Babble On

Fall Susurrus

2011-10-27T06:38:00.001-04:00

It's a very mundane task that sends me outside before the sun comes up, but the cats must be cleaned up after. I am facing south as I come off the porch. To my left, I can see the barest hint of dawn. Above me and to my right, the black of night remains, as do the stars.

To my left, just past the two fences that mark the end of my yard, there is an interstate highway. To my right, as well as in front of me and behind, are the homes and yards of my neighbors, and the street I live on. Above me, Orion the Hunter, Betelgeuse and Rigel on opposite corners.

To my left, the noise of man and his machines. To my right, the calls of birds and the hums and clicks of insects. Above me, silence, at least until the next plane takes off from the airport 10 miles away.

The early morning air has both the nip of colder air and softness of sun-warmed afternoon. It's a feeling that says Autumn.This moment has more to say. Summer has been here, winter is coming, but now we are poised...

And isn't that much of life, poised? For a choice, for an action? Transcendence, perhaps? It's a rather beautiful thought.

In the meantime, I have cat waste to dispose of, and cat food to give them that will be turned to waste in its turn. I have coffee to make, a wife to wake, a job to go to, and a memory of a poised moment to treasure.

The Help

2011-08-28T22:06:00.001-04:00

There are movies that entertain you, there are movies that move you, and there are movies that make you think. The Help is that rare movie that does all three.

Here are the bare bones of the story: It's 1963 in Jackson, Mississippi. Eugenia "Skeeter" Phelan has recently graduated from Ole Miss, she wants to become a journalist/writer, and she would like to work for a publishing house in New York. She finds her vehicle to do so in interviewing the African-American maids of Jackson, getting them to tell her their true stories of what their lives are like. Such candor can easily lead to broken lives.

This was the tail-end of the Jim Crow era in the American South, the last gasp of legal, institutionalized racial segregation. It was the atmosphere I was born into. I once, in my teens, met an elderly black woman who told me that she babysat my father when he was a young boy. She then proceeded to tell me that she'd call him Huston in private but Mr. White in public, because she "knew her place."

That story lead in the movie, and I assume in the original novel, to the publication, credited to "Anonymous", of a book entitled The Help. How very meta.

I took away a few concrete notions from the movie: 1) Courage is defiant. 2) We come to know each other only through sharing our true stories, and truth is the most necessary story of all. 3) Love is subversive.

I'm ashamed that I don't remember my father's babysitter's name, but I hope she'd find that the truth and subversion in The Help would make "her place" a bit wider.

Earthquakes? Hurricanes? Eh, Let's Watch A Video!

2011-08-26T20:44:00.001-04:00

Via Sports Illustrated's 8/24 Hot Clicks page.

My World Shook Today

2011-08-23T23:28:00.003-04:00

Twice, in fact.

At 1:51 pm, the shaking was quite literal:

I once toured a century old Cone Mills fabric plant. The heart of the factory was the huge room that held around 100 automated looms, all sitting on the second floor of the building. That floor was made of solid oak beams, and when all the looms ran, the floor vibrated, so loudly that I could not think.

My desk started vibrating like that at 1:51; in fact, the entire building thrummed, a deep bass rumble, like it was on top of a huge diesel engine. This only lasted a few seconds, but the questions -- Did you feel that? Was that an earthquake? -- lasted significantly longer.

This is my daughter Gigi. Today, she joined a proud and profound tradition in our family, second generation on her mother's side, third generation on mine. She became a teacher.

Gigi, it's been a hard wait these past 15 months, trying to find that first job in your degree field. You didn't give in to the despair I know you had to sometimes feel; it's frustrating and beyond frustrating to train yourself for four years, to know without doubt that you can do the job, if only someone will take a chance on you.

That is not only admirable, it is the root of all human success. You've kept the faith with yourself; now, you get to pass it on.

I am quite proud of you.

Mountain Man

2011-08-22T21:50:00.003-04:00

Fifty-one years ago, Herman James, a North Carolina mountain man, was drafted by the Army. On his first day in basic training, the Army issued him a comb. That afternoon the Army barber sheared off all his hair. On his second day, the Army issued Herman a toothbrush. That afternoon the Army dentist yanked seven of his teeth. On the third day, the Army issued him a jock strap. The Army has been looking for Herman for 51 years.

Happy Fourth of July

2011-07-04T21:06:00.001-04:00

It's been a busy day at the White manor. First thing, there was reading that simply had to be done, and then it was time to mow the back ~~pasture~~ yard. I have an electric mower that runs not off a battery but a long heavy-duty extension cord, which has to be yanked out of the path I'm mowing repeatedly. And that, of course, makes the mowing take longer than being untethered would.

It's cheaper than gas.

Lisa and I put together a couple of new patio chairs we got from Big Lots. The instructions were detailed and complete, but several of the bolt holes didn't seem so well aligned. Once the "some assembly required" was finished, we did have some very comfortable chairs. Two down, two to go, plus a table.

It doesn't really seem like lot, but it's been a day well spent. We going to watch the High Point fireworks in a little bit, from our upstairs. Should be very good seats.

So, to my fellow Americans, here's to the 235th anniversary of the world's oldest political and social revolution. Long may Old Glory wave!

A Milestone, with Melancholy

2011-07-01T09:47:00.002-04:00

My ex-wife Suzanne and I separated on September 7, 1996. It was a Saturday. I remember the date and day vividly, because it was the day after our son Andy's sixth birthday, and it was the day after the end of the work week. A friend was not able to come from Raleigh to help me move into my new apartment because he was cleaning up damage from hurricane Fran, which had passed through the Thursday before. I ended up getting help from Suzanne's partner Ellen.

Almost fifteen years have passed. My youngest son David turns 18 in 32 days. That marks the end of my obligation to pay my ex-wife child support. I sent her the July payment this morning, and I included the pro-rated August amount.

Fifteen years. It's been a long journey through grief at a failed marriage to anger at being alone to white-hot and long-lasting rage at her for taking the children 800 miles away to build her career (and at myself for not formalizing my legal protections) to joy at finding and loving Lisa to forgiving the deep old wounds.

Seven years of monthly checks and seeing the kids twice a week, then eight years of monthly Paypal transactions and seeing the kids two or three times each year.

There's no great lesson or revelation here, just the sense of realizing how much has been missed. And a few other things -- the realizations that I still know and love my children, as they do me; that my home is soon to be my daughter's again, as she moves back to North Carolina at the end of this month; that I am fortunate to have remained in the same workplace since 1998, as the economy cycles up and down; that I have my wife and my parents and my health.

It's enough.

Old News, Part One

2011-05-25T23:20:00.001-04:00

Lisa and I have been to Harrisonburg twice this year. The first time was January 8th, for the Shifflett holiday gathering. We used to do this on Christmas Eve, but it's gotten too difficult to get people together from four states and have the celebration the occasion demands. So, we aim for the weekend closest to Christmas. This past holiday season, Christmas and New Year's Day were on Saturdays, so we opted for the following Saturday.

We spent the 3.5 hour drive listening to a book on CD, something suspenseful, probably one of the Ludlums Meki gave Lisa for her birthday. Between that, one serious snowfall just south of Roanoke, and a snow-covered Shenandoah Valley that just begged for Lisa to break out the camera, we never cut on the radio.

Once we got to Harrisonburg, we were busy with last minute preparations for the party. And once the family got in, we were happily engaged in catching up on the last year, eating, and exchanging presents. And after that, once the cleaning up was done, we all collapsed.

Meki likes to take in Headline News first thing in the morning, which always means a bit before daylight when we're there. Actually, I think it means the same thing when we're not there, just not as early as during her Queen of Trash days.

On January 9th, we learned about the Tucson shootings the day before. You've likely heard the hullabaloo. Jared Lee Loughner and his Glock 9mm pistol. Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords wounded while holding one of her "Congress on your Corner" events.

Federal judge John Roll visiting his friend Giffords; congressional aide Gabriel Zimmerman; Dorothy J. Morris, Phyllis C. Schneck, and Dorwan C. Stoddard all attending the event; they died.

As did 9 year old Christina Green, who was born on September 11, 2001, recently elected to her school's student council and was at the event to learn more about how our government works.

Before the next week was out, the political scavengers were circling. Now, for the record, I do not believe that the ads Sarah Palin ran in the past that had Gaby Giffords name targeted with the crosshairs of a rifle scope were the reason Loughner attacked. Neither do I believe Ms. Palin's rhetoric that this was an isolated event completely uninfluenced by the nasty partisan politics of the last few years.

Scratch the surface of any decently competent historian, professional or amateur -- I'm very much an amateur in this arena -- and you're going to find a centrist. We know that history is messy, and that the simplistic cause-and-effect explanations that those on the political extremes love are never sufficient to explain what really happened.

That said, shame on those who tried to exploit this tragedy for their own ends. Shame on them; they worked to diminish us all.

Gabrielle Giffords' survival and recovery after being shot in the head seems miraculous. I sincerely hope so.

As I write this, I've heard the news that Jared Lee Loughner has been declared incompetent to stand trial, being able to neither assist in his own defense nor to comprehend the charges against him. He will be further evaluated to see if he becomes competent to stand trial. I do not know, being neither a mental health nor legal professional, what is involved in this process.

