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November 1, 2002

Who's A Big Mover?

For anyone wondering what Nortel Networks offers its lower-rung employees for hours of unpaid overtime on weekdays and weekends, here's your answer.

November 1, 2002

The Irrational Market

It's Hallowe'en. I'm sitting at my door with a huge bowl full of lollipops and peanut butter cups. I'm giving them away. Everyone knows this. And all they have to do to get some of what I'm giving is to walk up to my door, knock or ring, then hold out their hands or sacks. They don't have to pay me anything. Yet between 6:30 and 8:30 p.m., the average children/quarter hour was four. The largest number was eight in the third last quarter, follwed by the lowest number -- zero -- in the 15-minute period after. This is the sad result of an irrational market.

My first hypothesis was that, in the eyes of the consumer, the product that is advertised as free has some hidden cost -- the time and effort to get to my door, the resources spent on dressing up in a costume, the opportunity cost of not doing something in order to get the candy, etc. But this argument falls away pretty quickly. Although the weather was chilly, it simply doesn't compare with the sleet and high winds that characterized last year's Hallowe'en. This year has been relatively mild. And since these are neighbourhood kids, they aren't travelling great distances. Also, the effort put into costuming was not great, by any standard. Some kids had store-bought get-ups. Others just showed up in their everyday clothes. Opportunity costs? Unless these children took time off from their 6-10 shifts to go door-to-door, there weren't any. I conclude there were no hidden costs. The product was absolutely free.

My second hypothesis was that there was something wrong with the product itself. I'm giving out two or three peanut butter cups with three or four lollipops. Could these items and/or their quantities have resulted in negative word-of-mouth among the consumers? Shoudl I have splurged on the expensive O-Henry bars, or gone for a niche market with DoubleBubble gum or glazed peanuts? I happened to glance in the bags of some of the kids. Let me just say that they were definitely getting a superior product at my house. One disreputable entrepreneur was handing out foil-wrapped balls of cheap milk chocolate, the ones that look like little pumpkins. There oughta be a law.

My final hypothesis was that kids these days simply do not have the skills to realize the greatest return for minimal effort. Just as people are hard-pressed to make their own bread these days, so too have children lost the valuable knowledge of past generations. I saw no-one clutching rough sketches of the neighbourhood showing an optimized route. There was no evidence of collaboration among the consumers to lead newcomers to the best finds. No-one was seen carrying two or more sacks, evidently preferring to fill a single inadequate Tim Horton's treat bag. Sad.

November 3, 2002

The Critic

My friend Ken wanted me to critque one of his Management Accounting papers for his CMA course. At 7:00 pm, he e-mailed his 1000-word article summary to me. He didn't send the article. He wanted me to critique it in time for a meeting over coffee two hours later. It was due at midnight, so it was unlikely he would implement any of the changes I suggested. Plus, based on the last time I critiqued a paper for him, I didn't expect him to care. I'm sure Ken was thinking, "How could Eric not be motivated to do this?" I read the summary. It stank -- horrible spelling, run-on sentences, incoherent paragraphs, and an insincere tone throughout. It was obviously slapped together between his supper and the time he sent it to me. And I know he expected to get an 'A' with this.

My brother Jeff joined us at the coffee meeting at the nearby Tim Horton's. Together -- that is, Jeff and I -- we reworked the summary into something approaching a B, maybe a B+. Neither of us had read the article. We just drew on our combined experience and knowledge. Ken sat back and watched. What was he going to offer? At least I had fun working with my brother. After, Ken thanked us and took his paper home to retype it.

I agree with Jeff. I should refuse to do it next time, just to observe Ken's reaction. Ahhh. Probably, he won't care.

November 6, 2002

I'm Training Him Wrong On Purpose

Should I feel worried? My manager, my director, and a project manager want me to train a contractor on the basic workings of a 1x network, and then review his performance with them so that they can decide whether or not to hire him full-time. This is way beyond my job description. Are they testing me to see if I'd make a good manager? Are they abdicating their responsibilities because they're bad managers?

I'm training the guy. He doesn't speak English very well. He doesn't appear to have any IP knowledge or networking experience. He was hired months ago, but didn't take any initiative to learn about the networks. Neither did he show any desire to hang around the people in the 1x projects. On the good side, he's persistent when given a specific task, and he does have an ability to learn. Then again, I don't really like him. He just rubs me the wrong way. I hope that's a good enough reason not to renew his contract.

