When the solution becomes a problem

Due to the snow we've had over the past week or so, there have been a great many school closures in the UK, including our county.

On every hand, there are pointers telling us to visit this website to find out if our kids' schools are closed. How great that they have this facility. I'm assuming that the headteacher of each school is able to access the site directly to indicate closures. Great. So parents can go there instead of all frantically trying to ring the school and getting the engaged signal. Wonderful.

Except that, as soon as all the parents in the county tried to access it, it fell over! So the local radio station stepped into the breach and began announcing school closures. So good that they have a plan B.

Except that the radio was getting its information from the website, and the traffic on the server meant that the school representatives responsible for updating the website couldn't access it. So the information so kindly being supplied by the local radio station was not up to date.

We do know that the school bus service isn't running. This is a private service, paid for by parents. So we know that a good proportion of the students won't be there. Usually, under these circumstances, the schools are closed, but the problem with the server has made it impossible to find out.

For goodness' sake, when you build a solution, make sure that you have considered the logistics, and that it is actually going to be able to cope with the demands for the service it offers!

This is not the only example we see like this. The A&E (accident and emergency) services are in a similar position. When you hurt yourself, every signpost points to your local A&E. When you get there, you are likely to sit for 3 or 4, maybe even 7 hours waiting to be seen. While you wait, you can read the posters on the wall that tell you all the other places you could have gone - your pharmacy, your GP, the NHS helpline - all of which will no doubt have told you to come to A&E! Left hand, right hand.

When the millenium (foot)bridge was built in London, it had to be closed for repairs almost immediately because of the extent to which it swayed. The engineers announced that this was due to a phenomenon known as simultaneous footfall. When the designed the footbridge, they apparently didn't take into consideration the fact that people would be walking on it. Lots of them. All at the same time.

When we're designing solutions, let's consider the implementation aspect. The practicalities. The logistics. This is where it is very useful to have a friend on the inside (of the IT department). Unless the IT department knows what is envsiaged, they can do nothing to accommodate it. They also can't alert you to possible barriers to implementation.

It's also a good idea to include some load-testing in the battery of user tests you carry out on a solution before implementing it.

bonus pic of the day - hearts

I couldn't risk waiting until morning, because the steadily falling snow is likely to have obliterated these tracks made by one of our neighbours pulling out of his driveway. I hope the light is good enough to see the result! Pity this didn't happen in 5 days' time!

Jumping back up on the 'mandatory' soap box

Last time I addressed this issue, I got into serious trouble and wound up having to delete the post. But a presentation at the recent Learning Technologies conference has once again raised this matter on my radar, and I'm sorry, but it has to be said. Again.

In the L&D business, we are dealing with adults!

"Well, duh!" I hear you say. Except that it's nowhere near as well duh as I would like.

One of the primary reasons I didn't become a school teacher (in spite of an aptitude test that returned a massive spike for teaching) was because I didn't ever want to be faced with a group of people who were there against their will. I wanted all my learners to be there by choice.

So why oh why do we try to force adults to complete our learning programmes?

The presentation I am referring to covered the learning support provision around a change programme within an organisation. They made it mandatory.

Now, I don't know about you, but my experience of making things mandatory with busy adults is that they have the power of veto. They just say no: either explicitly or tacitly. I have been in several meetings over the years when I have pointed out that the worst culprits for not completing 'mandatory' programmes is senior management. I have asked what they plan to do do address the fact that the SMT might simply opt not to complete the learning programme and have lost count of the number of times the response has been of the order of "Well, they just must". Oh yeah? Or what?

Well, the answer in this particular organisation is that they linked completion of the training programme to departmental budgets. No training completion, no budget approval. And for good measure, no bonuses either.

The presenter seemed to see this as a good thing and referred to it as the 'carrot'. Sorry, but to me, that looks like a stick. A carrot would be an increased budget, a team weekend away, an increased bonus, new laptops... something along those lines. A carrot is a reward, not the threat of loss of standard affordances.

But surely the best thing you can do is develop a resource that is worth their while to use? And by involving the user community/target audience along the way, the resource is already on its way to being owned by the community by the time it is launched. And if you build in ways for the community to contribute to the material, it becomes even more theirs.

Now I'm not that naive. I have built facilities for user generated content into solutions I have designed in the past, and they have been used very little and then fizzled out. But I don't believe that this reduces the validity of the approach. We simply need to sell it better. To get more buy-in. To get the comms people on board. To have a few evangelists out there among the general populace. And the issues we address need to be important to the community. We will only identify those with any accuracy if we involve them in the solution itself, instead the whole 'done to' thing.

Making a thing mandatory is not the way forward. Think about the longer term. You might be able to claim a 98% take-up rate for your solution, but how much learning actually went on? How much change will you see in the workplace? And how much damage have you done to people's attitudes to learning solutions? As if our jobs weren't tough enough as it is!

I know that you could stop reading this blog at any time. You have that freedom. And I wouldn't deprive you of it. I'm thrilled that you're here, but I'm not going to force you to stay. I simply have to work hard to make sure that you want to stick around and see what I have to say tomorrow.

I like to approach learning solutions in the same way. There are going to be all sorts of recommendations to you to swing by. All sorts of signposts that tell you this is a good place to come for help. And when you do, I'm going to bust a gut to make sure that your experience is such that you'll stick around. That you'll come back. That you'll tell the guy at the next desk about it.

Because you're a grown-up. A busy one. And I respect that.

pic of the day - happy dog

Closely related to my learning point of the day. This is where Jess and I start 'school' next week.

Learning point of the day - hand signals

Today I went along to watch a session of the obedience class where Jessie and I start next week. Jessie was unbelievably good. Better behaved, in fact, that some of the dogs coming to the end of their training. She didn't try to go after the ball that the lady was playing with as a deliberate temptation the dogs had to ignore. She didn't go after the broom. She didn't bark at the wheelchair. She socialised most politely with the other dogs present and, in the only situation that degenerated into snarling and snapping, she wasn't the aggressor.

I watched the hand signals used to teach the dogs to sit, stay, and 'down' (lie down). The general rule is to hold your hand at the height you want the dog's head to be (which was a bit tricky for the older lady with the tiny border terrier). So to get him to stand, you use the verbal command and hold your hand at his standing head height. To get him to go down, you use the verbal command and drop your hand to the height his head will be when he lies down. The exception is 'sit', for which you bend your arm at the elbow and raise your hand to shoulder height, palm towards you, back of the hand towards the dog. I guess because, when a dog sits, he feels as if he is raising his head.

When you want the dog to stay, you show him a flat palm, as you would if you were directing traffic to stop.

The ideal is to reach the point where they obey the spoken command without the hand signals.

The lady who was running the session is training up a dog to be used by a person in a wheelchair and she showed us a few of the extra commands that such a dog (also called Jess) needs to learn. For example, she needs to learn to take up her place behind the wheelchair, so that she can respond to either side as necessary, without crossing in front of the chair and endangering herself and the occupant. Even at 7 months old, she was so obedient and so willing it was heartening to watch.

