dancingmango

It’s a girl!

And so at 11.50am on Thursday 25th May Lindsey gave birth to our brand new daughter. A bit of a surprise, we all thought it would be a boy – but that was a relief to Lindsey, we wouldn’t have to discuss the finer points of my preferred choice of boy’s name – Ozymandias. Instead we have a healthy girl, weighing in at the imperial 7lbs and 7oz. And her name? Sadly it is not to be Orphelia (my choice again) but Olivia Ita McNeill. India is delighted with her new younger sister, and Lindsey and I wonder if we will ever know sleep again. Oh, photos (can’t upload them on wordpress so on flickr):- http://www.flickr.com/photos/dancingmango/

I feel like a client

I took all of last week off to install a new kitchen.  The only thing I couldn’t do was fit the surfaces so I got the professionals in to help.  Air was sucked in through the teeth, the head shook.  “What numpty fitted this lot in?  Look at the gaps”  …Well I was going to use filler.  “If you want the kitchen to look good in a years time, we’re gonna have to pull it all out and start again”.  I don;t have time to start again, new baby arrives tomorrow.  Grrrrr.

And it occurs to me that this is just like the real world of business.  “We don’t need the consultants in, we’ll do it all in-house”.  But just like my kitchen, inevitably things go wrong, deadlines get missed and you end up having to start again and pay more than you ever anticipated.   Moral of the story, if you are going to do something, do it right.  Know your limitations.  Get the experts in.  Trust them.

Not just a funcitonal requirement, an emotional requirement

I’ve got a great new Nokia N80 phone. The front slides up to reveal the keypad. But it is an unsatisfying click. Functional, but not compelling. Compare this with the Samsung phones that slide with a Zhhhhhclunk. Both have the same function, but the Samsung feels better….