PCC Global Community Community Blog List

Russell's Blog - Frampton - still alive

Tue, 09 Dec 2008 23:40:49 +0000

Russell's Blog - Alizee

Sun, 30 Nov 2008 00:03:25 +0000

Russell's Blog - Another call

Sun, 17 Aug 2008 07:17:54 +0000

I hear my cell phone ringing. I struggle to answer it. It is dark. I've been jolted out of my deep slumber. I don't know wha time it is. I know I went to bed about 12 midnight.

Someone on the other end going "Aye, how yuh going".

Me: "Ah sleepin'"

Other: "Oh gord...ah sorry.. ah only see yuh online so ah press dee button....ah eh watch dee time...sorry ah gorn". [I've got Skype and it's on my cellphone - so I appear online all the time. It doesn't do the auto 'away' feature as the usual version.]

Me: "Alright"

I get back to sleep in a few minutes, luckily.

But in those few minutes - I'm thinking "Yet another blasted Trinidadian...demonstrating the same mindlessness typical of its people". No I'm not angry whilst thinking that - more in a state of ....well it's a difficult one to find words for...I guess a mixture of expectation, confusion, disappointment, puzzlement, disgust for the human conditon.

Actually the caller is a member of family, who is used to changes of time zones and international travel. So one could expect that if making a call to anyone, the time zone is checked. The time zone is actually displayed after my screenname on skype.

So why do I feel motivated to write this? I just discovered that the time of the call was GMT 02:35 AM.

The fact that someone appears online does not mean that their brain is awake. It means that their means of communication is live. Telephone landlines for example are permanently 'on'. That means I can call any friend of mine at any time. But I don't. I consider what time of day or night it is - especially if they're in another part of the world.

Human error? Well undoubtedly it is. But that brings me to the issue about when should human error be excused? Some might argue that because a certain percentage of humans in the same situation would make the same error it would be excusable. That's true to some extent. However, the characteristics of the individual making the error is also of some importance. For example if the individuals IQ is less than 80, age less than 12 or over 65, IT illiterate etc etc.

So whilst there is a general circumstances and criteria for how one excuses people, there are characteristics of the individual to consider too. But it is culturally the case that people in general merely excuse others because a substantial proportion of individuals in the same situation would make the same mistake. I call that the 'general test'.

I assert that the general test is not the full test.

Russell's Blog - Unusual call

Mon, 14 Apr 2008 20:36:14 +0000

In all the years the Skype in number to this webforum has been up there. I've received only two lots of calls. The first was from some American organisation that repeatedly called about two years ago asking for some "Boohoram" at "Presentation College". I had about 5 of these calls over two weeks. I repeatedly told the same woman who was calling "There is no one here by that name. This is not Presentation College". Eventually the calls stopped.

Then tonight (2008-04-14 20:00 GMT) - I get a call from a number in the USA from a male person, speaking in a Trini accent, asking whether he has come through to Presentation College. So I go like "No. I'm sorry this is not Presentation College. We are just the website for Pres Chaguanas, but we don't keep any numbers for PCC. Why not Google them and see if you get their number?" The person responds that he did so and came across our site and the number. So I could understand what happened. The chap sounded disappointed but did not appear that he wanted to make conversation. But he confirmed that he was an former PCC student.

Some thoughts crossed my mind?

Why is it when people are at PCC they do not join up at this Global Community?
Why is it when they leave PCC they then start looking to find PCC?
Why not when leaving PCC write down the telephone numbers?
Why is it that TSTT does not share its telephone directory online - like many other Caribbean countries?
Why do we not keep a list of phone numbers here at PCCGC for PCC?
Why does PCC not have its own website or opt to share this webspace as their own -when that offer has been open to them for the last several years?

I don't have the answers.

But I can do one thing that might help i.e. find the PCC numbers and put them somewhere on the site for others to find.

Russell's Blog - English Grammar

Thu, 21 Feb 2008 18:34:17 +0000

I've realised in recent years that, I've been forgetting my grammar - English Grammar, that is. Not that I can't remember how to use the English - it's like I can't recall what the heck a past participle is.

Now we had this stuff drummed into us at PCC in our teens, and back then I was very good at grammar. I could parse sentences etc very well.