Jess and I start at 10:30 next Monday, but, after all the conflicting messages we have been receiving, it was a real boost to hear that we might have to be shunted to the 11:30 class because the 10:30 class is for beginners and Jess might not need that level of training! The 11:30 class is for those who have graduated from the 10:30.

Way to go informal learning for dogs! Way to go, Jessie!

pic of the day - snowfall

We have more snow falling here at the moment. It's a bit slushy so it might not settle, but the forecast is for more snow overnight. I love the way the flakes catch the light of the flash, but, in case you're ooh-ing and ah-ing as I did over the large orange one - that's a street lamp in the background.

Learning point of the day - ELVs

No, not elves. ELVs. Experimental Law Variations. This is something that's happening in rugby at the moment.

The powers that be are experimenting with the game to see if it can be improved, so they tweak this or that law and the variation stays in place for a couple of seasons to see if it does, in fact, improve the game.

The one that was being mentioned during the Wales v Scotland (through which I confess to have slept due to extreme exhaustion) was the law about kicking out from within your own 22 yard section of the field. It used to be that this was permissible, but the ELV in place at present means that if the ball has been carried (passed) back into this area, you may not simply kick it straight out.

I realise that I am something of a hypocrite. I embrace change in the workplace. I recognise that my entire career is built on change.

But, when it comes to sport...

Do. Not. Mess. With. Perfection!

Let's look at it like this. Most of the soccer fixtures were cancelled this week because of frozen pitches. Soccer is a game in which full body contact is not permitted, and in which the players spend almost their entire time upright. The Six Nations rugby fixtures, on the other hand, went ahead as scheduled. Rugby is a full contact sport in which the players spend much of their time being pulled or knocked to the ground, often ending up under a pile of other players.

Rugby is not a game for fashion icons or the precious. It is a rough, uncompromising game. And I love it.

No doubt my objection to their existence will not bring a halt to ELVs, so I expect to spend some time being confused by the ever changing rules in a game I used to know like the back of my hand.

Sigh.

pic of the day - a shady character

This here is my rock. The love of my life. My bedmate of 20 years plus. The father of my sons. The donor of my surname.

This picture was taken while we were buying snow boots for the boys (and I, of course, wound up with a pair, too - never let it be said that I passed up an opportunity to augment my shoe collection!). John was mucking about trying on sunglasses. I think this pair looks rather good on him.

Learning point of the day - RP

So my elder son is turing into a geek, what of it? He has recently joined the ranks of World of Warcraft players. Under the tutelage of an experienced friend, he has made excellent progress, and we hear all about his adventures as an undead.

He has been explaining about RP - roleplay. I would have thought that all these games were RP, and that this was how they were distinct from virtual environments like Second Life, but I would have been wrong. You have the option to control your avatar, but remain aloof from it, or to play AS your avatar. In the case of the former, your dialogue represents what you as a person have to say. In the case of the latter, all dialogue is in character as your avatar, unless you prefix it with /o, which means officer speak.

There are specific servers given over to this mode of play. Those who opt not to immerse themselves to this extent have the option to complete quests and the like.

So, in Second Life, my avatar is virtual projection of me - it takes on my character, and allows me to interact with others through their avatars. In WoW, my avatar is either a plaything (like a doll, in many respects) or I, conversely, take on its character. No doubt, there are people who role play in Second Life, too, since it affords them an opportunity to become something they're not: a different gender or race, thinner, more beautiful, a fairy, an (anthropomorphic) animal.

My husband and I were listening to our son talking and reflecting that RP wasn't so very different from the improvisational games we used to play as kids. Most of the time, you spoke in character, but, every now and again, in order to manipulate the way things were going, you could slip out of character and make an announcement.

In WoW, there are strict rules about RP. You may not play God. You may not say that you are killing everyone... or even inflicting some harm on them. You can only say that you are trying to do so, in order to give them the opportunity to respond. I'm not sure we articulated it as clearly when we played cops and robbers, but any child who declared that he had just killed us all would get shouted down by everyone else present - just as in life, everyone gets a say!

The line between controlling an avatar to complete a quest and playing as an avatar is a fine one, but very distinct. I only hope that I have explained it clearly!

pic of the day - you don't say!

Right in the middle of the driveway to our local supermarket, standing proud in the slush, are these two cones warning us of the wet floor. What next?

Ken Robinson - who inspires you?

Hat tip to Jeff Utecht for posting this video in which Ken Robinson describes how his father inspired him: "Not only did he give me life, so to speak, he gave me a life." Fantastic.

He ends the video with a challenge. Who inspires you?

Actually, Sir Ken, I'm way ahead of you... for once! I blogged about this over a year ago.

But I'd like to extend the challenge.

Who inspires you?

belated pic of the day - personalised sandwich

I can't believe I forgot to post this on Tuesday!

It was a snow day and I asked my younger son to make me a cheese and mayo sandwich for lunch. When he was little his Dad always cut his sandwiches into a T shape and his brother's into a B for the first letters of their names.

I was so tickled with my sarnie that I sent this picture to my husband who can take credit for setting the precedent. As you sow, so shall your wife reap, apparently.

Dog training - who do I believe?

You would have to be either a first time reader or very forgetful not to know that I have recently acquired a dog. I have learned a lot since becoming her owner. She has learned a lot since becoming my dog. Not all of what I have learned has been enjoyable. Not all of what she has learned has been my choice.

I would like to take her for obedience training, to make sure that she and I are learning the right things. The trouble is, the dog training people are telling me such conflicting stories, I don't know who to believe. One lot say that you have to teach your dog to see you as pack leader. The other lot say that your dog shouldn't see you as part of the pack at all, but as a human. One lot say that when you walk with your dog, you must hold its head up high so that it can't sniff everything. But dogs do sniff. Why is that a bad thing? That same lot says holding the dogs head up makes it feel proud, like in a dog show. But maybe dogs in shows are doing what people think makes them look good rather than what dogs think looks good. After all, dogs roll in the most unspeakable things and, having done so, seem rather pleased with themselves.

At the first obedience school we went to, a German Shepherd barked rather fiercely at my dog. One of the trainers grabbed him fore and aft, flung him onto his back and shouted profanities into his face. If she had done that to my dog, I'd have been likely to bite her myself! The second woman we spoke to said all this 'dominance' stuff is nonsense. She spoke calmly to my dog and rewarded her when she responded. I liked her.

Then we started watching Cesar Milan, the genius dog-whisperer chap. He seems to support everything the first lot said. And he certainly achieves an unprecedented level of obedience in the delinquent dogs he works with.

My dog is not delinquent. She is pretty obedient and seems happy. But that is likely to change as the various members of the family adopt the methodologies that make sense to them:

• I like Happy Dogs' approach
• My older son will do anything Cesar Milan advises - even if the behavioural problem being addressed is not applicable to our dog
• My younger son thinks as long as she's happy, why bother with anyone's approach? But he's the first to complain when she gets a bit rough and uses her teeth on him in play
  
• Because my husband's long working day means he doesn't spend that much time with her, she does not mind him at all. This annoys him and he communicates that to her. He needs the intervention of an expert to help him build a more mutually rewarding relationship with her.

