Dirty Words

Someone is writing the Dirty word on our appliance. What's going on? I can't imagine anyone in our family doing it. How weird is that? I don't think the new dishwasher came that way. I'd remember. It's totally inappropriate. Dirty words are foreign to our family. We try to use better vocabulary. Yet there is was.

But it's true. I opened our dishwasher and discovered the Dirty word written inside. So far I haven't discovered it on the inside of any of our other appliances, just the dishwasher. I haven't a clue who did it. Whoever it is they are not using permanent markers because it comes off in the next wash. Then it's stainless steel glistening clean again. But then, as if at night, the Dirty word appears again and the cycle starts anew.

I've put the locks in the back door so no one can be coming in through that door. I'm going to get one of these Digital Alarm Clock-radio Spy Hidden Color Cameraand try to figure out who's doing this.

...dave
“I learned long ago, never to wrestle with a pig, you get dirty; and besides, the pig likes it.” - George Bernard Shaw

A Glass Mug

I bought a new glass mug for my coffee. It's fantastic because it keeps the liquid hot. It's thermal. I bought a set of two so I also keep one at home for beer. I bought them from
Peets Coffee & Tea.

I like everything about these glasses. I can microwave them and stick them in the dishwasher. No problem. The lip is thick so the coffee aerates as I sip it across the mug edge. The coffee tastes better.

But there is another reason I like to use these glasses for coffee and beer. They don't sweat! Now I don't have to search around the house looking for a coaster. I can set them anywhere, including the wood tables. They will never leave a ring.

Peet's actually makes a smaller 2 oz espresso glass but I like the large 12 oz size.

People often do a double take when they see this cup at work. They've never seen a coffee mug like this one. It's all the rage.

I'm giving autographs.

...dave
Good communication is as stimulating as black coffee and just as hard to sleep after. -Anne Morrow Lindbergh

I work in a snow globe

I swear, I work in a snow globe. There's always a blizzard blowing. And no sooner it settles down, someone comes along and shakes it up again. I feel like the little man on the snow plow. I get up, brush myself off, and plow new paths in the snow. That's the way it is in the Enterprise.

Every month it seems there is a reorganization. Every week we get a new VP. Every day there is some new process to follow. Just about the time I figure out who I should partner with for the projects I work on it changes. Someone keeps shifting the organization boxes on me. I'm a fairly flexible guy but this is driving me crazy. Stop shaking stuff up.

I think they believe that no one lives in my snow globe. Most people find it hard to believe that anyone lives in a snow glob. When's the last time you looked carefully inside a glob, at the little homes in there? Did you ever stop to think that someone might be living in one of those houses? I thought not. But someone does. I do.

There is so much turnover in the Enterprise that few people know how our systems work anymore. Things break, it takes an army to fix and twice as long to understand it. The cost is double. An organization chart doesn't exist, nor can it because it changes so frequently. Who I report to today may not be who does my review tomorrow.

Every time they shake up the organization everything goes topsy-turvy. There's a blizzard all around, houses tumble and I lay disabled on my back waiting for the snow to settle. But I just run the snow plow. When the snow settles and the houses right themselves, I jump back on my plow and start making new partnership paths in the snow. I start a new network of people.

But I do wish someone would stop shaking up my world.

...dave
Technology does not run an enterprise, relationships do. - Patricia Fripp

What's the point of the blog?

I don't know. Who knows why anyone writes? To tell a story, true or false. To entertain? To convey knowledge, information, or wisdom? Any or all of these reasons are good enough I'd imagine. One friend asked me if I was still blogging. Sure I said. "But Why?" she persisted. And I really couldn't give her a valid reason.

I'm not especially wise so THAT can't be the reason. I'm not especially knowledgeable so I don't really have much to convey to others so THAT can't be the reason. I'm not especially funny, so entertainment is not part of the equation. Why then? I simply don't know. Why do people draw, paint or create poetry? I guess because we like to create. I think I'm creating a story when I write. It's like breathing to me. It's very uncomfortable to hold my breath for any length of time. I need to breathe. Writing is breathing.

But then, why the public blog? Why not write privately? I do. But it's still not enough for me to just write privately. I feel like this is a good place for a voice. I mostly write for my friends.

I used to write newsletters and send them out by snail mail. That was fun. Once we went on a camping trip and I wrote up a single page of little stores with drawings about our adventures. Stuff like: frogs in sleeping bags, spearing fish, campfires and marshmallows. There's is nothing like a campfire after a swim at the beach. It was a good time. So I wrote about it in a newspaper style, main point at the top with details down below. In Journalese it's called the Inverted Pyramid Writing Style. It uses the first paragraph to give the story in a nutshell. The reader can just scan the first paragraphs under any subhead and get essence. If they are interested, they can read on. Often the general details are at the bottom. This also gives the newspaper company the option of cutting the last paragraphs or sentences if they need room on the page. Since the main points are at the top, it doesn't really affect the story.

