TWJ&W

As I mentioned in Why no blog updates for over a year, I ran into some problems with Jekyll, the framework I used to publish blog entries. I eventually fixed the problem. Then I tried to update Jekyll. Which caused different problems.

So I’m done with Jekyll. I’ve moved to Hugo. While that is the name of Martin Scorscese’s only film for children, it’s also the name of another framework for generating websites (from Markdown files).

Readers are becoming increasingly rare. I “met” one recently through a second-hand book.

Years ago now, I bought a 86-page specialty instructional book in the consignment section of a specialty shop. For less than half the price of a new copy.

I still haven’t read it but, today, I set down to make the book ready for me to read. Does that sound pompous? I just mean that I was erasing the pencil marks that the previous reader left in it.

Assumptions engage our human emotions.

• Some assumptions are embarrassing. CBC Radio “Morningside” host (the late) Peter Gzowski, long in a job that paid more than a living wage, once made the assumption that retirement tax breaks were available to all… when they require a minimum income.
• Some assumptions are infuriating. In the “Doonesbury” comic strip, cartoonist Garry Trudeau once did a masterful job of deflating privlege rather than ranting about it. In the daily strip for Wednesday, 19 June 1985, Trudeau has Congresswoman Lacey Davenport attempt to raise awareness of homelessness among rich constituents in Palm Beach, Florida. The heart-cry of one distressed-looking lady is “That’s awful! Why don’t they just move to their country homes?”
• Some assumptions are surprising. I grew up in one of the majority of Canadian provinces that celebrate Veteran’s Day, November 11, as a public holiday. When I moved to Ontario, the province that does most of the posturing about honouring our servicemen and servicewomen in the so-called national media, I was taken aback to learn that Ontario does not recognize the holiday. (It merely “observes” it.)

Because assumptions are so closely connected to emotions, you as a technical writer need to be aware that people can get defensive about their assumptions. Part of the defensiveness arises because everyone is unaware of all their assumptions. Being made aware that you have made an assumption can unsettle the ego, regardless of what the assumption was, and unrelated to whether the assumption was valid.