Moore or less?

I woke up in the small hours thinking about Moores Law - as you do.

There are just 5 weeks and 3 days left before Treescaper bails out of the IT industry after 34 years, possibly permanently - the jury's still out on that one. Back in 1975, we wrote computer programs with pencils on 'keypunch forms' - 80 column line by 80 column line - then sent them through the internal mail to the 'keypunch girls' who transcribed them onto punched cards and sent them back - with luck the same day. Coffee was drunk, newspapers were read, telexes were answered and eventually the deck of 80 column cards would arrive, bundled in the original coding sheets with elastic bands. We'd read them through, single out the typos, take some blank cards to the 0129 keypunch machine and make corrections. When we were happy with the deck, we'd place it in the basket for collection by the DP courier who'd run it over to the machine room to be run. The massive watercooled IBM 360 series model 70 would eventually load, process and churn out the resulting listing on a fraction of the processing power of the tiny netbook I'm using to write this blog entry.

A few cycles of the process would eventually result in a 'clean compile' and testing could begin at the same leisurely, almost geological pace.

That antique process and hardware enabled a team of less than a couple of hundred folk in a temporary building in Havant run the entire administration, manufacturing and support systems for the IBM World Trade Corporation. The company was truly global, the systems all multicultural with specialist components built by distributed teams. The Argentine 'Billing 370' team, for example, were the hyperinflation experts who provided the interlocked pricing and billing support for fellow suffering countries like Israel.

The 37 hour week ruled back then, the weekend was sacred, and a hell of a lot of fun was had by all. The clubhouse had a bar, the local pubs did good business at lunchtime (which actually existed) and the company's business boomed.

In 5 weeks and 3 days time, the last of that experience will leave the building. In that 34 years, thanks to Moores Law, the bloated layers of operating software and a ragbag of aquired and rebranded application software , we leave the company far less efficient than the one we joined.

Never mind... India holds the answer to all our problems. (I shall now extract my tongue from my cheek and turn in for the night)

It isn't what she's got to say....

A lyric, of course, and one which takes me back to pre-history, an album first bought on vinyl in 1968 and just refreshed as a remastered CD. Music keeps me sane, which is more than I can say for gardening. I drank my morning cup of tea looking out of the kitchen window at the pyracantha which I swear was enjoying a laugh at my expense. It's tempting to get out the chainsaw - my favourite gardening tool - and dispatch it back from whence it came.

An intriguing day involving a free lunch, a confession, a bit of meditation and some CBT. Five weeks and four days to go..... not that I'm counting.

Pyracathana, Peroni and Punctures

Water, Fall
Originally uploaded by Treescaper

Licking my wounds from this afternoon's wrestling match with a pyracantha, aided by a large medicinal Peroni and accompanied by the Hissing of Summer Lawns.

It's amazing how the wounds inflicted by this thorny beast of a shrub don't become apparent until long after you've packed away the tools and chilled out with a beer. It's then that the scratches up the arms, the thorns under the fingernails and the puncture wounds in the fingertips really start to make their presence felt.

Why do so many people plant the bloody things? Every single house I've ever lived in has had at least one...

Today, I did something amazing

Well I'd like to say it was this, but sadly I was stopped from doing that a few years ago - sadly because it was the couple of times a year that I actually felt I was doing something of use to society. No, today the amazing activity was 'gardening', the link being that I gave liberal amounts of beautifully oxygenated A-Negative to the pyracantha in the back garden.

The race is now on to get the cuttings tamed, bagged up and removed to the local amenity tip in the back of the Hertz car before my own comes back from its sojurn at the body shop. Bodily it's fine, but since last weekend's unplanned potholing expedition during which I reinvented a wheel, it's been taken away to have its suspension checked out while they track down a replacement alloy wheel to match the other three (round) ones.

It's been good week, considering all things. Six more to go......

In the shade of the freeway

Feeling positively cheerful and contemplating gardening - is this really me? Must have been the tea, toast and marmalade that did it. Also having posted a Jackson Browne related picture earlier, I decided to play some more to accompany breakfast. The first couple of lines of 'The Pretender' describe my little haven well and the rest of the lyrics strike a few chords as well.

I'm going to rent myself a house
In the shade of the freeway
I'm going to pack my lunch in the morning
And go to work each day
And when the evening rolls around
I'll go on home and lay my body down
And when the morning light comes streaming in
I'll get up and do it again
Amen
Say it again
Amen

I want to know what became of the changes
We waited for love to bring
Were they only the fitful dreams
Of some greater awakening
I've been aware of the time going by
They say in the end it's the wink of an eye
And when the morning light comes streaming in
You'll get up and do it again
Amen

Caught between the longing for love
And the struggle for the legal tender
Where the sirens sing and the church bells ring
And the junk man pounds his fender
Where the veterans dream of the fight
Fast asleep at the traffic light
And the children solemnly wait
For the ice cream vendor
Out into the cool of the evening
Strolls the Pretender
He knows that all his hopes and dreams
Begin and end there

Ah the laughter of the lovers
As they run through the night
Leaving nothing for the others
But to choose off and fight
And tear at the world with all their might
While the ships bearing their dreams
Sail out of sight

I'm going to find myself a girl
Who can show me what laughter means
And we'll fill in the missing colors
In each other's paint-by-number dreams
And then we'll put out dark glasses on
And we'll make love until our strength is gone
And when the morning light comes streaming in
We'll get up and do it again
Get it up again

I'm going to be a happy idiot
And struggle for the legal tender
Where the ads take aim and lay their claim
To the heart and the soul of the spender
And believe in whatever may lie
In those things that money can buy
Thought true love could have been a contender
Are you there?
Say a prayer for the Pretender
Who started out so young and strong
Only to surrender

Branching out

Fountain of sorrow
Originally uploaded by Treescaper

The Treescaper blog should now be joined at the hip to the Treescaper Flickr account meaning that there can be no further excuse for lack of action here!

It seems that the evil Google empire now has Treescaper firmly in its grip.

Turning corners

OK... this might be the year that I get a bit more active in the blogosphere. Having managed just two posts in 2009, it's tempting to actually delete them both and pretend the year didn't exist. The low points of the year actually plumbed depths I never in my wildest nightmares could have imagined. High spots there were, however, the most notable of which was the gaining of the finest of sons-in-law in New Jersey in July. 2009 was also the year in which I discovered the Peak District. So much did I enjoy that experience that I spent the last day of the year soaking up the views and the snow around in five dales around Tideswell.



2010 is starting in a much more positive light. Having been joined at one hip to the IBM Corporation and the other to Mrs Treescaper for the past 34 years, I will shortly sever connections with both and set a new direction. The related surgical removal of both residence and pension leaves me turning to Annie Hill for inspiration on how to make the best of nothing!

The trick is going to be to see how far I can get in 2010 before I have to start earning a living again..... So far in the planning stage is a Eurostar break to Bruges and a return to the eastern seaboard, from Montreal down to New Jersey via New York.... not to mention a few more excursions with the camera in Britain.

Here's to 2010!

Down below the borderline

Waking up after the ice age and staring an uncertain future in the face, December 11th looks like an interesting date for the diary. Whatever the decision I make before 5:00pm, I'll be down at the Cellars at Eastney in the evening in the company of Paul Barrere and Fred Tackett. Now that should make it an evening to remember, and one with so much to look forward to....

Waking up after the ice age...

I've decided it's time to reawaken the blog. It's happened before, but this time it might actually stick. 2009 has been a year to forget, with the exception of two highlights. The first - the Round the Island Race - was but a minor high compared to the wedding of the year in New Jersey.