Dancing by the Numbers

Eddie felt like nobody really loved him except for what he could do. Eddie could make the numbers dance.

Not just the taxes, or the books, or the warehouses, or the boxes, or the contents in the boxes, or the routes, or the credits, or the debits, or the interest, or the payroll, or the benefits, or the payoffs, or the kickbacks. The numbers!

He could make them perform ballet. He could make them waltz, cha cha, foxtrot, tango, two step, or break dance. He could make them dance slowly, quickly, blindingly fast, or a constantly changing rhythm. You could pick any dance, any speed, any set of numbers, and Eddie made them dance.

Eddie felt like no one understood.

 

They found Eddie face down in the river, a small bullet hole at the base of his skull.

Rumors said it was the mob. Or the feds. Or the union. Or one of several foreign governments. Or one of any number of corporations. But Eddie was dead. The numbers danced no more.

Perhaps someone understood too well.

 

To Eddie's surprise and delight, he found himself in a better world.

He felt loved. And he could see everything dance- quarks, protons, atoms, molecules, the grass and flowers, animals he'd never believed in, people, angels, creatures he'd never heard of or imagined, the very light around him, and a loving Father. Even the numbers danced. They'd dance for Eddie if he told them to, but he enjoyed just watching them dance on their own. Sometimes he danced with them.

At last he knew someone understood.

 

Edwina played with her food as usual. She looked distant and troubled. She was just five, but like her deceased father she was brilliant and precocious. Edward spoke.

"Edwina, you look perturbed, Is something wrong?"

"Papa, we went to Daddy's grave today," she said. "His marker said 'He made the numbers dance'."

"And you want to know what that means?"

"No, Papa. I want to make the numbers dance, too."

Edward looked at her plate, at the carefully sculpted four sided rice pyramid, the perfect cubes of meat, the four squares of green peas three on a side with a solitary pea exactly in the middle of those squares. As she prodded the peas with her fork, the squares rotated and revolved slowly around the pea in the middle.

"How many peas do you have, Edwina?"

Her eyes flicked to the peas for an instant. "Thirty seven, Papa. That's easy."

Edward smiled. "You will make the numbers dance, baby."

She didn't understand yet.

But she would.

Begone, Foul Dwimmerlaik of the Foot!

Some times my feet hurt- especially when I first get up. I'm not sure what that's about, but at least I know it's not this problem.

Palantir facialitis: an excruciating condition in which Sauron's face appears on the bottom of one's foot immediately after waking. Left untreated it may become systemic, eventually leading to burning eyes. Severe cases may lead to betraying loved ones or a desire to birth in mud to exceedingly ugly and unruly children.

Transmission vectors are not clearly understood but there is data indicating a strong correlation between wearing rings provided by untrustworthy companions, strangers, or politicians and more virulent disease symptoms.

The only known cures involve exceptionally hot dragon fire and hurling one's foot into a raging volcano.

Accidental Kiss

McKenna and I were discussing whether there is such a thing as an accidental kiss. She opined that it didn't have to be mouth to mouth. That seemed to me like cheating but I wandered in the forest of my thoughts a bit and this story jumped out from behind a tree to surprise me as thoroughly as what happens below.

Jeremy was late for class. "Mrs. Gillie is going to kill me," he thought. "Or worse yet flunk me. I'll lose my scholarship!" Without the scholarship he'd have to drop out of college, blowing his parents' dream of finally have a Macintyre with a degree after his name.

Running across the quad he veered around the big oak to avoid a couple kissing. "Why do people insist on making out in public?" he raged inwardly. Ducking to avoid a low limb big enough to give him a serious concussion, he noticed another couple engaged in passionate kisses at his feet... as he tripped over them.

Jeremy flew and stumbled for several yards. He was almost under control when he slipped on a mossy rock and fell right on top of Miri from his biology class, the shyest girl he'd ever known. She was smart, witty, and cute. He'd fallen for her right away but getting her to talk one on one was nearly impossible. He'd given up after a week.

But just as he'd once fallen for her, now he was falling on her. Time slowed. She looked up, half surprised, half amused, not yet showing alarm. Her arms came up as his went out. He fell into her arms which then fell onto him as if in a lover's embrace. The irony was not lost on Jeremy. He managed to break his fall with his own arms so that his head stopped gently just as it met hers.

