Yorkshire pudding

Not exactly a popular dish in the States, I've only actually seen it served at one restaurant in Los Angeles, Lawry's, along side their prime rib.  In my head, then, it had the same association with blood as black pudding, which is really too disgusting to even think about -- and a traditional part of any English breakfast.

So I was surprised and delighted to learn that Yorkshire pudding is simply a batter (not unlike pancakes) that is entirely acceptable for vegetarians.  Of course, the traditional Yorkshire pud is cooked on a tray underneath a roasting joint in order to catch the drippings, and then served with a meat gravy, but obviously I won't be eating mine that way.  (I'll be eating mine out of the freezer.)

Now I need to find some vegetarian prawn crackers. (I found 'Roast Ox' flavored chips that are vegetarian, but I really don't see the point.)

Timing is everything

In 2008, when I moved to London, the exchange rate was near record high, meaning the money I brought here was worth 25% less than it would have been just a few years before. In addition, I moved from the 55th most expensive city in the world to the third. Then I started looking for a job during the worst recession in 60 years.

Less than a year later, when I finally started earning pounds, the exchange rate had fallen to record lows, meaning that the money I send back to the US is now worth 25% less than a year ago! I know I've mentioned this before, but I just can't believe how bad my timing was. Plus, I found this cool graph:

On the bright side, last year London fell to the 16th most expensive city in the world, while Los Angeles jumped to #23.

Unmitigated disaster

Work required me to go to Gloucester on Tuesday.  I've been there several times now, but only driven once -- it fact, that was my first long drive in England, and although Google maps said it was a 2 hour trip, it took me 3 hours.  The train gets there faster, costs about the same, and lets me get in a couple of hours of work (or sleep) so I've taken it ever since.

My last visit, however,  I missed the returning train by seconds -- I was running down the platform when it pulled away -- leaving me stuck in the station for an hour, and I didn't get home until almost 9pm.  Plus my boss indicated I might have to stay overnight, so I decided to drive this time, confident that with more driving under my belt, I could make it this time in 2 hours.  So confident, in fact, that I took a different route.

Needless to say, I arrived an hour late, but that was fine because all I needed to do was fix a problem my boss had encountered the previous Thursday, finish the migration, make sure the client was happy, and go home.  A couple of hours, tops.

By lunchtime, I still could not re-create the problem my boss was having.  Ironically, had the problem been manifest, I could have fixed it and moved on, but instead it took me longer to show there was no problem.  I still have no idea what he was doing, but I convinced him it didn't matter what was going on before, it was running fine now.  In fact, the job he was complaining took an hour and a half (and the reason he suggested I might be there overnight)  was running successfully in 15 minutes.

While trying to figure out what had happened, I discovered another team had updated some of the test data and, thinking that might be the cause, I refreshed the data with production data.  That's when I found out that production data was wrong, and the test data (that I had just overwritten) was the fix. And no, I didn't make a backup (it was test!) but they could re-send the new data...on Friday.

So now there was no point in migrating the system into production, because production had bad data, so the new plan was to refresh all of the test data, wait for the other team to update the data again, and then run the new reports from test.  Since this particular data was only updated monthly, that was good enough for 4 weeks, and I would come back on March 16.  However, refreshing the entire test system would wipe out all of my new reports, so I had to wait two hours for the system admin to copy the data and then migrate my changes again.

At 4pm, the system admin announced the restore wasn't finished yet, but he had to leave to pick up his kids, so he'd finish it in the morning.  That meant I was stuck in Gloucester overnight so I checked into the nearby Holiday Grim, who put me in a handicap-accessible room that was bigger than my flat.  (After a rather embarrassing incident last year, I've learned what the red pull-cords are for and I no longer pull them...)
 The next morning, the database was up and I started to migrate my changes, only to find out the company had implemented a new migration process without telling me.  (This is not uncommon, and a large part of my frustration with this company, especially considering there are only 9 employees.)  My boss had written down some terse instructions which turned out to be incomplete and, in several places, wrong, and it took me just over two hours to figure it out.  (The old process took 15 minutes.)  When it was all finished, the web server crashed.

