Computer newbies

Tonight I went to a talk about the new possibilities of GPS systems. The speaker, a salesman, had a powerpoint presentation that his secretary made for him. At a point, he wanted to go back to the previous slide, and did this in the only way he seemed to know: by right-clicking, and selecting 'Previous slide'. But the touchpad isn't so easy to use, so he had some difficulty in doing that. I was sitting in front, so I said 'You can also use the left-arrow key'. He looked at me surprised, tried it out, saw that it worked, and looked at me as if he had seen the light.

How often haven't I been considered a computer guru for such simple things! Many people are still surprised when they see me use copy-paste, or ctrl-left-arrow and ctrl-right-arrow to move through a text faster.

Copy-paste I learned by simply reading the first few chapters of the manual. Ctrl-arrow navigation and left-arrow in powerpoint I simply learned by trying key combinations. Many people are afraid to experiment with software. Why? Are they afraid that if they press the left-arrow that it will erase half of their slides and give the other slides a purple background?

Look, I've done pretty amazing things with computers, if I may say so. I've written software to compare gene sequences really fast, written nifty code that combines C++ templates with macros to easily get function pointers of a DLL, code that generates other code, and more. If you consider me a computer guru, do it because of those things, not for the simple stuff that everybody should know.

Get in the phonebook

A few weeks ago I met a girl that I used to know over 10 years ago, but never very well. We had a nice chat for about 15 minutes. She told me she lives in Ghent as well now, where she works and such. She was really nice, so today I decided to call her to ask her out. I opened the phonebook under Ghent, looked her up, ... and saw that she wasn't in it. Aaaaaargh!

Maybe you tell me now that I should have asked her when I met her, but I just can't make such a decision that quickly. If I ask her out, it feels like I'm responsible to take some time to spend with her.

So ladies, get in the damn' phonebook! It doubles your chances of being asked out by a man. If you have a cellphone, it can be listed just as well. Why on earth would you not want to be in the phonebook?

And while I'm on the subject: don't wear rings on your left hand, from a distance it can't be seen well if it's a wedding ring. And don't go out with your brother or a good man-friend, we easily mistake him for a boyfriend, especially if you laugh a lot with his jokes.

Deaf Interpreters and IT

Yesterday evening I went to a talk about software development. The interesting thing is that there was a deaf man in the audience, and he brought along two deaf interpreters - yes, two, they switched every 15 minutes, it seems a hard job. The deaf interpreter sat on the stage, all to the left in front of the deaf man, so he can see the deaf interpreter and the powerpoint presentation on the screen in the same viewing angle.

I wondered how the deaf interpreter managed to translate all these abbreviations typical for IT, but abbreviations are quite common, so I guess sign language has provisions for that. But what was more difficult for them, was the weird technical terms. I often saw them look at the screen behind them if they heard a 'weird' word. Granted, in a talk about software development you don't expect to suddenly hear the word 'fitnesse' (that's a program to allow non-programmers easily write tests). But when she heard the word 'wikis', she had to interrupt the speaker and ask him what he just said :-).

Debussy

Today I continued my exploration in my own collection of classical CD's - which, as I said earlier, I hardly know because I bought them too fast.

I listened to some music by Debussy this morning, more particularly Prelude A L'Après-Midi D'une Faune, Clair de Lune and Danses Pour Harpes et Cordes. Really beautiful, amazing. But I now know I won't listen to it anymore if I still have a lot of work to do, it's too relaxing, it's so strong that I lose that moderate level of stress to work well!

Robbie Williams is a nutcase

I guess Robbie Williams is to some women what Britney Spears is to some men. So it's only natural that I prefer women who don't like him :-)

When I heard that he wanted to be the new leadsinger of Queen, and really thought he was the perfect man for that job, I knew Robbie Williams isn't quite normal.

When I heard that he'd make a new record, with music like Neil Diamond, Kraftwerk and Depeche Mode, I thought he was pretending to be a nutcase.

But when I heard his cover of Kraftwerks Neonlights, I knew he's really a nutcase.

Look, I admired him a little more when I heard that he likes Kraftwerk, one of my favourite groups. It proves that he has an ear for the not so mainstream popmusic. But when he made this cover, he blew it again. You may be incredibly good at one thing, like making popmusic, but that doesn't mean you're good at everything.

I don't like covers anyway. Usually a lot of the good stuff in the first version is lost in the cover - which is definitely the case with Robbie Williams' Neonlights. It's okay for an artist to pay a tribute to a musician they admire, but can't they do that by just saying it in an interview?

Tattoos

Today a serviceguy came to check my hotwater boiler. It was a balding man with glasses who hardly dared to look me in the eyes. Imagine my surprise when he reached out his arms so his upperarms were uncovered, and his tattoos were visible. A dagger on the right arm, and something I couldn't make out on his left arm, but looking quite heavy. I thought 'How on earth could this guy ever have been cool? And how would tattoos have helped with that?' Some people are very weird.