Pause for Thought

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We changed the world

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Not something that any of us say every day but if we are lucky then once or twice in a lifetime.

Twenty years ago this week I started my work on a project called Orbitor for Nortel Networks. I was the product guy. The project became the world’s first smartphone, and although never launched it changed the way we look at and use mobile devices forever. First use of Java in a mobile phone (Scott McNealy said “I didn’t believe it was possible” to me in Frankfurt in 1997), first over-the-air download of an application to a phone, and many more firsts. The guy who worked on the background tech went on to architect the iPhone. And we all had a ball doing it.

The tech and the product means nothing now, except the legacy. This week I emailed 5 of the key players in the team, two of which I hadn’t spoken to for years. All replied within two hours. Here are some of the comments:

“Phil, What a wonderful note.  While other faculties may be failing, your memory is spot on.  It is indeed 20 years since Brian and I and the Orbitor team crossed paths with two crazy Brits and commenced a wild journey.”

“I agree.  Thanks for the memory.

 Nortel’s strength at its height came from the innovation and resourcefulness of its people, and the Orbitor team represented the pinnacle of that value.

 Projects like Orbitor didn’t just change the world, but changed those of us who came in contact with them.  We (you) are the legacy of that – keep the flame alive!”

“20 years, eh?  I didn’t have a specific date etched in my archives, but that timeframe sounds about right.  I recall at least one software developer who came into my office asking if he could join my team because he wanted to work on Orbitor.  I told him that there wasn’t any such development project at that time.  He said, “Not yet, but there will be, and you’re going to be the one to do the development, and I want to be there when you do.”  Yes, we did hire him.  We had a lot of people on staff who could predict the future.  We got pretty used to living 10-15 years in everyone’s future.”

It is a measure of what we built that a lot of the team, although busy with their own lives, have gone on to have serious careers, but still stay in touch, albeit not as often as they would like. What was it that Russel Crowe said in Gladiator? Oh yes, “What we do in life echoes in eternity”

I wonder how we are going to change the world next?

P

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The Magpie Conundrum

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You can probably tell that it is another offline Sunday because I want to talk about magpies. In my few idle moments I struggle with magpies, more specifically what to say to them and when. To explain, in my household we were brought up to say “Good morning my Lord” to a single magpie to negate the one-for-sorrow in the 1789 nursery rhyme. Superstitious but curiously addictive. But there are questions that just can’t be easily answered:

  1. If one sees the same magpie every day (there is one who practically lives in our garden), should this be said once or every time we see it. Does the sorrow go away or is it renewed each time the sun rises and has to be negated daily?
  2. When driving, what is the distance between two magpies that is permitted? If we get this wrong one way there may be double sorrow. If we get this wrong the other way and say “Good morning my Lord” twice, will we miss out on the joy?
  3. Exactly how much trouble are we in if we say “Good morning my Lord” to a bird that is not a magpie? This could be due to sun in the eyes or a part-albino black chicken that is needy…
  4. In these politically correct days, three for a girl and four for a boy just sounds wrong.
  5. Five for silver and six for gold sounds good but once again there is a problem with driving and distance. I would imagine that looking for silver and gold whilst driving would result in a crash. This would probably be down to it being four magpies and one or two singles who had not been addressed properly. As you swerve to avoid the boy from number four the crash would cause sorrow (or double sorrow), possibly involving a silver or gold “other” car.
  6. Seven for a secret never to be told is a whole other ball game. Who’s secret is it? Do the magpies hold the secret or the girls and boys? Does it involve silver and gold? Tricky.

In some parts of Europe single magpies are said to forewarn of wolves and armed men approaching. This worries me given the one in our garden.

I do like my unplugged Sundays!

Phil

p.s. written in the sunshine last Sunday.

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Goodbye to 2013

Annus_Horribilis

I want to say goodbye to 2013. No really I will pleased to open up 2014. This has been a strange and difficult year for me and our family and we need to move on. HIT THE REFRESH BUTTON.