I do know this. Loughner was competent to choose to go to Congresswoman Giffords' event, carry a handgun, select targets, and pull the trigger. There is no doubt that he was the perpetrator. If there is to be any justice here, Loughner should never walk the streets a free man again. Never. Never.

Congratulations Sandy and Brian!

2011-05-21T16:34:00.001-04:00

Today, my friend and coworker Sandy Chase becomes Sandy Chase-Wassinger. In fact, unless I have miscalculated (always a possibility), she and her Brian are now married. Congratulations, guys, and may you have as much happiness together as Lisa and I have.

Overheard In Post-Operative Recovery

2011-03-20T19:31:00.001-04:00

I'm not going to tell you who said this after having surgery, nor am I going to tell you who overheard it. It's important to respect their privacy, but this is too good not to share:

Oops. What?! My head fell off!

This Is The Face Of Inspiration

2011-03-20T07:50:00.003-04:00

Meet Anthony Robles, one of the 2011 NCAA wrestling champions:

I had a lot of butterflies going out there. This year I think that was the biggest difference in my wrestling, was my mental game. Going into every match I was real relaxed, real calm. But before that, before this match, it was nothing but butterflies. I felt like I was going throw up, I was so scared I almost started crying. But it's just the atmosphere. It's the true athletes that are able to just overcome that.

He also said he's likely done as a competitive wrestler but would like to remain involved with the sport.

The original story is here.

A Weekend To Savor

2011-03-13T23:34:00.001-04:00

This has been a singularly enjoyable weekend. It didn't have the usual start for one of my weekends; I worked late Friday evening. This was the culmination of a week's worth of intensive co-ordination of the efforts of several IT groups in the US and Europe in fixing a major application outage. We got the installation of a home grown message queuing system -- think of it as active email, passing messages in a store-and-forward manner between two programs, instead of two people -- up and running, which let my application send supplier evaluation data to a global purchasing app.

It really is cool when efforts pay off that way.

For the rest of Friday evening and early Saturday morning, Lisa and I were straightening the house. Mom and Dad came for a visit on Saturday. They brought us one of the bird houses Dad modeled after the house he grew up in, and a free-standing full length mirror they don't have room for any more. We spent a good while just chatting, catching up on what's going on in our daily lives; then, we took them to Carter Brothers BBQ for lunch. We went back to the house for a bit more conversation and ended up watching the last half of Sweet Home Alabama on Starz. I had forgotten how cute a movie that is, but not how appealing Reese Witherspoon is. By then, Dad and Mom had to head on back home, and we scooted over to Greensboro to attend a Relay For Life fund raiser at Carvel Ice Cream. Such torture.

This morning, we slept in and got to spend time just reading. I watched the championship of the ACC tournament between my UNC Tar Heels and the Duke Blue Devils. Carolina came out very flat. In between Duke's big men dominating to start the game and the Heels having no movement away from the ball on offense, it's no wonder Duke opened by scoring the eight points of the game, leading at the half by 14, if I recall correctly. The Heels finally came to life with about 10 minutes left in the game, which was how they played their first two games of the tournament, but they never got any closer than 8 points. Today, the Blue Devils were simply the better team. Despite the Heels losing today, I've enjoyed college basketball more the last 10 days than I have in the last couple of years.

After the game, I spent a while doing some research on a new utility I'm going to be using at work over the next couple of months in conjunction with some database upgrades. We still use a fair number of SQL Server 2000 databases, and Microsoft is ending support soon. So, we're upgrading to SQL Server 2005. The SQL Server batch utility has changed significantly between the two releases -- it's the difference between Visual Basic 6 and Visual Basic.Net -- and I get to do the application upgrades.

I read a couple of tutorials on the new (well, newer) version, called SQL Server Integration Services, and I actually created my first executable package. This is going to make the database upgrade project go much more smoothly. Just before I finished my SSIS project for the evening, I heard some familiar music from the living room. Lisa had found Up on one of the movie channels, and so I hustled to finish up my work to catch as much as I could of one of my favorite movies.

It's added up to a pretty sweet couple of days.

A Test

2011-02-19T08:16:00.005-05:00

If you'd like to find out whether you really understand American culture, here's a suggestion. Take an Asian work colleague who is in the United States for the first time to a Wal-Mart in a town you don't really know. If you navigate the colleague's shopping list correctly, you're a winner!

Shippensburg Sunset

2011-02-18T15:00:00.004-05:00

I'm in Shippensburg, Pennsylvania, in the middle of a two week training assignment. One of the companies under the same corporate umbrella as the IT company I work for has a manufacturing facility here. The manufacturing company had a bill of material and engineering change notice application developed by a third party several years ago, and now that they have decided to "bring it in house", I get to take over primary support and maintenance.

I got here last Sunday, in time to wander around town, find the plant, and have a nice late lunch at the Before And After Café ("...for before and after whatever you're doing...", as the menu put it). I spent the rest of the afternoon lazing around my hotel room. Once I got hungry for dinner, I decided to check with the front desk on what would be a good place to eat on a Sunday evening. I wasn't surprised, this being a town of 7500, when I was told that most places were closed and that my best bet was to head the 15 miles down Interstate 81 to Chambersburg.

It was overcast when I left the hotel, and I simply forgot to grab the camera, which is something I'm always going to regret. Since there is no picture of this, I hope my words do the scene some small justice: As I headed south on the blacktop, the quiet, sleepy fields to my right were covered with a thin blanket of snow. The sun slipped under the dark clouds toward the western horizon, and its red light transformed the closest ones, so that they were not on fire, they were fire. The ones dead in front of me and just to my left became glowing embers, while the ones to the east were gray ash.

As the song says, it's only for a moment, then the moment's gone. But the memory...the memory endures.

It's A Thriller...No, It's A Commercial...No...

2011-01-21T17:58:00.004-05:00

This is almost as clever as the disassembled Honda Accord from several years ago. Enjoy!

My New Year's Goals

2011-01-17T20:25:00.005-05:00

Resolution - A solution. A firmness of purpose. A wrapping up. In other words, an ending.

It's easy to make resolutions and very difficult to keep them. Not everyone has the iron will and determination to say, "There is something in my life that I don't like, and I'm going to completely change it, right now," then follow through on it. I admire those who can, like my father.

In a rare point of fact, I have kept the last New Year's Resolution I made, several years ago. I decided I wouldn't make any more New Year's Resolutions. Things have been just a little bit simpler for me ever since.

I am setting a few goals for 2011. I am going to first give myself a tool to help me measure how I'm doing. I believe this could lead to some big improvements I've been wanting to make. So, without further ado:

Begin each day with a short task list to get done today, and check each one off as I complete it.

Move more and eat less. Keep a record; if it isn't written down, it didn't happen.

Try to write daily.

I have a cell phone and people with whom I wish to maintain contact. Connect the two.

Be very deliberate in what I buy to read. As Lisa and I put our library together, I am finding more and more books I have yet to read. There are a few authors -- Jim Butcher, Lee Child, and Dean Koontz among them -- whose releases we will purchase in hardcover as soon as possible after their release dates; everyone else should wait while I work on the backlog we already own.

I think I can do this.

RIP Gerry Rafferty

2011-01-05T20:23:00.005-05:00

Gerry Rafferty passed away yesterday. Many people remember him as part of 1970s soft rock group Stealer's Wheel, from their song Stuck In The Middle With You. I recall him especially for his solo hit Baker Street, which was the soundtrack of my summer of transition from high school to college. It fits a bittersweet time in my life, and I'm grateful for the memories. Enjoy.

A Special Ring

2010-12-13T15:39:00.002-05:00

An older, white haired man walked into a jewelry store one Friday evening with a beautiful young gal at his side. He told the jeweler he was looking for a special ring for his girlfriend. The jeweler looked through his stock and brought out a $5,000 ring and showed it to him. The old man said, "I don't think you understand, I want something very special."

At that statement, the jeweler went to his special stock and brought another ring over. "Here's a stunning ring at only $40,000," the jeweler said.

The young lady's eyes sparkled and her whole body trembled with excitement. The old man seeing this said, "We'll take it."

The jeweler asked how payment would be made and the old man stated, by check. "I know you need to make sure my check is good, so I'll write it now and you can call the bank Monday to verify the funds and I'll pick the ring up Monday afternoon," he said.

Monday morning, a very teed-off jeweler phoned the old man. "There's no money in that account."

"I know," said the old man, "but can you imagine the weekend I had?"

RIP Elizabeth Edwards

2010-12-08T23:52:00.005-05:00

You were the essence of grace under fire, and I have no better words than your own:

The days of our lives, for all of us, are numbered. We know that. And, yes, there are certainly times when we aren’t able to muster as much strength and patience as we would like. It’s called being human. But I have found that in the simple act of living with hope, and in the daily effort to have a positive impact in the world, the days I do have are made all the more meaningful and precious. And for that I am grateful. It isn’t possible to put into words the love and gratitude I feel to everyone who has and continues to support and inspire me every day. To you I simply say: you know.