November 7, 2002

Living in a Suburban Paradise

I have a love/hate relationship with bureaucracy. The dance of paper and protocol enchants and mesmerizes. But sometimes I don't want to dance. Sometimes I just want to speed over to the buffet table and get my food already, and I shouldn't have to do this stupid waltz or lambada or what have you. My question is, "Why doesn't the bureaucracy serve my whims?"

I raked the leaves and twigs from my yard. I put them in bags and kept them in my garage until the designated yard waste disposal day arrived, and then I put them on the curb expecting them to be gone when I got back from work. When I got home, the leaf bags were still there. I figured it was because the weather which had suddenly turned snowy, and the truck got bogged down in traffic. Some other peoples' bags had also not been picked up. I brought the bags back into my garage and waited for the next designated yard waste disposal day. The second time around, the weather was sunny and clear, so I put the bags out with high hopes. When I got home, though, the bags were still there. Humph. I called the City Waste Management department to complain. The francophone woman on the end of the line explained my error. I had used ordinary plastic garbage bags for the leaves. Yard waste is picked up only if it is in paper yard waste bags or a box that can be emptied. See? It all makes sense now. I remember feeling more vague resentment towards the labbying efforts of the powerful paper bag manufacturing industry than the City's waste management policy.

So I bought myself ten big paper yard waste bags from the nearby hardware store. I only needed three, but I am planning ahead in case there is a future shortage and my own convenience. Then I emptied the plastic bags of the leaves and filled the paper ones. Then I went down to Waste Management Office in City Hall and filled out the required form WM2480-Y-1A, got that stamped. I took the form up two floors to the household licencing office, where I paid my annual yard waste disposal licence fee and got my ID checked and then had a photo taken. In four to six weeks, I should receive my new yard waste disposal identification card in the mail, and a printed record showing that I am registered in the yard waste disposal management database. I've been told to keep the ID card and the form handy, in case any waste management employee asks to see them as proof. Once I get the card, I can safely put my yard waste on the curb, where it will be collected by the proper authorities.

November 21, 2002

Caesar Enricqus

I admit it; I'm addicted to The Game. I installed it a few days ago to deal with crushing boredom. After the first couple of nights playing past midnight, my eyes stinging from staring at the monitor for hours, I realized just how sick I had become. So I removed it. That was it. Never again.

I re-installed it yesterday. I have to teach those Greeks a lesson. How can one little phalanx beat a veritable army of Roman archers? What the heck is going on? The computer must be cheating. Well, I don't care anything about this game. In fact, I'll just turn away from the monitor. It's my turn? Maybe I'll get around to it. Oh, here's "The Hockey News." There's a little feature on Super Mario, and I'll think I'll read -- now! Attack, archers! Attaaaaack!!!

November 25, 2002

There's Nothing On

Who would have guessed I'd get bored of television AND the Internet? But it happened. I found I was doing all of my web surfing at work. When I got home, all I did was refresh the same pages, hoping there would be something new, but there wasn't. I have the VIP cable package, which provides me with 72 channels of 24-hour content. I ended up watching "Star Trek" reruns, and, lately, the refreshingly unedited "Looney Tunes" cartoons on the Cartoon Network. It's not worth $95 a month to me, so I'm going back to Basic Cable. I was going to cancel it all together, just go cold turkey. Luckily, cooler heads prevailed.

December 1, 2002

Capsule Movie Reviews

Now that my cable service has been significantly reduced, I've been forced to leave the house for my dose of pre-packaged entertainment. (Small steps, Eric.) I can't believe how much I was missing.

Die Another Day (aka "Buy This Car! Buy This Watch!")

Beautiful people get caught up in a web of international intrigue. Action, suspense and sex follow. Non-conformist individual who seeks to overthrow the status quo (i.e. re-negotiating arbitrary Cold War-era political boundaries) dies a horrible death.

Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets (aka "Kids Make The Best Consumers")

Beautiful people get caught up in a web of intramural intrigue. Action and suspense follow. Non-conformist individual who seeks to overthrow the status quo (i.e. cancelling racial quotas in student enrolment) dies a horrible death.

The Ring (aka "Most Brutal Chain Letter Ever")

Beautiful people get caught up in a web of interdimensional intrigue. Action, suspense, and allusions to sex follow. Non-conformist individual who seeks to overthrow the status quo (i.e. MPAA-enforced copyright laws) forces others to die horrible deaths.