I Know, I Know
It's not as dramatic as "When Averbs ATTACK!" or "Revenge of the Zeugma from Hades!!" but you work with what you've got. For your information, an aphorism is defined in my "Collins Concise" as a 'short pithy saying that encapsulates a general truth' and is derived from the Latin <hack spit> 'Aphorismos'. Art!
This illustrates exactly what I want to get around to later in the Intro. You folks who are unfamiliar with TANK probably haven't the foggiest idea what the vehicle above is, and may, thanks to that bunting, think this is one of the latest hot models off the Ruffian production lines at Uralvagonzavod. NO! Read that date. An easy mistake to make; they are actually serving with Paraguay.
The tank is an M3 Stuart, a light South Canadian tank that was one of their first attempts at creating a tank. If you want, think of it as one of the Seven Rings, as opposed to The One Ring, which would be a Challenger II in this analogy.
ANYWAY the aphorism in question is "If it isn't broken, don't fix it". Art!
The sleep of reason breeds strange things
Okay, you may be aware from enough of my Manglement stories that many South Canadian employers think their employees are little more than indentured slaves, and will cut any corner if it saves them a penny. To them, the aphorism ought to be IF IT AIN'T BROKE DON'T FIX IT except in neon and six feet high.
Thus it was that Original Poster was working on old, outdated hardware that his managers refused to replace because IF IT AIN'T BROKE DON'T FIX IT and the software running on it was politely described as 'legacy', which means it ought to have been replaced a decade ago, but once again let's all shout it IF IT AIN'T BROKE DON'T FIX IT. Art!
Sadly for the business, they had a 'Bus Factor' of 0 when it came to OP, as they had fired him. In case you were wondering, Bus Factor is how many other workers you possess that can cover a critical task if the normal employee gets hit by a bus. In a properly run business the Bus Factor would stand at 4 or 5, to cover for leave and training.
Then the business discovered that nobody else in the company knew how to operate either the hardware or software.
Oooops. This is the primary consequence of IF IT AIN'T BROKE DON'T FIX IT. Yeah, I bet they weren't shouting that from the rooftops any longer.
So, like any chiselling cheeseparing manglement, they tried to re-employ OP at his old rate. He countered with an offer to work as a contractor. Foolishly, and in keeping with their previous stupidity, they refused. Art!
Office contractors are deadly dull. Have a Happy Harry HIMAR launch instead.
They hired in an outside contractor, who refused to work with the obsolete hardware or the obsolete software, rather disproving the IF IT AIN'T BROKE DON'T FIX IT
assertions. In fact they gouged the company, only working during business hours, stretching the work out over 10 days and charging $47,000, which works out at nearly $550 per hour.
The business was, obviously - of course! - frothing with rage and took legal counsel about suing OP. They were told to shut up and accept that they'd been charged a Bottomhole Tax, as OP had been fired without cause. He'd also offered to fix the problem over a weekend, working 20 hours at $250 per hour, for a total of $5,000.
Replacing all the obsolete kit and programs would have cost a fraction of their eventual outlay. As I said in the title, When Aphorisms LIE!
One-Seventh Scale?
Yes Indeedy Ally Sheedy. You will, I hope, have been following Conrad's gradual uncovering of SpitBrix's 20 Most Incredible Lego World Records, and we've now reached Number 2. Art!
This is a one-seventh scale replica of Air Force One, standing thirty-six feet long. There's no info on how long they took to build it, but it would have taken weeks, and doubtless on a metal skeleton to sustain the weight, too. Art!
I did discover that the build team are Polish, and that they call it 11 metres long, 3 metres high and 10 metres wide, but we'll forgive them because of 303 Squadron.
If this is Number 2, I wonder what Number 1 is? because I've forgotten after viewing this video only once.
If you want a better sense of scale, I believe "Action Man" is one-sixth scale, so ponder on that for a minute or two.
Going Rogue
Yes, more about "Rogue Trooper", because there is more to tell. You will recall that the Genetic Infantry were essentially super-soldiers in comparison to puny normie Hom. Sap. soldiers. So much time, effort and money had been invested in their creation that an element of redundancy was also included in their design: each of them had a microchip implanted in their brain. At the moment of death their entire personality and memory would be encoded on the chip. Art!
This allowed them to be re-cloned and have the old person re-implanted to be born again. All GIs had slots for microchips on their rifle, helmet and backpack, and the microchips could activate said kit. Art!
Needless to say, Friday's microchipped mates don't get on together, because in conflict there is drama.
"City In The Sky"
The evil snake-like alien Mirkan 93 is finding the outback hard going, thanks to have a metabolism that makes a slug look like a hummingbird.
This unpleasant diversion forced him away from the direct route to the
flying-eye pickup point. He didn’t dare
venture back to the track in case the ants were still following.
Thirty minutes later he encountered more toxic ants, and yes, they were
following the track. He veered off
again, to the west. This time he kept
clear of the ants, but again had to keep far from his most efficient route.
The radio was no use. When he
tried a squalling storm of static threatened to shatter his eardrums. Jamming by the Baseship – to what end? he
wondered.
Impossibly, more giant ferocious ants began to appear from his
right. At first they only came in ones
and twos, running in circles without any apparent aim. Within minutes the singles and pairs became
tens and dozens. Now beginning to feel
alarmed, Mirkan 93 veered away from them, and discovered more ants not ten
metres away to his left. In a fit of
rage he blasted whole square metres of ground into smoldering blackness, dotted
with tiny charred spots where the ants died in hundreds.
And came on in their hundreds.
How completely coincidental that the ants have appeared and are driving Mirkan 93 away from the track, hmmmmm?
"Gabba Habba Hey, We Don't Accept You"
With apologies to The Ramones. It's a lyric from their song "Pinhead". I refer, lest ye be unaware, of Pimpkinhead's legal counsel Alina Habba. She is, by the standards of those in the South Canadian legal profession, rather a rubbish lawyer. She's woefully inexperienced in criminal law, civil law, procedures, legal process and anything else she's come across in the courtroom. Art!
Rumpy Trumpy fancies the pants off her, which is why she hasn't been fired, despite being paid $2,000,000 to lose him $83,300,000. He doesn't trust her, either, as it's just been revealed that he paid $400,000 to private investigators to look into how competent his lawyers were, and if they were doing their job.
Well, no. No she wasn't. Donald Buck has been making noises about hiring another law firm. "Private Eye"'s legal eagles of Sue, Grabbit and Run might be available.
Finally -
Still watching "Foyle's War" and I've noticed that, because it's so old, there are younger versions of established stars in each story. So far we've seen James McAvoy, David Tennant and now Danny Dyer. Who's next?
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