So I keep having this slow down problem all the sudden at home, and I could not figure it out, then I noticed the sapisvr.exe process. And I would kill it and it would hang the application I was in if it was IE or yahoo messenger. I was going what the hell is that. Then I happened to bring up blogger to write a blog, and I noticed something. Text typing by itself. For a split second I thought virus, then I remembered, Windows XP has this "neat" feature where you can dictate to it. So I turned off my mic, and voila, no more typing, process' not hanging. Now I just need to find the setting to turn off the dictation period...

We live in a conveinence (yes thats probably spelled wrong) society, but its not as bad as it could be really its not. I was cooking supper tonight and the recipe called for a quarter cup of water, I was thinking you know I am surprised. I am surprised that they do not have those and ones for milk in the grocery, so lazy people can just grab one and not have to measure it out. Maybe that would be something good to start selling. Hmmmm I have a business idea, any VCs out there?

Okay its 10 pm on a Tuesday night. What pops into my head, but the name George Markowsky. Now you probably have no idea who that is, as you shouldn't, unless you went to the University of Maine. As you can see from the picture, he is what many would consider a true geek. Pocket protector and all. Very smart man, but as you can see from these ratings, a hell of a hard teacher. Now most of you are going, why the hell did you think of him at 10 pm on a Tuesday. And I can answer that quite easily. I have no idea. But now you know who he is, and if you ever have him good luck.

I like to watch Jerry Springer. There I said it, I am not proud of it, but its true. I like to watch it. Its more mindless than anything else I have ever watched, and I love it. You could not find more outlandish stories in an Enquirer. The women who show up on it are scarey, and the men are down right disgusting. Its wonderfull. You get to sit back and laugh at the losers of the country from your own living room and no one needs to know. They had this one on where Grandma was sleeping with Mom and the Granddaughter's boyfriend. Not only is the idea totally disgusting, the people involved are as well. It was hilarious. Maybe this is my faces of death, as I never have and never want to see any of those flicks...

Wow I think that was the longest post I ever put up. I guess I just have a thing with outsourcing. I have worked at two companies that thought outsourcing of one thing or another was their solution to their web issues. Having had to work with the outsourcing company and seeing the results of their solutions, its only lead me to believe more and more that having personnel that are your employees that you can trust and look to for experienced judgements will get you much farther than attempting to hire another company that has no idea what your issues are and were, or expecting them to know what they will be.

I get Eweek magazine. And in the last issue I looked at it had an article about EDS "partnering" with another company, for that other company to provide the desktop support that they are supposedly providing in their IT outsourcing packages, at least for some clients. Apparently, according to Wall Street there is not enough per employee revenue in doing desktop support, so EDS to shore up its numbers is effectively outsourcing that work to another company. What really gets me is that EDS is an outsourcing company, its where companies like Xerox go to outsource their IT, because presumably its cheaper to have a company like EDS do it than do it yourself. And now EDS is outsourcing this to another company because there is not enough per employee revenue to satisfy Wall Street. Does anyone else see the problem with this? Well, if not follow along. First you have Xerox, say, and they outsource their IT functions to EDS. They do this because its "understood" that a companies IT staff is too expensive and its not the "core competency" of the company to do IT work. I am not going to discuss this at this point, other than to say take your car, share it between you and 3 of your neighbors, now either that car is not needed much and thats a good idea, or you find that you do not have that car at times you need it as its busy at your neighbor's house. It would make sense that you have a car at your disposal all the time, now whether you are leasing it or own it thats another argument... Now back on track, so Xerox outsourced their IT to EDS, because it was supposed to be cheaper, and because this was EDS's competency. So now we are at EDS, and EDS is now told their revenue per employee is not high enough. What does that mean? It means that they do not make enough money via the contracts they have compared to the employees they have. There are a couple of choices at this point, they can, increase the number of contracts (and thus the money) while keeping the employee count the same. I.e. increase sales. They can lay off employees, thus keeping the contracts (and thus money) even, while decreasing the employees, bringing up this revenue per employee number. Or they can "outsource" the desktop support because its "not in their core competency" and its expensive to run that in house. So now we are at Company X, and the current end of the chain. What are some possible thoughts at this point?

Company X makes no money, otherwise EDS would not have outsourced.

EDS is not really saving any money, they are just hiding expenditures by funneling the same money out to another company and effectively getting rid of those employees.

Xerox just got shafted as now their desktop support is twice removed.

Either outsourcing is a business with extremely little margins, that no right minded company would want to be in, or outsourcing is just a fad thats used to shift numbers around in your books.

Enron was just the tip of the iceberg when it came to cooking your books.

Any who, if you ask me its just plain silly.

So you pick your nose huh? Well guess people have been doing it for ages and ages. Just makes you wonder did Einstein pick his nose?

We went roller skating last night. I do not remember the last time I went roller skating, if I ever went at all it had to be when I was in Grade School. It was actually fun, I saw what had to be a 50 year old Oriental man who could barely speak English, out there for the very first time in his life. Its gotta take some gumption to get out there and roller skate if you have never done it before, and you are 50 years old. I doubt I would do it. Next time we go I want to bring my inline skates... One thing this did point out though is POP songs have a life after they fade from the radio. They get played at all these types of establishments. We heard Billy Jean, the Macarena (sp?), YMCA, and Barbie Girl to name a few. Who says that you need to write real music to get recognized as an artist, write Pop songs and you will still have them skated to 20 years later...

And just because I feel like it The Lard Rock Cafe.

Because I knew you just had to see it, the world's largest pecan. Please hold your ooohs and ahhs till the end. The world's largest fish. And the world's largest praying hands. Okay now you can clap...

Did you know that, if you are REALLY bored, you can find out that the lowest Social Security card ever issued, was issued to a New Hampshire resident? And I thought that New Hampshire's only claim to fame was the "Live Free or Die" motto. Which by the way is a pretty damn good motto...

A guy knows he is getting old when he starts growin hair in his ears, so this guy must be really really really old.

The 50 best album covers of all time. I am not impressed, if that Presley cover is 50, their criteria is definitely in question...

Well its true, sometimes too much is too much. That woman must have had the worst back problems ever. Heck I do not know how she was able to stand up!