Privilege

2010-11-25T06:03:00.005-05:00

It's rather earlier on Thanksgiving morning than I intended to be up. The cats are fed, the coffee is started, Bach's Brandenburg Concertos are playing, and I have the time before the bustling of the day -- yes, there will be bustling today, preparing the traditional Thanksgiving dinner and packing to travel -- begins to set down these musings.

I've spent a lot of time over the past year reading the thoughts of Internet sages on privilege, the unearned accumulation of advantage. This is nothing I set out to do. These various essays and rants were simply posted where I read anyway. No doubt this confession will affirm in some minds exactly the points about privilege. You see, I'm a 50 year old white male from the American South.

I've never had to remind anyone I was talking to that my eyes are on my face, not my chest. I've never seen employees anywhere I've shopped spending more time watching me to be sure I wasn't slipping merchandise into my pockets than waiting on the customers in front of them. I've never been turned away from voting. And what's more, I've never had to even think about these things.

Privilege.

If you're reading this and your primary assumption amounts to, "Well, it's about time he realized how lucky he is," may I suggest that you learn to recognize the blinders your high horse is wearing. You can learn from me as surely as I can from you.

I am incredibly grateful for the life I have, and even more, for the help I've had getting here. Yes, I have seized the opportunities that have come my way. Yes, I'd be stupid to pass up the advantages that life has afforded me, both for myself and my family.

And yet...

I am striving to live a life of of honesty and integrity. I can give up things so that others can have them and still get far more than I sacrificed. After all, life is hardly a zero-sum game.

On this Thanksgiving Day, I don't want to be treated the same as everyone else. I want everyone else to be treated the same as me.

The Difference Between Legal And Fair

2010-11-18T06:21:00.004-05:00

In my last post, I embedded a video from YouTube about a middle school football team using a particularly clever play to score a touchdown. And, in the limited context of the video, it is hilarious.

Frank Deford is one of the most insightful sportswriters ever, and he has some sobering thoughts on this play, put into a larger context:

...it is perfectly legal to act in a game. But the players who do that in the pros are not embarrassing the opposition. They're just trying to con the umpire. It's a benign bit of hustle that would've made for some good Aesop's Fables if old Aesop were around writing a sports blog nowadays.

But the Driscoll team didn't act instinctively to try to put one over on a ref. The middle schoolers didn't even come up with the ruse. Their coach dreamed up the play, and even participated in it, hollering from the sideline. The referees weren't victimized. In fact, they had to play along.

No, it was only the other team's kids who were embarrassed and belittled by a children's coach being a wise guy, a bully of sorts. It wasn't genius at all. Sure, it was legal, but it wasn't fair. Laugh at kids being outslicked by a grown-up, and you're cruel. That isn't sport.

You can read his full commentary here.

My children are all young adults, well past the age to participate in youth sports, but I still find it worthwhile to ask myself, how would they have felt to be on the other side of this legal play? How would I have felt for them? I suspect I would have tended towards Mr. Deford's position, and that gives me an uncomfortable feeling about myself.

Surprise!

2010-11-10T06:10:00.003-05:00

I saw this on Good Morning America yesterday, and I laughed until the tears were rolling down my face and my belly hurt. It was worth it.

Hereafter

2010-11-09T06:01:00.007-05:00

Hereafter is the story of three people touched by death.

Marie Lelay is an investigative journalist on vacation in Indonesia with her producer/lover. It is their last morning before returning to Paris, and she realizes her companion has not gotten any souvenirs for his kids. She tells him she is going shopping for them and asks him to come along, but he just wants to sleep as long as he can. As she is running her self-appointed errand, a tsunami strikes. She drowns, and then we're...somewhere else...with her. Back in our world, a couple of strangers try, and fail, to revive her, but she comes back on her own. Changed.

Marcus is a young boy, ten, maybe eleven. He seems a little ethereal to begin with, sweet, slight. His twin Jason, always wearing a cap, decisive, is Marcus' anchor in this world. In fact, Jason is the anchor of his family. We first see them getting their picture struck, paying the photographer with change scraped together dearly. Then, at home, they put the framed picture and a cupcake topped with a single candle out on the kitchen table, a birthday surprise for their Mum. She never shows up before they go to bed. The first thing we see the next morning is the photo and the cupcake, with the candle melted down all over it. The first thing we here is a loud knock on the door, followed by shouts demanding entrance. It's child protective services. Mum, you see, is a heroine addict. The twins, with Marcus following Jason's lead, work around the social workers, cleaning up the apartment, finding Mum and bringing her in the door just after the social worker, with bags of groceries. See, all is right with our world!

Once the social workers are gone, Mum sees the picture her boys made for her. Even as she's still coming down off her latest high, we see that she does love her sons and is trying. She says something about a drug that may help her kick the addiction. Jason -- strong, decisive Jason -- calls the chemist (we're in London), determines that he has the medicine, instructs Marcus to stay with Mum, and runs off to get help for Mum.

After he has gotten the medicine and is on his way home, Jason is accosted by some neighborhood toughs. "What's with the cap? What's in the bag? It's the basic we're bigger, we're bored, and you're our toy attitude. Only this time, Jason runs! But Jason can't outrun the lorry on the street. Unlike after Marie's drowning, no one tries to revive Jason. Marcus knows with a twin's certainty that something wrong has befallen his other half. When he arrives on the scene, he finds Jasosn' unbloodied cap, picks it up, dons it. He, too, is changed.

Those who sacrifice for others, it seems, are sacrificed along the way.

George Lonegan is a very rare thing, a genuine psychic. He can actually see that somewhere else Marie went while she was dead, and he can tell people the Truth. His brother Billy considers this a gift, something that is a license to print money. George considers it a curse, because the Truth sets him apart. And that being set apart is why he works as a longshoreman and takes a cooking class. His love of Charles Dickens is simply his own.

Every other "psychic" we see in the movie, and we see quite a few, is a charlatan. They each put on a show with scientific gadgets or candles and shadows or limited seating seminars when they're doing a reading or contacting the other side; it's all smoke and mirrors. George simply asks whomever he is reluctantly reaching beyond the veil for to let him hold their hands for a moment. "It makes a connection, and that helps", he tells them.

From this set up, we see how Marie moves from a hard-hitting journalist after her next expose to a seeker, asking "What happens to us when we die?"; how Marcus, wearer of his twin's cap and resident of the foster care system, persists in trying to reach Jason to tell him that he can't do this life alone and needs him back; how George is seeking connections. And we see how their stories eventually intertwine. This is where George is changed, not by death, but by life.

Of the actors, it's worth noting that Jay Mohr as Billy Lonegan plays an excellent sleaze. And Matt Damon...the man is a chameleon. I believe in him as totally as George Lonegan as I do in him as Jason Bourne.

The movie is paced slowly, deliberately, in a way that reminds me of Gattaca. Other than the tsunami and the car accident, there is no action, which is hard to believe of a Clint Eastwood directed movie. And, in the tsunami, where it awkwardly overruns those trying to flee it, we see that Eastwood is not at all at ease with CGI special effects.

The movie is all exposition and character study. As Lisa put it when we were talking about it, "I was expecting some great revelation."

You see, despite the advertising, Hereafter has next to nothing to do with the supernatural. That's a head fake, in the spirit of Randy Pausch's Last Lecture. This movie has to do with curiosity, persistence, integrity and connections. It's about how to live.

Of Old Spice And Sesame Street

2010-10-16T21:13:00.004-04:00

I'm sure many of you remember this most clever of advertisements from the 2010 Super Bowl:

When my children were very young, I watched Sesame Street with them after work. If you've never seen it, you won't realize that it, like the old Bugs Bunny and Road Runner cartoons, was made with multiple levels of humor, just so that parents like me could comfortably watch with their kids. Believe me, it wasn't excruciating to sit through an hour of Sesame Street the way it was through five minutes of Barney!

I hope you enjoy Grover's interpretation of the Old Spice commercial as much as I did:

Moss Man, Thwarted

2010-10-16T20:00:00.007-04:00

Gregory Liascos of Portland, Oregon is a rather clever man, but probably not a dog lover.

A caretaker at the Rice Northwest Museum of Rocks and Minerals in Hillsboro, Oregon found a hole cut in a wall of an exterior bathroom last Wednesday and called the local police. The police, including a K-9 team, were on the scene around 5:00 am Thursday morning. The dog alerted his handler that he smelled something, then bit the ground, which cried out in pain.

It was Liascos, wearing a ghillie suit -- think Marine snipers -- that made him look like a patch of grass.

He is currently a guest of Washington County, pending a hearing on charges of burglary and criminal mischief.

Colder Weather

2010-10-12T06:18:00.004-04:00

Well, it's a winding road
when you're in the lost and found.
You're a lover, I'm a runner,
and we go round and round.

This is the heart of the story the Zac Brown Band tells in Colder Weather, the latest song I can't stop listening to.

Like many a song of loneliness and loss on the road, it sounds gorgeous. Every musical detail, from the instrumental arrangement to the vocal harmonies to the melody, is as exquisite as I've ever heard.