Jessie, poor girl, needs a consistent message. So we need to pick one and stick with it.

But whose?

A long time ago, in my early days of blogging, I attracted some criticism by saying you need to pick your expert on a topic. It's in cases like this that I maintain that one message is needed.

Learning point of the day

I have always maintained that, as learning professionals, we should always be learning. Of course, those of us who inhabit this space are doing exactly that, but we are by no means typical. I meet altogether too many corporate trainers who see it as their job to know and to impart what they know. Being seen as a learner is to expose your underbelly - a position of vulnerability altogether too many are not prepared to adopt.

It occurs to me that posting a pic of the day allows readers a glimpse into my life. What it seldom does is afford you a glimpse into my learning journey. And that, after all is what this blog is about (hence the name). So I thought I'd redress that. I'm not sure how long I'll be able to sustain it, but I thought I'd have a learning point of the day post. Some days it may be something significant about learning and/or technology. Other days, it may be something trivial. But my learning journey is both life-long and life-wide, so I am just as likely to learn something about dogs as I am about technology. In fact, the issue of learning about dogs is looming so large at the moment, that I shall afford it a separate post today.

My learning point of today concerns snow. For you Canadians, this is going to seem very 'well duh!' but if you bear with me, I promise not to make fun when you have a learning experience about sunshine ;o)

What I learned is this - snow melts ice.

Immediately outside our back door is a wooden deck. Just beyond that, is a small lawn. The lawn is higher than the deck and is held in place by a retaining wall made of railway sleepers. On Tuesday, I tried to clear a path across the deck to the lawn because our dog was slipping as she tried to make her way to the grass for... well, you know what for. The trouble is, the snow had melted and a thick sheet of ice had attached itself to the deck, and, short of gouging great scars in the wood, I couldn't achieve my goal.

Today I was able to clear the path I wanted. Why? Yesterday's heavy (by our standards, okay?) snowfall formed an insulating layer which melted the ice enough that I could scrape it loose without damaging the wood.

Mind you, I don't know how long it will last - the snow is still falling.

I also learned that, if you're clearing a flight (do you call it that when there are only three of them?) of steps, you start with the top one. Now that I kinda figured that out before I started, but it would have meant going up the icy steps initially because, as I said, the deck is lower than the lawn. Being afraid to slip, I started at the bottom, where I could stand securely on the cleared deck. It did mean that I had to do the whole job twice, but... meh.

You may be wondering why I was doing work like this at all when I have (a) a damaged shoulder/neck and (b) two perfectly healthy teenage sons. The answer is that I felt like it.

pic of the day - a boy and his dog

The quality of this photo is really poor, but it absolutely had to be pic of the day. My dog is off the leash for the first time, and she and my younger son are charging around the park enjoying the freedom.

On our way home afterwards, my son offered to help an elderly lady who was shoveling her driveway. He worked very hard and chatted politely to her all the while as he did. When he was done and she thanked him, he said, "You're welcome."

Some days you realise, with all your faults, you must be doing be doing something right!

A snowy day

Last night, we had by far the heaviest snowfall we've seen in the UK in the 10 years we've been here. It had never occurred to me that snowfall was inconsistent. Our back garden has about 15-20cm, but a field near our house was easily under about 30cm.

My younger son and I took the dog for a walk this morning and, feeling very daring, let her off the leash for the first time ever. She was ecstatic! She made friends with other dogs and raced around the park at a speed that wouldn't disgrace a greyhound. But she came back when she was called. One of the dogs she met was a pedigree Akita and the likeness between the two of them was unmistakeable.

I made this little video clip at one point:

pic of the day - cleaning crew

These are the two young Korean students who clean my house for me once a week. When the head of their language school approached me to ask if I could offer them a cleaning job, he was slightly embarrassed to be offering me male cleaners - in the UK, domestic cleaners are still almost all female. I was happy to assess their efficiency on the work done rather than their gender.

Minjun Kang (left) has a dust allergy - hence the mask, and Kiho Yun (right) yelps every time one of my cats appear - although he insists that he is not afraid of them, merely startled by them!

They work very hard and are sweating profusely by the time they leave. Every few weeks, they come and ask me if I have "any commentary" on their work.

What's not to like?

Growing up - those penny dropping moments

Mild profanity warning.

Several of my Facebook friends are the contemporaries of my sons: school friends, kids from church, girlfriends, ex-girlfriends, etc. Apparently, I am a legend. I'm fairly sure that my legendary status is not unique. Perhaps they befriend all their contemporaries' parents in a bid for higher friend counts.

Be that as it may, I love reading their status updates. This is because I find teenagers so fascinating. They swing from moments of crystal clear, mature observation and insight right back to complete self absorption in a heartbeat. They fly high and swing low. They crow in delight at an astonishing achievement and then slump into the Slough of Despond because person X called them a name. All in the blink of an eye. I am aware that they're quite fragile at this age, and (when I can) I try to offer encouragement and support.

For example, one girl - let's call her Ivy - has generated the following status stream over the last while (names deleted, but no other corrections made):

Ivy is on msnnn (:
Ivy is depresseeddd.. i hate januray :(
Ivy is the only person alive to not like [name deleted]. (:
Ivy 's arm hurts. i hate injections. yes i cried at school. Cringeeyy,
Ivy thinks hes so weirdddd- LOL
Ivy should of kept her mouth shut
Ivy s in scienceee- [name deleted] (:

and then suddenly - with complete coherence:

Have you ever noticed that the people that tell you to calm down are the people that pissed you off in the first place?

That's one of those real 'you know what?' moments, and a perception that is unlikely to change any time soon, because I have to agree with her. And I told her as much. When kids are little and their worlds crash around their ears, you can scoop them into your lap and hold them there for a bit until they have recovered their equilibrium - providing them a safe space in which to feel broken.

When they are in their teens, your hugs aren't enough any more. Their problems have moved beyond the scope of a hug as a repair mechanism (and chances are, they think you're to blame for the catastrophe anyway).

Our elder son is in a bad place right now, being victimised at school. Recently over his monthly 1:1 breakfast with his Dad, he said "I thought I had moved on from this. I thought I had left this behind. How come I'm back here?" He was piecing together the realisation that chapters once closed may re-open and that long-healed hurts have a way of resurfacing. He announced that he doesn't like this growing up business and that he doesn't want to turn 18 this year, after all. When I later asked him what he planned to do instead, he reverted completely to mischievous imp and said "Dance!"

Well I hope he does - both literally and metaphorically. So, in the unlikely event that there are any teenagers reading this while going through one of those uncomfortable moments of being grown up, may I dedicate the words of this (completely uncool) song to you. I am aware that this is actually a Lee Ann Womack song, but her version on YouTube is not embeddable, so here's an alternative:

The benefits of enablement and empowerment

I came across this story via a Facebook group this morning. It is the very moving account of a young girl with severe hearing impairment and her hearing dog. The change in this little girl's life is enormous... and it's all about empowerment. About enablement.

