Knowing The Price Of Everything And The Value Of Nothing

 "Knows the price of everything and the value of nothing" is a famous quote from Oscar Wilde's 1892 play Lady Windermere's Fan, defining a cynic as someone focused solely on cost or monetary worth rather than intrinsic, emotional, or ethical value. It critiques materialism and a shallow, profit-driven society. 

It's something I come across quite a bit and no more so than someone who has no idea what goes on behind the scenes and is quick to trash the work undertaken with some idea in their head about what should happen based on their life experience in the business which, in layman's terms is the square root of sweet Fanny Adams!  

I used to find this when people queried how much my quotes were for certain projects and they could not get their heads around the fact that you cannot discount people costs.  You can possibly do it on capital equipment but I cannot reduce the people and get the same work done in the same amount of time.  I used to enjoy asking them which person we should lose from the team and what part of the project didn't they want delivered!  It's my fun facts time where surely it would be easier to have a baby that rather than a lady having to produce a bay in nine months we could get 9 ladies to do it in one month!

The other one was it takes a month to build one mile of motorway and so if you increase the workforce 30 fold you can do it in a day!  Flawed logic and it's impossible to actually achieve even if you were able to as you'd also need 30 times the machinery and all the materials to arrive in the correct order and in huge quantities.  Everyone would be getting in each others way and the overall logistics just could not achieve it.

In many ways this is how politicians appear to view the world, in a way modelled by home grown spreadsheets and an idealized view of their world.  They apply their own rules to things, not asking the experts if it is (MY favourite word comping up...) DO-ABLE.  Yes, can your idea actually be feasibly implemented and of course in 101 cases out of a 100 of course it can't.  

There's also the knock on effect.  input and output, cause and effect, impact on other projects and so on.  It's what I used to do planning at an Executive (Programme) level.  I used to watch their eyes glaze over as I spoke about the overall Programme rather than the individual projects that made up that Programme and how project managers (I used to be one so I know) and sponsors were focused only on their part of the overall scheme and had no cognizance of the other things going on around them unless they were delivering into one or more of those projects.

A delay in one project could cause problems across the whole spate of projects and cause bigger problems elsewhere.  A one week delay on an individual project could cause months of delays elsewhere.  Operating at their own project they could not see the whole thing but it did have an impact.  More often than not huge impacts could be caused by something very small at the project level.

How many times I had to explain this I've lost count.  There'd always be some smart arse with no connection to the overall programme ready to offer their 'considered opinion' and we often used the phrase to laugh at them "For every problem there is a solution that is simple, neat—and wrong!"

Is it worth explaining to these people the error of their ways?  I don't know, I'm tired of attempting to do so as they get all defensive and don't listen to the explanation anyway! 

Turtles All The Way Down?

 It's beginning to feel that way I think.  Just look at the complex situation where we find ourselves in and as we scratch the very outer surface of the huge almost unimaginable web of lies, corruption and deceit I think we all know that this is hardly all of it and that it goes very deep and to many layers of depravity that we cannot or are not allowed to see.

It should shake us to our very core but we are so used to these levels of depravity and corruption that it no longer shocks us.  The can of worms is perhaps an infinite number of cans of worms each as disgusting and sickening as the previous ones.  

Are we being fed a little at a time to make it acceptable?  Are we defending out own sanity by blocking this stuff out of our minds "well it hasn't affected me or my family?"  or is there something else at play here?  

What is more concerning is that these things involve children and again, can we really fathom out what is going on or what has happened and why is no one tackling it?  We aren't being told the half of it and how deep does this scumbaggery go?   

It looks bad from the little we know of it and I imagine as it is leaked out to us in snippets it won't look as bad as what it actually is.  

Choreographed Political Theatre

 Well imagine a press release all ready and waiting for something to happen?  Really?  Of course, things don't happen these days without the spin doctor's say so and this close choreography beats and synchronized Olympic event hands down. 

It should not surprise us in the slightest but I am certain that half of the public "buy it" and the rest of us roll our eyes towards the heavens and wonder when will they realise that half of us no longer listen to (or if we do don't believe) these propaganda press releases and related actions.

It's tiresome and see through.  It insults the intelligence and undermines democracy and trust in the very people who are meant to do our bidding rather than trying all the time to rule us.  They rarely  use words that mean they are meant to rule on our behalf and instead use words like power.  "When we get power", "When we are in power".

Talking of power we had two old ladies living not far from me both fined by local enforcement officers £300 each for the heinous crime of...... leaving a charity collection bag on their doorstep for the charity van to come and collect (as per the instructions on the bag).  Not lying on the pavement or in the road, no, one their very own doorsteps.  That's the shit head low life council for you.  We pay their wages, we vote them into power, they fine our old age pensioners on the spot the bastards, I feel utter contempt for these low life gits (as you might have guessed) and everything that is wrong in the UK now can be wrapped up in that one act!

