Off on holiday

As I might have mentioned, I'm off on holiday again this week. In fact, I'm currently set in a Best Western in Tennessee, where the weather is warm enough that I'm already pining for Ottawa's mild 36 degrees.

It's been an odd journey. I came via Washington Ronald Reagan - it's the first time I've been there, and while I can't way it'll be the last, that's only because the return flights are also booked there. On the one hand, the views were pretty darned impressive - I'd no idea just how close to the famous bits of Washington the airport is, and I had a stunning view along the National Mall to the White House as we came in to land. On the other, the flight path seems a little - ah - convoluted. We were, it felt, manoeuvering to land when we were still about ten yards up, making it the second most terrifying landing I've been involved in. The first being a night landing at La Guardia, before which I was unaware that La Guardia is on the river. My reaction to the increasing proximity of the water is perhaps best left to your imagination.

I was also surprised that the plane from Ottawa was relegated to what was described as a plane parking lot - we had to stay on board until they'd wheeled up a set of stairs to take us to a minibus, which then took us to the gate. There were about a half dozen other planes also going through this process. I did wonder if Washington had taken against the Canadians for some reason, and then I realised that they probably didn't have the best memories of Canadians (See? I have been doing my research! Bonus points if you get that reference, though there'll be a penalty if you have to use Wikipedia)

So there may be more this week, as I actually have the laptop with me; though I may also be too lazy to add more. You'll have to wait and see.

Work again

This might be a little rant-y; feel free to skip to the end.

For the last couple of weeks, I've been acting as front-line tech support at work. The chap who normally does it is on leave; there was some who came in to cover for him, but she never actually turned up. The first day she was supposed to be there, she called and said that her car had been impounded - she's been living in Quebec for long enough that she should have updated her driver's licence, so when she was pulled over by the police that morning.... That doesn't explain why she didn't appear the next day, or indeed any day since.

So with about an hour's training, I've been answering the phone and taking messages for people. I can understand just enough to send people off to the right person about 80% of the time; and while I'm still terrified of the phone - there are far more buttons that I'm comfortable with - I can at leats use it without cutting too many people off. I can't say I don't resent it - I'm a software engineer, after all, and this isn't what I'm supposed to be doing. But I'm doing OK at it.

I do dislike that I'm expected to be doing my proper job at the same time, though - it's quite hard to concentrate on code when the phone is ringing. And when I get asked to fix a PC as well.... I think it's been ten years since I last popped open a PC case, so I had no idea how to go about fixing a hardware issue - I ended up asking so many questions of a colleague that it would have been faster for him to do it himself.

And then I found out that I'm supposed to be answering support emails too - there have been complaints that we're not going responses. I don't mind doing that sort of thing, but I've been doing support for a fortnight now, and this is the first time that anyone's mentioned them to me.

So I think the general gist of my rant is... If you want me to do four jobs, that's fine. But you might want to be sure that I'm aware I'm actually supposed to be doing all of them, and you might want to consider whether I actually know how to do them in the first place.

And it's amazing how my motivation seems to slip the later I get paid; my latest paycheque is now two weeks late.

Flightnetwork.com

I'm currently trying to find out whether the tickets I've booked for a trip in a couple of weeks have been processed, and have been on hold with Flightnetwork.com for the last twenty minutes.

They have what is possibly the most annoying hold music ever; if nothing else, it's on a loop that lasts about forty seconds, and there's not much that would still sound good on the fortieth repetition in so short a span of time.

Happy Canada Day!

July 1st is Canada Day, Canada's official birthday. I feel terrible - I forgot to get it anything (and yes, I've been using that same joke all week.) It's 145 years old today!

I've been out at the official celebrations, at the Parliament building. There was entertainment all day, but I just popped along for the free concert and firework display, which was pretty darned impressive. The concert less so, though that's mainly because I had no idea who the artists playing were. Why yes, I am an old man.

It was impressive to see so many people, all out enjoying themselves, and not determined to drink themselves into a stupor, even though it was a lovely warm day. And people were so proud of being Canadians - there were impromptu choruses of the national anthem on the way out, and so many flags everywhere. I can't remember the last time I saw people who were actually proud to be British in such numbers, and you're only going to wear the flag like that if you're an athlete or in the National Front.

So it was a lovely day, and the fireworks were spectacular. I'd recommend booking in for July 1st next day quickly ;)