• She has gained independence "she felt safer with Gem".
  
• She sleeps better, "before we had Gem, Evie had never, not even once, slept through the night in her own bed. Now she goes to bed at 7.30pm and gets up the next morning at 7.00am," with the knock-on effect that her parents, now do, too.
  
• Her behaviour has improved "her improvement in behaviour has also been noted by her grandparents and her teacher"
  
• Best of all, she has grown in confidence "In the past, Evie has been very reluctant to speak in front of others and on many previous occasions when her teacher has asked her to talk about something she has said no. However, a half day was recently dedicated to Evie at school for her to tell the children about her new dog. Evie stood at the front of the class, and spoke non-stop for a full five minutes." I confess, I welled up when I read that. I am a sucker for stories of empowerment!

Not all enablement involves a learning solution. Imagine if someone had sat down and said, right, we need to send Evie on a training course to improve her behaviour!

Women in charge? Consider all options!

Euan Semple shared a link via Twitter to this post by Leon Benjamin this morning, which cites (but does not link to) material by Paul Harris and opines that the world should be compelled to put women in charge because we are apparently

more honest, more loyal, more caring, more thoughtful, more trustworthy, and much less dangerous

He goes on to point out how, if women had been running the show, there would have been

no Hitler. There is no Mussolini. There is no Napoleon. There is no Hirohito. There is no Attila. There is no Genghis Khan. There is no Inquisition. There are no Crusades. There is no Robert Mugabe. There is no Ariel Sharon. There is no Stalin. There is no George Bush; Wouldn't that be a safer and happier world?

Well, this is all well and good, but, if we're going to consider the extremes of one gender, we must weigh them up against the extremes of the other. Not every women is a warm motherly, altruistic, nurturing type. Of course, there are not a great many examples of women in positions of extreme power, so this is tricky. However, there is Jezebel. And would you really want to be governed by Imelda Marcos? Let's remember that Margaret Thatcher was behind a time of great unhappiness among blue-collar workers in the UK and is unlikely to have won personality of the month award in the Falklands. Let's consider names like Catherine the (ahem) Great, Bloody Mary and the less-than-merciful Isabella of Spain.

Have a look at this (admittedly hatemongering) site, which mentions these and a few others I hadn't heard of.

In case it seems as if I'm arguing against the case for women in positions of power, I am not. However, I am arguing against the current fashion for a blanket male=bad/old fashioned/outdated; female= good/wise/the way to go.

All humans are flawed, and neither gender has the march over the other. People should be elected to positions of power on their merit, not their gender.

Oh, and one last point to consider in the light of this quote in Benjamin's post:

I am proposing a political movement whose sole purpose is to convince all the nations of the world to change their laws so that only women can hold political office.

Sarah Palin.

I rest my case.

Disaster recovery plans

I recently got an email from someone who expressed disappointment at my husband's flash-in-the-pan blogging. I communicated this to him, and it must have encouraged him because yesterday he produced no fewer than three new posts. Two of them deal with the issue of disaster recovery. You might not quite get his quirky humour, but I reckon that he offers a few useful take-aways.

This is not only an issue that affects large corporates - we solo acts are possibly even more dependent on our data, our apps and our operating systems, and need to know that we can retrieve them if a crisis strikes.

On an obliquely related note, I found it interesting that I had to teach him how to create href codes in html. I often think of myself as a bit of a technical numpty, but I guess if I have something to offer an IT professional, I'm not doing too badly!

On another obliquely related note, his nom de plume is not pronounced 'john is cream', but 'john i scream'. The reason for this is that our surname (row-MACE) sounds very much like the Afrikaans word for ice cream (roomys: ROO-uh-mace) and, among our friends in Cape Town, we were known as 'the ice creams'. It was useful to have such a memorable name when I was freelancing!

Social media - the 'can't be arsed' brigade

Apologies if, in your neck of the words, the phrase is more than the mildly crass epithet it is here.

Steve Borsch of minnov8 has written an interesting article which looks at why execs who don't get social media, well... can't be arsed. Hat tip to Robert Scoble for the link via Twitter.

I'd be interested to know whether it's an accurate reflection, but of course, the people who could tell me aren't reading this!

I must be doing something right!

So it snowed, like two inches here yesterday. Then it rained overnight and much of it melted away. Nevertheless, the schools are closed today... even though there is less snow around than there was when the kids came (safely) home at the end the day yesterday.

What do you suppose the first thing was that each of my sons did on hearing the news that there was to be no school?

My elder son, vanished into World of Warcraft.

My younger son (unasked) ran me a deep, fragrant, hot bath, surrounded by candles and furnished with beautiful music from his iPod which he popped (complete with speaker dock) nearby. I have just stepped forth from said bath and, in spite of the teeth clenching pan in my right shoulder (yes, still!), all is well with my world.

There are some days...

pic of the day - sunrise

I was sitting in my office a few minutes ago when this sight caught my eye. No matter how often I see a lovely sunrise, it never fails to stir me.

The social side of Learning Technologies

On the first night of the conference, Donald hosts a bash at a pub near the conference venue. There are caricaturists, magicians, pool tables and lots of booze. There is also quite a crush and a high level of noise. This year - perhaps because it was the 10th anniversary - the free bar stayed open until long after I had left. Not that my fruit juices were going to break the bank anyway!

So what's the point of this? Is it just a jolly?

During coffee and lunch breaks at the conference, it's heartening to see the networking that takes place, but I suspect the social adds an extra dimension to the conversation. Stopping to watch one of the card tricks, you might find yourself next to someone you've never met before, and, as you speculate on how your signed card found its way into the locked box that was on the floor the whole way through the patter, you have an opening for a conversation. While you may feel a little reticent about introducing yourself to someone whose face looks vaguely familiar, the fact that the person is holding a caricature of him or herself provides you with another conversation opening - "That's pretty good, actually" or, in my case "Gee, that could just as easily be Sarah Palin!"

The fact that many of us speak with longing of having the chance to meet face to face is an indication that this conventional medium has value beyond what you learn in the presentations. There is such a long list of you I want to meet in person and, not being shy, I would have absolutely no reservations about starting up a conversation with you. In fact, you might find yourself being thoroughly hugged! You have been warned. We meet so often in this space, that some of us have become friends. In spite of my rude foot-in-mouth announcement, I felt no awkwardness about hugging George Siemens at our first meeting last week (fortunately, he seemed unfazed).

But I'm not typical, and the ice breaking quality of a drink or two, some snacks, light entertainment and a game of pool, really help to cement the relationships begun during the conference or online beforehand.

So here's my caricature. Whaddya think?

pic of the day - snowy tree

I came across this sight today on my to the dentist. As you can see, the tree is incredibly close to the wall of the house - perfectly placed for a chick flick elopement scene. Add a sprinkling of snow and Bob's yer uncle - a lovely scene.

Sled envy!

A twitterfriend known to me only as Documentally - a rich source of personal perspective material - has just posted this video of himself driving a dog sled. I would love to have a go at this. And I think my half-Akita puppy could easily be trained to do it - she's a strong girl who loves to be out in front, pulling me behind (except for walking, I'm teaching her that this is not how it's done).

