I've got a headache THIS big

Boy, you ever have one of those days when you just can't accomplish anything? It's like the tiny ship of your soul is bounced from one storm to another and never finds purchase on any solid ground. There has been so much correspondence both verbal and written running through my mind today that it has officially given me a huge headache.

The whole thing started at 8am when I opened my work email. What to my wondering eyes should appear but a note from management that, while perfectly reasonable in its content, made me wonder if they really understood anything about how the department works? Long story short, the missive made me wonder if *I* was being blamed for something largely outside my control. It also made me wonder if I was going to be held accountable for things that were totally outside the scope of my work. Was this the first sign, I thought, that rather than narrowing the scope of my position as developer it was actually going to expand it into things completely outside my purview? And more importantly, would I spend a fourth sentence saying the exact same thing for a fourth time using different words?

In short, in one fell swoop half of my optimism drained away into the gutter. Optimism is such a delicate flower. It has now been over two weeks since the last time I spoke to management about the current reorg. In any other circumstances I'd chalk this up to the holidays but I've seen movement in other areas of the company; clearly change is under way. I've even heard bits involving my department but it seems clear that whatever's happening doesn't require my input. Perhaps I've had my say and I'm no longer necessary or perhaps the changes don't involve me, but I'm getting edgier by the day. I'm still officially reserving judgment but I cannot remain unrestrictedly optimistic.

During the lunch hour I broached a topic with the wife that resulted in an extremely protracted and extremely heavy conversation on the topic of interpersonal relationships. Unfortunately, for the most part I can't really reproduce the results here; it's one thing to broadcast your own innermost thoughts to the world but wives tend to prefer to speak for themselves. She did, however, ask one very good question that I can answer: "What exactly are you looking to get out of friendship?" That, I thought, is a damn good point. Why exactly do I care about any of this? What is the result of success and how do you know when you achieve it?

The answer, of course, is a complicated one. It first must be understood that the goal of any friendship isn't really something you can dictate. You can't expect to find someone to walk the Appalachian Trail with you among those with 6-month-old babies at home. No matter what your goals are, they have to be compatible with the person on the other end of the handshake and in many cases, you have to take what you can get. For ease of analysis I think we should first break friendships down into at least four easy categories:

Category 1: The Fred and Barney Friend (FAB)
As outdated as the reference is, there were no better friends in the universe of Honeymooners-copycat-animated-sitcoms than Fred and Barney. These two fought together, played together, schemed together and generally looked after each other like brothers. Even if they hadn't worked together they would have been fast friends for life. Fred could have called Barney at four in the morning to come help fix a leaky pipe or at the last minute to go out to dinner together with the wives. While they weren't the only friends the other had they were certainly the default option for whatever was going on. The FAB friend is also the one you call to complain to when your spouse does something stupid or the first person you tell when he finally buys you those diamond earrings. Your FAB friend also generally throws your baby shower or bachelor party.

Category 2: The Recurring Outside Work Friend (ROW)
One of the things that defines a friendship for me is the effort one puts into meeting 'outside the bounds of convenience' and generally this means outside work. The ROW friend comes over to watch the big game and goes bowling occasionally but isn't typically the 'default' option if no one else is available. You might call your ROW at four in the morning but only if all other options have been expended. Your ROW will probably ask if someone is throwing you a shower but find it's already being planned. If you work with your ROW then you'll commiserate with them about work issues in great detail but you'll also be aware of their non-work interests.

Category 3: The Work Friend (WF)
As you might expect the work friend's interest in you ends more or less when the foreman pulls the birds tail and he screams to signal the end of the work day. Little effort is made to meet outside work except at work-related functions but discussions about work could be quite detailed and in-depth. You'd typically never consider calling your WF outside of work hours no matter how many pipes break because you probably don't have their phone number.

Category 4: The Occasional Work Friend (OWF)
Lowest of all on our hierarchy are those with whom we relate only when fortune throws us together by chance. OWFs may exchange words in the hallway on the way to the loo or lunch together in the breakroom but no attempt is made to seek the other out. You won't call an OWF for emergency plumbing needs because chances are you don't know their last name or their phone number.

So, now that we've got the categorization out of the way, what was the question we were asking? Oh yes, what's the goal of all this friendship crap? Obviously enough, the goal is to have as many friends of the highest grade possible. (This makes it sound so logical and antiseptic; it's so flattering isn't it?) Right now I consider myself as having 4 somewhat weak ROWs, one strong WF and countless OWFs.

Clearly, there's a vacuum of leadership at the top of the food chain that I've always found impossible to fill. I didn't realize until somewhat recently why this was the case and as usual it was my wife who pointed out my stupidity. Before I get to the direct stupidity we should make a clarification on the ROWs. I describe my 4 ROWs as somewhat weak ones only because they have other commitments. I can't ask any of them to go out at the drop of a hat because they have kids or other 'stuff to do'. Clearly people have their own lives. Every one of them is deserving of more of my attention but circumstances simply don't make that possible.

Ready for the stupidity of which my wife so kindly reminded me? Years ago when I still worked in the office one of my WFs invited me over to the house to watch a movie. For whatever reason I evaded the request. Not long after I evaded a second similar request and as a result my WF devolved slowly into an OWF. As you might have observed, months later I was on here bitching about not having any friends. Again and as usual, I allowed my discomfort of doing something new to keep me from achieving my goals. Just like the library story yesterday, I was complaining about a situation that didn't actually exist. People are making every effort to promote themselves up the chain but I'm actively smacking them on the head and sending them back down the ladder. WTF was I thinking? Anyway, enough of that; lesson learned I guess. I'm never turning down another invitation again, even if it's one of those "Holiday Decorating" parties where you have people over to put up your Christmas tree for you.

Several hours of that later I got an IM from one of our remote employees who, despite the holidays, is obviously a bit depressed. I spent half an hour trying to put a positive spin on his somewhat glum situation but to little effect I'm afraid. I'm happy that he at least found someone to talk to for a while. I'm half expecting an IM right at midnight tonight since his plans seemed to be to sit home alone for the final day of the year. Sadly most of that is beyond my power to help but I can at least listen.

Lastly and most frustratingly I was informed today that the cube I intended to use while in the office got assigned to another employee. So unless I can weedle a proper cube out of HR I'm stuck at home forever. Well, not strictly speaking I guess; one of the ROWs offered to let me set up a TV tray in his cube. He may need a promotion for that one.

So after all that... and writing all that... I'm kinda worn out. But my headache is gone. Apparently it's good just to vent hot gases from your head once in a while... anyone know a good trepanner?

The Day in Brief

I wasn't going to post a personal entry for today until my wife gave me a reason to. We should go with the day in order though so we'll get to that at the end.

Yesterday I mentioned a bit of my life I'd been neglecting so early this afternoon I went for a stroll around the neighborhood. I took the GPS along and about 349 feet into it I reissued an old lament that my wife and I often discuss. Down in our part of the suburbs the new neighborhoods all include sidewalks as the houses are built. It's great if you want to walk anywhere in the neighborhood but eventually you'll come to a point where you find yourself thinking of a Shel Silverstein book. The options at that point are to either walk in someone's yard (which I find rude) or walk on the edge of the street. The latter is a bad idea and will be illustrated in a story once I'm done with this one. Anyway, further in my walk I reminisced that when I was a lad you could actually walk to places. You could step out of your front door, put foot to pavement and walk somewhere totally different from your house. It was flippin' brilliant. After about another mile I realized that I'd been complaining for 2 years about a situation that wasn't actually true. The library and a liquor store and a pizza joint are just 3 miles that-a-way. Forty minutes later I was ceremonially touching the flagpole as proof of concept. Sadly it was a Sunday so I couldn't buy a fifth of vodka for the walk back home but the point is simply this: I've been complaining about the fact that there's nowhere to walk from home when in fact it's just not true. I'm not sure how often I can bring myself to walk the 6 miles round trip to the library but the fact is that it's available. Reality listened to my complaint and retroactively addressed it.

Ah, yes, you're asking for the story about walking along the side of the road. Alright, fine. When we lived in our previous house I used to take these crazy walks around the 'block' of our neighborhood out in the country. A large part of this was along the edge of the street with no sidewalk and just a drainage ditch along the side. About 80% of the way through my walk I misplaced a step, turned my ankle and pitched straight into the ditch in a most graceless manner. About 30 seconds later as I sat in the ditch wondering if I'd make it home or not, a lady stopped to ask if I needed assistance. I refused and shook it off after about 5 minutes and hobbled home. A few months later the wife and I were driving down a similar country road and what should we find but a man sitting in the ditch obviously in distress. We stopped and gave him a ride back home. Apparently he was having some sort of sugar situation but the point of this rather long story is that somehow the wheel of karma had turned and we repaid the kindness paid to us just months before. Anyway, the point is: don't walk along the side of the road.

It has occurred to me as I write so much every day that this blog really is using up all my good smalltalk material. According to that stupid 'how to work a room' book the key to smalltalk is having your source material ready. So if you read this blog on a daily basis it's just possible that I may find it impossible to talk to you as I may not have anything left to say.