He tried to pull back. She tried to push him away. What was happening? Why were they still eyeball to eyeball, nose to nose, and... lip to lip?

"Mmh mhh mhhhmhh!" he apologized.

"Mmh mhh mh!" she demanded.

"Mmh mmh't," he argued.

Braces. Their braces were locked.

"MMMh mhh mhh!"

"Mhh mmmhhh mhh?"

"Mhh."

"Mhh..."

"Mmmm hmmm..."

"Mmmmmm."

"Mmmmmm."

After an hour their braces accidentally unlocked. Each of them later told friends it was one of the saddest moments of their lives.

Mrs. Gillie was out sick so class had been canceled.

Jeremy aced biology.

The young lovers graduated with honors on a Friday morning and got married that afternoon on the quad.

They eventually lost their braces (a month apart to the hour) but every year on the anniversary of that fateful day when Jeremy was late for class they re-enacted that first kiss. They did this right up until they were 65. That year they added an accidental chipped tooth, an accidental split lip, and an accidental bloody nose to the re-enacted accidental kiss. Laughing and holding handkerchiefs to their faces, they wandered over to the student infirmary as much to befuddle the nurses and doctor as anything else.

From that year on they celebrated by painting braces on their teeth and laying gently down under the giant oak to kiss for an hour. Rain or shine.

Jeremy died a week before their 60th accidental kissiversary.

A week later at the appropriate time Miri wandered dreamily across the quad. As she ducked under the huge branch, she realized there was a couple kissing at her feet.

She skirted them successfully but slipped on the same rock Jeremy had slipped on sixty years previously. As she stretched out her arms she realized with some bemusement she was falling toward a very good looking young man. He caught her. Their faces a few inches apart, she gazed into his eyes a second and smiled.

He laughed. "Do you realize how lucky you are? I caught you just in time!"

She laughed as well. "You have no idea how lucky you are! Oh, wait. I suppose your braces are real. Mine aren't."

His left eyebrow raised as he helped her to her feet. "I don't follow you."

"It's just as well. Thank you for catching me, young man. What's you name?"

"Jeremy."

He stood scratching his head as the old lady ran off laughing like a schoolgirl- right after she kissed him smack on the lips.

His cell phone chimed. Time for biology. If only he could get that shy Chinese girl to talk to him...

 

Copyright 2015 Triple R Publishing, Round Rock, TX. All rights reserved.

Christmas Stories You Won't Hear on the News: Coal

We always hear about Santa and presents. Seldom do we hear about Santa and coal, other than as a threat. But what is the reality?

Once upon a time there was a boy in Tumbleweed, New Mexico who was so bad that Santa filled his house with coal. But that wasn't enough. Santa called in an air strike and millions of tons of coal were delivered to this tiny town in the desert.

Shortly after Santa left sparks from the fireplace set it on fire and the house burned down. Winds fanned the flames, and the mountains of coal covering thousands of acres burned as well. (Thankfully the rest of the town was out of town.) Due to some unknown element in this type of coal (which doesn't add to the carbon footprint) the ash was white as snow. The area is now known as White Sands National Monument. If you visit, just remember that mixed in with all the coal ash are the ashes of a house and a particularly naughty little boy.

 

Meanwhile, half way round the top half of the planet and much farther north, there's a very poor, very, very cold town. It's so poor and so cold that hundreds of years ago desperate townspeople, tired of burning their Christmas presents to stay warm, started plotting to be naughty just to get coal. When Santa's elves told him, Santa made a special deal with the people of this forlorn Siberian outpost. If they behave they get coal. If they misbehave they get toys that won't burn. They go through as much coal in a year as Tumbleweed went through in one night, but they're not a tourist attraction, and they're still here- asleep in warm beds.

We Three Strings: A Christmas Story in the Wild West

Three strings ride into town from the desert- hot, tired, and thirsty. They hitch their rides and mosey to the saloon doors. They stop, confronted by a sign: NO STRINGS.

The string named Slim growls. "I'm gettin' a drink!" He pushes past the doors, but a few seconds later comes flying out to land in the dusty street. An angry barkeep appears in the doorway. "Can't ya read? We don't serve yer type here!" He stomps back inside.