Unlike many a song of loneliness and loss on the road, the road isn't the storytelling device. We get a couple of vignettes, first hers, then his. In both vignettes, we get details that we can see -- taillights shining through a window pane, a night as black as a cup of coffee -- so that this story feels lived in.

There's a highly expressive vocal bridge after the verses, and structurally, it's a rather conventional climax to the song. It does deliver an effective emotional payoff.

Nothing else in the song works quite as well as the emotionally devastating coda. There's enough ambiguity here that we're unsure if the guy is about to climb into his car again to wander after another phone call to her, or if he's standing next to her grave, remembering and regretting.

I'm with your ghost again,
It's a shame about the weather...

It's Just As Well They Can't Read

2010-10-05T09:39:00.002-04:00

I told Sheldon and Leonard, our male kittens, that, since they were going to be asleep during the procedure and didn't have to shave their testicles beforehand, getting neutered today was no big deal. I don't think they bought it.

Marching To The Beat Of A Different...Guitarist?

2010-10-02T14:36:00.004-04:00

David is, among many other fine things, a guitarist. We were driving from some point A to some other point B during his last visit a couple of months ago, and, being fans of classic rock, we were listening to Boston's debut CD. Long Time was playing, the song reached the bridge between the first and second verses, and as it went into the brief strummed acoustic guitar passage, David said, "This is my favorite guitar riff." I made some sound of absent-minded agreement, and we went on with our day.

I didn't think about this exchange for probably another month, until the next time I heard the song. Then, I really thought about what he said.

I think of a riff as a lead part, but the piece David commented on was definitely rhythm guitar. It is a catchy piece of musicianship, one that lingers in the mind, but it's rhythm guitar. David is intensely serious about his music, so he's very qualified to recognize a riff. But, it's rhythm guitar!

Music is one of life's great pleasures, both intellectual and visceral, and is there any real reason I should have hesitated to embrace a new perspective on it? On mature consideration (don't laugh), I didn't think so, and I have found that my musical enjoyment is enhanced by listening to it a bit differently, a bit more attentively.

So, here's a thank you to one of my favorite guitarists, my youngest son David.

An Oral History

2010-09-21T16:03:00.006-04:00

I subscribe to a periodic email newsletter from Mental Floss, and on a day home sick from work, while I was cleaning out my inbox, I came across a message in which Mangesh, one of the founders of the magazine and website, shared some of his 9/11 stories. From his name, it sounds like he "ain't from around here." I think that really means that he may have a far keener appreciation of this country than many of us who are of European descent. Whether or not that's true, he included a link to a short piece at StoryCorps, an oral history site.

Go and listen to John Vigiano tell about his sons, New York City firefighter John Jr. and New York City policeman Joe. His story will both break your heart and put a smile on your face.

September 11th has been on my mind a great deal lately. I was beyond disappointed in the news coverage from the major news outlets, especially since so much attention, on that day, was paid to the proposed Islamic Center near Ground Zero and to the Florida Koran-burning-that-wasn't. On that day, of all days, we needed to remember what happened in 2001. We needed to remember how we weren't Southerners or New Englanders or Midwesterners right after that day. We weren't black or red or white or yellow. We were just Americans. United in grief, in loss, in anger, in outrage.

I don't speak for anyone but myself, but I'd like to be just an American again. I don't need any other label for the world to know me. I don't need to start a fight with anyone over it, but I'd love to finish one that anyone else starts. Give me a chance, and if I can, I'll help anyone who needs it.

And honestly, I hope that I speak for Mangesh from Mental Floss, as well as for John Vigiano. They both spoke for me.

Changing Homes

2010-09-11T21:50:00.004-04:00

This morning, around 10:15, I drove back over to Greensboro to pay a visit to the old apartment. I had a step stool with me, so I could change out the few compact fluorescent bulbs we had installed for some inexpensive -- ok, cheap -- incandescent bulbs. Before I walked out of the first home Lisa and I shared, I took a last look around and whispered, "You served us well, thank you" to the walls that no longer held any reflection of our personalities. Then, I went by the complex office, turned in all our keys, and left without another glance back.

It's been an arduous task, this moving. It's not that far between Greensboro and High Point, not in physical distance. But, it's a world away, going from renting an apartment to owning a house. Not just financially, but mentally and philosophically.

After all, what does home really mean?

There are the cliches: Home is where the heart is. Home is where, when you show up, they have to take you in.

There's the thought that home is your place. There are many people who would die before giving up their piece of land.

For many others, home is wherever their family is.

I find truth in all of these. I had a time in my life when, between school and several part-time jobs, I was never at the apartment I lived in then. And when I was, my then wife wanted to go out, to eat, to shop, to visit her family. For a time, I was rootless.

By the time I really had a place to be, years and children later, I was losing that marriage. And after that, I had an apartment, joint legal custody of my children but only part-time physical custody, and so I was largely alone.

I found in my Lisa and in the apartment we lived in the last six years both the person and the place; I fully understand what home means to me. It's where the rhythms of shared lives come together. We learned the little things, where the smooth places were in the roads leading to the apartment, which restaurants had not only the good food but the good people who came to know us and always make us feel welcome, when the upstairs neighbors were going to be loud, when the maintenance staff would be mowing and blowing leaves onto our patio, when the garbage trucks would make pickups, when traffic would be favorable to our movements.

Now, it's time to learn all those things anew, in a new place. Our home.

Peaked At 5

2010-09-03T11:31:00.003-04:00

Cammie King Conlon, age 76, passed away two days from lung cancer. She was billed as "Cammie King" when she portrayed Bonnie Blue Butler in Lisa's favorite movie, Gone With The Wind. And frankly, my dear, we do give a damn.

The Carolina Emperor

2010-09-01T21:02:00.007-04:00

This emerald was found, in August 2009, near Hiddenite, NC:

It's called the Carolina Emperor, and it was 310 carats uncut. I had forgotten that North Carolina has such things to offer.

One Week and Counting...

2010-08-28T07:21:00.005-04:00

I can't wait!!!

The Things That Come Out Of Thailand

2010-08-28T07:05:00.004-04:00

Cute, no? Earlier this week, a Thai national tried to smuggle this two month old through Bangkok's Suvarnabhumi International Airport in a suitcase full of stuffed animals. He was found when the suitcase was x-rayed prior to boarding a flight to Iran.

Bad Literary Mashups

2010-08-14T08:05:00.008-04:00

Earlier this week, thriller write Meg Gardiner joined in a Twitter game suggested by another writer to come up with titles for, well, bad literary mashups, in the tradition of such recent artistic triumphs as Pride and Prejudice and Zombies and Abraham Lincoln, Vampire Hunter. After she came up with such gems as Eat, Pray, Jaws and Dracujo (The Vampire Puppy), she invited readers of her blog lying for a living to join in the fun.

Being a bit of a sick puppy myself, I couldn't resist. I did range farther afield than many, because I brought in song titles, as well as movies and books. Be warned, what follows may make your head hurt:

Watership Down Among the Dead Men

The Ninja and Mrs. Muir

On The Road Less Traveled Again

Lust For Life In The Fast Lane

If You Give A Mouse The Cuckoo’s Egg

The Phantom Tollbooth of the Opera

Barbarians At The Anubis Gate

Crash: A Bend In The Road Not Taken

The Canterbury Tales Of The South Pacific

A Bridge Over The River Kwai Runs Through It

In A Little Cold Blood Night Music (I think I’m trying too hard!)

A Christmas Bob & Carol & Ted & Alice

On Patience

2010-08-14T08:03:00.004-04:00

Our greatest asset is patience; our greatest weakness is throwing in the towel. Banish discouragement and feelings of impossibility by working hard, doing more, and not giving in! A diamond was only made beautiful after millions of years as a lump of coal.

- SparkPeople's Healthy Reflections

50

2010-08-05T09:34:00.010-04:00

Well, the countdown is over and, as of 10 minutes ago, I am 50 years old. I've been blogging it as Taking Stock for nearly a year and a half; in reviewing, I've found I didn't write nearly as many entries as I expected to.

For example, my last post in this series was about why I like country music, and it was dated July 11. I only got half my thoughts down, and I said I'd come back to the subject the next day, but I never did. Oh, I did half-heartedly start one evening, late, but the words wouldn't come. I've learned in my three years(!) writing Babble On that forcing a post only makes me unhappy with both the effort and the quality of the finished piece. I'd rather not publish crap.

By the way, Country music's roots are Southern and rural, like mine. It prizes melody and straightforward storytelling, with a very subtle sophistication in the musical execution, more than any other genre of popular music I know (yes, jazz did grow out of the blues, but listen to Western Swing and tell me improvisation has no place in Country). In attitude, Country promotes self-reliance, family, and patriotism, while not shying away from the grittier and seamier side of life; that's the old "drinkin' and cheatin' songs". There is an aura of realism to this music and an awareness of its history. You really can sum up what I find attractive about Country music by listening to Red Headed Stranger. That's why Country music.

I intended to write about the sacredness I find in laughter, the happiness and the pain of being a divorced father whose children live several hundred miles away, the joy and the work of growing into the provider and intimate partner a husband should be. Come to think of it, I did cover those last two subjects more deeply than any others.