I was involved in a pubic consultation last year about parking where I explained that if they were to introduce parking fees in this particular area that it was as easy to go park on the streets nearby as there were no parking restrictions there.  Did they listen? You know the answer as well as I do and guess what?  The local roads are now clogged up with people parking and it is causing local traffic issues - obviously and no one is using the car park as predicted.  Useless pricks the lot of them.  Why ask if you aren't going to listen and what we, the ordinary general public, who are loaded with real life experience, worldly hard earned from life's hard knocks and having to face these public servant made issues every bloody day?  

It's like everyone can see what the government's next failure is going to be before they do, what fiscal crap they publish, what the budget will mean and lo and behold it comes to pass as if by magic and is a huge surprise to them and yet we've all been saying it to them since the lauched their latest policy etc.

The whole thing is beyond a joke.  It's all spin and ideology with no risk reviews.  

As I often quote from the late Sir John Harvey Jones: “Planning is an unnatural process; it is much more fun to do something. The nicest thing about not planning is that failure comes as a complete surprise, rather than being preceded by a period of worry and depression.”

Retirement - Decision Soon

 I found myself at it again the other day,  thinking that I needed to be doing something and of course, there really isn't anything to be doing.  There is and there isn't.

The App and my journey are continuing.  I have given it until March to see what happens and then I need to make a decision either to continue or close it down.  It would be nice for it to be winner but it isn't looking as if it will be based on improving views but no actual purchases.  I am surprised a bit as it is very different to other subscription Apps but it is what it is of course.  So perhaps in another month I will be able to make that decision.

I have things to do, of course, but I still have this sort of frozen impasse where I feel I should be doing something but I am not doing it (whatever it may be) and working out what to do with myself.  I'd like to be doing something more than I am doing now but there's getting the enthusiasm for it and this want to have a rest.  Just don't do anything at all but knowing me, that's not going to happen.  I can busy myself with hobbies but so many things these days have lost their joy and I cannot be bothered.  When I do get motivated well that's different of course but where is that old spark and how do I get out of the rut I am in? 

I find myself quite settled in my home and happy with my own company but really do want to get out and sort stuff out.  I suppose I will be able to work this all out in 4 or 5 weeks time?  I hope so.

I Like A Spreadsheet

 It is interesting that I have been using spreadsheets in one way or the other for 40 or more years.  When we got them in the late 80s electronically it was a revelation as before I had been handcrafting them for quotations and bills of quantities and so on.

I was often times laughed at for showing how we could at a stroke change things and try different formulae to arrive at different views of the truth and why actually some weren't to be trusted.  You can show a profit when there isn't one etc.

They are useful to back up written work and support  plans and designs.  And so I turn to stuff I will call it, that just gets presented as "The Truth" and has no data to back it up, no well worked argument with a rationale, experiment, conclusion etc.

Just a statement made and it is, in reality, just what someone thinks, or wants me and others to think.  You see it all the time on X and Facebook someone says something, states it as fact and it's an opinion piece at best.  Challenged they go into meltdown and rather than state how the y arrived at said conclusion that they've shared with me and the world, they YELL REALLY LOUDLY and cite that as proof 😊😊.  If that doesn't work you then call their parenthood into doubt or add words like denier or similar. There is a lot of this around.  

I can call a politician whatever I like and generally I reckon I could back that up with four or five examples of evidence to say it.  I saw today someone called a politician a Fascist.  Now Mussolini and Hitler could well be called that but a politician in the UK?  Even acting like a Fascist is taking things a bit extreme in reality.  They probably mean in some cases acting like a Dictator and even then that doesn't really hit the mark.  Being an outrageous knob on the other hand would fit if indeed they were doing what they are at the moment and as a previous post highlighted just making things worse as they thrash around trying to save their jobs and digging a deeper hole.

They haven't acted anything like a Fascist - it's just that the person commentating wants them to appear in a bad light.  At the moment everyone seems to be acting in their own interests and not those of the electorate - the people who give them power.  This faux outrage that their ideology is collapsing as most of these policies must appears to allow their supporters carte Blanche to attack everyone else but their own people. Built on sand, no ROI in any decision making, no attention to the risks on the other side of their Utopian dream and the damage their rainbow coloured world of unicorns and fairies actually inflicts in the real world where we actually live.  It's pathetic and so damaging to societal cohesion and to the country's finances. 

Anyway, I think I should demand the spreadsheet when they make these claims.  