Another string, a twisted old man, shoves his Stetson back. "We'll see about that!" He saunters inside. A few seconds later a fight starts; tables bust, men and women yell, a chair hits the wall, glass breaks. The second string flies over the swinging doors to land, disheveled, in the street by his bruised, dazed friend. The barkeep appears in the doorway again, yells, "NO STRINGS!" points at the sign, glares at the third string and stomps back inside. A few feet in he stops and hollers over his shoulder. "We don't serve your kind! Go away."

The third string, a strong string, practically a small horsehair rope, glances at the sign, at his friends baking under the Arizona sun in the dirt, and into the saloon at the bar. He ponders a second, removes his hat, loops around himself a few times, and messes up his top end so threads stick out everywhere. He hangs his hat on a nearby nail and moseys inside.

A furious shriek from the bar greets him. "Hey! Don't your type ever learn? We don't want no strings here!"

"I'll have a beer."

Apoplectic, the barkeep throws a glass on the floor. "We! Don't! Serve! Strings!"

"Ain't a string. Now where's my beer?"

The barkeep just stares. "Not a string?!?!?"

"Nope. I'm a frayed knot."

An Interlude Amidst the Interviews

Let's continue where we left off in the previous blog. The interviews could only go uphill and for that round they did. I don't recall any other disasters, and we hired a great employee. Over the next few years I was still in charge of everything except the actual hiring decisions, into which I had input. But there were still some interesting times.

(All the new hire names are made up.)

One recent grad was a decade older than the rest. Don had taught French at a high school but between not knowing how to help students who didn't care and the abysmal pay, he decided to return to school and try something else. He got a degree in computer science and we hired him.

At this point in our growth it wasn't unusual to hire several people at once; Don was one of four who started together. I was working 80 to 100 hour weeks; the later I worked the less likely I was to get in early. After Don's first day I decided to play a prank on him and the other newbies. When they would log in, they would get a random silly message and get logged out. There was even a point to it- getting them to work as a team to find the problem and fix it.

But I ended up working until 4AM so I wasn't there when they got in. I got in about 2. I logged in. A message displayed. "You're fired." It logged me out. I tried again. Same thing. I laughed- albeit with a wee bit of trepidation. Tom walked nonchalantly into my office and leaned against the door frame with his arms crossed. "So, how are you today?"

"I'm great. I can catch up on my sleep. I just got fired by a computer."

He grinned.

"You gave those guys a rough morning. Craig (the VP) was a bit upset. He calmed down, though."

"They couldn't figure out how to fix it?"

"Apparently none of them hung out with jokers at school. Frank got a message that the line printer was assigned to the overhead lights. He was really confused so he just started reading through the system manuals. Jane recognized what was happening but she hasn't used JCL before so she just came to me and I fixed her login. We came up with the idea for yours even before Craig knew what was going on."

"Well?"

"Here's where it got ugly. Craig went into the machine room for something and found Don and Dave with manuals and stacks of printouts, digging frantically through them and arguing. They didn't want to explain what was going on at first, but Craig raised his voice and that scared them more. Apparently Don's terminal said that someone's program had overwritten the OS and they needed to re-enter it in hex on the system console. So the two of them were desperately trying to find the operating system printout with hexadecimal codes."

I had to stifle a laugh. Craig stuck his head in. "It wasn't funny!"

Tom grinned even more. "Yes it was."

I couldn't help snickering.

Craig laughed. "OK, it was, but you really scared those boys. I think you owe them an apology."

I bought them lunch but they were so relieved they hadn't destroyed anything they weren't even upset.

After a year, Don quit and went back to teaching. He was doing a good job but he simply didn't care. "I'm going back for a masters in French and a masters in teaching. I'll find a way to help those kids." We missed him, but I've always encouraged people to pursue their passion. I was glad he found it anew.

Dave, on the other hand... That was an adventure.

Dave had excellent grades, did well on the test, and knew his stuff. Still, there were enough little red flags in our interactions that I had recommended against hiring him. The decision maker wouldn't listen. he thought I was being petty over something.