The thing is, we've had 354 flakes of snow here today, so I'd need wheels on my sled.

pic of the day - every tribe and tongue and nation

We attend a church with a very culturally diverse congregation. This is the first thing that people see as they enter.

Word cloud: Twitter followers

This is the word cloud of my Twitter followers. I would prefer it if they were not referred to as Twittersheep, since many of them were simply gracious enough to do a reciprocal follow... I started following them first!

Nevertheless, look how large and proud the word learning looms. Teacher and technology also feature. Social isn't way up on the list, but then I guess fish don't discuss water all the time, either.

pic of the day - my (ahem) artistic efforts

I'm pretty creative, but it's all in my head. My hands are not very good at producing what my head imagines. Part of my Christmas gift to my younger son was a commitment to populate two of the painted frames on his bedroom wall. This is the result - there is still one more lizard to be added to the frame on the right, but it isn't dry yet.

I missed yesterday's pic of the day as I tried to write a 700 word report on Track 2 of Learning Technologies 2009. No easy task! I didn't even break for lunch.

Articulate 09 - PC Pro review

My IT support man and sleeping partner forwarded me the link to this review. It's a far better job than the haphazard mentions I have been making lately, but then again, it's a review of the product as a computer application.

If you want a review of the product as a learning development tool, you're better off trawling the blogosphere to see what the learning professionals have to say!

Learning Technologies 09 - random, fresh reflections

I am back in my little office at home after two whirlwind days of Learning Technologies 09 conference. I have to write up a report on Track 2 (learning in practice) and on George Siemens's keynote, which will no doubt be published somewhere. Once I've written the report, I will probably unpack a few of the sessions in greater depth. But I thought I'd just unload some of the initial swirling impressions... in no particular order.

1. L&D professionals are getting the message about learner empowerment. I'm sure the battle is a long way from won, but we're gaining ground
2. L&D professionals are falling out of love with courses and are demonstrating a decrease in the idea that 'we have a performance gap' translates to 'we need a training course'
3. Nevertheless, many L&D professionals are still having a hard time persuading senior management teams that this is not some namby pamby, pink and fluffy HR fad
4. Some organisations and, tragically, some L&D leaders still think it's alright to force, compel, blackmail, threaten, bribe, coerce and otherwise corral staff members into completing a training initiative
5. We need to be careful not to see each shiny New Thing as a replacement of existing things. Sometimes a New Thing is just that: a new thing. One which we can add to our toolkit. When you buy a hammer, you don't throw away your entire toolbox
6. George Siemens is a genius. I had been looking forward to meeting George in the flesh ever since I heard he was coming to the conference. So how did I choose to ensure that our first meeting was the beginning of a lasting, meaningful friendship? The very first words out of my mouth were, "You're a lot smaller than you seem online." Way to go, Karyn! How to win friends and influence people
7. L&D people need to come out of their ivory towers and engage with the business, aligning their provision with the business goals and taking an active role in steering the business forward
   
8. Apparently - according to Jay Cross - I look like Sarah Palin :o( . He took this photo at dinner on Tuesday night to prove his point. You decide. He had threatened to say as much from the platform, but even though he didn't, before the conference was over, word had spread and I was being 'Palin-ed' left and right
9. Some noted luminaries need to move away from the idea that learning = recall!
10. Rapid no longer = quick and dirty. But rapid is not the only option!
    

pic of the day - George Siemens

George delivered this morning's keynote at Learning Technologies. Forty minutes of densely packed, information rich, insightful (PowerPointless - woohoo!) talk.

pic of the day - opening LT2009

Don Taylor, on his birthday, introducing the Learning Techologies 2009 conference this morning.

pic of the day - hobnobbing with the elite

I took this picture at dinner this evening. Seated around the table were Jay Cross (Mr Informal learning), Tony Buzan (Mr Mindmaps), George Siemens (Mr Connectivism), Seb Schmoller (Mr ALT), Don Taylor (Mr Learning Technologies) and me. Here Tony and Jay are pretending to have a deep discussion and philosophical discussion about the menu!

pic of the day - charming!

At about lunch time today, I returned home to see a man pulling this truck up outside my house... in my husband's parking spot. He got out and disappeared. I expected him to reappear some time later and drive away. He has not yet done so and it's now 11:30pm. The vehicle is fully taxed, and since we have no official claim to the parking space, there are no grounds on which to report it to the police.

A neighbour tells me the man is a Gypsy (a term I gather is still allowed in the UK, as long as it is accurately used) and fairly well known in the area as a scrap dealer. What worries us is that the truck is loaded with washing machines, fridges and exercise equipment, none of which are secured in any way. A temptation for an opportunistic thief. And I don't want opportunistic thieves getting the idea that this area is a good place to ply their (ahem) trade! I'm also not keen that said opportunistic thief might drop a washing machine on my car seen to the left of the picture!

Monday laugh - anagrams

Because I'm a sad cryptic crossword geek, and because I'm a keen Scrabbler, I like anagrams. A friend (who obviously doesn't have enough to do) sent me these, many of which are new to me. Apologies for the caps - that's how they arrived:

• DORMITORY: DIRTY ROOM
• PRESBYTERIAN:BEST IN PRAYER
• ASTRONOMER: MOON STARER
• DESPERATION: A ROPE ENDS IT
• THE EYES: THEY SEE
• GEORGE BUSH: HE BUGS GORE
• THE MORSE CODE: HERE COME DOTS
• SLOT MACHINES: CASH LOST IN ME
• ANIMOSITY: IS NO AMITY
• ELECTION RESULTS: LIES - LET'S RECOUNT
• SNOOZE ALARMS: ALAS! NO MORE Z 'S
• A DECIMAL POINT: I'M A DOT IN PLACE
• THE EARTHQUAKES: THAT QUEER SHAKE
• ELEVEN PLUS TWO: TWELVE PLUS ONE
• MOTHER-IN-LAW: WOMAN HITLER

How clever are dogs?

As is to be expected, we have been trying to teach our 'puppy' (does an 8 month old dog weighing in at 21kgs still qualify as such?) certain things.

1. We have tried to teach her to come when she is called. She comes when I call her. She is erratic in response to the boys and she ignores my husband altogether.
2. We have tried to teach her to sit when she is told. She does this when she feels like it. There are times when it is perfectly obvious she knows what you want of her, but she is opting to decline your kind invitation. I have always felt that deliberate disobedience takes more intelligence than unfailing compliance. I'm just not so sure I like it that much!
3. We have tried to housetrain her. She has realised that it's good to pee and poo in the garden. She has yet to learn that it is NOT good to pee and poo on the lounge carpet. Fortunately, our visits to the back garden are frequent enough that she seldom has the need to demonstrate this ignorance.
4. We have taught her to 'stay' when we put her into her 'bedroom' (the integral garage - don't worry - it's been made over into living space. Like most other people in the UK, the last thing we would think of doing with our garage is parking a car in it) or when we leave the house for a short time.
   
