write.as/jonbeckett

I've returned photos to the Wordpress incarnation of my blog. If nothing else, they brighten it up a bit. Publishing purely textual posts becomes awfully repetitive after a while. I'm hoping that I might use the photos as an inspiration of sorts – on the days when I don't think I have much to contribute, I'll look at the front page of the various stock photo sites and see what comes to mind. It's probably no better than daubing my face with facepaint and throwing pieces of bone on the ground, but it's better than nothing.

I often think of things to write about while I'm out and about – and of course never have a notebook in my pocket to write them down. By the time I return to a computer, the thought has either completely gone, or diluted so much that the incredibly important rambling opinion piece I might have written is reduced to a footnote on the end of yet another post about blogging.

And yes, I know I've told myself not to write about writing. It's kind of recursive, isn't it. Writing about writing. And now I'm writing about writing about writing. I could point out that the last sentence was writing about writing about writing about writing, but it all gets a bit silly. Welcome to the mind of a software developer.

On about software development, I heard an awful joke the other day. I'll preface it by saying that I'm going to explain it, which will kill the joke even if you get it.

“A man went to the grocery store on his way home from work. While there, his other half called, and said 'While you are there, can you get some bananas?'. He never returned home”.

Did you get it? I'll explain. It's all about the word “while”. The condition on a while loop in programming specifies the exit condition. After getting the bananas, the man is still in the shop, so he gets some more bananas, then he gets some more, and so on.

I told you it was an awful joke.