Lastly, I have to note what made this exceptionally trite post for the day worth writing. It should first be noted that my wife's relationship with this blog is a somewhat strained one. She seems to appreciate many of my highlight posts on topics of interest to the masses but classically she's not a fan of many of my more mundane babbling about books and various other crap. As a consequence she has ignored the last month's worth of posts since I've waxed unnecessarily personal. This evening, for whatever reason, she took a peek at some of my more recent posts and after her perusal said, "You are such a good writer, I don't understand why more people don't read your blog. You have a way of making even silly, everyday things sound interesting." I was flabbergasted. I'm not sure she realizes what a compliment that is but I thank her for it none the less. I have to say that much of the appeal may be because she actually LIVES with the person whose innermost thoughts are dancing across the page but I'll accept her kindness just the same.

Promiscuity: An Evolutionary History of Sperm Competition Chapter 1

I recently recommended Dr. Tatiana's Sex Advice to All Creation to someone and was reminded that I had Promiscuity waiting for me on the shelf upstairs. Over the next few posts I'll jot down a few notes and afterwards boil those down for your perusal along with a few of my personal observations. It should be noted that these posts will likely be extraordinarily graphic and thus not recommended for the faint of heart. That said, they should at least be interesting but don't expect it to hang together like a proper narrative since I'm just going over my notes not retyping the whole text.

Chapter 1

The Greeks, due to a surfeit of dead male soldiers to dissect had a really good idea of how the male member worked. The female form, however was a different story since dissection of a woman was strictly forbidden. Having observed various ob-gyns over 10 years of marriage it seems clear to me that not a lot has changed in the past 2000 years. The text admits, for example, that science currently doesn't know what physical function the clitoris performs. My wife, however, says SHE has a pretty good idea.

Erasmus Darwin introduced the concept that males in a species have secondary sexual characteristics such as large plumage displays or dangling wattles to attract females of the species in his 1792 text Zoonomia. In the 1960s, Bob Trivers postulated that the showiness of these displays is inversely proportional to the male's involvement with the young. To offer proof by anecdote, the peacock has a tremendous sexual display but his responsibilities end immediately after he inseminates the hen. Inversely, the male magpie invests heavily in his mate bringing her food throughout the entire brooding process and he is virtually indistinguishable from his hen.

In 1937 Geoff Parker introduced the idea that this competitiveness may even happen at the level of individual sperm. Parker examined dungflies, a species in which the female is approached by several males and noted that as a female approaches a patty several males wrestle for the opportunity to mate with her. It's in the female's best interest, Parker argues, to be inseminated by as many males as possible. Similarly, the male is best served who can not only inseminate a female but protect her from insemination by others. At the same time males who can fight through the attempts of other males to keep females to themselves have an advantage. What results is an arms race between males who attempt to protect their mates from intruders but also to overcome the defenses of others. Meanwhile the female benefits as long as multiple males assail her honor. And to help her make the distinction the female has evolved all manner of chemical and physical processes to put the competing sperm through the wringer to select only the best.

Crazily Eventful Day

Since yesterday crawled by like a half-frozen earthworm it seems only fitting that today was just stupidly full of epiphanous moments.

This morning as our eldest and I stumbled about checking on the status of GC17VPJ I realized that I was neglecting one of the legs of the metaphorical 3-legged-stool that is my life. Lately I've been keenly attentive to the 1/3 of my life related to personal/interpersonal goals and I've also been forced to pay a bit more attention to the 1/3 related to my work. In the hubbub, the remaining 1/3, my physical health, has been allowed to go by the wayside. My diet has completely gone to hell and it's been three weeks since I last went out and roamed aimlessly about the woods getting a bit of exercise. It occurs to me that the other 2/3 make little sense if this one is allowed to slip so it's time to get back onto the straight and narrow. Then I wondered to myself as I wandered about the woods, "Why in the hell am I using this 'stool' metaphor to describe my life?" It quickly dawned on me that it was a leftover from a conversation I'd had a few days earlier about work. This person's stool metaphor had been floating about in my head and was reused for something else completely quite against my will. Neat how that works when you can trace the lines back to their place of origin. Only slightly later I was caused to remember that at current job minus 3 the exercise bit was not really a problem because I had an insane lunchtime walking partner. I remember with relish those 2-hour lunches when we would walk 6-8 miles over hill and dale; exercise is clearly not a problem when you have a hyper-motivated person to walk with. I quickly calculated my odds of finding another even half-motivated partner (<10%) and those of getting the old partner to work in the office again (<50%) and became somewhat pessimistic but determined to carve out some time anyway.

At 5 we had dinner with some of the wife's school chums; I have to say that I'm always in awe of what good friends she has in these people. For the most part I try to just stay out of the way in these situations but I have to admit they're nice people but a bit difficult to relate to in many ways. They swapped random stories for an hour or so until it was time for the Chris Rock concert downtown at the Murat.

The 'warm-up' comedian was supremely unfunny as they always are but the introductory musical act was "Biz Markie." Mr. Markie was revelatory to me on several levels but the first of which is the fact that I don't know shit about music. During his 30 minutes on stage he played bits of about 25 songs and until he got to the very end of his set I can't say I'd heard of a damn one of them. Based on the reaction of the crowd around me though I was in the vast minority. I did find myself somewhat puzzled as to what talent the man was actually displaying however. From a purely practical point of view he seemed to be merely operating electronic equipment on a stage; he didn't sing or perform in any visible way until the final song. His 'scratching' was annoying and served only to fill time while he changed from one song to the next. The crowd was effervescent in their praise of his performance but I failed to see the value in merely playing recorded music. All THAT said, I was not untouched by the urban undertones and Terpsichore moved me to "grove" in my seat in what I thought a highly amusing manner but my wife quickly arrested my attempts to "get down" by tendering her assessment that my dancing was, and I quote, "awful." Looking at those around me it seemed evident enough to me that that was the point but apparently my "awful" was not of an appropriate subtype.

Secondary to the aesthetic principles of Mr. Markie's performance I realized something about myself that I don't really pay much attention to. Despite my outward appearances of stoicism and a general "stick in the mud" attitude, it's just possible that I am, in fact, a wild, outgoing party person at heart. It seems that as the months creep by my reserve in front of the world is slowly lowered and that by the time I'm 50 I'll be completely unstoppable. I realize that this is hard to imagine but as each month goes by it seems like I do something new that I would have considered unthinkable in previous years.

It was about that time that I was reminded of a time years ago when my wife was a bridesmaid in a wedding and as such she had to go out and dance with the wedding party. But because there were 4 bridesmaids and only 2 groomsman (I was merely a guest at the wedding) she was going to be left with another bridesmaid as a partner. Well if there's one thing you can say about us it's that we CAN NOT dance. Our best attempt at dancing is more of a non-rhythmic, uncoordinated swaying. Anyway, my wife was terrified; all we talked about for weeks was about how she did NOT want to dance and she knew I was too scared to dance with her so what was she going to do? This was going to be awful. Well, the wedding came and went and the reception came and suddenly it was time to dance and my wife slunk coyly onto the dance floor ready to try her damndest to look inconspicuous on the dance floor by herself. It was at that point that something snapped inside me. As terrified as I was, I was not going to let my poor wife stand on that dance floor by herself and feel horrible while I could do something about it. So I crept up behind her and tapped her on the shoulder and when she saw who it was her face just about exploded in a dozen different flavors of surprise. We did our un-rhythmic, uncoordinated swaying in front of a few hundred people and the world did not explode, nobody laughed, but my wife and I enjoyed ourselves immensely just for the sheer joy of being there for each other. I actually consider that one of the defining moments of our lives together and we still do our un-rhythmic, uncoordinated swaying at weddings today.

ANYWAY, random reminiscences aside, the reason that has anything to do with anything is because of a yet unintroduced third couple at the concert. In addition to the friends we had dinner with we picked up a third couple from my wife's school at the show. The husband in this couple is a good friend of my wife's and he's actually the reason we're here to see Chris Rock in the first place. Rock is apparently one of his favorite comedians so this is all primarily for his benefit. Not long into the performances it's clear that his wife is NOT having a good time. If her facial expression isn't enough to make it clear her statement of, "I'm going to need alcohol to get through this" seals the deal. The practical lesson I take from this is to reaffirm one of my general rules: as "the spouse" your primary job in these situations is to make sure that your spouse has a good time with her friends. So basically, no matter how crappy a time you may be having, make sure your spouse doesn't suffer because of it. I would say that I fulfilled my responsibilities in that respect this evening despite the fact that I found the content of the main event somewhat trite and cliche. What was more entertaining than the performance was the audience's response to it. They were particularly boisterous and it's hard not to get swept up in the energy of that many people in such a tight space so personally I'd have had a hard time being a wet blanket no matter how hard I tried. Apparently some people are a lot better at it.