Here's an example:

The family was seen roasting marshmallows around the campfire just after a swim in Kailua Bay. Eric dropped his into the flames thereby causing a great outcry. It had been perfectly crisped to a golden brown just before sliding into the heat. He was able to obtain another from the large 32 oz bag. Marshmallows come in 32 oz. bags at the nearby grocery store. Smaller marshmallows are available in smaller bags often called mini-marshmallows. However, these are two small to mount on coat hanger wires for campfire roasting.

So in the story above the real excitement was in the first two sentences. I know it was a gripping story for you. The last few sentences could have been eliminated altogether and not affected the exciting story.

So where was I? Oh yeah, the newsletter.

The trouble with the newsletter is that it costs a postage stamp for each mailing. I have about 40 regular readers of the blog. Let's see, at 39 cents each that would be $19.11 every mailing! Not to mention the big hits I got on the story about the Moleskine tabs. In one day I received 450 hits. That would have cost $178.62 to send out a mailing to all interested in the story. The Internet is free. I can blog for free. You gota love the Internet. It ain't all rosy, but it's got some redeeming features.

And so I write on. All about nothing.
...dave
After all this is over, all that will really have mattered is how we treated each other. -Ziggy

Morning Faces

Morning Faces

I think morning faces are most important. Even though I may be half asleep when I get up, the faces I see the first thing in the morning are memorable.

For me, I see no faces until I walk into the Enterprise. The first morning face I see is the Security Guard. He's an old codger, balding on top and gray at the temples. He stands at the Security Entry Desk. I can see him from halfway down the hall. I smile and wave but he really doesn't respond. Maybe he's near-sighted? I don't know.

As I approach the cattle gates, he looks my way but still will not say anything. I'll swipe my security card across the cattle gate. That's what I call them because at key times of the day people go through single file in or out the narrow isles.

Anyway, I see the guard halfway down the isle and I say "hello" but he doesn't respond until I pass through the gate. The gate makes a bing noise and the light glows green. I'm through. Then he'll say "Good Morning." It's almost like he's somehow attached to the green light that gives me the go. Maybe somehow he's tethered to the gate's green light? Maybe he's not real. He may just be a manican. Come to think of it, I've never seen him actually move from behind the desk. He reminds me of one of those animatronics I've seen at a Disney theme park. He just smiles and waves and pivots at the waste as I pass. I really think there's a direct connection. He kind of lights up, like the gate, when I come through.

Then there is the guy that wands my cafeteria card. The Enterprise instituted a "cash-less" cafeteria. You receive a card with a chip on it. You charge up the chip from special machines in the lobby with bills you feed into a machine. As you purchase food in the cafeteria the special registers read your card and deduct the amount. Jimmy, the guy that's usually there in the morning when I come in, takes my card, stuffs it into the slot, pounds at the flat screen software buttons and returns my card. He resembles a robot. His movements are stiff, jerky, and metallic-like. He never smiles or says "hello." He just processes your transaction. It's so odd because I see him each and every day, each and every morning, but I can't seem to get him to smile or say anything out of his programmed announcement of the amount remaining on my card. It's my special challenge to get him to step out of character, to hack into his firmware and get him to do something he wasn't programmed for.

And then there's another co-worker or two that come over in the morning to ask what's new on the house or how was my weekend. Those are the morning faces I see each day.

I wonder what morning faces others see? Mine are kind of mechanical. I wonder if others have more human contacts in the morning?

...dave

Housework

Finished the dining room. It feels good to get a room completed.

TODO:

Liights, fans, doors, closets

...dave
A bartender is just a pharmacist with a limited inventory. - Stephen Wright

Open wide

I sometimes sketch over my sketches. I do "blind contours" made popular by the book The New Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain. You don't look at the sketch while you draw, you just focus on the thing you are drawing. What often happens is a very close resemblance, if a little lopsided. Still you'd be surprised.

This sketch was a composite of two sketches. I drew Ruth first, then the french fries. I ran out of room with the fries but continued anyway which resulted in it looking like she was eating all my fries (which she does).

Great fun this sketching stuff.

...dave
“Life is the art of drawing without an eraser.” - John W. Gardner

Stuff to do

My recent journal entries have just stuff I have to do. I'm telling you, if I don't get the house done and move Ruth from the basement, she'll put me in the basement and it'll be where I LIVE.

So I make lists, lots of lists. I analyze what I have to do and how to do it. Like this sketch of what I had to do to our bedroom floor. Rip up the 3/4 inch sub-floor, plane the joists, and screw it back down. Putting in the wood flooring was a cake walk. It's all the prep work that kills me.

And my back. This is hard work, bending over, nailing and beating in the boards. Tough stuff for the office worker. Would I do it again? Yeah, 'cause I'm saving big bucks. I figure I'm saving about $4,500 in just the labor of putting the floor in. All the prep work would be extra of course.

Although I'm making great progress (the floor is really complete) my journal still has lots of lists of TODOs. And I haven't even started on the outside!

I'm looking forward to completing the office so that I can move my books into it. There I can just look at the outside and dream of what must be done.

...dave
"A home without books is a body without soul." -Marcus Tullius Cicero