 1: it can actually be a lot of fun if you look at it as a sort of digital archeology.  You are exploring an ancient world!  I enjoy it.<p>2: write reams of documentation for every function and module and service you decode, check them off on a checklist, and point out how you generated x pages of new docs and analyzed y% of a previously mysterious codebase.  Then when you refactor, you get to point out how many thousands of lines of obsolete PL&#x2F;SQL code you replaced with 10 lines of Ruby.