I once heard the phrase that money is like manure; it's of no use when it's all piled up in one place so it has to be spread around to do any good; - and it's stuck in my mind ever since. At some childishly simply level it resonates in my mind and I can identify with it on principle. I can't help but wonder, for example, if, instead of the government shelling out literally unimaginable sums of cash to prop up banks and the financial system, it had distributed that money to the wider populace at large. I'd have used my share to pay of the mortgage (or at least, some of it) and at a stroke that would leave me with a significant disposable monthly income that I could then choose to spend and by so doing, would help, along with millions of others, to rebuild the economy, purchase by purchase. I wouldn't even want any bonuses for taking the government money either.
There's another very direct reason why manure - or poo - shouldn't be allowed to build up in one place and that's because it stinks and is very difficult to deal with. That's as true of real poo as it is of metaphorical poo. And over the last three weeks or so, I found myself having to deal with an awful lot of unexpected metaphorical poo, all clustered in one place.
On one day alone, the two most important and formally utterly reliable computers in our small agency failed catastrophically. Sure, the data was backed-up, no probs there, but both machines were functionally dead and despite the best efforts of the techies, there was no option but to purchase replacements - no big deal in the scheme of things as they were due for renewal later this year anyway. But to have to do so at short notice with all of the implications for the reinstallation of software (some of legacy versions of which won't run under Windows 7) together with all of the associated license activation hassle (and it was, and remains, hassle) and synchronisation issues and trying to keep our business running and work delivered meant only one thing. Pain.
Had we been able to do the hardware upgrade at a pace as originally planned, we would have had the scenario of a small bit of metaphorical manure (the aggro of the upgrade process) reaping its rewards as the new machines provided for greater productivity. As it was, we just had a lot of poo and are still in the process of clearing up the poo. The benefits will come, for sure, but given all the other pressures on time and the knock-on effects, in no time soon.
Over the coming days more unexpected poo piled up - personnel on holiday, sudden childcare let downs - elderly parent suddenly falling very ill, TMA marking, car trouble, overflowing water tank, BT broadband failure at local exchange for several days - again - which for a design company is decidedly not good news... and heaven knows, seemingly endless minor niggles that just kept on coming.
Yes, no doubt about it, over recent days, my conviction that too much poo clustered all in one place is most definitely of no use whatsoever has been well and truly cemented in place.
Does poo cluster?
I once heard the phrase that money is like manure; it's of no use when it's all piled up in one place so it has to be spread around to do any good; - and it's stuck in my mind ever since. At some childishly simply level it resonates in my mind and I can identify with it on principle. I can't help but wonder, for example, if, instead of the government shelling out literally unimaginable sums of cash to prop up banks and the financial system, it had distributed that money to the wider populace at large. I'd have used my share to pay of the mortgage (or at least, some of it) and at a stroke that would leave me with a significant disposable monthly income that I could then choose to spend and by so doing, would help, along with millions of others, to rebuild the economy, purchase by purchase. I wouldn't even want any bonuses for taking the government money either.
There's another very direct reason why manure - or poo - shouldn't be allowed to build up in one place and that's because it stinks and is very difficult to deal with. That's as true of real poo as it is of metaphorical poo. And over the last three weeks or so, I found myself having to deal with an awful lot of unexpected metaphorical poo, all clustered in one place.
On one day alone, the two most important and formally utterly reliable computers in our small agency failed catastrophically. Sure, the data was backed-up, no probs there, but both machines were functionally dead and despite the best efforts of the techies, there was no option but to purchase replacements - no big deal in the scheme of things as they were due for renewal later this year anyway. But to have to do so at short notice with all of the implications for the reinstallation of software (some of legacy versions of which won't run under Windows 7) together with all of the associated license activation hassle (and it was, and remains, hassle) and synchronisation issues and trying to keep our business running and work delivered meant only one thing. Pain.
Had we been able to do the hardware upgrade at a pace as originally planned, we would have had the scenario of a small bit of metaphorical manure (the aggro of the upgrade process) reaping its rewards as the new machines provided for greater productivity. As it was, we just had a lot of poo and are still in the process of clearing up the poo. The benefits will come, for sure, but given all the other pressures on time and the knock-on effects, in no time soon.
Over the coming days more unexpected poo piled up - personnel on holiday, sudden childcare let downs - elderly parent suddenly falling very ill, TMA marking, car trouble, overflowing water tank, BT broadband failure at local exchange for several days - again - which for a design company is decidedly not good news... and heaven knows, seemingly endless minor niggles that just kept on coming.
Yes, no doubt about it, over recent days, my conviction that too much poo clustered all in one place is most definitely of no use whatsoever has been well and truly cemented in place.