Being consultants and founders' backgrounds, we all had to wear coats and ties (or equivalent dress for the women). No jeans. Dave's first day he wore an immaculate three piece suit. He walked into the office of the executive VP (Tom S), introduced himself, and talked a bit. He noted that one of the reasons he had hoped to work at our company was that we looked professional. Tom told me about this later that day and asked, "You sure he's OK?" I related what had happened. He shrugged his shoulders; he didn't like to interfere in the systems group.

A week or two in, Dave showed up in blue jeans and a white button down. As I walked into my office he was brushing his teeth at his desk. An hour later he had his bare feet on his desk, trimming his toenails. When I asked what he was doing, he smiled innocently and said, "Foot hygiene!"

"Let's not do that in front of everyone, OK? What if a customer came in?"

"Oh. I hadn't thought of that."

Jane later thanked me. "Glad you thought of customers. He wasn't listening to us!"

No one would do anything about Dave. I was supposed to manage him but had no authority (this was an ongoing issue and one of the reasons I eventually left). A few months later he started drooling over the women from Shasta' regional office who walked by our windows a couple of times a day. He started watching for one in particular. When he would see her coming, he would hold up a sign. "How about lunch?" Or "Are you available?" I didn't find all this out until Nancy and Helene finally came to me after he went running down the hall when he saw her, opened the front door, leaned against the frame, and told the lady as she passed by, "I love you!"

I talked to him. He wouldn't listen. Craig wasn't in so I went to Tom S. He talked to Dave and made it clear the behavior would stop if Dave liked working for us. Dave grudgingly acceded. I found the lady later (I knew some of them a little bit just from being normal and friendly instead of psycho and friendly). I apologized, explained we had just found out, and told her that if it happened again, she should let us know and he'd be fired. Or if she preferred she could just call the police. She teared up and thanked me several times.

I'm sure the whole Shasta crew was happy when we moved to another location.

Things were weird in various ways for the next year or so with Dave. Eventually he was sent to a customer site on a project we were behind on. We were months late delivering the software but we kept a crew on site at our expense to get things working. After Dave had been on site a week, one of the customer's engineers told Fred (another of our engineers on site) that Dave had told them, "You realize that (our company) is screwing you over, right?" The customer knew we were losing money and working hard to resolve the problems. He figured we should know so he told Fred, who called me. I called Tom S and Craig (they were out of town). They flew Dave there, asked him about it, and he freely admitted it. He had no rational explanation. They fired him and sent him back to turn in his company items and get his stuff and go.

I met him at the front door with his personal possessions in a box. He wasn't allowed anywhere but my office. He was very, very hurt. "I thought you were my friend! Why are you taking their side?"

I gave him the brief version, told him to turn in his company credit cards at the front desk, and go. A moment later Helene came in. "Miles, did Dave give you his cards?"

I ran outside. Dave was pulling away in his car. I jumped on my Honda Interceptor (the only time since I was 16 I rode a motorcycle with no protective gear), and took off in pursuit. Dave had a turbocharger and decided to use it. I still caught him a mile away at a stop sign with enough lead time to park the bike in the middle of the road and get off it just in case.

He smiled his most charming smile. "That was fun. What's up?"

"The credit cards, Dave."

He looked forlorn. "Don't you trust me?"

"It doesn't matter. Those are the rules. You have to turn them in."

He just looked at me.

"Or I have to call the police."

Dave looked devastated. He pulled them out of his shirt pocket (he'd had them ready!) "Don't be a stranger."

"Sorry, Dave. I just might be."

He didn't run me over. He left. I went back to work. Half the office was standing out front, waiting to see if I came back, and whether I was intact. They cheered. I handed Helene the cards. She didn't want to take them. "Do I have to touch these?"

I told Craig if he ever overrode me on a personality rejection again I would quit. He promised not to. Thankfully it never became an issue.

I'm not dissing anyone in management. They were just as new at this as I was; we were all making it up as we went along. We all made mistakes and we all got things right. While it was frustrating at times, it could have been much, much worse.

These stories are 100% true. There may be a minor detail or two wrong, but there is no embellishment. If anything, it was even weirder than described.