Lastly and least importantly, I got home in time to see the end of the Patriots/Giants game. I'll save you all my vituperative rantings about the Patriots but suffice it to say that when a Gucci-wearing prettyboy like Tom Brady goes down in history as the quarterback of the greatest NFL team of all time it's time to shut off the fvcking TV for good. What a crock. But that's a post for a different day.

Bored, Bored, Bored Incredibly Bored

Except for a few brief moments of amusing chitchat this afternoon today has been unbelievably boring. How bored, might you ask?

Well, boring enough that this evening I updated my MySpace page with actual information. Yeah, that boring. No, no, stop laughing, it gets better. In a fit of randomness I looked up some people from my high school graduating class. I have to say that they grew up to be a lot more normal looking than I would have guessed. And also boring enough that I'm not sure what else I can say of even partial interest... um. Wow. This IS dull.

No, wait, I think I have one. I was amused today during a bit of chitchat at the way in which things I say have a tendency to stick with people. For example, I made a comment months ago about gift giving and how one should only give a gift if it's truly meaningful and not merely for the act of going through the motions of giving a gift. Well, my chitchat partner made reference to that statement from months ago and I was embarrassed in the sense that I didn't remember having said such a thing. Clearly it's something I would say but I'd forgotten the specifics. Very sad when you forget your own rhetoric. Similarly, I made an obscure callback to one of my well worn stories to someone else and they recalled what I was talking about without repetition. It seems evident that other people have a much better recollection of other's stories than I do. It's somehow very touching to me to think that people I talk to are walking around with little bits of me sticking in their brains.

Then I start to wonder who's sticking in my brain. I hear the echo of Mrs. Timmons in 6th grade, "Lying makes your guts turn green!" she'd bellow. My grandmother moves through the house singing, "... and a whippoorwill high on a hill... let out with a blue note... and pushed it through a horn... until it was born..." Grandpa and his WW2 story, "I was in Greenland and all I saw were these planes doing bombing practice on a rock".... the war was pretty boring to hear him tell it. A story of a man smuggling bibles to China runs through my mind... A man tells a story of how when he was a child he was placed in a burlap bag and beaten with reeds and at the age of fourteen a Zoroastrian named Vilma ritualistically shaved his testicles... all this crap wandering around in my head too. It makes one wonder where "I" end and "they", those cranial invaders begin.

Oh, I was also invited to a wedding. Yes, you heard that right. *I* was invited to a wedding. Not "my wife was invited to a wedding and I'm coming along" not "my girlfriend has planned a wedding with me as groom and I'm required to attend" but little old me. Yes, I know I'm overreacting but I'm determined to take this as a touching gesture so shuddup about it. Only one problem ... see paragraph three above. New baby? I've got GREAT gift ideas. Birthday? I've got some AVERAGE gift ideas. Gift just for the hell of it? My idea kicks ASS otherwise I wouldn't give a gift at all. Getting Married? No clue what to get you. Yeah, none. I'm going to need to think long and hard about this as I don't have a ton of time to fart around.

Alright.... so as it turns out that wasn't NEARLY as boring as I thought it might be. Well, not for me anyway. For you probably but heck, nothing I can do about that.

Into the Office - 12/27/07

Well today I drove in to the office and stayed there all day. For those of you doing the math, that's an hour and twenty minutes or so round trip and 7 hours actually in the office. In exchange I think I managed about 30 words with a real person. That's a pretty crappy rate of return but since absolutely EVERYONE in my sphere of immediate influence was out of the office today by some unpleasant holiday miracle, not a particularly surprising one.

Just for amusement, let's recall those 30 words: E gets credit for 10 words as she saved the company 41 cents by delivering something to me by hand rather than mailing it. I think I could have squeezed a few more words out of her ever-smiling countenance if I'd thought to mention that she can just save them up ad infinitum and I'd pick them up on but I wasn't quick-thinking enough to manage that one. The other 20 words go to T as he accosted me literally as I was walking in the door this morning. T is one of these people who could strike up a conversation with a tree and the tree would have a comprehensible response. It is, frankly, an amazing talent. I'm *SO* jealous. I did get a chance to do what I call the 'accidental conversation termination dance' though. Here's how it goes:

1. Conversation starts unexpectedly, generally across some distance
2. Subject A approaches subject B and conversation continues
3. Subject A senses a lull in conversation and takes it as a hint that the conversation is over and begins to leave.
   
4. Subject B begins speaking again so A dashes back to B so as not to appear rude or disinterested
   
5. By the time A arrives back at B, B has stopped talking and the conversation really is over
   

I really must stop doing that as it's most embarrassing, especially since it generally only happens with people you don't talk to very much anyway and might actually be offended by the maneuver.

Alright, enough of that. The office silence was certainly not a problem today. I heard all manner of interesting background tidbits including a complete inventory of all the Christmas gifts received within a 10-cube radius, detailed instructions and FAQ on how to pay a citation online and the hardware requirements of an entire department. All in all, much more interesting than the Leave it to Beaver reruns I'd get at home.

On returning home, however, I found chaos and a general miasma of pissed-offedness. It is too early to draw a causal relationship between going to work and the death of domestic bliss but things were clearly not in a good form. Children were being obnoxious and demanding, adults had headaches, crap littered the areas I had picked up just yesterday. Only hours later did everything return more or less to normal. I guess we'll see how things go when I finally make it out of the house again on the 8th. *grumble*

Random Thoughts for 12/26/07

On the 22nd it seemed like I was going to be off forever. Now that it's over it seemed to pass in a flash. That said, I'm looking forward to having something to do tomorrow since I did absolutely NOTHING over the past five days. I'm going in to the office tomorrow for an entire day so it'll be neat to see if I tolerate it well or go utterly insane. Since I expect only about 5% of the staff to be in it'll be even more sepulchral than usual. Really must take some noise and some headphones.

I had a protracted online conversation last night and at one point the statement that "it's easy to give advice" floated across my IM and it seemed contextually appropriate given a couple of the posts here in the past week. My response, of course, was to agree completely. Yes, it's damn easy to spout general advice to the absent masses. But I guess sometimes you just have to say things out loud; these posts delineate my philosophy on all manner of big, important topics and that philosophy seems to work for me. Your mileage may vary but I have a hard time believing that at least half of my burblings aren't generally applicable. No warranty is expressed or implied though.

Today is the day after Christmas and about 2pm I realized why this is my FAVORITE day of the year. Yes indeedy, it's the day the Christmas tree comes down. I'm a creature of habit and having this big obnoxious decoration in the living room for a month is surprisingly annoying. So let us officially celebrate that the family living space is plastic tree free!

Lastly, I failed to mention that the in-laws give cash gifts for Christmas and for the first time in... well, ever, I had no clue what the heck to do with it. I've apparently come to the point where there's nothing left in the universe that I want. I can't even justify buying items from my Amazon.com wishlist anymore as I'm so behind on my reading. After scrubbing my mind there just isn't anything else. For about an hour I was planning to give it to kiva.org until my wife forbade it under the "that's obviously a scam" theory. Perhaps it is but it appeals to me on some odd level to loan a furniture maker from Paraguay $150 to expand his business. In the end I sent the wife to the spa with it but I still wonder about those third-world people trying to better their lives. Perhaps one of my readers has a suggestion for a good charity that would accept an occasional contribution?

Christmas 2007

This year Christmas in our household started at 6:30 in the morning, a full half an hour earlier than last year. By 7:15 the festivities were as good as over and by 8:30 our youngest was officially 'over it' and having us read the same books as usual. Our eldest has made it to 9:30 at least without reaching the point of complete apathy. For my own information next year I'll record the material transactions of the day.

Our youngest, in addition to the usual holiday miscellany got a few items to feed her obsession with Mickey Mouse. Specifically a Mickey Mouse Clubhouse playset and Mickey and Minnie plush toys. The eldest asked for items related to dragons so she got a few books on the topic and a pair of plastic models and lastly a low-end MP3 player. I officially congratulate my wife on keeping the holiday relatively sane this year (at least as far as the kids go).

The wife got what she all but ordered for herself. I think the total count was one skirt, one wrap, four shirts, one pair of shoes she REALLY liked and one pair of shoes (that I picked out without her knowledge) that she really hates. On the whole, the satisfaction level is still pretty high. For my part I came away with a lapdesk and two pairs of jeans (my wife says she chose "a wash that a a young person might wear" but for my part they're just blue and I'm not sure what I'm going to do with all these pants [who needs 4 pairs of pants?]). Our eldest picked out a Hallmark Snoopy ornament on behalf of the youngest and my wife ended by raiding a few items from my ever-present Amazon.com wish list.

At any rate, I'd say Christmas wasn't totally over the top but still more than I'd bother with if were up to me. We have yet to visit the in-laws so no doubt we'll still manage to end up with much more crap than we actually need.

What makes a good Husband??

Note: This post is an extension of a previous (and more vitriolic) post that covered the same basic topic earlier today. I find this version to be a bit less abrasive but significantly more preachy. Take it for what you will...