On the good side my daughter turned 21 and got a 2/1 in her degree. My son turned 18 and my marriage turned 25. We have been largely healthy and Gizmo the Cairn has been a delight. There have been some fantastic supportive people around and I thank them all.

On the down side life has been tough and will be for a while yet. Sadly a number of people have let me down in business. They know who they are and know what they did (or didn’t do). While I wish them no ill-fortune I hope that in future they deliver on what they commit to. Enough of this and of them.

I did not see the sea in 2013, perhaps for the first year in my life. So if we are going to build a bucket list for 2014 it MUST include this. When you grow up by the sea it is just part of you and the separation is a strain on the soul. I am building my bucket list here.

We move into 2014 quietly and with purpose. As a good friend of mine pointed out to me this year “It is time to stop dicking around”. Quite

See you in a more sparkly and productive 2014.

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Mojo

Lost my Mojo

I confess that I’m suffering a bit at the moment. While sleeping, sometime in the last few weeks, someone SNUCK IN and stole my mojo. Or maybe it decided, all by itself to go on holiday on its own and have a (well-deserved) break from me.

Those that work with me know that I’m an optimist and strive to be the person that my dog thinks I am. At the moment there are no outward signs that anything is different. We have to accept that at times the way we behave towards others is supported not by rampant mojo but by a quiet determination not to let folk down. Frankly, between us it feels a tad inauthentic and is making me grumpy with myself, which again, is not my natural state. This Phil is usually happy in his own company – but right now I’m bored witless with myself.

So research has been done, but I’m not convinced by what is on the internetwebthang. Apparently I need to:

  1. Drink less alchohol (nope, haven’t had a drink yet in 2013)
  2. Eat better food (we do quite well on that front, thank you)
  3. Do something different ( Ok I can work on that one. My friend Lucy has just given up television and gained 3+ hours per day. But what to do – crochet? Water polo? I guess it has to be something unrelated to earning a living)
  4. Relieve stress (easier said than done)
  5. Spend less time online (Just how much time do we all waste dicking around online? Sometimes it is madly stimulating, but at other times it just sucks the life out of us)
  6. Getta betta social life (I hear you)
  7. Go on holiday (Not this year)
  8. Do what you love (I’m trying damn it)
  9. Get some exercise (Point taken)

I always quite fancied living on a WiFi enables barge, gliding gently from lock to lock in the summer sun, making a handsome living in two hours per day trading PORK BELLIES and selling DIESEL POWERED NUNS online. But I digress.

Do I now have a plan having got all of that off my chest? Not really but sometimes the simple act of writing it all down makes it better. A bit like by making a list of all of the things you have to do makes some of them go away! I’m leaning towards Lucy’s viewpoint, but need to find a mojo-regenerating project that is not work or chores. Something just for me.

Failing that, will whoever stole my mojo please return it pronto – it’s mine and won’t suit you anyway. Or…when it has had its fill of sun, sea, sand and whatever else mojos do on holiday, it will send me a postcard and return refreshed.

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Change

Time for change

“One day your life will flash before your eyes. Make sure it’s worth watching”

I always know when it is coming, but usually have not known why – of course logic and reason can be applied, but it’s the feelings that count, that make it inevitable. And those feelings are semi-conscious feelings, a moment of wistfulness, a hypnagogic interlude, the whisper of a song, a long forgotten smell.

It starts with broken sleep, not bad sleep but broken, lately waking up at stupid o’clock, dozing on the sofa in the evening, getting woken by Mr Cairn at 1am when he has caught wind of a potent smell drifting in from the garden. Then coincidental hearing of music from other times of change – this morning flicking channels a film had Blue Moon (revisited) by the Cowboy Junkies playing in the background. Then a smell – summer rain and dust mixing. Then a desire to travel again, to be on the road in America or back in Moscow.

This is a pattern I know, and may be illogical or may be coincidence, but really it is neither. It is a shift in me that will lead to change. I tell clients that nothing remains the same, it either progresses or deteriorates. At pivotal points restlessness sets in and the outcome is inevitable. Am I going to leave home – of course not, or pack it all in and knit yoghurts for a living, of course not.

Watch this space.

“May the bridges I burn light the way.”