January 26, 2006
Dear Everyone:
Last night was ARMA night, hence this week’s Letter lands back on Thursday.
I survived my PMP [Performance Management Program] meeting yesterday, although my PMP document will have to be completely rewritten. This comes as no surprise. No matter what you say, the boss wants to hear it another way. Example: Never use “help” if you can use “mentor”. The higher-up manager really likes the word, “mentor”.
The other hitch is that we changed operating companies in the middle of the year. The “old” operating company preferred one format, the “new” operating company uses something quite different. So, hours have been spent preparing for PMP. Hours that can’t be billed to a customer. These are called “Management” non-billable time. More hours will be spent redoing the previous work, plus more work to find out how many people I, personally, trained last year. (Or, as my boss said, “Guess. Make something up.”)
And then they have the nerve to complain that we don’t bill enough of our time.
In other news…
Last Saturday, I decided to have just one more meat roll for dinner. I bit down on what felt like a bit of bone in the ground beef. But as soon as I saw it, I knew it wasn’t bone. It was tooth. Specifically, it was a substantial part of tooth number 12. Or, put another way, it was the part of the tooth that was holding all the old fillings together.
Luckily, it didn’t hurt at all. And the rough side is on the outside, away from the tongue. On Monday, I called the dentist’s office and the only day that he could see me that didn’t interfere with meetings I had to attend, was 4:00 this afternoon. My dentist confirmed that there is a crown in my future. Unfortunately, he is booked month’s ahead. Fortunately, he now has an associate who had free time tomorrow morning. So I’ll get started on the new crown in the morning.
In the meantime…
One of my customers is “Boring & Really Expensive Services” (BRES). They decided that they wanted to consolidate many electronic file cabinets into one in the document management system. They had agreed on a company-wide file structure. Until last week, when one of the managers thought it would be a really nifty idea to make a major change in the structure.
Naturally, all the other managers, who had to agree to this change, are too busy with, among other things, PMPs of their own. So the project was rapidly grinding to a halt. The project manager (not a manager herself) sent an ultimatum and we’re back on track again.
So tomorrow, when I’m not at the dentist, and not rewriting my PMP, I’ll be working on coming up with a training plan and training materials to teach the BRES folks how to use their shiny, new file structure.
By the way, a broken tooth wasn’t enough to keep me from joining “Jeannie” and her friend at the movies last Sunday. We saw Casanova, a movie which should in no way be confused with the historical figure, Giacomo Casanova.
Heath Ledger, an
Australian actor, plays Casanova, the famous Italian lover, as a rather
impoverished English nobleman.
But never mind. The
first scene offers a clue into why Casanova felt compelled to love every
woman in
This is a romantic, comic piece of fluff, with lots of laughter, hot air balloons of various sizes, and a protagonist who changes identities faster than you can change your socks. Also, Jeremy Irons is a hoot as the Grand Inquisitor, complete with orange wig. The plot doesn’t really matter. Just sit back and enjoy.
One other thing.
People familiar with sailboats know about the “Jenny Sail”.
This is a sail that is attached to the top of the mast and
billows out in front of the boat.
“Jenny Sail” is actually a nickname for the “Genoa
Sail”. One of the main
characters is from
Love, as always,
Pete
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