At first we couldn't figure out what had happened, and by this time the client was getting quite upset, and I didn't blame her, but all we could do was ask the system admin to bounce the web server.  He was in a meeting so she left a large post-it note on his keyboard to ensure he did it before going to lunch.  He apparently went to lunch without ever looking at his desk.  And apparently on Wednesday's he plays footb soccer, so he was gone for two hours.  When he finally returned, it took him all of 2 minutes to get the system working again.

I had not been sitting on my hands, of course, and by this time I had made quite a few updates that I wanted to get in so the user could test them, so  I did another migration -- with the proper instructions, it only took 15 minutes -- and the web server crashed again.  We got this resolved quickly and at 2:30pm the user ran the new reports and got ... nothing.

Not wrong data, not bad data, but nothing at all.  I was horrified.  I had no idea what the problem could be, no idea how to fix it, no idea even where to start.  I finally started from the beginning, manually running each step, which is not easy because the tool I use--and the reason I hate it so much--hides everything, like a car with its hood sealed shut.  I finally realized the problem was the process -- the same process that was breaking last Thursday, that was working fine yesterday, the entire reason for my trip out there -- I'd forgotten to run again since the database had been refreshed!

We kicked it off at 3:30pm but at this point I was quite worried because the rental car had to be back by 6pm, and I was taking Jess to a concert in London that evening, so I convinced the client to let me go by promising to return on Thursday if there were any problems.  (Fortunately, there weren't.)  I got in the car, looked at the map to determine my route, and promptly headed off in the wrong direction.

I don't know what it is about roundabouts, but they throw me off my bearings every time.  Couple that a complete ignorance of the local geography -- they never post directions, only places, such that I have to choose between A417 to Ledbury or A417 to Cirencester -- and my general aptitude for going the wrong way, and it gets me every time.  By the time I was able to turn around and come back to where I'd started, it was after 4:30pm and I was hitting rush-hour traffic.  I called and extended the rental car for an extra day.

It took another 3 hours to get home, the last 45 minutes just being the last 3 miles of the journey.  (It kills me to know Jess does this every day.)  I was tired, sore, and the last thing I wanted to do was go out for the evening, but we did nonetheless.  Jess offered to drive and I gratefully accepted.  However, we could not find any parking near the theater, and ended up parking at a mall about a mile away.  We walked in the near freezing temperatures, occasionally pelted by rain, only to find that 'unreserved seating' at Shepherd's Bush Empire actually means 'unreserved seating or standing, when we run out of chairs.'  And they had run out of chairs.

But it actually worked out well: We were on the second level, leaning on the railing, with plenty of space and an excellent view of both the stage and the people crowded shoulder-to-shoulder on the ground floor.  Standing for two hours -- after driving for 3 -- was actually a pleasant change, and the music was fantastic.  (It was Corinne Bailey Rae's first concert in two years, it was swamped by the press, and I was lucky to get tickets.) 

P.S. Just to add insult to injury, the next day I had to return the rental car, which is all of 3 miles from my house.  I got lost, drove for over an hour, and screamed myself hoarse.  I hate driving in London.

Back in the U.S.S.A.

[Sorry, was just reading about the Beatles' Abbey Road studio being put up for sale.]

After a rather grueling month of 80-hour weeks -- punctuated only by my company telling me how unappreciated my efforts are -- I'm taking a few days off to visit my uncle in Georgia.  His recent medical issues -- in December he didn't know who I was, and thought he was back in Connecticut -- seemed to have faded, the only lingering effect being that he has forgotton large chunks of his past.  He calls me now, looking at a photograph, and wants to know if that really happened.  I'm just happy to be talking to him.

I'm also taking him to Chattanooga, Tennesee for a night, just to get him out of the house.  He was there about 14 years ago, but of course he doesn't remember.  I've never been.  We're staying at the old terminal, where they've converted train cars into actual bedrooms.  (Not sleeper cars -- they pulled out the seats and actually installed beds.)  Hopefully we'll get a chance to see Ruby Falls but the tour is 4/5ths of a mile, so it may not happen.

Mr Brains Faggots

This advert, from the mid-80s, may exemplify the cultural divide between the US and the UK:



Even more disturbing is that you can still buy them today.

Pancake day - February 16

I love a good pancake as much as the next person, but I don't know if I'd dedicate a whole day to them. And in any case, pancakes in the UK are really crepes. (If you want a thick pancake, you have to ask for an American pancake, in which case they'll probably spit in your food, so best not to bother.)