As I was sitting in the family vehicle waiting for my wife to come out of yonder shopping establishment I heard one of those idiotic jewelry commercials on the radio. It seems, gentlemen, that a lot is riding on this year's Christmas present. If you don't make it down to Jared or the Shane Company before the day ends then you might as well forget any hope for a happy new year. And you can be assured that on December 26th when your honey goes back to work she's going to be telling ALL her friends about what a crappy husband you are if you don't get her something in that 'little burgundy box'... or is it light blue? Well, whatever the case, it had better be a little box and it better be colorful.

So to hear the local purveyor of high-cost, low-sentiment gifts tell it, the difference between a ‘good’ husband and a ‘bad’ husband can be found in how much he spends on you. It seems that the criteria for a proper marriage are all forgotten in the glitz of the latest ‘bling.’ Initially I thought this was all a bunch of marketing hype and that nobody could honestly think that way. That was until I mentioned this to my wife and she confirmed the awful truth. Apparently this *IS* the way some people think. So when the woman in the Jared commercial says, “I just want a man who’ll get me something from Jared,” that’s really someone’s idea of a good husband. Listen, I’m no expert but if that’s really the case then your standards are too damn low. Prepare yourselves for what I like to call: Rob’s Christmas Rant. You can thank those damn jewelry commercials for the topic.

OK, ladies, a good husband comes in three parts and none of them have anything to do with his wallet… or his pants… or his ‘bod’ or anything else. After you’ve been married 40 years all that crap goes south anyway so it’s not really worth worrying about it. No, what you need is a man who…

1. Listens

Of the three parts of marriage, listening is the easiest to do but also the most often screwed up. So, ladies, you just got home from a long and annoying day at work. Your boss gave you an impossible assignment and your co-workers were a bunch of helpless morons. Being a woman the first thing you want to do is talk about it; you want to work through the day in words and settle things in your mind. Not because you expect immediate answers but because talking about it makes you feel better and it’s therapeutic. The average husband comes home, generally with the same issues, and all he wants to do is go hide in the garage or on the computer or in front the television. So when you get home you tend immediately to go in different directions.

The difference between ‘good’ husband and ‘bad’ husband is simple. Good husband listens to what went on in his wife’s day. He participates in the discussion, offers insight and provides help where he can. He offers information about his own day and commiserates where possible and sticks with it no matter how long it takes because his wife’s happiness is important to him. Bad husband… well, he turns up the TV when you start to talk or says, “I have work to do, we’ll talk about it later.” Bad husband puts his own needs over those of his wife and often doesn’t even make an effort to listen to what’s going on in his wife’s life.

2. Thinks

The second part of being a good husband is the most complicated and almost every husband screws this up at least once in a while. Ladies, you need a husband who, when he does something, he takes a moment to think about how that impacts you. This is best illustrated by example. A good husband realizes that when he works late, he’s making his wife work late too, especially if you have kids. Similarly, he knows that when he fails to do his part around the house it’s generally the wife who has to pick up the slack. He knows that marriage is a zero-sum game and every liberty he takes is balanced by a sacrifice from you. The husband you want recognizes this and does whatever he can to make sure you don’t have to sacrifice your life and happiness because of his own selfish endeavors.

3. Acts

All too often men think that the third part of being a good husband is all there is to it and spend too much of their effort here. Ladies, you need husbands who realize that the outward physical and material acts of affection are merely the icing on the cake. A diamond ring is fine but until your man actually loves you enough to sit down on the couch and listen to you rant about your day, all you really have is a bit of jewelry. Further, the man of your dreams needs to realize that the gift is not nearly as important as the sentiment behind it. Those $10,000 earrings are nice but would they mean more to you than jewelry box he spent six solid months making for you?

***

When my wife got back to the car we talked about the commercial and I asked her what she thought of as the ‘perfect husband.’ As usual, she merely flattered me with her selection but in the end she settled on the simple definition of: “a friend.” I think there’s a lot of truth wrapped up in that simple statement. Good married couples may not start out friends, she says, but they end up that way. Each considers the needs of the other and does whatever they can to make sure those needs are filled.

Selfishness leads only down a path of resentment. One partner harms the other inadvertently by their selfishness and the other resents it. They in turn take some small revenge and the cycle continues until everyone’s miserable. Luckily though, kindness rolls downhill just as fast. For example, if I make a special effort to ensure the house is in order when her friends come over then she might respond later by making my favorite meal unexpectedly. Feeling the benevolence from that I do her another good turn later and before you know it we’re falling all over each other trying to please each other. Doesn’t that sound like fun? And to think it all started with such a simple act that took an hour out of my day.

More important, perhaps, than any of this is the mere act of kind, simple, honest communication. For example, my wife told me that she related the story of our second date to one of her friends recently. In the story the waitress comes and takes our order but for whatever reason I refused to look at her. When the waitress leaves, my wife asked me, “Why didn’t you look at the waitress?” My wife’s friend was aghast at this. “You asked him that and it was only your second date? He must have really liked something about you to stay with you!” Most people, it seems, would have just decided that I was some kind of weirdo and never bothered with a third date. My wife on the other hand, asked me about the problem and helped me correct it. The same concept works in the other direction as well but the point is simply that you can’t expect your life with someone to get any better unless you tell them when things bother you. If you’re watching a movie and he gets himself a bowl of popcorn but nothing for you then saying, “Honey, I’m kinda hurt that you didn’t offer me any popcorn” is wonderfully effective. To a large extent we shape our mates; if you expect him to help more around the house then tell him so. If you expect her to keep the kids busy while you mow the lawn then tell her. Good spouses aren’t born, they’re made.

These things, I suspect, you will find much more beneficial to your married happiness than any amount of Christmas bling. And you can tell the jeweler I said so.

What makes a good Husband? [shorter, ruder version]

As I was sitting in the family vehicle waiting for my wife to come out of yonder shopping establishment I heard one of those idiotic jewelry commercials on the radio. It seems, gentlemen, that a lot is riding on this year's Christmas present. If you don't make it down to Jared or the Shane company before the day ends then you might as well forget any hope for a happy new year. And yes, you can be assured that on December 26th when your honey goes back to work she's going to be telling ALL her friends about what a crappy husband you are if you don't get her something in that 'little burgundy box'... or is it light blue? Well, whatever the case it had better be a little box and it better be colorful.

To be honest I was ready to dismiss all this as marketing hype and go on until I remembered one of my wife's stories. I'll spare the details but the point seems to be that there really are people who think this way. Apparently their lives are so chock full of great stuff that they need those $20,000 diamond earrings just to put that final cherry on top of the sundae. Do doubt that's how the people in the commercial felt when they get their small but colorful boxes.

Of course we, the normal people of the world, all know those yahoos are nuts. They're not putting diamond earrings on top of a wonderful marriage to 'commemorate their journey through life together' as one TV commercial puts it. They're putting on something sparkly and expensive-looking to distract onlookers from the garbage heap that is their life together. No woman in her right mind would rather have a diamond than 5 hours a week of her husband's undivided attention. You can pile up all the gold on the planet but in the end there's nothing more valuable to your spouse than the time you spend with them in frank and honest communication. Don't buy a bunch of gaudy gifts this Christmas; instead ask "How was your day?" and then sit and wait for the answer. When she tells you, commiserate; try to help if you can. Relate similar experiences. Try to share uplifting points from your day. When your spouse is having a bad day it's your job to lift her up and make it better. In other words, be a friend. There are no words a woman wants to hear more than "How can I help?" after she's had a rough day. Those 4 words can be a comfort to her for the rest of her life. The words, "I got you those earrings you wanted" will comfort her for about 60 seconds.

Headed to the Bijoux: Juno

Through a very fortuitous series of events Kathy and I got out to see a movie this afternoon. Stylistically I was strongly reminded of Napoleon Dynamite except that this movie had the advantage of being funny, at least in parts. The thoughts that rumble through my head are relatively predictable...

As usual, Hollywood optimizes characters until they're utterly unrecognizable as people. If kids in high school have interests as deep and wide as the ones portrayed in this movie then where are the adults with such interests? Perhaps it's merely a Midwestern trait but most people I know are much more grounded in the simpler things in life. Juno introduces us to teenagers who act more like my father than any teenager I've ever met. I'd love to meet such people if they actually exist or at least swap CDs with them. The soundtrack for this movie, which featured songs I've never heard by an artist I've never heard, was also brilliant; pity I'm too lazy to find out more about the music involved.

I was also amused to see that the movie revealed 'dark man secret #3': Every man who is not the eldest of 12 is scared shitless by the idea of having a baby. Now that is not to say that they will admit it; clearly women have a visceral need to have children and no man wants to step on that, especially in a new marriage. Men will say (as one of the movie's characters did) that they're looking forward to having a child and ready to be a parent but when it comes down to it we don't know beans about babies. Babies are delicate, illogical and the most important thing in a new mother's life so it's a damn scary prospect that as men we might be called upon to take care of one with exactly 0 previous experience. In the end though the wife builds the father she wants for her child in the first year. If your husband isn't the father you expect then it's your job as mother to correct him; in all likelihood he doesn't know crap about taking care of a small child. OK, I've wandered far enough off topic ...

