Freud would have laughed too.

There is a saying that goes "I may grow old, but I will never grow up." I would say that applies well to my father who despite working for a bureaucracy and raising 3 children kept his sense of humour.

I often enjoy his anecdotes of practical jokes and general enjoyment of the more serious moments of life. The honest fact is during the traditional reading of the 10 commandments in Church my father and I have a charismatic moment of emotional fits of laughter. We can never get past coveting our neighbors 'ass'.

There are times where it is inappropriate to have a giggle breakdown. A videoconference is one of them. It gives the impression that there is a problem with the equipment or an earthquake has struck the office.

Interrupting is a bad thing. And so no matter how funny the moment is, pinch your mouth closed, tear up like someone had onions for lunch, and see if you can hold your breath long enough for the funny moment to pass.

A few weeks ago we were discussing some new servers and server housing equipment that was coming to the office. This is exciting because our lives are boring. I was so into paying attention for mistakes that we were half way through the topic before I clued in and said to my in-room co-workers (our microphone WAS muted):

"Do you realize he has been discussing big racks for 5 minutes and none of us commented on it?"

Loss of composure in: 10 seconds.

That did it. The presenter continued to discuss the problem of ensuring the equipment would fit by saying "We could get a tape measure to assess the racks. You guys haven't had a problem with humongous racks up there, have you?"

It must have been fun to see us begin to glow red trying to contain the outburst. Then all three of us began to bellow in laughter, tears running down our faces.

The worst part is trying to point out to a grown man in a business meeting that you're laughing at what he is saying because it sounds like boobies. No lesson in college prepares you for that. Thankfully I've never had to explain to a priest why I get so emotional during the reading of the 10 commandments.

I may be increasingly cellular degenerate, but I'll still find body parts funny.

Ken 2.0 and Ken 2.0a

I really hope to be a successful parent.

This isn't a cry for help from someone who skipped those classes in grade 5. Trust me, I know how it works. I would draw you a word picture but that would make you jealous.

My measure of parenting success is that my children surpass me in ways that are good. Despite this noble pursuit, my wife does discourage me from introducing my children as "Ken 2.0 and 2.0a". Something about them being scared or scarred.

Some things are going well. They read better than I did at their age. They are both better than me at drawing. They are considerate and polite enough to dupe everyone else but their parents. So far so good.

May I mention that my children so easily exceeding me in all areas is no poor reflection on my parents. I was just a terrible child, able to dupe only my dear Grandmother, who for some reason attributed all my wrongdoing to my sisters and parents. I don't think any words can describe how beautiful it is to be rotten and have a sibling blamed for your rottenness.

Part of helping these beta versions actually reach their release date (when they are eighteen) is some simple "what is good for you" sessions. And by sessions I mean telling them what they must do.

There are some things, like roads, large areas of open water and train tracks, where you do try to put some fear and respect into the innocent dears. They just have no concept of what one tonne of metal moving at over 1.16 meters per second in a 0.83 meter per second speed limit does to an otherwise healthy waterbag with limbs.

There are other important, although less dramatic lessons that they pick up. Like don't eat rocks, don't throw rocks, don't throw your food. And not smoking.

The other day I came home to see chalk drawings on my driveway. Among the typical replicas of crime scene outlines (in hot pink) there was this dire warning:

"Beware"
"Dangerous"
"No Smoking!"
"Or Else"

This was followed by the usual smokebusters symbol and two stick figures who were holding cigarettes. Their eyes had been replaced with X's to symbolize their sudden demise to the side effects of taking a puff in my driveway.

It was a bit macabre and zealous, not to mention quite threatening. I don't know who told my older daughter that smoking was unhealthy, but I want to interview them on their techniques. And then write a book on that and profit from it.

You have been warned: don't smoke around Ken 2.0

Fair=(x(A/B))+1

Siblings. It is hard to describe what effect they have on your life. I never had a moment of my life where I was my parent's only child, although I have had a few moments were I think I was disowned. Like the day I forgot Mom's coffee at home.

Being a brother or a sister means you have to share. No matter what bunk your parents tell you about "loving everyone equally" you know it's not true. See if they REALLY loved you they would have let YOU sit in the front seat after your older sister left for university, and not let the youngest get perma-shotgun.

Not...bitter..

Most of sibling life is a vain attempt of achieving the unnatural state of discord also known as "fair". Fair is loosely defined by this equation:

Fair=(x(A/B))+1

x is the item in question, be it Smarties or minutes with a toy. A is the age difference in years from the next sibling. B is the birth order ranking. Then once you have the amount calculated, fair is only complete when you have one more than the next person.

Since my children were, and still are not twins I was able to observe this effect on my older daughter. And the result was what can be best described as giving her a little human pet that she thinks she needs to house train.

One item of chagrin is the seating arrangement at the supper table. The coveted position is beside my wife. They cry about who sits there. They push. They deviously switch food and table settings to get their way.

