(no subject)

Another day, another $0.35.

Some days, i'd just like to take all of the PMs at the place where i work, and take them to Microsoft to sit in on a spec inspection or review. Just so that they'd see how different the job of project manager is from what they really do. As a PM, when someone from test or development asks how something is supposed to work, the answer should not be "how do you think we should handle it?"

They have all these interesting business rules which often- if not usually- seem to intersect with one another- where they should be parallel. Where you'd expect intersections, things are fairly regularly tangential.

Then too, there's a point where decisions just need to be made- whether right, wrong, or indifferent. We shouldn't have to have discussions about what happens when a user who has view rights a and b sees when viewing items attached to widget A when there's no practical reason for a user to ever have both viewership rights in the first place. But rather than saying "no, that situation is gibberish, because someone either has view a or view b, and can't have both, because that's somewhat like demi-virginity."

But, in spite of this, i like my job. It's comparatively low stress, and i get paid to tell my PM how features should behave.

Three completely unrelated items:

• Trying a new Bavarian Weissbier- this from die Privatbrauerei Höss Sonthofen- and it has become a new favourite.
• Congratulations to Howard Dean with his big win in the Vermont primary. Even though it came after stopping an active campaign, it's nice to see- and it's a win by about a 24% margin. Such a shame it comes on the night that the nominee-apparent has his last serious challenger withdraw
• And finally, natal anniversary felicitations to wendytorrence.