For somewhat ineffable reasons I find the father in this movie very personally relatable. When things are at their worst for the daughter he's cool, calm and collected. His dry sense of humor also seems familiar. Funny, I always seem to see myself in these screen people. My wife says this guy is me forwards, backwards and all directions in between:



I'd call that totally and utterly inaccurate but you make the call on your own.

Jets... officially cooled

I was chatting online last night (yeah, I know. ME chatting online. Hard to believe isn't it?) and the person on the other end of the conversation described my recent blog entries as 'manic'. I couldn't agree more but I might choose the word frenetic just to be opaque. Anyway, it was a good observation and looking back at 12/19/07a I really need to just relax and not worry about ultimate outcomes so much. Pursuant to that I have drafted a legal document, which I will have notarized on Monday; it states simply that should I fail to relax within the next 14 days I will forfeit 65% of total assets... No, wait, shit... that's the wrong way to go about it too I think. No, it'll be better if I just let the wind blow me about a bit and see where I end up, hopefully not tangled in any power lines.

All other mania aside, I have absolutely determined that I need to go into the office on a regular basis. The fact that I went in twice in two weeks and people looked at me like an uncooked goose at Christmas dinner makes me think that I'm quickly becoming a stranger. At some point that becomes a not-so-good thing. Plus it's always good to have more reasons to shower. Currently I'm aiming for Tuesdays and Thursdays. Even if I'm totally invisible to everyone I can at least observe these curious human creatures close-up.

Making my way through the first 70 pages of Dune reminded me just how much I enjoyed the book in the first place. It's one of those books I read as a child and lost several days to with hardly a notice that they had gone past. It also brings to mind the fact that I need to be more careful drawing the line between 'recreation' and 'work'. I tend to take things that should be recreational and turn them into another unpaid profession. I won't belabor the blog with examples but the words card 'business' must ring a bell with at least some of you. (See the autobiography part 7). Anyway, point is, I need to learn to recreate properly and not turn everything into a second job.

Speaking of recreate, it's worth mentioning that I seem to be enjoying work as of late. For some reason the merest inkling of the tiniest idea that my work might be appreciated seems to be highly motivating. This all falls down of course when it's determined that nobody actually knows what it is they want and you hop from one idea of what to be done to another. Anyway, in an optimal world, doing a job that is important and having people recognize that work might be the best recreation of all. That sounds like good resume tripe to me at least.

Random Thoughts for 12/22/07

Thought the first: Always talk to the wife. Chances are about 90% that she not only understands the situation better than I do but will also have something constructive to say. Even if she doesn't have a solution, the mere act of talking about it out loud will often resolve most difficulties.

Of course my favorite movie is on but I didn't notice until it was 80% over. I was, at least in time for my favorite quote, "And remember, my sentimental friend, that a heart is not judged by how much you love, but by how much you are loved by others."

Seeing my favorite movie on reminds me that I need to watch "Sweeney Todd"... no, not that movie thing... the good one with all the singing. GOD this is a good opera...



"... what happened then? well that's the play and he wouldn't want us to give it away..."

genius! Genius I tell you! Does make one a bit peckish too...



OK, so maybe after all that the points are:
a. Never underestimate the value of an opinion from the other side of the gender gap. Women frigging know EVERYTHING. (And ladies, men know some stuff too; the trick is finding one who will tell you all those dark 'man secrets'.)
b. Don't eat any cheap meat pies.

Time Off Sucks

Alright, it's pretty clear that this is going to be a long five days. I'm 4 hours into a 5-day vacation and I'm already hopelessly bored. I'm not sure I can blow another 100 hours watching television.

What sucks is that this is a side effect of actually enjoying work for a change. Back in the days when I was ready to quit, weekends were a joy. I couldn't get out of the place fast enough. The past week though has been really enjoyable; I've managed to keep myself busy, I've had a lot of entertainment from friends in the office and there's an air of hope in the place. My mind is constantly abuzz with excitement of a personal and professional nature.

Now when I think of five days stuck at home it just pales by comparison. Luckily, I suppose, my wife has expressed the same sentiment so we can at least commiserate on that point. That unlucky woman has two weeks of this rot to look forward to; I hate to think how she's going to feel over the summer when she's kicking around here for three months.

Pushing outward, I wonder if others feel this letdown. Yes, I know the holidays are supposed to be a time of joy to reconnect with family and all that but I think that in today's society co-workers really are an extension of family. In fact, I'll readily admit that I know the people at work a HELL of a lot better than I know my in-laws and furthermore they're a hell of a lot more interesting. Perhaps I'm the exception because I'm so thoroughly detached from my natural kin but I'm not getting the warm Christmas glow here so much as holding my breath waiting for it all to be over so I can get back to my life. Christmas seems not so much a celebration as it is a practical exam in personal tolerance as we remind ourselves why we don't hang out with certain relatives more often. Add to that the accounting required to make sure that each person has EXACTLY the same amount spent on their thoughtless and unnecessary gift and I'd say you have Christmas in a very tidy and cynical nutshell. Ho Ho *adding machine prints* Ho.

The Nature of Friendship

As it has become abundantly clear to me that I'm not going to be able to 'quiet my mind' enough to either read or sleep it seems I might as well blather on about something...

This story, as it turns out, begins two days ago as I sat at lunch with a friend. Somehow we came around to the topic of friendship, etc and she said that in her experience all her really good friendships had a sort of epiphanous moment in which things seemed to change gears from mere acquaintance to more of a ... well, I don't remember her exact words (I REALLY need to take better notes if people are going to spout wisdom at me) but suffice to say that the relationship deepened on some significant way.

So as I sat here this evening reading and re-reading and re-re-reading the same page of Dune and trying to put the Muad'Dib in his 'proper place,' those words rolled and rolled and rolled through my mind. They're of some significance today of all days especially but then I realized that I'd heard that same idea months (if not years) before. The story, plus or minus identifying details goes something like this:

Years ago I was level two support at a software company. It was my job to help support the level one staff who were actually on the phones with customer issues. At one point we had a new employee in the level one group and the two of us had chatted on occasion in a casual way but nothing particularly heavy. After he'd been working there a few weeks I came to him and asked if there was anything I could help him with. Apparently something in my delivery struck him the wrong way or gave the impression that I was saying he wasn't doing well and that really pissed him off. I went on to explain the situation and that I was, in fact, just there to help with anything I could since that was, after all, my job. That, my friend indicated, was an identifying moment for him as far as I was concerned and we've been good friends ever since.

A quick survey of others I consider 'good' friends reveals a similar pattern. In all cases there seems to be some moment of conflict or tension or high emotion that breaks down the barrier between mere acquaintanceship and true, lasting friendship. Without this watershed moment, friendships seem to just fizzle and grow cold. There's only so much smalltalk and light-hearted banter you can exchange with a person before it becomes tedious. If you don't have some moment of revelation and openness to create truly open lines of communication then you eventually just run out of words. And really, that's OK. One can't possibly be 'best buds' with everyone.

This rambling brought to you by: insomnia. I think that has about done the trick though; I've just about put myself to sleep. Good Night Austin, Texas wherever you are!

Today's Decisions and Resolutions

While yesterday's post was all bright lights and sunshine, today finds me a bit more ambivalent. None of the facts have changed certainly but the balance of my optimism has shifted more in favor of the non-work aspects of life. I find more and more that the bits of myself that bother me, are in fact utterly irrelevant or totally unnoticed by others. I suspect the most annoying bit of me is probably the bit that worries and frets endlessly about absolutely nothing.

As always, it's hard to pin down the cause of any feeling but I think my personal paranoia may have something to do with simply having too much time on my hands for introspection. Every action and every word is analyzed and re-analyzed for how it could have been improved or how it might have caused offense. Situations are mentally played back in slow motion to distinguish friendship from disdain and mirth from mockery. At some point one has to stop gazing into the limpid pool of one's own soul, put aside the tapes and just go outside and play ball with the other kids. I need to push myself and my interests outside my own skin more often and in more obvious ways; the current plan to do this has a few key points:

• Ask more questions about people and when you get the answers write them down. I've heard this a million times from a million sources but never really taken it to heart. People love to know that you're listening to them. This is going to be one of the harder things to repair as I have a horrible memory and it's going to be a hell of a challenge trying to collect the vitals of everyone I know without making it obvious that I failed to remember the first time but as painful as this exercise will be it may help me to be more attentive in the future.
  
• Remember and celebrate important moments in people's lives. I have a friend from three workplaces ago who still remembers my birthday. Every year I get an email wishing me a happy day despite the fact that we see each other only two or three times a year. It's a small thing but it really makes me take notice. Women seem to do this sort of thing automatically but it's relatively rare among those of the male gender. I think it's a quality worth mimicking.
• Give gifts often and widely but only if they're truly meaningful. Case in point: my wife's friend had her second child in February so we got them this book. Then my wife had the idea to take sea creatures from the book, cut them out of plywood, paint them match and make a wooden growth chart. I hate to toot our own horns here but if I got a gift with that much thought and effort put into it I'd be pretty impressed. And thinking back on it making it was one of the most enjoyable projects I've ever done simply because it was a gift. That is not to say that I don't wonder from time to time what it's doing at 'right this minute'.
  
