Standards

I was thinking about managers, bosses and how they are really always being evaluated from below. I think back to someone high up, Manager X whom I thought was perfectly professional, spread evenly and strongly between all points of interest and at least seemed to care for the individuals in the team. But then we did discuss him amongst ourselves and his failings, as few as they might have been, were brought out for display.

I didn't join in, I only listened. As a rule I do not speak up during these types of conversations. I don't have a good filter for what I think and say and I wouldn't want to get into trouble. Besides, its easier to respect ones managers. I just wanted to tell them all about my previous experiences with higher management and how Manager X was a paragon, a God compared to them all. But then all those other people would never have made it into this kind of an organisation. The playing field was completely different. And as a result, everything that I was appreciative of was taken for granted. Agreed, that he was good but that was no reason why they should be blind to his failings. I shrug internally. It will take me a while to get to that stage. I have so many issues about my own deliverables, outcomes and their acceptability. I feel like I'm craving acceptance and thats not a good attitude, no? It's good in the way that it makes me work so much harder. But it's bad in that it gives me confidence issues and derails my personality at work.

The Why of the Mango

"The avocado may be an example of an 'evolutionary anachronism', a fruit adapted for ecological relationship with now-extinct large mammals (such as the giant ground sloth or the Gomphothere). Most large fleshy fruits serve the function of seed dispersal, accomplished by their consumption by large animals. There are some reasons to think that the fruit, with its mildly toxic pit, may have co-evolved with Pleistocene megafauna to be swallowed whole and excreted in their dung, ready to sprout. No extant native animal is large enough to effectively disperse avocado seeds in this fashion. If so, the avocado occupies a similar ecological niche to the mango of Asia."

I am just giddy thinking about the pleistocene megafauna that made the mango happen. Thank you, thank you, thank you! You are not forgotten. Your existence was not in vain.

Off to do some research on the coevolution of the mango

"Also, paleognaths were of course long distinct from neognaths."

Of course, of course... (confused but too shy to speak up)

Well, I was reading this, so speaking up might be of no use. Off to wikipedia!

(Playground chant) Iridium loo--ooves Iron.

No but seriously. I didn't know thats why Iridium was so rare in the earth's crust. It just sank with all of the iron to the core.

It has to be a sign of idiocy. the last few days I've been addicted to the lolcats site http://icanhascheezburger.com/

lolcats are siiiiiidesplittingly funny

I want a cat (sniff)

I want a dog more (sniff)

Does it make sense if two people are working long hours to get a dog? No, I didn't think so either. Mope

Sometimes I leave the radio playing while I study and then something will come on and stun me. I burst into spontaneous applause

Only too soon I'm in a small room once again in the dim yellow lighting and my claps echo.

I'm a bit sceptical of Women's Initiatives in companies. Because really, whatever problems a woman faces and needs help with, it's a bit restrictive to think that we are the only ones affected and the only ones who need help. Surely, there's not much that is the sole domain of a woman any more (besides pregnancy perhaps and there's maternal leave to take care of that) But honestly. Things like low confidence, parenting needs, handling stress. we've got it equally dealt out between the sexes. And to say there's discriminiation that women suffer from; well thats an issue that all stakeholders need to resolve and is not really the realm of a Women's Initiative.

As someone's friend put it after attending one of these meetings "I'm doomed. I'm a woman." :p