My Rules (draft)

"I have a code that I live by."

 

I have a code that I live by. [1] It's the result of observation, listening and making mistakes. Mistakes have consequences, so I make a mental note and move on. Unexplained, my rules might appear obscure, stupid even. The stories and reasoning behind them aren't.

 

#6 Got COM?

 

I hadn't seen Bill for years. I ran into him again coming up the ramp of a train station one morning. We organised to have a drink after work at a Pub in the city. Ordered a few drinks and got to talking work until it was time to leave. Then he asked,

 

"Got COM?", "Got COM?,"

 

then more insistantly,

 

HAVE YOU "Got COM?"

 

I looked at him thinking, "Starship Troopers?" [2] He smiled and explained it this way. It doesn't matter where you are, always have your Coms ready. It had been drilled into Bill to always be contactable, be it in the field at work or the Pub.

 

#7 The 7P's

 

The polite version is straight out of IBM corporate America. I heard Greg use this when I was doing post-grad studies in the early 90's. But I'd heard a better, distinctly local version years prior in Kilcunda.

 

Kilcunda is old coal mining country. I was with a group mapping significant land marks. More inches of rain fell than the two days we'd been there, but I wasn't worried. I'd packed my rain gear.

 

Coming back after a long cold day in the rain and mud, Andy looked at me spit polishing my GP's. Took another looked at the lace-up and said, "that's not how you do it." "Don't cross the laces, zip one up the middle to the top. Then lace the other left and right to the top." I proceeded to unlace, then re-lace my left boot. "That way if you trip, sprain or break an ankle it only takes one cut up the middle."

Mate, it's all about the 7P's...

Prior Preparation Planning Prevents

PISS-POOR Performance

 

Laughing, I continued re-lacing my other boot. The 7P's. [3]

 

#18 CVS2BVS

 

When you're in the knee deep in shite, CVS2BVS is your best friend. That's what Ian reckons. [4] I'd been sent off to a course on psychology and thinking, SOT. One of the gems, Ian came out with was

 

Current View of Situation 2 Best View of Situation

 

 

Ian made us repeat this, CVS2BVS, CVS2BVS, CVS2BVS to drum it in. How does it work? If you visualise not just where you are at the present but where you need to be, you are free to concentrate on the path.

 

 

Reference

[1] seldomlogical, "Rules and resolutions",

 

[Accessed Wednesday 17th, July 2012]

 

seldomlogical.com/2012/03/24/rules-and-resolutions

 

[2] In Starship Troopers - A 1997 film directed by Paul Verhoeven based on the book of the same name by Robert A. Heinlein - you can hear the lead scream, "got Com?" just as the bugs over-run the FOB.

 

[Accessed Wednesday 17th, July 2012]

 

www.subzin.com/quotes/Starship+Troopers/Mayday

 

[3] You can see the lace-up I describe: www.flickr.com/photos/bootload/247175242/in/set-721576269... and more clearly here: www.flickr.com/photos/bootload/4411846915/in/set-72157626...

 

[4] wikipedia, Michael Hewitt-Gleeson, "PhD Lateral Thinking 1980 and SOT. Ian credits SOT with his training as a PO and service in 1st AFT, Vietnam."

 

[Accessed Wednesday 17th, July 2012]

 

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Hewitt-Gleeson

 

 

A port hole on the Rapaki, a steam crane docked in Auckland Voyager Maratime Museum.

 

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