5. We have tried to teach her only to take food when given permission. We're making huge progress here, but dogs are by nature foragers and scavengers so, unless she has been expressly told not to eat something that is conveniently placed within her reach (like on the very back of the kitchen counter, for example), she is likely to be found munching away on the chocolate muffin you were saving for later.
6. We have taught her to give a paw when asked for one. Because this generates a reward, she now lifts her paw without being asked... just in case.

And it's this last point that I've been thinking about. Mark Berthelemy (sort of) addressed the issue of dog training in this post a while ago. What about the things they learn without being taught? How much intelligence are they demonstrating?

For example, I am trying to teach my dog to fetch a ball. We need to be sure of her response to recall before we can take her off the lead in parks. During my all too brief lunch break today, I threw a ball for her, using commands like 'fetch', 'bring', 'drop' and 'leave'. She has a short attention span and I could see that she was bored with this game really quickly. I threw the ball, and yelled "Fetch it!" She did. But when I called "Bring it, Jessie!" she failed to comply. Instead, she took the ball to a corner of the garden and put it behind a bush. She then arranged dead twigs and living branches so that the ball was hidden. When I went to retrieve it, she placed herself across my path so that I couldn't reach the ball. When I reached over her, she (gently) headbutted me out of the way and sat down. Quite clearly, she was saying "Leave it!" to me.

I never taught her that. She has never done anything like it before. The closest she has come was to bury a bone, but that's sheer instinct.

Is this informal, learner driven learning in action? One woof for yes, two for no.

pic of the day - the power of Pratchett

On the whole I've never quite 'got' Terry Pratchett, but the Nome series and the Nac Mac Feegle books, I do get. They have me chortling away to myself.

As evidence of their appeal, this is my non-reader 15 year old, engrossed in Wee Free Men, which the inimitable, irrepressible Drew Buddie (aka digitalmaverick) has promised to read and release in podcast form. Drew will make the perfect Nac Mac Feegle. Crivens!

Blurb - for a beautiful gift

This evening I heard about Blurb from the seldom seen (blogwise, at any rate) Michael Sivers and his lovely wife. Said lovely wife used it to make her Mom's Christmas present. Uploading photos and text, she created a beautiful, hardcover coffee table book of her Mom's five grandchildren which moves the grateful recipient to tears every time she talks about it. And all this for the sum of £12 including P&P.

It's my Mom's 70th birthday at the end of this year. I think I've just figured out what to give her.

pic of the day - peeling paint

There are so many things I could have done for today's pic of the day... if only I had remembered to take my camera with me! Instead at 10:20pm, I had to plump for this picture of the top of our en suite bathroom wall. Recently painted, we have no idea how to stop this from happening... or to curb the prolific growth of black mould in the shower. I think a serious remodelling is in order. Yeah, right. Meantime on planet earth, a recession is in effect.

pic of the day - stamping and punching

That was the title of the evening's activities at our once a month ladies' get together. But it was all non-violent. The stamping and punching were of the crafting variety. These two cards were among the fruit of my labours. Ironically, the card labelled Evie is for a friend. Evie will be the fruit of her labours within the next few hours...

Running as assessment?

I used to run. A lot. I don't run anymore. I messed up my knee and the NHS says "We-ell, as we get older..." I don't have private medical. So I don't run anymore.

But I listen to runners talking. Twice a week, as I sit in the clubhouse while my son trains with the club. I hear them discussing this meet and that race.

And I think about running.

If you think about a race, it has a lot in common with summative assessments. You train for weeks on end, then you go and stand on the line with a bunch of other people. When that gun goes off, this is it. This is what all the training and preparation has been about. It doesn't matter how well you did in the training sessions. It matters only how quickly you cross that finish line.

You race against the other runners. You want to do better than them. You race against yourself. You want to do better than before. You're looking for that 'PB' that runners talk about. That personal best.

I'm okay that that's how it works in running.

I'm not okay that that model is applied in education. If I work my tail off all year. If I attend every lesson. If I complete all the set work. If I participate in class discussions and group work. And then I go to pieces in the sepulchral silence and the tension of the exam room, I am considered a loser?

Education is not a race. One brief moment should not outweigh the rest of the year.

In the exam room, I may not talk to other students. On the road, I can talk to other runners. In the exam room, I may not use my phone, or listen to my ipod to soothe my shattered nerves. On the road, I can do both of those things.

Er... no. Not any more.

It seems that in official road races nowadays (as opposed to fun runs) any competitor seen with an iPod is immediately disqualified. Two members of our club fell victim to this ruling at a recent event.

Perhaps they're afraid the person is listening to something which induces the same results as steroids. Perhaps having a rhythm playing in your ears gives you an unfair advantage (Was there ever a song like Faithless's "Mass Destruction" for giving a perfect running rhythm?)

I think we might have started to assess the wrong things out on the road just as much as we have been doing in the exam room.

The tide is moving in the wrong direction!

Unashamed to weep at the cheese!

There are times when songs that I think of as cheesy suddenly stop being cheesy and, instead, move me to tears. This song might be forced off YouTube soon, so catch it while you can. In the light of this week's landmark event in American (world?) history, it seems suddenly pertinent and hopeful and poignant and... not even slightly cheesy. Of course, you may disagree!



Whatever land we call home, and whatever characteristics of it we would sing about were we to have written this song, we really, really need to learn to share it!

pic of the day - my slipper

My genuine Oskava slipper is suffering from dog-pattern baldness!

Articulate community to the rescue

Tuesday was a horrible day for me. I was trying to transfer an Articulate project from my deskptop computer to my laptop. Those who have worked with Articulate will know what a pain that can be. Fortunately, the good people in Articulate Towers must have heard the distressed cries of their user base and decided to do something about it. In response to my frantic cry for help on the user forum, someone called beeneeb sent me a link to this information:

If you want to back up all of your Presenter ’09 project files for safe keeping or send them to your collaborators working on the same project - or just send your project to another computer, Presenter ’09 provides a simple and effective tool to package all the necessary files into one zip file. This Send to Articulate Presenter Package feature creates a package of the contents of Presenter ’09, along with any embedded Engage, Quizmaker and other inserted media files (such as Flash movies) so they can be edited on another computer.

1. In PowerPoint 2007, click on the Microsoft Office button. Select Send -> Articulate Package.
   In PowerPoint 2000, 2002, 2003, go to File -> Send to -> Select Articulate Presenter Package.
2. The Articulate Presenter Package dialog box opens.
3. Select the location where you want the package to be created. You can also specify optional Package Notes, including the project name, the version number, the author of the project with email and other special instructions.
4. Click on Create Package.
5. A dialog box tells you if the package was successfully created, giving you the option to view the folder with the package files.

Hallelujah for user community forums. Hallelujah for beeneeb! Hallelujah for Presenter 09! (I have to say that I am thus far very much more impressed with it than I was with earlier versions - it provides far more flexibility to the author)

An email from a customer support engineer gave me this advice:

If you want to move your project files from one computer to another, be sure that you move not only the PowerPoint file but also the Articulate project files. If the project was created in Presenter '09, all project files will be stored in a .PPTA file with the same name as the PowerPoint file (and located in the same folder as the PowerPoint file). If it was created in Presenter 5, all project files will be stored in folder with the same name as the PowerPoint file (and located in the same folder as the PowerPoint file). You will also want to move any quiz and interaction files that you may have created for the presentation as well.

