Love, As Always, Pete

The Weekly Letters, by A. Pedersen Wood

October 16, 2003

Dear Everyone:

Still not on my way to Singapore.  That project appears to be on hold for a while.  Ditto some other aspects of a much larger project of which Singapore was only a part.  From the little I’ve heard, it’s a classic example of the customer changing the parameters after the project’s been started.  (“I know we said a kidney-shaped pool, but now that the hole’s already been dug, I think I’d rather have it look like a tulip.”)

So that, and some other things I was supposed to be helping out on, has been put on a back burner for now.

On the Plus Side, a project that I’ve been working on (with some help from a co-worker) for months came to an end today when the last of thousands of boxes were changed to different owners.  It is a rare and satisfying thing to be able to mark a project completed and tell the customer how much money they’re going to save over the next year.

Also, the Singapore thing had a positive side affect in that it woke up the document management team that they really should have a backup in the training department.  They assigned someone from the IT (Information Technology) group to be my backup.

So I spent some time working with a person who will be the “Hobby” training coordinator (and he’s to have a backup as well) to show him the ropes.  And I’ve been spending time with my West Coast backup.  All of this just in time because someone finally thought to mention the fact that some 200+ people may need to be trained by the end of the year.

Take a look at a calendar.  It takes time to line up training rooms.  (Those are rooms equipped with hands-on PC’s and a projector and stuff like that.)  So we can’t really start until the week after next.  Five weeks until Thanksgiving.  Two weeks after that and then everyone’s off for Christmas.  If you have one training session per week, with an average of 10 students per session, that’s only 70 people.

Double the number of sessions per week and you can cover around 140.  Since not all of those folks are here in the Bay Area, we figure we can pretty much meet the “demand”.  And some of the projected roll-outs may get a later start than are currently planned.  So we’ll keep our fingers crossed.

Unless I suddenly find myself on a plane to Hong Kong and then all bets are off.

In other news…

When I thought I was going to be “out of town” starting this Monday, I quickly moved to change my hair appointment and a dentist checkup.  Once I got word about the project being on hold, I decided to stay with the new dates.  So I got my hair cut last Saturday, one week earlier than usual.

Then “Jeannie” and I went to a movie.  Intolerable Cruelty is about a divorce lawyer and a “professional” divorcé going up against each other.  As the lawyer, George Clooney is the ultimate in handsome, debonair and cunning.  As the woman with many ex-husbands, Catherine Zeta-Jones is nothing less than stunning.

Attracted to each other, yet knowing each is unattainable, they circle like wary adversaries, feinting and parrying.  Traps are set and sprung.  A good time is had by all.  Lots of unexpected cameos by high-level actors who probably did it just for the fun of it.  Also, many Simon and Garfunkel songs.  Thoroughly enjoyable and worth the price of a matinee ticket.  You should go.

Love, as always,

 

Pete

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