zBlackX

Another joke from Ross

The day after his wife disappeared in a kayaking accident, an Anchorage man answered his door to find two grim-faced Alaska State Troopers.

“We’re sorry Mr. Wilkens, but we have some information about your wife,” said one trooper.

“Tell me! Did you find her?” Wilkens shouted.

The troopers looked at each other. One said, “We have some bad news,some good news, and some really great news. Which do you want to hear first?”

Fearing the worst, Mr. Wilkens said, “Give me the bad news first.”

The trooper said, “I’m sorry to tell you, sir, but this morning we found your wife’s body in Kachemak Bay .”

“Oh my God!” exclaimed Wilkens. Swallowing hard, he asked, “What’s the good news?”

The trooper continued, “When we pulled her up, she had 12 twenty-five pound king crabs and 6 good-size Dungeness crabs clinging to her.”

Stunned, Mr. Wilkens demanded, “If that’s the good news, what’s the great news?”

The trooper said, “We’re going to pull her up again tomorrow.”

Ken posted a comment a while back to the effect that I needed to post an update. I agree it’s been far too long but I just couldn’t seem to find anything I wanted to write about. Tonight is not all that much different but I guess I’ll force myself to write something.

I mentioned in a previous post that I’ve been trying to learn Java. Since then I’ve read a couple of more books on Java and I’m taking a Java I class at Mesa Community Collage. The class is OK but I’m not learning as much as I want. I plan on taking Java II next spring but I’m not sure I’m going to be able to learn what I’ve not been able to get out of books on my own.

I found a web site, Java^TM EE (J2EE) Programming (with Passion!), online that has an informal self-study Java class that might be helpful. I think I’ll work though it when his next session starts the middle of next month. I’ve got the basics of the language down but getting my arms wrapped around the tool and environment APIs is proving to be quite a challenge.

A thought provoking video —
http://www.albinoblacksheep.com/video/shifthappens.

Calling all mainframe programmers – or want-to-be mainframe programmers.

Where I currently work we are having trouble finding mainframe programmers. They don’t pay enough, which is part of the problem, but it looks like the labor market in the IT field is tightening up also. Going forward it is going to get worse because I estimate that 80% of the staff is within just a few years of retirement age. This is compounded by the fact that there is essentially no one providing mainframe training. Even on new technologies, that are newly available on the mainframe, such as Java, SOA, and WebSphere.

There is a community collage here on the west side of town (Estrella Mountain Community College) that is adding two new introductory mainframe classes this fall. The first one, CIS181 – IBM Mainframe Z OS – Level I, is an introductory course covering general concepts of how to allocate and access files, use JCL to run jobs, and use TSO and ISPF.

The second one, CIS181 – IBM Mainframe Z OS – Level I, covers some stuff that is new to me (HTTP Server and WebSphere), but they are only 3 out of 9 major bullet points. They each deserve a full class of their own, and passably an advanced class. This is the first semester they have had these classes and hopefully they will add more advanced classes in the future.

Disclaimer: I didn’t mention where I worked (although it probably wouldn’t be hard to find out as I may have mentioned it in other posts), but the comments and opinions presented here are my own, and are not necessarily shared by my employer or anyone else.

Paul Graham has a new essay about “Stuff” at http://paulgraham.com/stuff.html. One of the comments references a book and video about the “The Paradox of Choice” that is also quite helpful.

We just spent several weeks moving stuff and we also have a bunch of stuff in storage. I want to go through everything and really pare down the junk. We’ll see in a couple of months from now how well I do.

An animation worth watching

http://www.deviantart.com/deviation/34244097/

A blonde’s car gets a flat tire on the Interstate one day. So, she eases it over onto the shoulder of the road.

She carefully steps out of the car and opens the trunk. She then takes out two cardboard men, unfolds them and stands them at the rear of the vehicle facing oncoming traffic. The lifelike cardboard men are in trench coats exposing their nude bodies to approaching drivers…

Not surprisingly, the traffic became snarled and backed up.

It wasn’t very long before a police car arrives.

The Officer, clearly enraged, approaches the blonde of the disabled vehicle yelling, “What is going on here?”

“My car broke down, Officer” says the woman, calmly.

“Well, what the hell are these obscene cardboard pictures doing here by the road?!” asks the Officer…

“Helllllooooo, those are my emergency flashers!” she replies.

(From one of Ross’s emails.)

New words for an old gospel standby (from the TV show “Malcolm in the Middle”):

“Amazing race, how sweet the taste, that saved a wrench for me. I once was in the lost and found. Was blind but found my keys. My face …”

“… although I’m sure somebody in America is currently trying to patent the photon.”

From a zdnet article.

… people start offering you their seat on the bus.

(Happened twice in the last two days.)