• Get the hell back to work. I have at least verbal approval from the wife to actually go into work a couple of days a week but I wonder how this will really turn out. She's managed to rule out every work day for the next 2 weeks on one technicality or another but hopefully that will improve after the holidays. Truth be told, I am starting to go just a smidge insane in this box all the time.
  

Well, there sits the plan. We shall see what twists fate throws in my way to aid or thwart its completion. The silly thing, of course, is that this all comes across as so fake and artificial. Why would you have to 'try' to appear to care about people? If you really care about them won't that be obvious? Sadly, apparently not. The stupid thing is that I find people utterly fascinating and would like to get to know everyone on the planet. But, because of some silly quirk of personality (and a decent dose of my own stupidity) I come across as someone "who clearly just has other things to do besides talk to me" as I've been told. Ironically, this is exactly the same incorrect perception I have of other people.

But anyway, if you should find yourself on the business end of one of these points, please do take it personally.

Mysteriously Great Day

I've found lately that sometimes the hardest thing to understand is oneself. Today was punctuated by brief periods of unexplained jubilance. Was it too much caffeine? Perhaps something in the air? It's impossible to know for sure but I have the usual theories.

Over the years I've noticed that I tend to move the opposite direction emotionally from those around me. Just when my wife is about to go berserk with the kids screaming all around her, I slip into a calm and entertaining mood and take the kids off to play a game of "You're too little to push me over!!" When she's absolutely in a rage and ready to tear my head off because of some stupid thing I've done, I move effortlessly into the role of ruthless logician and explain to her why she shouldn't really be mad in a calm measured voice (this REALLY does not help, by the way). Similarly, when people at work are at their lowest ebb of doubt and pessimism I tend to move the other direction. Today was such a day; multiple people in my virtual vicinity were obviously frustrated and perhaps that was enough to push me towards more effervescent side. Pity I was not in the office for any of it to flake off on anyone else. [Side note: This can actually be a fun game if you play your cards right. When I see an obviously sad person I do some of the craziest shit that I'd never THINK of doing under any normal circumstances. For the most part it's utterly beyond my control but obviously I can't realize you're doing it or it breaks the spell. No explanation really; some visceral part of me wants to cheer people up. *shrug*]

Alternatively, maybe today I was just smart enough to take my own advice from yesterday. I'm unusually far ahead in my work hours for the week so I started work late after picking up the house a bit, cleaning the toilets and wrapping a few Christmas presents. In a word, I was relaxed. No panic. No huge queue of mega-important tasks. No thoughts of "I have to put in X hours today or I'll have to work over tomorrow." Just calm, measured performance of my job. We tend to get so wound up over metrics and hours and performance that we stress ourselves into crappy performance. We freak out and screw up that causes us to get behind which causes us to stress out which causes us to freak out and screw up that causes... well, you get the idea. Take a deep breath once in a while. If all else fails, do those LaMaze breaths from the Cosby Show... you know the ones. You can't deny it.

Lastly, and perhaps related to the first theory, I feel needed. I'm not really sure WHY; nothing whatsoever has changed to indicate I'm any more necessary than I was before. Perhaps it's some unfounded optimism about our impending structural changes. If pressed, I'd say there's a 75% chance my job gets significantly better in the next 90-120 days. That's not to say that the transition will be at all pleasant but most of the scenarios to which I assign non-zero probabilities do turn out to be real, tangible improvements over the status quo. I'm not sure what better reason one could have for jubilance... well, perhaps if I had some way to substantiate my 75% estimate.

But whatever the real reason I just felt I got my parking on this planet happily and properly validated today. From random comments from the field of my acquaintance to my wife's breathless, "You know, you really are just the best husband ever!" this afternoon on the phone all the lights of my life were green today. Almost makes a person want to go to bed early to see how tomorrow's going to turn out.

Lessons Learned: 12/19/07b

As I sat here on the computer doing actual company work (for reasons that will be explained later) a few more dry and dusty ideas blew through my mind.

Thinking back about my comments on the 'enigma' person earlier it occurred to me that it might be a bad idea to broadcast my innermost thoughts to everyone on the planet. I mean seriously, someone could take my "Smells like the Holy Spirit" song idea and make a boatload of money. OK, more seriously, you could take someone's blog and use it to manipulate them. I don't mean in the sense of saying, "On 11/12/06 you said you hated the color pink and now you claim to LIKE the color pink. I think that makes you a LIAR, Mr Sullivan!" but in the more subtle sense that this thing is a very sensitive barometer of my attitudes about work and life and ... well, almost everything else. But then I think that it would be a stupid amount of effort to go to because I'm easily manipulable. You don't have to deviously trick me into doing much of anything; it's in my nature to just do what I think is in a person's best interest and generally that starts with servicing your direct requests. I don't know... clearly on one hand writing this much stuff down could be a REALLY bad idea. I could find out later that Publisher's Clearing House decided to skip my house because I made an off-color comment about Ed McMahon, for example.

Closely related to that is the idea that somebody's going to read themselves into something I write and get really cranked off about it. Some day my mother's going figure out how to get on the internet and read about the day Grandpa died and she's going to be completely fricking mortified. Now is that because I chose to do something to intentionally piss her off? No, of course not. My goal is to represent the truth as I see it before a couple of days pass and suddenly I can't remember it anymore. So if you see yourself echoed in these posts somewhere then take that as the compliment that it's intended to be. You were important enough to stick in my mind long enough for me to find my way back to the computer and interesting enough that I found it worthwhile to write about you. If you find yourself on here and you're not pleased by what you see then consider yourself incredibly, INCREDIBLY lucky. In today's world of half-truths and white lies it's impossible to get an accurate picture of how you really look to the outside world. I'd give anything to know the utterly candid truth about my own life, all the way from the people I accidentally cut off in traffic to the people who think I'm an ass because I don't come to their holiday parties.

Tonight between the hours of 9pm and about 11pm I did some work for one of our clients. Why, might you ask, did I do this at such an hour? Would not 9 in the morning have been just as effective? Why would I blow my entire evening doing work for a client? Well, I'll tell ya why in a simple concise nutshell: The customer was pleasant. Yup. That's it. When we met with them today, they had taken the time to review what we'd given them and they'd prepared their feedback and they delivered it to us politely and respectfully and there was no bickering about the sales process or dissension about what was wanted and what wasn't. They just told us in clear and distinct terms what they wanted and frankly that was such a refreshing circumstance that it was a joy to help them. Yeah, you heard me. Even though the work itself was utter tedium, work that a well-trained chimpanzee could have done it was still a happy experience because one had the keen sense that the customer would get it, be grateful and we'd all be happy. One tends, I think to forget about the importance of clear and achievable goals in work. It's all very well to say, "This department needs to bill $500,000 this month" but if that's as clear as the goals get then how do you achieve them? What do you put on your TODO list each morning to produce your share of $500,000? "Collect $10,000 in aluminum cans for recycling"?

Lessons Learned: 12/19/07

Alright well today was an amusing day to be certain. I went into the office, had lunch with one of my esteemed colleagues, talked to a mind-boggling friendly customer and then... well, who's to say what's next. In this short span I wound my mind around some wisdom.

OK, this first bit. Well, it's pretty damn obvious but it's probably the most important lesson I've learned in a REALLY long time. And the funny thing is that at the time of learning it I didn't really realize I was learning it. The whole thing can be summed up in one simple word. One word, five letters: relax. Yeah, I know... that's it though. It's not something I do well but I think it's the key to actually enjoying ANYTHING and you all know how important enjoyment is this to me this week. In the past I've tried to enjoy by planning... and fretting... and worrying... and making contingency plans... and carefully measuring each word I ever utter... That's all bullshit. You don't plan enjoyment. Enjoyment is sitting down and turning off exterior concerns and just letting things happen. Whether this is wandering in the woods enjoying nature or reading a book to a group of children in your best "Mama bear, papa bear, baby bear" voice the result of simply letting yourself simply be in the moment and go with the flow of what's going on around you is just simple, teary-eyed, euphoria. It's the difference between nervously worrying about what the other adults will think if you read "...and somebody's been sleeping in my bed and they're still there!" in falsetto in a crowded library... and just doing it with as much gusto as you can to impress your tiny audience. The words are the same but by relaxing and showing people who you are with sincerity and honestly you take what might be a mundane task and turn it into real enjoyment. If there's one unalterable directive I could brand across my being this would be it.

When I was in the office on Friday the atmosphere was almost festive. People were out and about chattering away with abandon. It reminded me of my first job out of college where we operated like one big party every day... Today when I went in the company had returned to its normal sepulchral state. I was only actually in the office for half an hour or so but the whole time I expected a half-decomposed corpse to amble around the corner at any moment and start eating people's brains. Perhaps the tension was internally created but the place had a strong aura of "leave me alone I'm friggin' workin' hea!" No doubt at least half of that is generated in my own psyche but it's hard to talk to anyone in a place where 20 cubicle occupants are working away in dead silence.