What Can I Do Next? I Know, I'll Dig Myself A Deeper Hole!

 And so it came to pass that our micro brained leader pulled off yet another action that made him more hated and despised whilst declaring that it was good for the country.  Yes our PM signed up to yet another treacherous "agreement" that makes us poorer and then explains how good it is for us all that he's done it!

It's both funny and tragic at the same time.  They appear to learn nothing and miss the point entirely.  This is some climate change nonsense with the EU who are going down the toilet faster than us probably because we have the un-flush-able turd in charge! 

It's as if he really thinks, despite all the evidence to the contrary, that this will fix things when it does the opposite.  It makes him look more of a pratt than he already is and out of touch and frankly doomed - he really shouldn't be in post but believe it or not, he's the best that the Labour party have got.  God help us all!

In so many ways it is as if these guys are in some sort of warped Disney Film.  They think they are the heroes and they really need to stop, work out that everything in their own world is wrong and come out here, the other side of the sickly sweet "all is wonderful" fantasy world they appear to inhabit and see what it is like.  What it is really like.  They appear to have absolutely no idea and their ideology and "let them eat cake" attitude will bring them down.  I hope the fall from grace is massively painful for each and everyone of them.  They are the lice and fleas of the human race, parasitically clinging on and feeding off us free.  

It's difficult enough as it is and I see my new tax code has arrived which is how we deal with things now, tax the daylights out of us and pass the proceeds onto those who presently are living off of a dwindling number of people able to pay the tax to support them.  Unchecked they will of course kill off the host.  Perhaps that is what they want but they hasten their own doom in doing so.

Of course a lot of this stuff is going on to protect what is left of his weak and feeble premiership.  

My Boss Was Like This Government

 I've had a pick of bosses some good (very few) most bad but listening to our utterly useless Prime Minister (in name only now I'd suggest) and his imbecile ministers you have to wonder why they are so utterly useless, charmless and on the wrong wavelength to ordinary people.  I class myself as ordinary - I know difficult to believe but there you go!

They just come up with stuff that immediately puts your back up, has no foundation in reality or doesn't appear to have one foot in reality.  They think it does, they think it is big and clever and the rest of us can hardly believe what they've said.  If you wanted to go about getting the people behind you and agreeing with you and rebuilding your reputation you'd do well to say the absolute opposite and pursue sound policies based on data, reality and good judgement.

If they aren't coming out with crazy stuff like, I don't know, making boats more buoyant by drilling holes in them, cutting the wings off of planes so they fly straighter, compulsory square tyres on motor cars then they are out cussing and dissing their opponents or practising Red Herring tactics and blatant obfuscation. WE SEE THROUGH YOU, YOU UTTER MORONS!  

Honestly it's like listening to kids in a junior school coming up with alibis over some prank that has been found out.  It really is that pathetic and at least you can laugh at children's excuses.

Attacking your opponents goes nowhere, pathetic politicians have been doing it for years but do they not know that we see through it all.  No one believes them and no one takes them seriously anymore.  They are cornered and are fighting exactly like cornered animals.  Attacking words and their meanings, attacking us because we are far to stupid to b given the vote.  No wonder people are getting seething and angry at the moment.  

Small insurrections are starting I notice little things like criminal damage to council parking machines and notices are one.  It low level civil unrest and reading between the lines it's that politicians are ignoring their voters wishes, forcing change where it is not necessary (if it ain't broke don't fix it) and forcing those who voted for them to accept things they neither voted for nor want.  All the while pissing on us and telling us it's raining. 

I like the British, they have a good level of tolerance but that's stretching and beginning to break, you can feel it and their good nature has been stretched and is about to come under more stress especially if you try and rule carrot and stick and continue to take more than you give.  I feel that things are at breaking point and that finally enough is enough.  Sit back,m grab some popcorn and Buy the Ticket, Take the Ride (Hunter S. Thompson).

I hope the present evil batch of low life politicians see their future writ large come the May elections.  Good people, don't flinch, send them into the Abyss back where they belong. 

Give & Take

I saw that someone had "taken offence" to something someone had said but it wasn't clear what offence had been given and by that I mean that there's a lot of take these days isn't there?

People are quick to take offence quite often where none was given in the first place.  I deal with things that offend me by turning off the TV, walking away, blocking and other methods.  Of course we all react differently to things and we all have something that offends us.  But if it offends me, does it offend someone else and who am I to then go around and preach to someone else that they too should be offended by something that offends me and that, in all probability they haven't seen or heard?   Today it seems that is what you need to do.  Rather than ignore you need to make other people align with your taking of offence?  Strange behaviour and for what purpose?