The Interview Process From Heck

Not long after I got my first, full time software job at JHK & Associates I was given the task of^[1] finding new employees. I'd never done anything like this. My bosses hadn't done much and didn't care for it so it fell to me. Ex nihilo, I had a week to:

1. come up with a list of job requirements;
2. have one of the admins get them in the appropriate papers (there was no internet);
3. completely revamp the application form;
4. develop a test to screen out posers and help rank people with a clue;
5. get the first applicants screened;
6. make a recommendation to hire.

And by the way, the software delivery schedule can't slip.

Somehow I did it. I probably violated the letter of a couple of federal laws in terms of questions on the application, but we had no evil intentions. Nobody every complained, and we never discriminated on any basis other than technical, leadership, and whether they might be psycho. We learned the last one the hard way, but that story will have to wait.

The test was the hardest part for me. We didn't want to scare people off. We would want this to work for a wide array of positions from entry level to senior. I was quite proud of the result; it served us well for the several years I stayed and they used it long after I left. I wish I still had it.

Some people, of course, don't test well. We always used the test as a starting point for discussion. We hired people who didn't do well on the test. We passed on people who aced it. But that was all over time. The way my first two interviewees reacted to the test, coupled with my lack of experience, made for a hairy couple of days.

These both happened to be women; we'll get to some weird guy interview stories, too. Their names are (AFAIK) fictitious; I certainly don't remember names this many years later. Just their faces.

Interviewee number one was a recent grad from the University of Georgia. They had a good computer program, but it was aimed more at business, focusing on COBOL and maybe BASIC. We were an engineering shop focusing on FORTRAN and assemble languages. As Mary sat down and handed me the test she looked dejected. "I don't think I did very well."

She'd done well on the software engineering questions but got nothing at all on the FORTRAN questions (we had emphasized FORTRAN in the ads). "No, not really. Have you had any FORTRAN at all?"

"No." She looked at the desk. "They told me when I majored in CS that COBOL was all anyone wanted!"

"I'm sorry. I know there are plenty of COBOL jobs around, but this isn't one."

"This was the only programming job in the paper this week! I don't know what I'm going to do. I'm sorry. Thank you for your time and honesty."

I shook her hand and she left, a tear sliding down one cheek. I started to write things up. A moment later I noticed her run past my window. Seconds later one of the admins was in my doorway with her hands on her hips. "Miles! What did you do to her?"

"Nothing. Why?"

"She went past my desk sobbing like her heart was breaking, and ran out the door! I tried to talk to her but she wouldn't stop."

I explained what had happened. Nancy said, "I guess that's why most companies don't tell you anything on site; they call back."

Lesson #1: Never tell an interviewee they haven't got the job unless you are prepared to deal with the fallout!

The next evening we had a woman from another culture interviewing. The test was designed to take 10-15 minutes; she was in my office after five. "This is a stupid test." She flung it down.

Sara had answered less than half the questions. Even some of those were not complete answers.

"I have a masters in computer science. Do you have a masters in computer science?"

"No, but anyone with the knowledge we asked for in the ad should know this." Given that I had not finished my undergrad degree, and that I had friends who had not graduated who could do the test in their sleep, I knew this was true. Both my bosses had Masters degrees but they were quite happy with both my knowledge and the test.

Sara wasn't really interested in discussion; she wanted to browbeat me into giving her the job! After two or three minutes, Tom stepped in from next door. "Could you please hold it down? And, ma'am, if you don't like it, you don't have to stay."

She left in a huff, but first demanded we return every piece of paper to her. I finally gave her the resume back, but the application and test were ours, and she wasn't getting them. She left mumbling vague threats. Tom came back in my office. "Are you OK?"

"Yeah. I lost control of that one."

"You sure did."

"What would you have done?"

He laughed. "Probably been a lot ruder a lot faster if I'd been in your chair."

Lesson #2: Maintain control of the interview, and don't even bother with people with bad attitudes. For those, ignore lesson 1. Just send them on their way.

Helene, our other admin, came down after this one to make sure I was OK. She'd heard it forty feet down the hall, and apparently Sara glared daggers at everyone on her way out. She let them know she wasn't happy, she had her resume, and we should be sued because we were so stupid. I guess I still looked a bit stunned; Helene have me a hug.

To be continued...

 

NOTES
[1] I realize that modern business English would shorten "given the task of" to "tasked with". I still find this mildly annoying. Besides, my phrasing is historically accurate.