Totally for my own reference.

Yesterday at our company all-hands meeting, we all got a pretty cool rollerball pen with a Hauser 707sf refill in it.

Upon Googling (gerund!), I found out that Schmidt 888 refills are compatible and that the “International Standard Size” is very likely also compatible.

Links I found for representative refills:

• Monteverde Fashion Fun Colors Refills
• Hauser 707sf Black refill
• Schmidt 888 red refill

I am having a work issue that involves needing to plan and strategize and implement a large standards/process library for my IT department (at work, natch). The project is long-term, and just starting out, and while I am a member of a team (and thus not solely responsible), I need some guidance vis a vis where to start looking for formal guidance. As such, I posted a question on ask.metafilter.com and would also love your help if you’ve got comments or suggestions.

In order to avoid spamming, here’s the link to the post on ask.metafilter.com, but feel free to comment here if you’d rather.

I would deeply appreciate any meaningful feedback you might have, not only in answering my original question but also if I’ve obviously left out steps in what I’ve already said about the context or my planning.

Got to the hotel after determining I got to the 30th street rail station a bit too late to get to Reading Terminal Market (I jones for the apple dumplings). It’s a flat fee for taxi rides to the airport from Philadelphia, so I got that fee and a receipt for the expense report.

Next: Wait 30 minutes to see about dinner, since I only had a 3-egg scramble for brunch, and am hungry.

Even computer professionals (who should know better, in my opinion, given that in general they are also in support roles and know how frustrating it can be to have it done to you), cave to the temptation of handing over a broken system to those responsible to it with a very vague wave of the hand, a cursory description and big expectations.

So far today, I’ve dealt with one such in an escalation from our internal helpdesk (long on conveyed user complaints, short on actual useful details) and one from internally within our high-level support group (also long on complaint - i.e. “it ain’t working!” - but short on actual useful details so I can start troubleshooting).

In four more hours at the office, I wonder how many more I’ll tally up.

My boss is fully committed to all-day meetings this week, my team lead is out on vacation, and we’re full bore, which means I am never getting a break between seeing to my own deliverables through and answering the every-15-minutes (I’m being charitable here) questions from folks who are or who see themselves as my subordinates.
I’ll be sure to let my superiors know about that dynamic when they get back.

Still thinking on the best way to convey that it’s possible to stack up questions/requests and not make the day a continual one of always-more-important interrupts. It was a Valuable Business Lesson I learned one day as a much wee-er Malcolm when my boss freaked out at me at the bank I used to work at after I interrupted him the fifth time one morning for what turned out to be really trivial crap. I’d like to convey the same lesson, but probably not in the same way. I don’t like freaking out at anyone.

Anyhow, on the home front, the router freaked out yesterday but I restarted it a couple times, poked at it and upgraded its firmware to firmware from September 2007. Not exactly indicated by the symptoms but it’s probably a good idea to upgrade it since I’m seeing problems. H mentioned that there was some electrical work in the neighborhood that could have zapped the poor thing. I’ll keep an eye on it and be ready to replace it if need be. It’s about a year and change old.

It seems to be working today. We’ll see how it goes.

VoIP is supposed to be activated today. I’ll keep tabs on that as I can. The number port was supposed to go through today.

I have WiFi access. I can keep tabs on work. I am paying attention to the ongoing meeting, which is a design and planning session, and interjecting, clarifying where needed.

We plan to leave in the early afternoon. Yesterday, leaving at 3:15 or so, we got home around 7 or 8, but there was snow and panicked drivers, and silliness.

This session is pretty good. The main architect is earning her keep, but as an MS employee, seems to have certain priorities she has to talk about. Still, I would have preferred she/the rest of the team come out to our offices, 30 miles/1 - 1.5 hours away. This is one of the things I hate about this region - the traffic/commutes.

This is a work item, related to the clicking plans I had earlier.

Sometimes vendors/hosts have customer support forms that ask you to rate your expertise. At this point with this product, I think I may understand how it functions better than many of the support people I work with. I wish there were a self-rating level that said something like “No offense, but if I have to work with your crappy product for more than 30 minutes, it’s likely I know more about it than you do.”

Today it is my lot to click almost every link in a 30+ GB document library. There will be lots of music and lots of breaks. And no, I can’t delegate the work because it requires someone with my knowledge to do it, and there aren’t a lot of us.

Wish me luck staying sane and not wearing out my clicking finger.