It's interesting that Lisa overheard someone at my high school reunion say that I was about the last person they expected to get married. That was the 1978 version of me, a lonely little nerd with next to no self-confidence, who used what humor he could muster as a substitute for social skills. And it worked; my best friend actually thought I was outgoing in those days! The 2010 version of me is a valued and knowledgeable employee, a solid behind-the-scenes volunteer with a charity I believe in, and a decent provider, parent, and spouse.

I love my life. I do have regrets, as any person who takes a thoughtful look back at himself should; I could always have done better. However, in spite of those regrets and the often deep accompanying pain, I would change nothing. I am who I am because of my journey.

I will continue my journey as I have so far, taking in knowledge and hopefully transforming it through experience into wisdom, prizing the grace and mystery and beauty in this life, and loving my wife and my children and my parents and my friends as deeply and as well as I can.

And I will always, always laugh.

A Promise

2010-07-31T08:16:00.002-04:00

To my son Andy, you should consider my home your refuge, for as long as I live, no matter what.

Just Another Morning

2010-07-25T08:30:00.004-04:00

I woke up around 6:00 this morning, when I wished I could sleep in longer. Since I couldn't, I did what I do most mornings when I can't fall asleep again. I fired up the ebook reader on my phone and read. Right now, I'm making a second pass through the Miles Vorkosigan series, which is not only one of the most enjoyable SF series it's been my pleasure to encounter, but one of the most thought provoking as well.

After about half an hour of this, I got out of bed, made coffee, and fed our six cats. Well, I did make them wait until I had the coffee started, and only Leonard complained at all. I still haven't seen Tempe this morning, but I'll bet that he and Blazer are back in the bedroom snoozing with Lisa.

We picked Andy and David up at the Charlotte airport yesterday afternoon; they are here for their summer visit. Andy only has a week off from his summer job, David two weeks, and I'm glad that their visits from Indiana have become less events than just a regular part of life. I like my sons, who are both growing into fine young adults, and it's very interesting to spend time having professional discussions with Andy. He's a third year electrical engineering student who is working for a web hosting company this summer. I read just enough about hardware and he about software that we can geek it up together. I can look to my left right now and see him sitting on the sofa surfing the net on his phone.

David is still abed. He stayed up later than his brother, which I think is a pretty usual thing, and watched The Italian Job. He likes going through our old DVDs when he's here.

Sadly, Gigi won't be here this summer. She's very busy with her job search and has to be home for whenever an interview comes up. Maybe later in the year...

In about 10 minutes, I will be logging into work. If things go well over the next couple of hours, a team I'm on will finally complete an on-again, off-again two year project to migrate several applications from four Windows 2000 servers to two Windows 2003 servers. That will save our customers a bunch in IT charges, give them better application performance, and simplify support from IT. Can't wait.

All in all, it's just another morning.

The 32nd

2010-07-18T21:23:00.008-04:00

Last night, I did something I've never done before. I attended a reunion of my high school class. In the 32 years since I graduated, I've missed two reunions, at ten and thirty years. With the last reunion only two years gone by, why reunite again so soon?

My first guess is that my classmates simply needed their Eddie fix...nah, probably not.

More likely this is a bunch of people who by-and-large just like each other, who enjoy a lively get-together, and who had enough people willing to organize the event that it simply had to happen. Oh, and we celebrated with quite a few people turning 50 (that may be translated as commiserated with).

David Gore's Bummin' Hole Lodge was the perfect site for our shindig, a very rustic cabin on a pond. It's far enough back in the woods without doubling as the set of Deliverance that we didn't disturb anyone. One of the biggest advantages for Lisa and me is that it's close enough to Dad and Mom's home that we could have made it there in five minutes, if Dad hadn't closed off one of the farm roads a few years ago. As it is, we had to take a couple of county roads, making the trip ten minutes. Twice the travel time, what a burden!

The food and libations flowed freely, and conversation followed. It was wonderful to catch up with old friends unseen in 30 years (yes, Jimmy H. and Jimmy W., I'm looking at both of you), to exchange so many hugs, to compare numbers of children and marriages, to reflect on careers and on missing classmates, and to start thinking about the next time we'll get together.

To Antoinette, Steve, and Susan, (as Steve's wife put it) fellow IT whores -- I hope we can swap war stories again soon.

To Al, Hong, Jimmy H., Kim, and Patti -- I look forward to sharing a table with you again.

To Anthony, Anthony, Sherrie, Tami, and Wanda (with apologies to anyone I left out) -- thanks for the fantastic job putting this thing together.

To Coburn -- I'll probably never top that line about not being able to make a horse put on a bathing suit.

To Kim and Tami -- Thank you very much for your kind words about Babble On.

And finally, to Beatrice -- you still scare the hell out of a lot of us!

50 - 26: Why Country Music?

2010-07-11T21:26:00.003-04:00

Country is my favorite musical genre, but it hasn't always been so. In fact, I used to detest it. This is a bit surprising to me today, considering the music I liked when I began to be aware of the wider world beyond myself and my immediate family.

I was just shy of my teenage years when I discovered the pleasures of music. John Denver was the biggest artist around, in that time between the end of the Beatles and the rise of Elton John. Denver's music was sweet, almost saccharine, full of pretty melodies and simple, back-to-nature lyrics. For the most part it hasn't aged that well -- Rocky Mountain High, and perhaps Matthew, being the most notable exceptions -- but it did provide a safe, comfortable entry to American popular music in the early 1970s.

I soon graduated from my "gateway drug" to a more lasting addiction. It wasn't really a great stretch from John Denver's country pop to the country rock of Linda Ronstadt and the Eagles, but especially the latter have proven a deeper lyrical sophistication combined with complex vocal harmonies and outstanding musicianship can stand the test of time.

In case you the reader have any doubts, I remain an Eagles partisan after 35 years.

At the same time that I was captivated by the music coming out of Southern California, I was disavowing the country music largely coming out of Nashville. I thought of it, playing off my father's cues, as empty, twangy noise. This would have been around 1975, and in many ways, musical history has vindicated my views. The biggest days of Johnny Cash and Merle Haggard were over, I had no interest at the time in Loretta Lynn, and the music was produced to be heard on radio, not really to last.

This included, as far as I knew, Willie Nelson. I knew his huge hit Blue Eyes Cryin' in the Rain, but not his concept album Red Headed Stranger. Discovering this artist, his music, and in particular this album are crucial to my larger point, and I'll revisit the subject again tomorrow.

So You Think You Can Dance

2010-07-10T22:46:00.004-04:00

The only reality TV show I watch, generally, is The Amazing Race. It's been the only one that's felt, well, real to me. This week, Lisa's mom Meki has been visiting, and we're just off some of our usual routine.

That's how we came to be channel surfing last Wednesday and ended up watch Fox's dance contest. And guess what? I ended up not only intrigued, but hooked.

This show is vastly different than Dancing With The Stars, which is mildly entertaining celebrity fluff. SYTYCD is actually an intense, highly compressed, and competitive apprenticeship. I watch the dances and react emotionally to the showmanship. The judges are critiquing the dances and dancers on their technical merits, and they are teaching aspiring professionals.

Like every other reality competition on TV, the public votes, with the dancers getting the lowest totals in danger of being eliminated. Unlike every other reality TV competition, the judges decide who goes.

No, the judges are not unbiased, and that factors into the eliminations.

It's extremely entertaining TV, and it's refreshing that there are no product placements.

Toy Story 3

2010-07-10T22:06:00.006-04:00

The characters familiar from Toy Story and Toy Story 2, especially Woody and Buzz, are all here. Well, not all, as things change in 15 years, and some toys are no longer with us. In fact, since Andy is about to go to college, things are totally in flux.

Andy intends for all his old toys, except Woody, to be stored in the attic. Woody is supposed to go with him to college. There's a mix up, and all the toys end up being donated by Andy's mom to Sunnyside Daycare. And the toy-in-chief there, Lots O' Hugging Bear, is not the sweet and lovable plush toy he seems to be...

You'd think that the third movie in an animated trilogy would be, at best, silly kid's stuff. And you'd be right if the movie had been made by any other outfit than Pixar. This studio's mantra is story first and foremost, and they have never deviated from this. Toy Story 3 is visually gorgeous, and the tale it tells is by turns hilarious, horrifying, uplifting, and bittersweet. The people who made this movie understand the appeal that looking back on childhood has for adults, as well as the pull adulthood has on children. The transitions depicted here feel absolutely spot on.

Yeah, I'm a Pixar fanboy, and why not? They simply don't miss.

Independence Day

2010-07-04T11:32:00.004-04:00

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.

Of all the sentences that have written, uttered, or thought in the history of the United States, this is the one that most defines the ideal of America. It is the possibility of equality of opportunity that brings so many to our shores. This is the reason for the Bill of Rights.

It was Lincoln's inspiration for Four score and seven years ago, our forefathers brought forth on this continent a nation dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal.

Do yourself a favor, those of you who are, like me, American. Take a break from the fireworks, the cook out, the travel sometime on this 4th of July and look up some of our historic documents. Read the words quietly to yourself, aloud to your spouse and children, or broadcast them to your neighbors. Then, think about what the words really mean.