No disrespect to him, but I found the first option easier to understand, so I'm going to give that a go.

C'mon Eyeore - give it a rest!

I mentioned recently my predeliction for talking to complete strangers. This evening, as my train was about to pull into the station, a man waiting beside me in the vestibule was yawning widely and frequently. In my typical way, I said, "Like that, is it?" He told me he can't sleep at the moment for worrying that someone is going to assassinate President Obama. I guess I would have been more surprised if he were not the third person today to mention that possibility in my hearing. One person said, "I give him a week before someone offs him."

Is pessimism so inculcated into the British culture that we can't conceive of anything positive happening without being convinced that someone is just waiting to take it away?

I have previously mentioned that I have concerns at the weight of expectation on this young man's shoulders, but I hope that is seen as tempering optimism with a measure of realistic caution. To be so worried as to be losing sleep over the possible assassination of the President of a country in which you don't even live is surely going a bit far?

pic of the day - St Pancras station

Up intol March last year, when we travelled in to London by train, we ended up at Euston station. What an ugly building! Since we moved house, our journey to London now ends up here: King's Cross St Pancras. Is it not an uplifting sight? How unstationlike could a station be? The train you see to the left of the picture is bound for France via the channel tunnel.

pic of the day - computer hell

Today is a horrible day! I'm trying to migrate all my work to my laptop from the family computer, and it is not going well. "Why?" I hear you ask. Well I don't really, but I'm going to tell you anyway. One word. Articulate. Articulate projects are a pig to try to migrate to a different computer midway. I have tried to get some help and none of the responses have been on target. Oh, for a techie to come and look over my shoulder and say, "Ah yes. I see what the problem is." And then FIX it.

Aargh!!!!

Laugh with me: Calvin & Hobbes

How familiar is this scene?

pic of the day - the current soundtrack

Our sons have recently purchased a copy of Fable II for the Xbox360. It seems to be an all consuming game, because they spend every spare moment on it. So, its sound effects form the background music to much that goes on in the Romeis household at present.

Of course, to my jaundiced eye, it looks exactly the same as any other 'shoot-em-up' game, but I guess they feel that way about a lot of the things I watch on telly.

Early reflections on going solo

I thought I should capture my thoughts on life as a solo act, so that I can look back in a few years and see if my views have changed.

Let's start with the minuses, so that I can end on an up:

1. Sometimes I am so busy working in the business, I don't get any time to work on the business. For example, I put together a website, which has been met with a round of indifference. I lack the skills to make it more interesting, I lack the time to acquire the skills and I lack the money to pay someone else to do it for me. I put in a few proposals and the feedback indicates this is another area I need to work on. Once again - no time, no skills, no money.
   
2. I have absolutely no understanding of PAYE and VAT and accounts and all that blarge. I am not in the slightest bit interested in it, either. So I appointed an accountant and hoped it would all just go away. It didn't. The accountant emails me and asks for this form and that reference number. I don't even understand what she wants, let alone know where to find it.
3. I am a gregarious person. I love to interact with people, much to the disgust of an erstwhile colleague who preferred the sepulchral silence of a morgue. I find being on my own day in and day out quite desolate.
4. Other people (including my children, sometimes) don't respect the fact that I have work to do and deadlines to meet. They expect me to be able to do this or that thing at the drop of a hat.
5. I have never been very good at compartmentalising my life. Now that my office is at home, I often forget to leave and can easily spend 16 hours in front of my computer.
6. Cashflow. This is the Achilles' heel of so many small businesses. Clients don't pay until they feel like it, and, because they're big corporates, you're somewhat powerless. Do I want to sic a lawyer on them? If I do, they'll probably just opt not to use me in the future, and I can ill afford to be offending clients at this point! But it's not always about the big boys doing what they please. I have one situation where I needed a certain application to be able to complete a job for a client, but it was expensive and I couldn't afford it until the client had paid me. But why should the client pay me for work I hadn't done? In the end, the client bought the software for me and will deduct the amount from my first invoice.
   

Okay, that's enough negativity for now:

1. I get to work when it suits me. I have settled into a pattern of doing the school run most days. I don't have to be in the office by 8:30am, and no-one comes to boot me out so he can lock up at 8pm.
2. I get to dress as I please. If the boys are on holiday and I don't have to take them to the station, I can (and do, sometimes) work in my PJs. I would never dream of going into the office without my 'face' on (although few women in the UK bother with make up). I now very rarely get painted.
3. Because I am at home most of the time, we were able to get a dog, which our boys had wanted since forever. I also take said dog for her morning walk, which blows away the cobwebs and gives me time away from the computer. Because she is still a pup, I have an enforced 2-hourly break as I take her out into the garden and tell her (as suggested by the shelter) to 'hurry up'. She usually obliges, for which she is rewarded with a treat.
4. I get so much more done in a day than I used to in a shared space, because I don't get interrupted by issues that take me off-topic.
5. I can check up on Facebook as I work. Most social spaces were blocked at my last place of work.
6. I can choose to work on things that matter to me, rather than the things that get handed down from on high. My business isn't run by the beancounters (mind you - see #2 in the previous list).
   
7. I get involved with the project from the beginning, instead of having some badly conceived specification document thrown over the fence by a sales-focused person who doesn't understand learning or learners and cares only about the bottom line.

So this is where I am now. I wonder if this will change over time and, if so, where - and how extreme - the changes will be.

pic of the day - what's in a name?

This is my name in Korean... I think. There are two Korean language students at a local facility who come and clean my house each week. They wrote their own names and mine on the whiteboard in my kitchen. I copied it, and this is the result. They graciously told me that it looked like the work of a native, but I suspect they were being, well... gracious.

On being taken by surprise

My younger son (aged 15) and I took out dog for a walk this morning. Inevitably, my son was plugged in to his iPod. As we walked through a large, open green area, he turned to me and said, "Somehow my my music is exactly right for this place." I asked him what he was listening to. I was slightly surprised by his answer: Chopin's Piano Concerto No.1 Romance: Larghetto. I say 'slightly' because I know he enjoys classical music. I just didn't know he enjoyed it enough to have loaded it onto his iPod.

I can pretty much guarantee that anyone seeing a 15 year old teenage boy wearing low slung jeans and walking his dog, the last thing they would expect to be playing on his ipod is classical music. We all 'know' what kind of music teenage boys listen to, and that isn't it, is it?

How often are we guilty of 'knowing' what our learners will do or like or understand?

A few moments later, he appeared to have a spasm. The concerto had ended and the shuffle had moved onto another track. Because the concerto was fairly quiet, he had turned the volume up, so the punk track that followed it nearly blew his brains out. It was very funny to watch. Fortunately, he saw the funny side, too.