Then there's the other give and take that's a bit annoying.  Not sure how many times I have done this but I've bailed out a number of people over the years, financially and in some cases in the tens of thousands of pounds and do you think they have ever paid me back?  I suppose I didn't expect to be paid back in reality even though they said they would.  In two cases, I've bailed the same person out more than twice and of course now I wouldn't do it but it would mortify me if I was to ask for help, take it and then not be working hard to give it back.  I had another case where I was due quite a bit of money from a transaction and found out that someone had taken my share, again, significant money and they just said because I wasn't there at the time, they took it, had spent it and that was that!

That's all take and no give.  It's the sort of world we live in these days I suppose where there is that level of entitlement and where it is completely acceptable to do these things.  We live in a selfish, self centred world.  I'm no longer offended by it but it does seem to me that if we all eased down a bit, the world might be a better place.

Can You Hear That Click?

 When I was about 11 or 12 a friend who lived around the corner, on the way back from School, invited me in.  His dad was keen to show me his HiFi room.  Proudly he opened the door to show a barely furnished room, parquet flooring and on a low flat coffee, rectangular, table was a Bang & Olufsen Record Player and Amplifier.  There were 4 large speakers in the corner of the room and this thing was like someone from another world had sent it.

Os think early 1970s so I am not sure if it was a full quadraphonic system.  There was a single armchair in the centre of the room.

I cannot recall where he got the LP from now but he had all the gear and cleaned the LP and set it on the record deck and put on the music - it made an amazing sound, as you'd expect" but then, suddenly he said "Did you hear that?" I probably asked what and he said "That click, did you hear that click?"  AS you may know I have always had problems with one of my ears (11 or 12 operations down on that one) and I didn't hear anything at all.

I could see he was irritated by it though.  I think it destroyed his listening pleasure and he would probably have replayed it to see if he could hear the click again. Are we listening to the music or waiting for the click?  

AS an aside, when I was an early adopter of CDs I would often say to people can you hear the silence and classical and choral music really benefit from the silence so I do have some sympathy but even on my old vinyl I always felt that the click or hiss was part of the experience and let the music play!  

That Was Hard Work - So Technical

 My biggest problem with Techies has always been that they code for themselves and not for normal human beings!  By that I mean that they don't realise that an idiot like me has no idea what app the technical specifications means let alone what they do.  

I doubt any of them have read The Design of Everyday Things by Don Norman which argues that products should be designed with the user's psychology in mind, prioritizing usability and intuitiveness over aesthetics.  Same with software really.  

So today I was uploading images but it was a video that had me scrambling about and thank goodness for AI which I managed to get detailed instructions and even then other software was being "helpful" and screwing it up.  Anyway, it is completed now thank goodness.

Just hard work when it really doesn't need to be!  That said, I am learning quite a bit about advertising and how algorithms work.  It's taken almost a month to get somewhere near where I want to be but now things are working.  I just need to up the volume so to speak as it really is a number game.  Not everyone who downloads your App buys it and so on.  That's the next stage.  

The Last Throw Of The Dice

 Or almost the last I think.  It hasn't been a month yet since I set off on this last gasp sales and marketing push.  If anything the results have been mixed both exciting and disappointing at the same time.  A large volume of hits and downloads but very little to show in the way of actual sales which is the disappointing bit.   Today I am going to do some last minute tweaks to see if we can boost the sales even further.  Small changes to the wording and the way targets are set and then we can run, perhaps for the rest of the month and then review where we are.

At present it's knife edge stuff I feel.  It needs the Oomph to get things moving and it needs a steady input and we aren't quite there yet results go up and down as subtle changes are made to the algorithm which is a little painful and slow sometimes (yet other times it can be like a runaway train).  It's getting the balance just right, the keywords lined up and a steady hand on the tiller as I try and navigate this new (to me) world.

If I can get a steady flow into the business and steady purchases then it will be worth a small further investment in time and money but if not, well, we tried.  It's got to be that black and white unfortunately.  Of course it is one of those things and in an environment where the present government hates businesses it isn't easy to start with.  

I just need to maintain my patient iterative approach and see where it takes me.  

Ordinary People Are Extraordinary

You think you know someone and yet, in fact you probably don't know them as well as you think you do.

I was recounting a story about someone I knew, not very well but I'd been out drinking and socializing with him many times and as much as you can I knew that he was an Actor but  in between jobs, as many actors do, he was a scaffolder.  I was regaling the story about how we travelled on the train up to London and just after the train departed on its way, he pulled out a big flask of whisky which we took nips out of on the way up so that we would be warmed up when we got there.

