misspelt word. It could be a fact or a religious leader...
But I got lazy. Which is not such a deviation from my usual personality type. So from that point whenever I got asked to supply an online nickname I gave Canon Fodder. So while I am not the sole user of the handle, (I'm not even the only Jason Long) there is a fair chance if you meet a Canon Fodder online it'll be me. So obviously I blog under the name, I also use it on Flickr which has become a little embarrassing; as I now own a Nikon. I had to explain the origin of the handle when I joined the Nikon D40x users group.
I've taken a quick look at some of the other users of the name. It's quite a varied bunch;
First off there is a Wikipedia entry for Canon Fodder which to my ignorant delight was a 2000AD Comic character! I enjoyed reading my friends issues of 2000AD in the past and while I am a fan of such characters as Strontium Dog and Judge Dredd I never new their was a Canon Fodder. The Character has his own page on the 2000AD Website.
There is a sports blog using the name as well as the url, but I do not understand why. It is American, so there may be no reason.
Delightfully Trekies or should I say Trekers have entitled the page where they debate and fix continuity issues Canon Fodder
There is a slide show using the name. Once again I am clueless for the reason.
Finally a fellow Blogger has used Canon Fodder for his Blog He/She seems obsessed with reading a great big list of books. Once again no specific reason is given for the title. But I suspect the may be a play of words going on here. Canon with only one n is not a misspelt word. It could be a fact or a religious leader...
Saturday, June 16, 2007
Sixteen
Well Yesterday was Katies birthday; she turned sixteen. Lots of gifts were showered upon her. As well as the birds, that even as I type this fill the house with their musical squawks, Katie received a light-box, numerous artists pens, hand made cards, clothes and hard cash. Also, thankfully while I was at work, an alcohol crazed teenage riot/party was held in the evening. (I may have exaggerated a bit there.) I think Katie is a bit disappointed with turning sixteen; all the things she is now legally able to do either Lorii and I won't let her, or she does not want to. But that's teenagers for you.
Wednesday, June 13, 2007
Saturday, June 09, 2007
Shift Work
As from Monday I start on a new shift at work. I'll start at five in the afternoon and work into the early hours of the next day. The main incentive is a 15% pay increase, but it also means I'm at home during business hours and free to pursue the collars business that seems to be taking off. We have had enough demand that prices have gone up, and we have just taken an order from an alternative retailer. If someone had told me a year ago I'd be making money in the sex industry selling locking steel collars to the BDSM fraternity I'd have rolled on the floor laughing.
Friday, June 08, 2007
Happy Me
When I was about seven years old I bought my first camera; an Instamatic 110. I keenly snapped away on this until, after a visit to Farnborough Air show at the age of fourteen or fifteen, I started lusting after an SLR. My first SLR was a Ricoh XR1, my second a Chinnon CE5 and there the progression stopped. Financial and family commitments ment money could not go on new cameras. My first digital was a Sony Cybershot W1 bought second hand from the modern day equivalent of a pawn shop. But today I have been gifted a Nikon D40x. Hence the bloody big smile in the picture. Stunning pictures should follow...
Monday, June 04, 2007
Stats
I've subscribed to one of those sites that counts the number of visitors your web-site attracts, and gives you various statistics about them. Of course these figures are predictably small; I'm not writing about anything important here. But they have thrown up a few surprises. I was unaware that I have readers in Kathmandu and Caracas. Or that I am the top result in Google when you type in 1812 Ovature!
Saturday, June 02, 2007
New Job
Well I've been offered a new position at work. It seems the company wants to make a push into America and, until there are enough customers to warrant setting up a factory in the states, I'm going to working a shift in time with the West Coast of the USA. The work will not change; I'll just be on hand to handle telephone enquires after normal UK office hours. The main incentive for me is the 15% pay increase. But it will also mean that I will be home during the day, which will give me more hours when I can work on making collars. Something that seems to be taking off quite well.
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