Over the last couple of days I have been reading “jPod” by Douglas Coupland. My other half read “Microserfs” many years ago and has repeatedly told me I need to read it because it reflects her view of my world - the world of a software developer.
Before starting on what I think of it so far, it’s only reasonable to repeat what the fly-sheet has to say about it;
Ethan and his five co-workers are marooned in JPod, a no-escape architectural limbo on the fringes of a massive game-design company. There they wage battle against the demands of boneheaded marketing staff who torture them with idiotic changes to already idiotic games. Meanwhile, Ethan’s personal life is being invaded by marijuana grow-ops, people-smuggling, ballroom dancing, global piracy and the rise of China. Everybody in both worlds seems to inhabit a moral grey zone, and nobody is exempt, not even his seemingly strait-laced parents or Coupland himself.
I wasn’t sure I was going to like jPod when I started reading it (yesterday) - it seemed to have no story - it meandered along. Then while reading it this morning I realised it was just like my own life - only my own life isn’t filled with drug dealing parents, people trafficking, or any other such extremes.
I can relate to the daily idiotic exchanges of pointless inanety between cubicles though. It really does happen. When the book opens with everybody penning letters to Ronald McDonald, I had the biggest smile. For many months myself and a couple of colleagues passed quiet moments by inventing silly-but-plausible people’s names - such as “Sue Mowrestler”, and “Jenny Talia”.