But lately when I've got long reports to do - I'm uncertain about some aspects of grammar. Tenses seem to cause the most trouble. In my line of work I'm dealing with clients who report to me:

What went on in their lives
What's going on in their lives

Then I need to report on what they said. However, they may be reporting on things that had started in the past but may be at various stages of completion.

So the problem of course is using things like past participle.

To cut a long story short I found to sites that were helpful:
http://www.learnenglish.de/grammarpage.htm and http://netgrammar.altec.org/Units/menu.html

Russell's Blog - Motivation...

Mon, 19 Nov 2007 16:18:34 +0000

I often wonder why people do or don't do what they do or don't do. I mean I'm not interested in things like laziness. I'm more interested in the things that contribue to laziness.

The funny thing is if you ask people why they do what they do, it is most unlikely you will get a real, true or reliable answer.

The PCCGC forum for example is replete with numerous examples about what people do and don't do.

Over the last 6 months I have had peopel approach me to join FaceBook. Reluctantly I join facebook. My motivation was to see what they had on offer. Pure curiosity really.

Well it didn't take me long to notice that FaceBook really did not provide as much as we do right here at PCCGC. So that left me with big questions. It's not that I haven't reached out to others at PCCGC and actively tried to find out if we could do more here to build cohesiveness.

So what's in FaceBook? I imagine that FaceBook is a big name and that consciously or subconsciously people like to be part of (or thought to be part of) the big picture. So like if you say 'I'm on FaceBook' - well everybody knows facebook instead of some obscure forum somewhere.

Well the net is big enough for all of us. I'll be part of FaceBook but also be part of this.

Russell's Blog - JumpTV rip off

Sun, 14 Oct 2007 18:12:15 +0000

JumpTV believes there is no problem with the video below. I guess they all hear things at JumpTV because when I get to CNC3 I cannot hear what's going on.

JumpTV response below:
Dear Russell,

Thanks for contcating us about that,and sorry for any inconvenience might
happen from our side.
As we have checked the channel CNC 3 on 10/14/2007 at 4:30 am (EST), it is
working properly audio and video.

Please let us know if you still have difficulties and we will be happy to
assist you further.

Thank you,
JumpTV Support

To by bitter complaint. You may not understand why I'm so upset. I left them because of poor service and on the night of 13th Oct 2007 when I rejoin in desperation - to hear election news in T&T - I get this nonsense.

Russell Lutchman wrote:

>
> PROBLEM DESCRIPTION
> This isn\'t funny. I only just resubscribed to the Trinbago package as your
> records will show. Guess what. I can\'t hear a flipping thing. Oh please
> don\'t give me the yarn about if I have my speakers turned up, codecs
> installed, hearing aid turned on etc. First time I\'m back and I get the same
> crap service on this package as before. CNC3 TV is the station that I\'m not
> hearing. All else I can hear.

See below.

The first part of the video is of IETV. Then I move to Gayelle TV then to CNC3. Can you hear audio to the video when I move to CNC3? No? But JumpTV can. So we're all deaf.

Russell's Blog - Green

Thu, 20 Sep 2007 09:03:21 +0000

Hey..how come the hit count on Karen's Blog has over taken mine? I'm green.

Russell's Blog - Courted by Vista

Thu, 16 Aug 2007 08:55:13 +0000

Well I'm not a big fan of Micosoft, but since I got my new laptop last week I've grown warmer to Vista.

Amazingly the OS has not crashed once in that time.

They really put their brains to managing media. I've been looking at many of my photos with a new eye.

The UltraBright 17 -inch screen on the laptop really helps. And Microsofts Media Player and other stuff for looking at media works a treat. I'm seeing so much more detail in my photos that I had not seen before.

Well if the stuff wasn't made by Microsoft I'd be impressed - so I'm still impressed.

Russell's Blog - Do people think?

Sat, 30 Jun 2007 16:29:45 +0000

I recently began to wonder about this after two interesting common incidents related to the use of Skype.

Two people I know - of sufficient intellect - who knew that we wanted Skype set up to transmit voice communicaitons did the following:
1. Install Skype
2. Then say "Ah eh have a microphone".

Now maybe I'm missing something, but daize like installing a telephone line and then sending a letter to somebody saying "Oh gord - ah install dee phone line but I eh have phone!"

Do people really need that much intellect?