the boredom of ramfree17

The mob mentality negates the basic premise that two wrongs doesnt make a right. Being part of a mob grants both a sense of power and a degree of anonymity by blending with the crowd. The combination of both can imbue a euphoria that overrides the normal and logical reasoning, enabling a person to do things they won’t normally be expected to do.

Once a mob is fired up, it will either take a lot to subdue it. Most of the time, it will simmer down but only after leaving a lot of damage in its path. The participants of the mob usually doesn’t feel any remorse as they justify their actions as both “right” and “acceptable” since it was the actions of the mob and not their own.

The best time to stop a mob is when it is just starting up. That is easier said than done though. The best way to handle a mob is get out of its way and just hope that there is still something left in its wake.

This will be a voice in the wilderness post.

To my friends and acquaintances from both sides of the Filipino political arena: if you want to post anything related to the current pandemic, may it be a public service announcement, a morale booster, or a gratitude post then please do so. However, take your political slant out of it. Here is the reality: YOU are NOT helping.

The government is doing what it can to stop the spread. Organizing and mobilizing a country is not easy. If you have the experience and willingness that you can do something better then go to your govt office and volunteer. Otherwise STFU.

The decisions of the government are based on a compromise. There will always be somebody affected. The best option is a compromise, not a win-win. If you have a win-win option, go talk to your elected govt official. Otherwise STFU.

If your argument is your heart goes for those unable to stock up supplies because of poverty or lack of opportunity, then go improve a few lives and share what you have. Your bickering doesnt help get them fed or assured. You are only fanning their fears with yours. If you cannot help directly, STFU.

If you are clamoring for businesses and enterprises for benefits and advance payrolls for those affected by the quarantine/lockdown,they are already evaluating that and trying to figure out where the money will come from. Do that if you have a business but don’t assume others can easily do the same. The owners and managers are already losing sleep and getting stressed trying to protect their employees and their business. If you have a seat in the managing table then I know you will go with the best option. To the others, STFU.

I can go on but you should already see where I am going. This is the point where I need to heed my own request and STFU.

[Lifted from an old email I sent to my previous project mates.]

This is an email to remind about wantonly tweaking configuration settings in the Oracle Fusion Middleware stack to make the code work. Wantonly in this case means it did not go through the official change management process as the members in question wanted to quickly solve an issue that was first encountered in the UAT environment.

E2 is supposed to mirror the E3 environment to catch any problem that could happen in E3, or replicate an ongoing issue.

Our goal is not to make our deliverables pass UAT, but to provide deliverables that will not malfunction in production.

Any setting that needs to be changed needs to be evaluated properly to ensure it doesn’t affect the other applications in the environment. Each setting change is always a compromise between two conflicting scenarios (e.g. performance vs scalability, traceability vs resource management, etc.). We need to understand what we are exchanging for each setting update. The E2 settings change needs to be propagated to E3 afterwards.

For the nomenclature:

• E2 is the User Acceptance environment, and
• E3 is the Production environment.

For sometime now I have opted to play with my responses to the mundane question of “how are you doing (today)?” in the office. My response admittedly has turned dark lately but the canned response usually are:

• Better than I deserve! (credits to Dave Ramsey)
• Same-old, same-old.
• SSDD 😉
• Can’t wait for the week to be over.
• Looking forward to the weekend.
• Still breathing.
• Dying a little bit every day.

The last one is a play in the saying that one of these days death will come to our doorstep. It is a reflection of the common reality that all of us will need to pass through that milestone in our lives. The question however is that given of that inevitable reality, how much of that time can we comfortably say we have lived; and not just along for the ride and surviving? Can we look back at the end of each day or week and say “it was worth it”?

I saw my father today

In fleeting moment he was dancing in our living room.

I was not hallucinating nor dreaming

But it took me a while to recognize him.

See, I got my pointer finger squeezed between the hinges of the portable dog fence.

The shock and adrenaline rush causing a familiar tirade. A wail of pain peppered with a self-directed admonishment:

“Ang tanga. Ang tanga-tangaaaa!” (“Dumb move. You d-dumbasssss!”)

While enveloped by a crimson pain for an eternity stretching few seconds that was when I saw him.

For that was exactly how he would react in situations like that. Reactions that I aways thought funny and, par for the course with my father, “eccentric”. I didn’t realize that I have appropriated it as well.

Ergo, I am my father’s son and a part of my father lives within me.