The Joy Of The Pedant

Introduction

During my time on Vocal many people have suggested why I have not even been placed in a challenge and therefore why I will never place in a challenge. I am not going to name anyone or what their suggestions are and were, but in my opinion, if these are the reasons then those reasons are extremely pedantic.

While I would love to at least place in a challenge, I know my work is good and I have lost count of the number of Top Stories I have received on Vocal, plus the bonuses, tips and Ambassador's payments, so I do see myself as a success.

Terry Pratchett once complained that he had not won awards, but while I am not a fan of his (or Stephen King's) books and love both of them as human beings.

The thing is Pratchett (sorry he left this earthly plane) had a huge fan base, sold millions of books, and so was a huge success. He had enough money to do anything he wanted, which is impressive for a writer. Would he have traded his success for an award, I think not. I feel the same about myself and Vocal challenge placements. I have friends who have won or placed in multiple Vocal challenges but never had a Top Story. The two are not mutually exclusive and if I do get something from a challenge it will be a box ticked off for me, but I never really expect to win but do enjoy the prompts they give me.

So after that huge introduction, I am going to share a few examples of pedantry from the past that were annoying at the time, but I can look back on them and laugh. People who have known me for decades may know who I am referring to, but there will be no names or companies mentioned, but these things did happen to me, though you may think I have made them up.

On The Wrong Side Of The Pedant

I remember once parking and the parking meter stopped working after I had paid for three hours of parking, but that would be tight so I wanted another hour. There were two attendants and I asked if maybe I could give them some money, as they were there checking that people had paid their fees. They said it wasn't their job to maintain the meter. I got back ten minutes too late to find I had been fined £25. The fee for the extra hour would have been 50p.

I challenged the fine but the council just pointed out that I had not paid the correct fee. I could challenge that in court but it would cost me a day off work plus the cost of getting there and back, so I just paid up.

I had been working as a contract project leader on a particular project for six months and the company wanted me to join them on a permanent basis as a Team Leader with a verbal promise of a permanent Project Leader's post. Interviews were held for the Leader on the project I had led and the job went to a guy with no experience (but apparently his dad was a Freemason). He said at the time he didn't have a clue how he had got it.

When I questioned it and pointed out that I had led the project as a contractor, and the company was so impressed with my performance that they wanted me permanently, the interview panel told me that as I was not directly employed in my time as a contractor that my experience did not count, so as far as they were concerned I had no relevant experience.

In another contract situation with another company, my position was going to be made permanent, but I could not apply for it as I did not have a degree. To be fair that company said they would employ someone for the permanent position but would keep me on as a contractor because of the quality of my work.

A friend of mine applied for a contract database admin post, but his application was returned by his agent because he had not put that he had experience of Microsoft Word in the Microsoft Word document that contained his resumé.

Other times I have supposedly been rejected are for missing a full stop on a sentence in a specification (the person who was chosen ahead of me had never written a specification), then I was rejected because my top shirt button was undone on a very hot day. The interviewers were in T-Shirts!!

Conclusion

These are just a few examples that rejection can occur for absolutely any reason, sometimes valid, sometimes definitely not, but we do need to move on. Often I think, you know what, I would not want to work with those people anyway, but I know that my worth is seen by many people, including myself.

Music, appropriately is "Your Application's Failed" by Roxy Music composed by then drummer Paul Thompson.