If you can do this, you are more fortunate than most of humanity who has come before you. Take the opportunity to exercise your liberty and help someone else with their pursuit of happiness. Help pass on the ideal.

Well, I'm Back

2010-07-02T12:31:00.004-04:00

In the nearly three years I've written Babble On, the best thing anyone has had to say about it is when my daughter told me she could hear my voice in it. That means I'm achieving one of my goals here, because I aim for simple clarity, for there to be nothing between me and what I set out to say.

I just realized that I said nothing here in June. That, my friends, is not the plan. All I can say is that in the noise of the outside world, the rush and the confusion and the oh-dear-i'm-late-how-will-i-get-all-i-must-done hurly-burly, my write-me voice has been drowned out. There are things going on that are important to me and mine that have taken precedence, and some of them may very well make their way here. But, not yet.

For now, it's enough that I have the mental quiet and calm that gives birth to things I must say here. I've missed the creative rush.

5/17: At The Bottom Of The Ramp, Waiting For My Daughter

2010-05-30T22:40:00.008-04:00

Monday, May 17, sometime between 8:00 and 8:15 pm, I was standing next to a stage in the athletic center of Valparaiso University, holding a bouquet of roses. My daughter Gigi was in a line on the other side of the stage, waiting her turn to cross the stage, shake hands with the chancellor of Purdue University North Central, and receive her bachelor's degree.

I had time for memories, fleeting impressions:

October 4th, 1988 - a shell-shocked afternoon, after the doctor told us that Suzanne's last non-stress test didn't look so good, and we needed to come in the next day to have labor induced.
October 5th - a blur, from getting up, to arriving at the hospital, to the start of labor, to the maternity nurse being 7 months pregnant herself, to the doctor dealing with us and another patient in labor, to the arrival.
October 6th - after a night in a cramped recliner, I went home to wash up and change. The fall sky and the turning leaves were more vibrant than I had ever seen before.
Gigi, at two years old, running to me across a playground with her arms held high to be picked up and hollering, "Hold you!"
Gigi, at seven, clinging to me and crying like she's never stopping after being told that her mom and I weren't going to be living together anymore (Nobody said all the memories were happy).
My pride in Gigi as her participation in high school show choir gave her a world of confidence and made her bloom.
Taking her, during a Christmas visit, to the empty parking lot at work and having her practice driving a car with a manual transmission.

And then she was coming across the stage, holding her newly minted degree, stopping at the top of the ramp for a picture, then coming down the ramp, approaching me. I handed her the roses, we hugged, and she whispered, "Thanks, Dad, I love you."

As I walked back to the stands, my ex-wife gave me a thumbs up. My wife gave me a knowing smile, and she was entitled. I bought the flowers and gave them to Gigi, but they were Lisa's idea.

Gigi kiddo, congratulations. We love you.

Memorial Day

2010-05-30T21:31:00.005-04:00

Don Ward, United States Army.

E.A. "Red" Elixson, United States Navy.

H.A. Mathis, United States Army.

Huston White, United States Army.

Kenneth White, Army National Guard.

Wendell Ball, United States Army.

Jeff Justice, United States Marines.

These are a few of my family and friends I have known who have served in the Armed Forces of the United States of America, and to each of them on this, the eve of Memorial Day 2010, I say thank you for your service. For your sacrifice. But, Memorial Day is not about you. You all came home.

Memorial Day is about 58,261 names on The Wall. It is about 125,000 tombstones in 24 overseas military cemeteries. It is about the changing of the guard at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier.

Memorial Day is not about trips to the beach, barbecues, or a three day weekend. It is about remembering those warriors who gave, in Lincoln's phrasing, the "last full measure of devotion".

Go find a soldier today and thank him or her. This explains it pretty well.

Oops...

2010-05-06T12:59:00.005-04:00

This was the cake delivered to a reception hosted by Sens. Johnny Isakson (R-Ga.) and Jay Rockefeller (D-W.Va.)to honor Atlanta Braves manager Bobby Cox during the Braves recent visit to D.C. to play the Nationals:

There's more detail here. Wonder what that caterer could do with my name?

Under The Dome

2010-04-30T21:32:00.003-04:00

Stephen King's Under The Dome. Imagine you're hiking out of a small Maine town. There's the drone of a small private plane overhead, and you see a woodchuck shuffling along the road toward you. It hasn't yet made up its mind whether to duck out of sight, and suddenly it will never get to, as it's body is sliced in half by something invisible. Then, the plane you heard slams into the same invisible barrier, explodes, and rains debris all around you. In the next few hours, you find that you're not going anywhere, because the town of Chester's Mill is now trapped inside an upside-down bowl, and only air can get through. King examines how society breaks down when isolation is total and the societal leaders care only for how much power they can accumulate; he also examines how people of genuine good will confront the evil in human nature.

All of this is inside the most gorgeous book cover I have ever seen.

I've said before that the highest compliment I can pay a book is my eagerness to re-read it, to enter the author's world again and to see it through his characters' eyes. I haven't made that journey yet with Under The Dome, although I expect to relatively soon. For now, I'll have to settle for the second highest compliment I can give a book. Even though Under The Dome is over 1000 pages long, it's too short; I simply didn't want it to end.

To Lisa, On Our 6th Anniversary

2010-04-30T06:15:00.005-04:00

It seems just barely believable that it has been 10 years since we first met and became online buddies in the Dean Koontz forum on Usenet. Or that it has been 9 years since you became my most important confidant in the implosion of my second marriage. Since you sent me the "Our friendship is as rare as a rose blooming in the snow" email.

I cherish the memory of the day we first met in person in Roanoke, of knowing then and there that I had at last met the other part of myself, of hoping against hope that you felt the same, and of the joy coming in the next few months upon realizing that you did.

I am proud that I managed to surprise you by proposing on your birthday, and that I did it "right", with bended knee and a diamond ring held out to you in anticipation.

I look forward to this day each year, for it means celebrating a union that is good and strong. It means that we've made it to another milepost, surely having passed the time with a great deal of laughter, with some exasperation for the habits we each have that drive the other crazy, but with the determination that we will learn a bit more patience with each other every day, and with an always deeper commitment to each other.

Nothing worthwhile comes without attendant struggles, but being your husband is singularly easy. How could it not be, when I have you for my bedrock?

I love you, I am grateful for the happiness you have brought into my life, I hope I return that happiness to you in full measure, and I am looking forward to the rest of our adventure together in this life.

Happy anniversary, honey.

From The Nothing-Succeeds-Like-Excess Department...

2010-04-16T22:33:00.004-04:00

So I was just sitting and wondering what to do with that extra $60 million that's burning a hole in my pocket, when the Universe whacked me up side the head with a clue stick, leaving this inspiration. Prepare to be amazed.

Daily Zen

2010-04-16T22:27:00.003-04:00

I subscribe to a feed on Facebook called My Daily Zen, and while today's bit of wisdom is not nearly ambiguous to really be a Zen koan, it is a wonderful bit of wisdom: There are three ways you can get to the top of a tree: sit on an acorn; make friends with a bird; climb it.

The OKC Bomb, 15 Years On

2010-04-11T23:01:00.003-04:00

I have no words to match those of Ed Vulliamy, who reported on the Oklahoma City bombing in April 1995, on Timothy McVeigh, and now on the 15th anniversary of the bombing.

I remained horrified by the mass murder committed by a former American soldier and cannot fathom how he thought any cause was served by killing 19 children, among his 168 victims.

I am now and will forever remain in awe of the people of Oklahoma City. They showed the rest of us -- yes, I'm looking at you, New York City -- how to honor the memory of those taken by the faithless in truly senseless acts of violence.

Notes From My Week...

2010-04-02T23:28:00.004-04:00

Dreamworks is slowly building into a powerhouse animation studio, with Kung Fu Panda a couple of years ago and now How To Train Your Dragon. They've developed a Pixar-like knack in their storytelling, especially as they tone down the dependence on pop cultural references. Honestly, the moments when Hiccup was riding on the back of Toothless, and there was nothing else but the two of them and the sky were exhilarating. The story was pretty standard, with the young boy who was an outcast in his own society, who discovers a basic flaw in that society and manages to lead his people into a new and better way of life and become accepted and valued. The humor seemed less forced than in some other Dreamworks features, and the emotions in the story seemed genuine.

Jamie Oliver's Food Revolution is a riveting hour of television. In tonight's episode, I think that Jamie found the key to making his revolution a success: enlisting high school age kids who have a vested interest in a healthier diet, have them cook for local movers and shakers who could shake loose the money needed to train school cooks in cooking from scratch for masses, and then give their testimonials to the movers and shakers.

Indications are that my job duties are about to be shaken up. Nothing official yet, but the signs are there.

It's been great exchanging messages with an old friend from high school this week (you know who you are!).

How A Webcomic Updates A Literary Classic

2010-03-31T06:33:00.004-04:00

It Didn't Work

2010-03-27T12:23:00.003-04:00

I'm sure it's not a comment on the good people of Pennsylvania, since I know quite a few highly intelligent people from there. However, this does not describe any of them. I bet the possum was annoyed, too.