It often happened on the way to London or back that the flask would make an appearance, so much so that a few of us also brought our Hip Flasks too.  There was lots of banter and much jolliment all in good humour and amongst ourselves none of this upsetting other passengers and so on.

He died after a short illness one of those where they operated and stopped and then explained that they could go no further.  

At his funeral we heard about his work and then we heard about his younger days when he swum the channel and that he was indeed quite the sportsman.  a 22 mile swim is extraordinary but you'd never have know as he never mentioned it in all the times that we were friends.

Then there was another funeral that I went to when it was disclosed that another friend was a 17 year old in charge of a landing craft at D-Day.  Seventeen delivering men and materials to the beaches.  There were others and once again you just don't know of the extraordinary things they did. One shot in Italy and injured in North Africa.  

But it doesn't have to be anywhere near these to be extraordinary.  Last night this gentleman gave a wonderful piece of ritual, word perfectly and it was done brilliantly.  Considering that this poor chap has a huge disability being severely dyslexic you would never have guessed but he persevered and his friends all went and supported him as he can't see what words are in front of him in the book, this was all done without and again, a huge brave commitment by him and his friends.

If you look around at every day life all of us, everyone, do extraordinary things day in day out and we just don't realise it.  Bless us all! 

BUT.... Keeps Their Job!

 Right in your face, all the time.  Somebody heads up a department or business etc and screws up massively.  They lose huge amounts of money sometimes billions (since how did we get to billions in the past 10 years or so?) and ineptitude and stupidity surely show up huge wastes of money, loss or losing track of people and money, plant and equipment and yes, nothing happens.

If I'd have made mistakes as big as these I'd have been fired on the spot.  It's insane that they let people get away with bad decisions that appear taken on a whim rather than in a properly risk managed way.  I used to tell people that I made my living on other people's misfortune for I was always rescuing a programme or project, Code Red team assembling and effectively fire fighting projects, shutting stuff down that had run out of control and were burning through cash or losing huge amounts and you see none of that now.  Hundreds of billions of pounds of overrun - oh no problems lets give you double the contract values and extend the time for twice the number of years you assured me it will take. 

Where did we get these serial failures from and why are we rewarding them with huge bonuses and seats on the board of another company when they are eventually paid off and reluctantly moved out of their jobs. A big golden handshake followed shortly afterwards by an equally massive golden welcome so they can screw up their next employer!

The Three Year Men we used to call them.  Brought in, rapidly rising through the ranks based on the opposite of merit all of them and then despite us all warning management as the 2 1/2 years approached things would suddenly start to be exposed and they'd get found out.  Not willing to show their stupidity in employing them in the first place they get to leave with an impeccable and impressive CV and glittering and glowing recommendations!

Watching From The Sidelines As The World Crashes Around You

 It's a mess out there but perhaps some are getting their just deserts as their past catches up with them.  It's amazing how most of us already knew but those who make the decisions blink rabbit frozen in the approaching headlights of doom. 

Defending their sordid actions to the greater public the pathetic excuses roll off their tongues without a hint of irony or even humility.  Do they not realise that we see through them?  Some of us have seen through them for years.  Now evidence is there and still they shrug their shoulders and continue to lie digging their swallowing hole ever larger as the lies become less believable.

In the meantime no one appears to know that an inquiry is being undertaken on some of the heinous crimes imaginable affecting millions of children by gangs across the UK and that's about as much as I can say due to the algorithms and destruction of free speech in the country.  So something that affects those millions and has been covered up and hidden will remain hidden as it is not reported by the MSM at all.  However, go and dig down in Facebook, X etc and you will find the inquiry and read for yourself the horrors perpetrated under our very noses. 

When did it become acceptable practice to hide news from the public or bend the truth and punish anyone who says different?  There's not a word about such things, it goes against the narrative, the bias and the "world view" of our public service broadcasters and they think we don't know or don't care but it will come out and when it does, woe betide those who decided and censored us.

Anyway, popcorn is at the ready and the luvvies will soon start losing their shit when it all comes crashing down around their ears.  They will probably have to move to the bunker soon as the lies unravel and there the GREAT OZ will be found behind the curtain of shame and perhaps then we will find our way again for we have strayed from the righteous path and it's time for the series of corrections to begin.  Maybe not now but soon.  In the interim, if you can stomach it, watch the attempts in vain for those who are guilty as they speak lies and swivel their heads and eyes to find somewhere to escape too.  The modern day Antediluvians attempting to escape the flood sent by God but having no escape from those overwhelming waters.  

By that action, Mankind was saved and let's hope that when all this evil is shaken out of our society we may, once again, return to a peaceful and harmonious life without our "Elders and betters" lording it over us.