Appreciations of the day

[Brian]

The capstone on the Silo of Incompetence has enraged the CTO.  I missed yesterday's all-hands, but evidently the first announcement was our CTO saying that the director of engineering had left the company.

Rumor mill is telling me he was fired on the spot and walked out with security.

While most everyone will get all that this entails, to explain it a bit more:

It's pretty unusual to fire a director on the spot, and it is the kind of thing that's a bit risky, since it makes the investors worry (though it's usually pretty easy to smooth over by explaining that the fired director was bad).  What's more standard in this kind of situation is the director to recognize that they're going to be removed and go along with it -- this allows them to collect a few paychecks and hunt for work while remaining with the company in name.

Instead, our director pushed back and said he wouldn't accede to the CTO's instructions.  I think it takes a lot to upset a CTO to that point.

I credit the old man (and the other senior tester) for their parting words to the HR rep and the CTO for accomplishing this.  It took a while, and theoretically should have taken even longer, but it certainly got results.

Now to see if the last two tiers of the Silo can be removed, as they're the ones we interact with directly.  If they're smart, they're going to be looking for new jobs right now instead of sticking around....

Edit: I have a 1:1 with the lowest rank.  I think today might be a good day to suggest an official title change to lab manager, and ideally the raise that should come with it.  Yeah, that sounds like a good idea.

[Dracos]

Watching Record of Lodoss Wars, MST'd to star Mark, Mark, Mark, Mark, and also, Mark.

[Brian]

That was unexpectedly hilarious.

[Dracos]

It really was :)

[Yuthirin]

Is this something you can link to?

[Brian]

No, we were just MSTing the anime from our couch, and compared one of the characters (Parn) to a player we all knew and had gamed with in the past....

Anyway.  I skipped the meeting for it, but evidently was given an award for a project I was on.

I did really work very hard for it, but it doesn't feel particularly earned, somehow.

[Brian]

Managed to wrap up the dungeon crawl campaign.  I think it was okay?  Had some really fun moments?  Nothing could stop the monk, but that was probably my fault for not doing more homework on loot....

[Grahf]

So, they're apparently going to be animating some of the Haruhi spin-offs again. Specifically Haruhi-chan, Churuya, and the new addition, Nagato Yuki-chan.

It's not a true season three, and the details are sparse at the moment (odds are KyoAni isn't going to be animating it, from the looks of things), but still, it's something from the franchise after such a long stretch of silence. Perhaps a tentative step in the right direction.

[Brian]

So far this is merely the most boring company holiday party I have been to, not the worst.

[Brian]

This just got crazy.  So, we're at a winery for the holiday party, and they have a planned activity of us blending wines, which then will be graded.  Considering their business model of "let us use your land and we give you 20% of your own grapes as wine!", I think we're being used as free labor....

[KLSymph]

If your company paid the winery to host the holiday party, it'd be even-less-than-free labor.

[Brian]

They did!

[KLSymph]

Clearly, the solution is to take their provided wine and blend them into such utter swill that a single taste annihilates the grader's palate.

[Brian]

We actually designed our blend to be highest possible alcohol content.  We were aiming for a 'box' wine, and everything.

Primary demographic was college students, secondary market was 'Dedicated Deep Drinkers'.  The sales guy had a decent pitch, but stuttered and wasn't as funny as some of the other teams.  We still had a good time, and were evidently judged one of the best tasting wines, despite mottos like, "Not that bad," or, "when you want to keep drinking, but not the good wines".

[alethiophile]

I am off of school (for a month) and work (for a week and a half).

Oversleeping, ho!