Ritual, Interrupted

2010-03-19T15:16:00.003-04:00

So, it's a beautiful Friday afternoon, the kind of warm Carolina day that anticipates Spring as surely as the buds on the trees. And, like every Friday afternoon for the past couple of years, when we're both at work, I went to the bank to pick up Lisa for our once-a-week lunch out. As I drove over, window down, I was listening to one of my current favorite CDs, Lady Antebellum's Need You Now. There seemed to be no need to take a cue from the title song's tale of both halves of broken relationship trying to reach out in a futile grasp for what can't be held onto.

Unlike most Friday afternoons, Lisa was stuck at the bank, waiting on customers. We both knew there was no way she'd be able to get out and join me for what is a high point of the work week for us both.

I tooled over to Zaxby's, got her the Kickin' Chicken sandwich meal and large Diet Coke she likes, dropped it back with her at the bank, and then went to Chick-Fil-A, where I proceeded to drown my sorrows in a #1 meal with a large Coke Zero. I'm sure I looked like a real Sad Sack geek, eating my chicken sandwich and fries with my phone in my hand. I mean, who could know that I was reading Moby Dick while I was there missing my wife?

Yes, I could have turned the rest of my day into It-Sucks-To-Be-Eddie-Friday, but why? It's still a beautiful afternoon, Lady Antebellum still sounds as sweet -- Hello World is a wonderful song for when you're feeling a little blue -- I'm going to see Lisa at home this evening, and we're going to have another turn at one of the rituals of our marriage next Friday afternoon. All in all, it's not so bad being me.

Rescuing The Strays

2010-03-17T13:22:00.003-04:00

I do not think that all those who choose wrong roads perish; but their rescue consists of being put back on the right road. A sum can be put right: but only by going back till you find the error and working it afresh from that point, never by simply going on. Evil can be undone, but it cannot 'develop' into good. Time does not heal it. The spell must be unwound, bit-by-bit, with 'backwards mutters of dissevering power' - or else not. It is still 'either-or.' If we insist on keeping Hell (or even Earth), we shall not see Heaven: if we accept Heaven we shall not be able to retain the smallest and most intimate souvenirs of Hell.

- C.S. Lewis, The Great Divorce

RIP Peter Graves

2010-03-15T16:01:00.004-04:00

From "Should you choose to accept this mission...this tape will self-destruct in five seconds" to "Roger, Roger...What's our vector, Victor?", Peter Graves was a smooth and debonair actor. He will be remembered most for his role as Jim Phelps in TV series Mission: Impossible and the pilot Clarence Oveur in the movie Airplane. He played the earnest hero quite ably, then proved capable of comedic subtlety by playing both a send-up of his hero persona and his own straight man in the process.

And after that? He became somewhat of an icon, as his voice became the representation of the Biography series. Not at all a bad resume.

Factoid I didn't know before today -- Peter Graves was the younger brother of Marshal Dillon himself, James Arness.

Though It's Never Gone Away, The Lord Of The Rings Is Making A Media Comeback This Week

2010-03-10T21:32:00.006-05:00

Today's xkcd:

The Trailer For Next Year's Best Picture

2010-03-10T21:19:00.002-05:00

Via lying for a living

The Mistborn Trilogy

2010-03-07T13:13:00.012-05:00

Imagine a world where the giant red sun is barely visible through an ash-filled sky. All vegetation is brown, and this is seen as normal, because no one remembers a time when plants were any other color. In fact, no even believes plants were ever anything but brown.

Then, imagine that the world is dying, from the very things that once saved it.

This is the world of The Mistborn Trilogy.

The political entity that encompasses this entire world (or at least as much of the world as we are made aware of in the story) is called the Final Empire.

The people of the Final Empire are divided into two classes, the nobility and the skaa. The latter may roughly be considered feudal serfs, as they are not quite slaves, but they are in no wise free; the former are the mercantile class and the local government.

The imperial government is run by two bodies: the bureaucratic Obligators with their tattoos of rank and the autocratic Steel Inquisitors with the spikes driven through their eyes. Together, they oversee the everyday running of the Empire and enforce its religious orthodoxy.

At the absolute apex is the Lord Ruler, who has held power for a thousand years, ever since he saved the world. Or did he?

Brandon Sanderson's trilogy is nothing less than the best written and most powerful work of American fantasy since the first three volumes of Orson Scott Card's Alvin Maker series were published in the latter half of the 1980s.

Sanderson is known for creating unique systems of magic; here, the primary magic is allomancy, in which a practitioner -- who must have a noble bloodline -- ingests and "burns" certain metals. This allows the allomancer, depending on what metal is being burned, to push or pull on any metal in the environment, to riot or sooth the emotions of others, to detect another allomancer burning metal, or to hide his own allomancy.

Physics holds true, in that what happens when an allomancer projects force against metal depends on whether the metal is attached to or lying on something that can resist the force. This makes for some extremely interesting action scenes, and accounts for the fact that no one but allomancers carry or wear metal.

Most allomancers can burn only a single metal. They are known as mistings.
A very few allomancers can burn any allomatic metal. They are mistborn. Magicians therefore have one power or all, nothing in between.

Sanderson is also known for asking, and answering, BIG questions. Faith and leadership are constant threads throughout the 2000+ pages of this narrative. As well, there is a single overriding question to each book of the trilogy.

In Mistborn, we are asked, "What happens when the hero of prophecy fails?"

In The Well of Ascension, the question is "What happens when everything we think we know is wrong?"

And in The Hero of Ages, we must find out "How do we save the world?" This question is neither theoretical nor rhetorical, but literal.

Sanderson's characters are vibrantly, exuberantly alive, and they grow throughout the books. And, the series rewards close attention to detail. There are actions and situations in the first hundred pages of book one that pay off in the last fifty pages of book three.

As you may have guessed, I recommend The Mistborn Trilogy without reservation. It is a truly enriching reading experience.

Finding Things

2010-02-24T21:38:00.005-05:00

Some days you lose things so fast it seems they're running away. Yesterday was our day to find the things that didn't run fast or far enough.

First was the Wii Sports disc, missing for a week. I don't know if one of the cats knocked it off of the entertainment center or if it slipped unnoticed when Lisa decluttered around the TV, but it ended up under the side table where we have the Wii and a turntable. The bottom shelf of the table practically rests on the floor, close enough that we couldn't see under it. Lisa happened to see the disc when she shifted the table to clean around it. Now, we can have that bowling tournament.

Next, I checked the office printer/fax, and I found the fax confirmation that simply hadn't printed out before I left work on Monday. I guess I should've waited a little longer.

And lastly, my checkbook gave up on our game of hide-and-seek. I found it in the bottom of my backpack. I'm glad to postpone ordering more checks.

In every case, this quote applies: Persistence is like wrestling a gorilla. You don't quit when you get tired. You quit when the gorilla gets tired.

Today's Outbreak of Common Sense

2010-02-23T11:11:00.003-05:00

Leadership requires freedom to take responsibility. Over the years the accretion of programs and entitlements has disconnected our leaders from this indispensable ingredient of all human accomplishment. No official, not even the president, has authority to make needed choices. Responsibility has been suffocated by law. The destruction of responsibility is a progressive disease, dragging the rest of society down with it. Ask any teacher or doctor. They're immersed in law all day long, preventing them from using their common sense to do what they believe is right. The only solution is to dredge the Potomac. Washington must start over, area by area, and simplify law so that officials have a chance of applying it sensibly to meet current needs. Individual responsibility should be the litmus test for all laws and programs.

- Philip K. Howard

And Now For Something Different...

2010-02-14T19:11:00.003-05:00

Just to prove the Babble On epigram, here's Rock Sugar!

Via Whatever.

Why Do I Do That?

2010-02-14T18:36:00.003-05:00

Is there anything you do that, every time you do it, you find yourself at least mentally pausing and asking yourself, "Why do I do that?"

For my part, when I leave the room she's in for a task or short errand, I tell Lisa, "Be right back", or "Be back in a minute." I'm pretty sure she knows I'll return shortly, but I nearly always say it.

Opening Ceremonies

2010-02-14T16:14:00.006-05:00

We watched the opening ceremonies of the Vancouver Winter Games on Friday night, and thanks to The Experiment, we saw them on the local NBC station in HD. How gorgeous! And it was truly appropriate that it was snowing in Greensboro as the Games opened.

Lisa has Native American ancestry, and she was thrilled with the First Country participation in the cultural portion of the ceremonies. We've attended a couple of pow-wows conducted by the Guilford Native American Association, and that helped me recognize several of the styles of dance.

The lighting effects were fantastic -- how did they pull off the orcas swimming in the open sea and spouting as they surfaced to breathe?!

I was still awake when the Olympic flag was carried into the stadium, but as the image and sound on the TV stuttered -- thanks be to my government for a great TV picture and erratic signal! -- I zoned out and missed the snafu where the fourth arm of the cauldron wouldn't rise from the floor. The replays show that the four torch bearers kept their dignity and did their country proud. However, can anyone explain to me, when the Olympic flame in the outdoor cauldron was lit, why didn't the woman who could only stand by as the other three lit the indoor flame get the honor?