And I realised afresh how many facets and how much depth make up this boy that calls me Mom. Moving from Chopin to punk (albeit not very seamlessly).

Moments later, he noticed that I was suffering with earache from the wind, and offered me his ipod to protect my ears. He set it to play something he thought I would enjoy, and I almost danced the rest of the way home as Grieg worked his magic. The final stretch was taken to the accompaniment of the incomparable Dance of Valkyrie.

Contented sigh.

pic of the day - optimism

It's still officially winter, but the daffs in my neighbour's front garden are preparing for spring. I love this sight. As a hot weather person, somewhat prone to SAD during the 'mole-months' (go to work in the dark, come home in the dark - never see daylight), There is just something enormously uplifting about this silent assurance that the spring is on its way.

pic of the day - my son's back

My younger son's girlfriend is spending the evening with us. She borrowed my eyeliner decorated my son's back.

Oh, and the red marks aren't spots - they're creases from the couch.

Talking to people

Wendy Wickham has returned from her holiday to the Dominican Republic, and her reflective post includes an inventory of what she used to consider must have items to take on holiday. One item on her list jumped out at me:

A willingness to ask questions and talk to people.

You see, one of the reasons English people find me weird is that I do this. All the time. Without the slightest provocation.

I compliment people on their clothes, their children. I compliment children on their manners, their beautiful eyes. I tell the person next to me at the supermarket freezer that the pizzas have gone up since last week. I say "bless you" when I complete stranger sneezes within my hearing. I say "Can I give you a hand with that?" when I see people struggling with something. I knock on complete strangers' doors and ask them where they got their beautiful dog/water feature/aspidistra.

And you would be amazed at how ready people are to talk right back! These reserved English people seem to be just dying for the chance to tell anyone who will listen about how they handmade their jumper/necklace. They are delighted that someone is inviting them to brag about their kids. They are thrilled to be able to tell someone that the same pizzas are "half this price at X place - you should check it out."

I meet the most amazing people and I learn the most incredible stuff. I learn that some people think celery tastes good with peanut butter. I go home, try it and disagree.

I learn that you can make a 'cocktail' by melting jelly babies in vodka. I decide not to try that one.

I learn that there are free crafting classes at a local stationery warehouse. I learn that my new dog is probably not a German Shepherd cross but may well be an Atika... maybe even uncrossed. I look it up on Google images and agree that the chances are better than average that she is at the very least an Atika cross. I ask the lady from the shelter who comes to do the placement follow up visit. She says she has thought from the start that Jessie is an Akita.

I learn that someone with epilepsy experienced a significant reduction in the frequency and severity of his seizures when he stopped eating meat.

Just last week, a conversation over the frozen pizzas revealed that the woman I was speaking to lived for 5 years in the city in which I was born. She even lived in a street in which I lived - although not at the same time. Considering that the city in which I was born is in a different country, on a different continent, some 12000kms hence! We spent a good few minutes reminiscing together, before parting ways, each with a warm fuzzy feeling.

I like talking to people. It startles them at first, but they usually get over it really quickly.

We are social creatures. We're supposed to talk. And you learn so much that way!

Pocket projector - I want one!

I heard about this last night. It seems ironic that I should have been told about this on the same day in which I posted about a calculator weighing in at 5.6kgs.

The Optoma Pico"Palm-Sized" Portable Projector costs around £245. It weighs 115g. It enables users to share images and videos from an ipod, mobile phone, camera, PSP or whatever. They project an image of between 6" and 60"(although some users have recommended around 30" as being optimal). Apparently, it generates clear, vivid, high contrast (but not HD) images, has a long (rechargeable) battery life, and boasts about 20K hours of lamp life (which is pretty darn good compared with some of the larger projectors!)

User-reviewers are rating it very high in terms of ease of use and value for money.

Right. That's been added to my wishlist!

Who runs the show?

Grandad, the irascible, award-winning, Irish blogger expresses frustrations many of us feel as the things we consider important get sidelined for the things that bring in the most money. There have certainly been times when I have almost felt as if I have been called upon to forsake my ideals and prostitute my craft.

Severe language warning (Sorry, Grandad, I know you don't like that caveat, but it's the sort of netiquette that's expected among the bloggers in this little patch of the blogosphere).

On shouting at the telly

Please, please tell me I'm not the only one who does this! Oh, I know other people yell at the telly during sportscasts. I know that some people yell at the TV when some or other fulminating politician fills the airwaves with rhetoric. I have been known to startle a passer-by by yelling at the interviewer on a radio station "Africa is not a country, you maroon!" (and, no, that's not a typo - that's my epithet of choice - long story)

But does anyone else yell during the adverts?

There is one advert at the moment that drives me spare. It's for some or other kind of baby milk formula. It starts out by telling us that breast milk is best for our babies. Duh! Then it trots out this peach "But if you decide to move on from breastfeeding..."

If? IF?

There are people who don't decide to move on from breastfeeding? The mind boggles! I once saw a comedy sketch based on this very premise. I didn't find it even slightly funny.

This is the problem with being a pedant... you can't let a thing just go.

I notice things like this. I notice signs with incorrectly positioned apostrophes. I notice songs in which hyperbole is pronounced as hyper-bowl. I cringe at 'nucular'. I mutter over 'your joking' and 'their aren't any left'.

Then I read back over a few of my older posts, and I see that I do it myself from time to time.

I wonder how many pedants are working through learning resources I've developed and tutting about the 'maroon' who wrote it...

Ouch.

pic of the day - technology of yesteryear

This is a Triumphator calculating machine. It belonged to my late father-in-law, who was born in 1916. Where he got it from, I couldn't say, but he may well have been its first owner - they date back to around 1910, I'm told. This one has a sticker on the bottom with the name of a supplier in Stockholm, which was where my father-in-law lived. It has a serial number on it. Why do I find that quaint?

It really works. It adds, subtracts, multiplies and divides. Our first landlord after we were married demonstrated it to me, but I can't remember the instructions - it WAS 20 years ago, after all!

It weighs a mere 5.6kg, according to my bathroom scale (mind you, my bathroom scale adds on 10kgs at least ;o) so it probably actually weighs about minus 4.4kgs), so there is no way you could call this a pocket calculator!

It may well be worth a fair amount of money, but there is no way my husband, an IT (and logistics) manager, is going to part with it! It's an early computer, after all!

pic of the day - mist

I live in a rather unprepossessing town in the east midlands of England, but when it's misty as it was even at noon, when this picture was taken, even it manages to look 'picture-skew'.

pic of the day - down memory lane

Tonight I took my son to the first athletics (Americans: read 'track') training session of the year. Sad old bat that I am, I had looked forward all day to taking this shot. This is the final straight, or the view from the start of the 100m, if you prefer. Most importantly, it is the view of my favourite two lanes. If you got to run in the centre two lanes, you knew you were considered a force to be reckoned with. I hated the very inside and very outside lanes with equal passion, but for different reasons I won't bore you with.

Although it is 30 years this year since I stood in this position in anger, I was amazed at how my heart rate accelerate and how much I just wanted to RUN!