Whee, escaped the dilation, at least.

Eye appointment today. Being as I'm running out of contacts, getting the next batch seemed wise. I had to drive, so asked him to skip the dilation and asked if I should come in another time for it (but it's a bit nuisancy: the bus takes very long from here, and doesn't run at all hours). He said to skip this year and do it next year (I had it last year, and I always get the optional peripheral test - which came out totally normal - so it makes sense and is what I was hoping for).

Then he did the regular part, after we'd discussed that, and he was totally understanding of why I didn't want my eyes dilated at the end. (Undilated, when they look in, I still tear up awfully. This time, my right eye bugged me so much I actually flinched back off the stand. I managed - barely - not to with my left eye but nothing could keep them both from flooding, and blinking shut. Me? Sensitive eyes? Nahhhh.) He missed the part where they do the puff-of-air test. The poor guy doing that had to repeat the right eye because I flinched so hard on it the first time - and I know what to expect and was trying not to. Eeeesh!

I had told him up front that I didn't think my prescription had changed. It was funny. The numbers had changed, but so slightly as to not impact the prescription - normally - so I was right. I say 'normally' because it turns out that before, the contact lenses I use were only available in half-diopter increments above 6 - now they are in half-diopter above 6.5, and can be gotten at 6.25 - so my prescription did change, since they tried both the 6.5 and 6.0 before, and settled on the latter, but 6.25 is really much closer (just slightly under the precise value) according to him.

So, they order a trial set and will call me when they come in (probably in a week) and we'll see if it's an improvement or not. This definitely works for me.

On the way home, I picked up the last set of shelves (please let it be the last) at Home Depot. The good thing is, these are just in case we want to do something 'some day' so all I had to do was store them...much easier. :)

Also had an inspiration-flash on the way out about how to describe risk factors and limits in software to non-software people, by analogy to a trip. Must write it up properly, and will probably inflict it here when I do.

Analogy: software development as travel.

Sometimes, it seems like non-programmers have a hard time accepting that there are limits on what can be done - both hard and fast limits, and limiting points where you can do more or act faster...if you're willing to risk a failure worse than the start. When you give them a time estimate, they complain that it's broad and surely you can be more precise. Well...no, you can't.

Let me compare it for a moment to a relatively simple trip. Say that you have to get from downtown Wilsonville to the Portland airport (a trip of only some 30 miles, by the way). ( Lengthy analogy ahead. )

I've probably beaten the analogy to death, but I think it's a good one and makes the point in terms that are more understandable than just talking about risk factors and the difficulty of estimation. If nothing else, I kept myself amused and out of trouble for a while, which has to be worth something.

I'm going to bed now. Hopefully I won't be dreaming of helicopters full of code, but you never know.