journal features

four hours with the auditors

the journal of Michael Werneburg

twenty-seven years and one million words

Toronto, 2011.04.08

We've got an audit coming up, and today was the last of several warm-up meetings that are laying the groundwork.

We're a tiny (14 person) software shop, and we're trying to reach COBIT-level maturity. The auditor, naturally, is speaking in terms of having a control/oversight department around to monitor our processes on an ongoing basis. It's going to be an interesting summer, especially as we're doing this in the midst of big rollouts for all three of our clients.

On a brighter note, I was able to switch the sprockets around on my increasingly customized bike, and I'm now running with a nice fat sprocket on the front axle. Much fewer revolutions, and more power. Woohoo! That said, it would nice if the commute route I'm following was at least pleasant to look at. As it is, I seem to wend through a series of rather shabby districts. I suppose it can't be helped; in this retrograde era of ever-escalating real costs of energy, attractive cities are going to be harder and harder to maintain.

rand()m quote

If I had my life to live over, I'd try to make more mistakes next time. I would relax, I would limber up, I would be crazier than I've been on this trip. I know very few things I'd take seriously any more. I'd certainly be less hygenic... I would take more chances, I would take more trips, I would scale more mountains, I would swim more rivers, and I would watch more sunsets. I would eat more ice cream and fewer beans. I would have more actual troubles and fewer imaginary ones. Oh, I've had my moments, and if I had to do it all over again, I'd have many more of them, in fact I'd try not to have anything else, just moments, one after another, instead of living so many years ahead of my day. If I had it to do all over again, I'd travel lighter, much lighter than I have. I would start barefoot earlier in the spring, and I'd stay that way later in the fall. And I would ride more merry-go-rounds, and catch more gold rings, and greet more people and pick more flowers and dance more often. If I had it to do all over again - but you see, I don't.

—Jorge Luis Borges