Lastly, an unnamed but high-ranking company official called me an 'enigma'. I can't help but laugh at that. Of all the people you know (if you're reading this) I have to be the LEAST enigmatic. For Lord's sake, I've published a detailed and intensely personal autobiography for any yahoo with a browser to read. This is the 207th blog entry I've posted about random crap in my life and it's not like my entries are about celebrigossip crap. You've got the innermost workings of my mind floating around on here. So if you want to, you can call me lots of things... but enigmatic... that's not one of them. I'm an open book.

Better Better Better Worse Worse Worse

After 10 hours abed we're feeling much better, thank you. Before the workday begins it seems I should put down some random thoughts for the day.

As proposals swirl around the company to reorganize the department in which I work I'm becoming increasingly interested to see how things will work out and in what perverse way I can get screwed over by it. My initial and unfounded optimism is starting to fade as I see the competing schemes.

The one proposal I know the most about I cannot make any reasonable objection to. It is the most inclusive of the four and seems to be the most compatible with my own. It stresses the need to dedicate a non-billable resource to maintaining our baseline products and at least hints at keeping our programmers from having to do many of the non-technical tasks they do today. If these two objectives are realized then I'll be happy (and a bit surprised).

The second proposal I've heard vague rumblings about scares me a bit. Its focus seems to be more concerned with realigning positions by their functions within the company. If this happens I'll be annoyed, perhaps terminally so. It will be an extreme disappointment if this theme leaks over into the others and our new product developers are moved into a department with schedule and other considerations totally unrelated to the part of the company they're supposed to be servicing.

The last person with a say is also the most influential and we've discussed strategic goals for the department for so long that I've long since lost a good sense for where his opinion ends and mine begins. We seem to agree on all the major points but differ only in the degree to which we're willing to do things. His view seems to be to blur the roles of positions in the department a bit more while I'm determined to let people focus on specific tasks. He's probably more closely aligned with reality but I'm determined that I'm more optimal.

So in summary, there actually isn't a whole lot of difference between any of the plans I've seen. Any one of them enacted as-is would be an improvement over what we have now. The pessimistic side of me though wonders how this can all come to naught. While I think it would be impossible to make things WORSE it's possible that the improvement will be so minor as to make it no longer worth the four years I've been waiting for things to change. It's also entirely possible that despite my somewhat selfish lobbying I could still get the short end of the stick and end up right where I am now. All this has pretty much rubbed the shiny optimism off my attitude at least for the moment.

Bored Bored Bored Sick Sick Sick

At the risk of being branded a valetudinarian I'm going to mention that I feel like crap. My stomach has been generally annoyed for at least four days. Nothing mega-violent but enough to make my head swim a bit and make life somewhat unpleasant from time to time. Let the record show that it is so.

In a similar vein I'm sitting here on my work computer and I'm bored bored bored. I heard through the grapevine that my company's CEO said that he expects people to be working a minimum of 50 hours a week. That's a bit of a surprise considering I've been logging exactly 40.00000 workweeks for a long time due to exceptional job-related ennui. I've even occasionally gone so far as to round down in places just to make a the point and keep from accidentally oozing over my self-imposed limit. Oops. I've been told, however, that change is in the air around the 'ole workplace so perhaps I'll have a whole new level of motivation here in the next... oh, 100 days or so.

I tried to live today in the spirit of the true sensualist but it was really hard. I was stuck home with a sick toddler who did something really rude to her diaper about once every 90 minutes. No doubt her stomach doesn't feel well either. This, I suppose, must be the evil drawback to living for the moment. Sometimes the moments suck and you're stuck with them. It was amusing talking to absolutely everyone I can think of about recent company events and realizing that we all seem to have the exact same opinion about what needs to change around here with the differences between schemes being merely a matter of degree. Now the fun begins and we get to see who wins (and who quits).

Just about out of words it seems.... Now the question is what does a person who lives merely for the pleasure of the moment do in the 20 minutes before he collapses, exhausted, into his bed? Old me would have crawled into bed to read "The Mysteries of Udolpho" because he'd read something about how the novel had influenced Jane Austen and he really wanted to know what made her tick. No more however! Now we live for pleasure and amusement! I think I'll go read "The Mysteries of Udolpho" because it sounds like a nice, creepy example of Gothic literature. *whoooo!!!!!* It's mind-boggling how quickly things can change!

Existential Quandary CXIXb

Before the workday officially begins, perhaps it would be a good time to finish defining this latest quandary.

Not so long ago I recall having a conversation like this one:

Co-Worker: "Why don't you do ?"
Me: "Why would I do that?"
Co-Worker: "Well, because it's fun! I did it and it was a blast!"
Me: "I don't really think that having fun is a valid reason for doing something. What's really accomplished after all?"

My version of reality stated simply that in order for something to be meaningful it had to accomplish something. If nothing else, the thing you're doing must improve you in some way so that you'll be better able to do some unspecified activity later.

The problem with this, of course, is that eventually you drop dead. Read all the books you want but eventually all that effort goes to waste unless you can put it to some practical use. The same goes for any activity no matter how relentlessly self-improving. My wife rails on about not being "the richest man in the graveyard" but the same idea can be applied to other forms of personal capital. There's similarly no point in being the "best read man in the graveyard" either unless that knowledge somehow leads you to a more lucrative or enjoyable profession.

So, six months ago I would have claimed that simply having fun was pointless but it seems clear now that perhaps having fun is really the ONLY point to anything. All the unpleasantness in life is suffered merely to enable us to have fun later. One studies in childhood to get a job later. One works today to earn money to have enjoyment and leisure later. Ultimately then, the highest purpose of life is to increase the enjoyment of ourselves and others. This, of course, can take a hundred different forms from doing your job in such a way that it helps others do theirs to simply complimenting a stranger in the grocery store because she chose your favorite color of nail polish. A million trivially easy acts can add to the sum total of human pleasure. As long as personal pleasure is not gained at the expense of others I'd judge that an act is inherently 'good'.

My primary complaint, if any is to be had, is that nobody bothered to tell me this secret of life before. Enough people have received the speech above that at least one must have been capable of revealing the obvious flaw in my logic. I've labored away under a self-delusion that cost me years of possible enjoyment. This is not to say, of course, that I plan from now on to lead a life of total dissipation but it tends to reorder one's priorities significantly.

Existential Quandary CXIX

After thirty five years of life I think that the events of Friday may have convinced me that I'm doing it all wrong.

See, for my entire life I've lived pretty abstemiously. I don't drink; I don't smoke; I don't eat to excess (well, not lately); I don't sleep around (hell, I turn an amusing color of crimson just talking to women even today) and I spend my free time doing things like brushing up on useless mathematical skills and reading novels that nobody else I've ever known bothers to read (at least when they had the choice to read anything else).

If you look back in the history of this blog you'll see all sorts of half-ass explanations for this pointless self-flagellation. I wanted to learn Latin, I argued, because I just enjoyed the learning process and Latin was handy. To read all the classics, I crooned, to know the human spirit and psyche in all its variety. Modern novels, I sagely noted, would be jumping off points for discussions with others who might have also read them.

Well, that's all a bunch of bullshit. Sure, learn Latin if you want to carry about a panoply of new words but be damned if anyone else is going to understand what the hell you're saying. And certainly, read the classic novels of yesteryear to get to know how people acted and felt 200 years ago; disregard the fact that you can get the same information from having a 10-minute conversation with any wino on the street. And let me tell you, I've had exactly 0 conversations spawned because of some modern novel I read.

No, as usual with most of the things I look back on this is a bunch of crap contrived to hide a key problem. See, by 'not fitting in' with others, by altering my realm of experience to exclude television and most other popular pastimes I justify my own cowardice towards other people. I don't have to approach anyone at work and have a non-work conversation, for example, because, well, they're obviously not interested in the same things as I am and so won't want to talk to me anyway. I subconsciously exclude myself from common human experience and then hide behind that difference because at heart I'm a chickenshit when it comes to people. What's even more amusing is that at the exact same time I woefully observe that I don't have enough contact with people and that I'm about to go insane because of it. So I simultaneously create and lament my own problem.

I propose that my great labor of self should be to strive in all things to act the true sensualist, to live by the creed that there is no greater good than the happiness of others and self. To do always that which feels right and best and yet still respects the feelings of others. For 35 years I have trodden the road of the frightened child, trying desperately to take up as little space in the lives of others as possible, always following my father's oft-repeated motto of childhood: "Children are to be seen and not heard." At 35, I may qualify as no longer a child, I think and perhaps it is time for me to be heard.

Mansfield Park - Jane Austen

After spending several months roaming around in modern literature the last two weeks back in the classics have seemed by comparison exceptionally laborious. As my wife, who is reading the same novel, will point out to you, reading Austen is more work than pleasure at times. It is not so much that she uses words unfamiliar to us or that the situations she paints are beyond our immediate experience. Truly, the themes of Austen's novels are as familiar as any made-for-TV movie. Instead it is her language which can tend to wear one out. Austen crafts sentences that are so winding and twisting at times that one imagines taking them from the book and wrapping them several times around the Christmas tree. Anyone who has read Austen with care even once should be credited for having passed eyes over the words at least twice in repeated answer to the question, "What did she just say exactly?"