It's actually Shrove Tuesday, the day before Ash Wednesday, which is the start of Lent, when Jesus went into the desert and fasted for 40 days.  If you're Christian, you know you're supposed to give something up (like meat) during this period, but historically you were supposed to get rid of all "luxury" foods, like sugar, eggs, and oil, so people made pancakes.  Now it's a tradition, with lots of charity events including pancake races (since 1445!) where you race whilst holding a frying pan and flipping a pancake!

Interestingly, Jews have a similar tradition before Passover, removing all unleavened products ("chametz") from their home.  Hard to discount the similarities between Moses wandering the desert for 40 years, and Jesus for 40 days, although in both cases it probably stems from a more practical need, before refrigeration, to empty the cupboards before winter stores begin to spoil.  (In England the period between now and the spring crop was called, not very creatively, the "hungry time.")

Shrove, by the way, is an old English word for going to confession.  The French obviously didn't bother with that, though, as they just called it "Fat Tuesday" -- Mardi Gras.  The Germans called it Fastnacht ("night before the fast" perhaps?) and celebrated with donuts fried in lard.  Lancaster County, Pennsylvania, is probably the only place in America where you can find fausnachts and trust me, they are as disgusting as they sound.

But the award for weirdest food on Shrove Tuesday has to go to the Scots, who eat fried balls of meat called "festy cocks" and make pancakes with slices of hot dogs.  (Oh wait, Jimmy Dean makes those as well.)

And before you say anything, yes, I realise I said "whilst."  I may never talk like a Brit, but at least I can type like one.

Focus

I've been thinking about focus lately. Where we focus our thoughts, our time, our energy. What we focus on when we look in a mirror, or at another person. How we focus on what makes us happy, or what we think will make us happy, or what we worry will make us unhappy.

More than that, though, I've been thinking about how our focus shifts, imperceptibly, over time. (You can call it growth but it's really just change.) I think about all the things I've focused on in the past, that hold no allure for me today. And I think about all the things I'm interested in now, that two years ago I never even thought about.

This past month I've been focused on work, which is notable only in that I promised myself I wasn't going to do that anymore. That is to say, I still have to work, but I don't want it to dominate my life like it has in the past. Unfortunately, given a particularly intractable database problem, and I was regularly skipping sleep to work on it. (As I write this, I have been up for about 40 hours.)

Ironically, my company is not happy I'm even doing this in the first place -- they say it was out of scope for the project, but my company is so dysfunctional I'm not really bothered by what they think. However, having the company not be supportive really puts what I've given up over the past month into context, and reminds me why I decided 3 years ago to focus on life instead of work.

Perhaps its time I renewed that vow. That, and update my resume.

On the bus

...bumping through London, a part of Islington I've been through many times, but still don't recognize. It's only 6:30pm but it's been dark for an hour. Streetlamps are sporadic here, and don't penetrate the gloom. A row of restaurants--eritrean, thai, japanese, and "Mississippi fried chicken" vie with typical tandoori and kebabs. Six months ago I'd never heard of Eritrea. The road markings are familiar now, the zigzags approaching a zebra crossing, the bus lane painted red, the "no" sign that doesn't have a line through it, so I always think it is giving me permission instead. I smile as we pass "Balls Pond Road." I am tired--today I went into what passes for the company office--and it will take at least 90 minutes to get home, 12 miles away. I am not denegrating public transport; driving wouldn't be any faster, and I am grateful not to have to wend that gauntlet.

I've gone underground, at King's Cross, which I know well--it is the intersection of the Piccadilly and Northern lines, which was my route to Jessica's for almost a year. I can't believe I've been here so long. There are 267 stations on the underground, but I have used less than 40; there are still huge swaths of London I've never set foot in. It's getting late--I can tell because there are seats available on the tube.

I'm back on the bus for the final leg, a 1 mile hop from Ealing Broadway. I managed to find a place that was equally inconvenient to three tube lines, though on a map it looks amazingly well connected. I need to buy a car. I need to find a place to live. I need to see the world. I need to take care of my family. I need to call my friends. I need to make dinner. I need to take a nap. So many demands, and the time keeps slipping away.