Friday Extra: Hey you there, grab a mop and pail and clean off this here boat floor thing!

 I normally get into work each morning about 7 AM.  Yesterday, I got in early, ready to concentrate on finding the cause of a segmentation fault in some new code I was adding to some old server code. 

One of the reasons I started working 7-4 many years ago was I could usually get a lot done in that first hour before people started arriving to chat about the TV show I didn’t watch or the bad call on the game I didn’t watch or some other crap I don’t care about.

Don’t misunderstand; I don’t mind shooting the shit at work at all.  Because of the way I approach the code I write, though, it’s easier to problem solve in an environment with fewer distractions.

Don gets in earlier than I do.

So yesterday, as I was eliminating possibilities for why my code was causing a crash, Don walked up behind me and said. “You’re not dressed like a pirate.”

His presence startled me.  I hadn’t heard him coming.  After his statement, I thought, “Oh please Don.  I don’t know or care why you said that, but please shut the fuck up."

Let me say right here that I am glad that Don doesn’t take a hint easily.  Because as I’m snapping out of my concentration to respond to him, I’m rude.  Actually, I respond in a way that I think says, “Not now Don,” but Don is persistent.  I only have maybe 5 seconds tops for him to leave before I have to jump off my train of thought and wait for the next arrival.  After that time is gone, I’m all too happy to chat with Don about pirates.

But the first thing I said was, “No.  I didn’t,” and continued to stare at my screen, hoping he’d get the message.

“Oh because Krispy Kreme is giving away a dozen donuts to anyone who goes in dressed as a pirate.”

My last gasp before I enter into mindless office chit chat, “I don’t eat donuts,” still looking at my screen.

“I wonder how many people are going to Krispy Kreme dressed as pirates today.  Now that would be interesting to see.  Even you, a person who doesn't eat donuts would have to admit it'd be funny to see a bunch of people dressed like pirates and eating Krispy Kremes,” Don went on.

Snap.  Code puzzle solution progress reset.  Now Don has a captive audience.  There’s no way to get to where I just was with him standing there.  And at this point I don’t mind at all.  I like talking to Don.  The evil concentration demons have left my body for now.

“How does a pirate dress, Don?”  I asked, thinking of software or DVD piracy.  I was purposely avoiding thinking of the peg leg, eye-patch, black flag seafaring type of Pirate.

“An eye patch, of course,” said Don, “And they say ‘Arrrg’”

And that was all he had.  He then walked away.  The irony being now I was ready to chat and I was a little sad Don was leaving, “I better get back to work,” he said, “and happy ‘Dress Like a Pirate’ day”

Thanks Don.  I was thinking how sad it was that I've now missed "Dress Like a Pirate Day,"  for the 'however many times they've had it' in a row.  On second thought maybe Don does know how grouchy I am and chooses to bug me for kicks.  Seems reasonable.  I hope that’s what’s actually going on, because I can respect that level of fuckwithedness.  Good on 'ya mate. 

If there's ever a 'talk like an american saying aussie phrases' day, I'm gettin' me some donuts.  Oh shit.  I don't eat donuts.  Never mind.

And just so you don’t lose sleep wondering, I was trying to insert several elements into a std::map and the program was crashing on the second or third insertion.   In one of the files included in a file included in the file I was changing was the #pragma pack (1) directive.  I had include map (#include < map > ) after the line that included the file that included the file with the directive.  I just had to move the “include map” line above the other one and everything was all hunky dory.  Arrrg!