Prolixity aside, Austen's descriptions of the inner workings of the human mind and its motivations are enthralling. Austen gives an almost Dickensian level of attention to her characters and at the end of Mansfield Park one feels like one knows Fanny Price like a sister. Among all of Austen's characters I find Fanny the most personally relatable. Her simultaneous self-doubt and self-assurance are hallmarks of the human experience and I can see myself in exactly her position. It is with regret that I found in the literary criticism the consistent theme that Fanny is a character to be disliked. Her virtue is seen as a pall over the actions of the other characters. Her adherence to social norms is an impediment to the enjoyment of those around her. How sad it is to find that the face in the mirror is not the same seen by society.

In summary, I consider MP one of Austen's finest while the majority of commentators seem to agree on exactly the opposite. Austen's other novels paint life in a sort of blissful haze while MP is frankly and honestly realistic about all the foibles of humanity. Of course in characteristic style her final chapter wraps everything tidily up in happiness for all concerned but the reader must forgive those 10 pages out of 320 which serve to give her readers of the time (and today) what they expect for their heroine.

Existential Quandary CXVIII

Yes indeed.... we find ourselves back here again. Wondering what the hell the point of anything is. Here's what we know so far:

Work:
Simply put, as of late work has become simply laughable. Luckily, I'm detached enough from the situation that 40.00 hours under one chain of command is largely the same as another. I regret only that not everyone in the situation has that luxury.

Family:
I'm not sure what caused it but my wife and I are, to be utterly honest, as happy as I can imagine being. For some unknown reason over the past six months we have appreciated each other like never before. The little ones in the house are giddy as never before. I'm not sure what I could improve on though perhaps if Isabella would learn to put her books back on the shelf.

Other:
The other bits of me are pretty much as usual. I have a wealth of intellectual and physical energy and nowhere to put it. I've tried to insinuate myself into a project or two without success and I'm certainly not going to waste more than 40.00 hours a week on work so that leaves me at a loose end. I've had a few random, crappy ideas for tying up some of these loose ends though.

As usual I think I need to put all this reading to some purpose. As I was perusing Wikipedia I realized that a decent percentage of the books I've read lately don't even HAVE Wikipedia entries. Looking at the larger web nobody has bothered to do much of anything with them and if I bothered then that would be a marginally useful and unique contribution to the web at large. It would also give me an excuse to look up all manner of obscure random tidbits and put them down in text. My only question in that vein would be whether to bother doing this in Wikipedia or starting a website of my own. Wikipedia's formatting overhead seems to be nontrivial.

I have pretty completely decided that Geocaching is stupid and that it's high time I got back to woodworking. My "Honey Do" list is a mile long and filled with unique and interesting challenges. The fact is that I've ignored it in favor of chasing after waterproof containers for much too long. Still valid as a bit of exercise but not really a proper and productive hobby.

Lastly, there's always that thing that hangs over my head like a 16-ton weight. I still feel this silly need to learn another language. For what purpose? None at all of course. Same as any of these other projects.

Clearly, I think this all boils down to just having too much time on my hands. Yet another example of the wasted leisure of the American middle class. This would be so much easier if I just watched more TV. I wonder if Burns and Allen is still on...

Random Babbling for 11/12/07

A few notes of no particular interest in no particular order.

After reading my blog entry from last night my wife has given me a two-week deadline to get the hell out of the house and get a friend. My objection that you don't cure a 35-year problem in 2 weeks seemed to carry no weight with her. She has threatened the somewhat inane consequence that if I don't meet her demands she's going to sign me up for a random class at IUPUI. History 436 "The role of the meat packer's union in the life of the 1930's American housewife" here I come.

I do, however, have a plan to counteract her threat. For the next month I intend to practically ooze friendliness. If I so much as get a pizza coupon in the mail I'll swoop down on the sender and shower then with my presence and woe to the checkout girl who dares make the token gesture of greeting. I may seem as much fun as a burlap sack full of drowned kittens but just wait until I've been in Gregarious mode for a few days. It'll be friggin' scary. Further, I'm going to pick a few random victims from my acquaintance and run a some experiments. It'll be damned fun I think. For the next month, my eye is on you, America!

I've noticed lately that I'm in a bit of a funk. (Have you noticed? Surely you haven't.) I realized part of the problem as my wife and I sat at dinner and a Beatles' song came over the 'slightly louder than it really needs to be' sound system in the restaurant. As I was singing "Somewhere in her smile she knows..." loud enough to be heard 3 tables away it occurred to me that it had been a LONG time since I'd listened to any music... at all. I tend to swamp myself with background noise in the form of television or talk radio all day long and have forgotten that eventually that will drive a person insane. Tomorrow we burn/find some CDs and we party like it's 1699.

I wonder how long it'll take me to give up on the first random thought. My bet is on less than 24 hours.

No Basis for Complaint

I've been keeping an eye on myself lately. Having written in this blog before about my relationships with others (or lack thereof) it's surprising that I haven't really looked at my own actions with a critical eye. Frankly, after having given myself a good inspection, it seems probable that I'm a jerk and a whiner. That said, I'm seriously annoyed that nobody has bothered to tell me so yet. Yeah, I know that just saying that is in itself being a whiner but let's carry on and look at some of the available evidence.

We'll start with Friday because that's as far back as I can remember. Friday was my 35th birthday and as such I received 4 'go to lunch' invitations all of which I turned down for various and silly reasons. One, amazingly was from an almost total stranger. While out geocaching another (female) geocacher showed up. After poking around in the weeds and swapping medium-sized talk for half an hour we finally found what we were looking for. She'd stated previously that she was meeting a friend for lunch and as we were saying our adieus she invited me to join them for lunch. Unsure whether she was just being polite or whether she was serious about her invitation I simply dodged it in a very awkward manner. Fifteen minutes later as I was sitting in the Qdoba parking lot eating a burrito in the car by myself the words, "What the hell is wrong with you?" floated through my mind. Fate had tried like hell to make my day a pleasant one by giving me some company and I'd done everything in my power to thwart it. I'd turned down 3 invitations and when the 4th arrived from out of the blue from a TOTAL STRANGER I'd even turned that down. And for what? So I could sit in the car and eat by myself? WTF?

Later, I realized that the 'lunch with stranger' debacle was actually a double death. I'd been internally complaining for a while that my available pool of 'geocaching partners' was basically empty and then, like magic, this person shows up and what do I do? Well of course, I'm rude to her (though unintentionally). Here, as before, fate threw me an option and I stepped on it for no reason. In retrospect I'm sure this is not the first such opportunity I've had to make a pleasant connection with another person outside of work but it seems I've consistently managed to bungle them.

Sadly, my family relationships reside in a similar vein but primarily due to neglect on my part. My in-laws, despite that the fact that we actually have quite a bit in common, no doubt believe I dislike them. Quite the contrary, I enjoy them immensely but consistently fail to make time for them. Similarly, I don't make an effort to see my father and step-mother as I should. My mother, of course, has asked to be left alone so she doesn't occupy space on the Christmas card list but that's no excuse for ignoring the people who would welcome my attention. All that said, we're still on good terms but there's certainly room for improvement.

The last set of people to be addressed are those from work and since they are by nature 'remote' it's hard to establish any real relationships beyond those that can be carried on via instant messenger. As of late even those people I used to know in person have started to vanish. One person I used to talk to on a fairly regular basis has refused to answer my correspondence for almost a year. Others have merely faded away never to be recovered even when I make attempts to reach out.

In summary and to restate the title, all this leaves me with no basis for complaint about my relationships with others. While it is true that I have few friends and exactly zero that I can actually do anything with, that's entirely my fault. Fate has thrown me into the path of quite a few nice people with whom I share common interests and done her best to foster bonds with them but in the end it's my job to actually make those friendships happen. The tougher question, of course, is "What am I doing wrong?" In the case of last Friday's encounter with a stranger it's apparently just sheer social backwardness. One can do little about that without practice. I tend to hide my social discomfort behind a veil of humor and it's hard to build a friendship with a clown who can take nothing seriously.

For most other people in my sphere of acquaintance I think the problem may lie in simple lack of effort. I'm more than willing to blog endlessly about my lack of personal connections but I fail to make the investments necessary to foster those bonds. That's no one's fault by my own. Last and probably least among the problems is my tendency to say (once I'm comfortable with you) whatever's on my mind. If I have any talent whatsoever it's for absolute candor. If you tell me that your deeply held belief system is based on something you heard while playing a Paul McCartney album backwards at 78 RPM then it's unlikely that I'll be able to keep the look of surprise from my face or avoid questioning you closely about it. To me, the greatest possible service you can do another person is to question their belief systems and that's often uncomfortable at first. People hate to be uncomfortable and perhaps in some cases I have that effect.