I'm in no way scarred by this. I just suggest they flank my wife and leave me to have all the elbow room on my side of the table.

My older daughter has observed that her little sister gets the privilege of being inadvertently elbowed by my wife while kicking me in the legs more often. When she bemoaned this my suggestion was to stop the noise she was making and come up with a solution.

Her idea was great. She would chart how often each child sat beside their mother. The advent of this dinventory resulted in this exchange:

Older child: Ok, so you sat down beside Mom tonight. I'll write that down on my list.
Younger child: Then I'll erase the list.
Older child: Then I'll write it in permanent marker.
Younger child: Then I'll throw it out.

It was like a transcript of "World's worst hostage negotiators".

Suffice to say that now I have an idea of their futures. The older one will likely be an engineer or perhaps an accountant. The younger one will be either a politician or a CEO for a large organization.

Who are you VS Who you are

Identity: (5) The sense of self, providing sameness and continuity in personality over time and sometimes disturbed in mental illnesses, as schizophrenia.

Isn't it funny that in contemporary English the question "Who Are You" is not equivocal to the statement "Who you are". In fact it is normally confused with the question "What is your name"

In ancient times the 'name' of a person would consist of the whole of the person, their acts and reputation. Now days it reflects on the social leanings of one's parents, as in:

You: Who are you?
Them: My name is "Sunflower Daisy Starstruck".
You: Were your parent's hippies?
Them: WHOOOAH, are you psychic?

When we try to define who we are that is a complex undertaking. We don't see ourselves in a vacuum. If we could our thoughts would be akin to "Good heavens I can't breathe... aaarrrgh". I say thoughts because in a vacuum no one can hear you scream, normally because the motor is too loud.

Our 'identity' is interpreted by how others perceive us, but this is a shifting thing too. For example, in my office I am identified as "Ken the geek". This changes when I am at a convention for geeks. Then I am "Ken the guy who double dipped in the guacamole".

So when I have the benefit of insight from a complete stranger I tend to consider it. After all, they don't have the usual context to compare me against. It is like an empirically pure, uninfluenced perception into my soul.

I change buses at the bus station each day. Being cold I often go inside the heated shelter to wait. And one of the people who commonly waits there is someone I'll refer to as "Ed".

Ed is a big guy. He is about 6'5", around 300 pounds. He wears a toque most of the year, and his glasses are something out of a 1970's police show. He is also someone you would define as 'challenged'.

Ed is gentle and sweet, and in appearance and intonation reminds me of "Lenny" from "Of Mice and Men". I say "hi" to Ed almost every day. He never replies.

It would be easier to take if he didn't go out of his way to talk to every woman present. He'll call out "Hi Lady" until he get's a response. Then some small talk will ensue. In 10 years of riding the bus I think he's given me the time of day once, and one weather report.

And then, this week for the first time he addressed me. Without knowing my name I expected him to call out "Hi Man", but he gave me one of those unique, profound revelations into how the world perceives me.

He yelled "Hey short guy!"

The saddest bit to me was there was no question who this gentle giant was talking to. I engaged in some conversation, but I was too embarrassed to be witty.

That may be a new nickname for me on the bus, but it isn't who I am. Except to Ed.

Business, Career and a Dress code.

Work is something you do, a career is when your work becomes your identity.

For some people their career has respect built right in: Doctors, Nurses, Police Officers, Military personnel, 'McDonalds' line managers. They all have more respect than what people give a professional bureaucrat.

It could be that all of them get to wear uniforms. By the way, the thin difference between a uniform and a costume is when everyone wears the same costume it's a uniform.

I grudgingly accept that after a decade I am officially in a CAREER. Not because I chose it, but because I failed to chose to avoid it. And now I am a professional order follower and repeater of the popular line 'please reboot'.

I once asked a project manager if they ever dreamed as a child that they would one day grow up to nag other grown ups about their inability to finish their work. Silly question, any child who dreams of that would spend their adult life in a different institution.

I mock bureaucracy a fair amount here and it really does deserve it. No one aspires to build an empire that has no limits to the number of rules it can impose on itself.

A business is an artificial entity without a soul or a mind. This differentiates it from political lobbyists because a business wasn't born normal. A business exists simply as a vehicle to make money.

When the business's business is to NOT make money then you have what amounts to a lobotomized Frankenstein's monster suffering from manic depression. And much like that monster, no matter what food or organs you put into it the result would be the same: A mashup of Pinocchio and Night of the Living Dead. By the way, I don't count charities or not for profits here because they do want to make money for their clients.

I have had the pleasure to work with dozens of motivated, professional people who are good at what they do. And yet somehow we still end up with the maddening situation of waiting for someone to get back to someone for some information that a team of 7 year old sleuths could track down.

In an effort to bring some dignity back to my job I may try wearing my Hawaiian shirts as a uniform. That way people can take me seriously when I say "Don't worry, corporate told me to do this, and as long as I don't think about it, it should work out fine. And if not, just please reboot."