Boardmad

I had a bit of a snort at this morning’s PVP when I checked in after my customary breakfast. I kind of understood the ‘throwing the goat’ reference, loved the urbane, diffidence from Butler but had to go look it up properly to check I was getting the connotation right…turns out I was ! Very funny !

How to “Throw the Goat
How NOT to “Throw the Goat”

Well it was funny to me at the time…and bizarrely while looking it all up I’ve come across a reference to Wil Wheaton of Star Trek TNG fame which I’m running down and reading up now.

I’ve been a fan of the word Bork for a long time now…in the context of the Swedish chef from the muppets crashing around singing ‘Bork, bork, bork’ at the top of his fuzzy little head while wildly brandishing a meat cleaver, to the use of the word to describe errant hardware, cocked-up software or release implementations that have gone awry.

However I’ve now found it’s successor…mborc. This stands for Matters Beyond Our Reasonable Control and while the etymology and usage isn’t exactly right I think it’s more a fitting usage of the language to describe when something has been ‘borked’.

I’m thinking i’ll use it something like ‘embarked’ but with the ‘o’ not the ‘a’…must rememebr to use in meeting from now on - see if it catched on. Heh heh.

As ever Dilbert nicely fleshes out the ongoing disparity between what business people say and do and what they actually mean !

This is always an interesting subject for me…in almost every meeting I attend where you’re actioned you end up clarifying the actual ‘meaning’ of the requirements or action point. Now this isn’t always just down to slap-dash, hurried or unclear specification or req’t gathering…more often than not it’s down to ‘meaning’ or context or even what the specifier actually had going on in their head at the time they specified the work and did they adequately convey this meaning into consistent, unabiguous statements that are free from interpretation ?

Then of course in a dynamic and evolving business env’t how does one keep the specification ahead of the requirement ? ;D That’s for another time !!

I cdnuolt blveiee taht I cluod aulaclty uesdnatnrd waht I was
rdanieg. The paonmnehal pweor of the hmuan mnid, aoccdrnig to
rscheearch at Cbmarigde Uivnertisy, it dosn’et mttaer in waht
oredr the ltteers in a wrod are, the olny iprmoatnt tihng is taht the
frist and lsat ltteer be in the rghit pclae. The rset can be a
taotl mses and you can sitll raed it wouthit a plorbem. Tihs is
bcuseae the huamn mnid deos not raed ervey lteter by istlef, but
the wrod as a wlohe.

Azanimg huh?

Yaeh and I awlyas tghuhot slpeling was ipmorantt !