Not Elsewhere Specified

from my email:-

A very long time ago a wise old archivist advised me about keeping
files on my native medicine work. He said that however complete I
thought my filing scheme was, I should have one file labelled N.E.S
and it would be the most important file which would repay regular
inspection. I hadn't a clue what he meant. He then explained N.E.S
stands for Not Elsewhere Specified. However clever I thought my
record-keeping was, the diversity of human activity would ensure there
was always something which didn't fit the system at the time. Bung it
in N.E.S. Over time that is where you'll find the design for a system
Mark 2. Which should have an N.E.S from which in de course the next
advance will emerge. Some 55 years on I still have a N.E.S and have
lost count of how many generations of N.E.S preceded it.

That old archivist had seen from looking backwards the futility of
trying to make people and their activities fit any system. Systems
have to be adjusted to fit people. And because he was a learned man he
was apt to say that was very old knowledge and would mention
Procrustes as an example of what not to do with people. He would drily
remark that attribution of ancestry to Adam was quite wrong. From the
capacity of each of us to muck up a simple chemical experiment he
could only conclude we were all descendants of Sod.

my thanks to Don

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