An evening with Marinko in domaćin. We usually do this once a year, but this time he insisted on seconds, his turn to foot the bill.
I have dropped a hint recently that Jan is looking for a fox programmer, so he was obviously interested. (... 73 words...)
So I talked with Jan yesterday, first about an obscure bug in the datepicker ActiveX which he's using (shows chinese characters on chinese set windowses on one, gibberish of another instance of the same datepicker). We then switched to Firriver related stuff, and I mentioned my apprentice being interested. No problem, if he lives in Toronto or North Holland :). As because "who was bitten by a snake, blows at cold yogurt" (a portmanteau of "bitten by snake, fears lizard" and "burned by hot milk, blows at yogurt") after Hana's stunt. They (current management) are scared shitless that someone may pull such one again. I almost mentioned that that was exactly what I was doing last months, perhaps whole year, but kept mum. And for current kind of development they don't need top notch programmers, they can use any cheap hi-school kids which exist everywhere, so cubicle farm it is. Oh, well, so I got the apprentice off my back. Other than that, he's just envying Nina and me for not having to deal with incompetent management, enforced hierarchy without clear chain of command, commands seriously disconnected from reality etc etc. He's stuck with them, what with his huge mortgage (house smaller than ours, in a village far north, cost 300k€, plus interest).
Marinko took the news calmly, didn't expect much anyway.
The waitress was interesting, quick wit, replies from elbow, and inspires an even quicker response. Felt like bit of verbal karate from my teaching days.
He insisted on yet another beer, so he had six bright and I had four dark, all regular size (0,5l). I went to pee at least eight times, and, amazingly, didn't look for a suitable tree on the way home, even though I was pedaling against the wind most of the time. košava, but not cold yet.