Here Come Da Judge!

Hello World, Woof woof! Now that July is well and truly behind us, it's just about time for those infamous Dog Days of August to start nipping at our heels, as it were, and if history is any guide, it won't take long before they're really barking in earnest. Of course, the weather around here has been so ridiculously inconsistent all year, you really don't know what to expect next, from the cold and bleak to the torrid and stifling - and not to mention, raining frogs and plague of locusts might not be out of the question either. People may complain, but it must be said that the weeds are loving every minute of it, and that's not just the dandelion wine talking, believe me. Our pokeweed is already over my head, and the false asters have been going gangbusters all summer. Around town, the corn flowers and Queen Anne's lace are having a field day, and invasive vines are latching onto things that are still moving. The way things are going, I would be telling those hounds of August to watch their step. In other seasonal news, it seems that Major League Baseball is introducing an innovative event they call Players Weekend, presumably under the tutelage of the new and improved brain trust at the helm of the organization, since the beleaguered Bud Selig retired. One of the features of this new event is that all of the players get to wear specially-designed novelty jerseys (to be auctioned off later for charity) and instead of their same old names printed on the back, they can request whatever nickname or message that strikes their fancy. For instance, Mets ace Noah Syndergaard is widely known as "Thor," while Kyle Seager of the Seattle Mariners (whose talented sibling also plays for the team) opted to go with "Corey's Brother" for the occasion. On the pinstripe side of things, the mighty Yankees have a rookie phenom (currently leading the league in home runs) by the name of Aaron Judge, and his souvenir jersey will say "All Rise" on the back. (Get it?!) I thought that was so funny. Also on the local scene, a couple of weeks ago, we joined friends of ours atop the Glen Island drawbridge to watch New Rochelle's signature Lighted Boat Parade churn past in all of their glamour and glitz, and it was worth seeing, I can tell you that. We had caught this ragtag convoy a few years ago by accident, but apparently they do it every year, and this time, we were prepared for it beforehand. We fortified ourselves with dinner at the diner first, because after all, they can't get started until after it's dark, and us oldsters can't hold up late at night like we used to. Our patience was rewarded when a long string of vessels started heading towards us, all ablaze and horns blaring, and with their very own DJ providing background music and commentary along the way. These hardy old salts (I think it goes without saying that copious amounts of drinking may be involved here) take great pains to completely bedeck their ships with all manner of twinkling lights, as well as other decorative elements, such as flags, palm trees, flamingos, Christmas trees, and yes, even Santa Claus, his very own holly jolly (s)elf. There were a lot more boats involved than we remembered from the last time, and each one was a sight to behold on its own (and I have the dark and blurry pictures to prove it) but the whole gaudy armada together had a wow factor that would be hard to beat. In spite of many obstacles, Bill managed to take some excellent pictures of the procession, and the colorful reflections on the gentle waves were especially artistic. It was a fun night out, and we were glad not to miss it, even though it did keep us old folks up past our bedtime. (Yawn!) Meanwhile, stepping into the murky waters of Internet commerce (one supposes) alert readers may recall an item from a couple of weeks back, about our friends at Agile LIVE and their incomprehensible advertisement on the AOL Welcome screen that begged more questions than it answered, and that's putting it mildly. They followed up that opening salvo with this next gambit - ========================== SAFe 4.5 with VersionOne Accelerate delivery with the scaled Agile framework ========================== which, if anything, somehow manages to make even less sense than the original, if that could even be remotely possible. (Personally, I highly doubt it, but as they say in a punch line from a completely different joke altogether, "They're doing some remarkable things with transplants these days.") Never one to be daunted, our resident tech maven Bill tracked them down on the web (and you can please feel free to go right ahead and visit their site at http://www.agilenutshell.com and see for yourself) where they are all too eager to announce: "Agile is a time boxed, iterative approach to software delivery." Once again, like the horoscope computer, we are confronted with a series of valid English words, that combined in this arrangement, have no meaning whatsoever. Fortunately, our diligent friends at wikipedia succeeded in slicing through the gibberish, which Bill handily summarized as follows: "The whole idea is to deliver the software in chunks, as they write it, rather than waiting until the whole thing is done, and each chunk is supposed to stand on its own until the next chunk is added to the package." It seems to me that a person of even the meanest intelligence would be able to convey that concept in an ad, without resorting to the horoscope computer to obfuscate and bewilder instead. On the other hand, they obviously don't care what the rest of us think, since they're apparently winning awards for whatever it is they're doing - or at least, that's what I think this next message is trying to tell me: ==================== VersionOne named a leader Gartner 2017 Magic Quadrant for enterprise Agile planning tools ==================== My favorite part is the button you can click on the ad that encourages you to "Read the Report," as if that's somehow going to shed any more light on the subject than they've already managed to completely obscure with their idiotic jargon to start with, thanks not. (Or, in the words of a different punch line to an entirely different joke, "Watch out for that first step, it's a doozy!" and I ought to know.) Now, it may be all too true that these folks are content to rest on their laurels - well deserved or otherwise - but frankly, I have no time to shilly-shally. My plan is to go to the MLB web site and bid on the Players Weekend jersey that says Gartner 2017 Magic Quadrant on the back, before they've all been snapped up. Elle