The Experiment

2010-02-14T15:57:00.003-05:00

Lisa and I have been living in our apartment ever since we got married. In fact, I've lived in the same apartment building, in three different apartments as my circumstances have changed over the years, for nine years now. Before that, I lived in two other apartment complexes for a bit over four years, after my first wife and I split. And Lisa lived in her apartment in Virginia for fourteen years before we got married.

Apartment living certainly beats not having a home, but it's time for a new goal. We're going to put our savings program in high gear, so we can put together a down payment for a house.

We've already taken the first step. As of last Tuesday, we no longer have cable television. Because we bundled our television and high-speed Internet, I didn't realize just how much we were paying, mainly to watch reruns of our favorite network series. Now, we have an extra $60 a month to put in savings.

The good thing is, since the DTV transition last year, a lot of local broadcasts are in high definition. The bad thing is, digital transmissions are a lot more susceptible interruption. Between unusually high winds and more snow storms than any winter in this area I can remember, we've been watching a lot of start-and-stop TV.

There's always Hulu, which is adding more "old" TV programming all the time.

Saints 31, Colts 17

2010-02-07T21:49:00.003-05:00

With apologies to The Who (great halftime show, by the way): Meet the new boss, not the same as the old boss.

This Peyton Manning fan feels no regret at the way the Saints won Super Bowl XLIV.

Joe Posnanski Thinks Brett Favre Should Have Run

2010-01-26T08:40:00.003-05:00

Yes, I shouted "Run!" at the TV. It was a reflex. But, of course, Brett Favre did not run. He clearly had no intention of running. Instead, he attempted the single dumbest pass anyone can remember -- a rolling right, throwing left, cross-his-body back-to-the-middle-of-the-field pass, the sort of pass they teach you not to throw about 47 minutes after you are born.*

*First lesson: This is how you breast feed. Second lesson: Cry and someone will change your diaper. Third lesson: In the NFL, you don't throw across your body back into the middle of the field.

The play has been dissected to death already -- and rightfully so -- and there is no shortage of things Favre SHOULD HAVE DONE instead of throwing that pass. Hell, he could have stopped in the middle of the play and started doing an interpretive dance to protest the treatment of Conan O'Brien and THAT would have been smarter than what he did.

No Bookstore

2010-01-24T13:57:00.004-05:00

The B. Dalton in the Mall del Norte in Laredo, Texas recently closed. The makes Laredo, with its population of 250,000, one of the largest cities in the United States without a bookstore. Greensboro is slightly larger than Laredo, and we have three big box bookstores in town.

B. Dalton is owned by Barnes and Noble, and even thought the Laredo store was profitable, B&N's corporate strategy is to get out of the mall bookstore line-of-business. This leaves the closest bookstore 150 miles away in San Antonio.

There is much concern in Laredo that this closing is going to hurt local literacy efforts. No one really expects the two public libraries, despite a catalog of over 200,000 volumes, to be able to meet the demand for popular titles.

There's a void here for someone to fill. Either Barnes and Noble or Borders could open one of their big box stores, but they've both been shrinking of late. Books-A-Million would be more likely, since it is largely in the South.

Or perhaps the most interesting notion: would Larry McMurtry be interested in expanding his bookstore business?

50 - 201: Words

2010-01-16T22:08:00.004-05:00

A week ago today, Lisa and I had one of our rare fights. It started because I was careless.

We're working on taming a stray cat we're calling Ollie. She's a pretty little cat, with very soft fur and markings that are a cross between a gray tabby and a calico. Lisa is letting her come inside occasionally, both to get warm and to get used to us. Last Saturday, Ollie did something new. She jumped up on one of our recliners.

Now, I have a strange sense of humor that leans a great deal on absurdities. Most of the time, when someone doesn't get one of my jokes, it's because I haven't given them my often warped mental context.

When Ollie got on the recliner, I said what I thought was a harmless joke aimed at her. I used a rather rude word. Lisa thought it was aimed at her and took great offense. The next few hours were not pleasant for me.

Lisa wasn't my target. For that matter, neither was Ollie. The situation was, but without my context, how could my wife know that? It really didn't make things better that I got snippy with her that she didn't buy my explanation, not at first.

We got over it. We always do. But I forgot a very valuable lesson from a business communications class I took almost 20 years ago: take 100% of the responsibility for your message.

I'm certain most of us have heard this old saying - Sticks and stones may break my bones, but words can never hurt me. Well, this old saw is well-intentioned, but like using a rusty hammer when you mean to make a precise cut in a board, it's wrong.

We are a social species. Our ability to live with each other is bound up in our ability to tell each other our stories. Our ability to think is both shaped and limited by our language. We can transcend this limit, which in turn shapes our language.

If your doubt the power of words, consider these phrases:
- I love you.
- You may now kiss the bride.
- It's a boy/girl!
- We find the defendant guilty as charged.
- I'm sorry for your loss.

Words can wound, and words can heal. They can imprison you, and they can set you free. They can illuminate ideas with perfect clarity, and they can obfuscate them with infuriating indirection.

They can tell you the daily same old, same old. They can teach you timeless history. They can give you a boundless future.

The key is to be aware of the tools you have in your words, so that you are their master and not their slave. Or, to use another old saw, say what you mean and mean what you say.

A Thought On Language

2010-01-16T21:49:00.002-05:00

Just as a sculptor has to know the stone, and an orchestrator needs to understand all the instruments, so also the writer needs to know the language down to the bone.

- Orson Scott Card

On Laughter

2010-01-15T11:30:00.005-05:00

However, a good laugh is a mighty good thing, and rather too scarce a good thing; the more's the pity. So if any one man, in his own proper person, afford stuff for a good joke to anybody, let him not be backward, but let him cheerfully allow himself to spend and to be spent in that way. And the man that has anything bountifully laughable about him, be sure there is more in that man than you perhaps think for.

- Herman Melville, Moby Dick

Pigeon: Impossible

2010-01-14T21:14:00.001-05:00

This could be a Pixar short. Yes, it's that good. Enjoy.

Buried and Strange

2010-01-14T21:06:00.002-05:00

A lawyer named Strange died, and his friend asked the tombstone maker to inscribe on his tombstone, "Here lies Strange, an honest man, and a lawyer."

The inscriber insisted that such an inscription would be confusing, for passersby would tend to think that three men were buried under the stone.

However he suggested an alternative: He would inscribe, "Here lies a man who was both honest and a lawyer. That way, whenever anyone walked by the tombstone and read it, they would be certain to remark: 'That's Strange!'"

Thanks to John Varley, and if I'm unintentionally violating copyright, I want him to know that I don't use Sidewiki!

Sal the Cat

2010-01-14T20:37:00.005-05:00

He looks up at you with huge eyes, as if to say "It's not my fault!"

Short Visits

2010-01-01T10:19:00.005-05:00

Lisa and I were at home a week ago, having exchanged our Christmas gifts to each other and listening to freezing rain and sleet coming down. I had just called Dad and Mom to let them know that we weren't traveling to Whiteville after all.

That was the second time we changed travel plans in two days.

We originally planned to go see them this week when the kids got here from Indiana. I talked to my ex's partner on Wednesday night, and she told me that they intended to be on the road to North Carolina on the 27th, returning home on the 30th. I checked the Weather Channel web site and saw a great deal of snow in their forecast. That made me believe that they would not be able to make the trip, so I told my parents that Lisa and I would see them on Christmas Day.

That was the first time we changed travel plans.

I got a call in the middle of Christmas afternoon. It was Gigi, with welcome news. They had already started their trip south, expecting to stop overnight in Ohio and get to Greensboro on the 26th. This was most unexpected, given the forecasts, and I felt like I'd gotten the best Christmas present since I was a kid. I called Dad and Mom again to let them know that the kids were going to be here for a couple of days after all and to that we were coming down for a day trip on the 28th.

That was our third change in travel plans, and the most pleasant.

Dad was grilling inch-thick steaks when we got there, along with seasoned potatoes in foil. Lord, but we were all stuffed! We exchanged gifts after lunch, I played tech support for Mom's computer -- Internet Explorer was giving her problems, imagine that -- and my cousin Denise and her daughter Alex stopped by. Alex is 10 months older than Gigi, and they're thicker than thieves. I got to enjoy just sitting and listening to two or three other conversations for a while.

After Denise and Alex left, we went to visit Aunt Mildred, Dad's oldest sister by 10 years. She has a bad back, can't hear very well, and is a bit forgetful, but she's getting around better than Dad these days. She always makes coffee when I visit, even though she doesn't drink it anymore. And what coffee does she have? Decaf Fresh Market Christmas Blend. We gave it to her a couple of years ago, and she keeps it in the freezer. It still tastes fresh, and she's just a joy.

At home, we watched a lot of TV on DVD that the kids either don't usually see or were quite behind on: Seasons 1 and 2 of The Big Bang Theory (Everyone loves "The Saturnalia Miracle" episode!), and Season 1 of Better Off Ted (Who wouldn't want to work for Viridian Dynamics?).

Since they were departing for Indiana very early on the 30th, I took them back to their aunt and uncle's house the evening before. On the drive home, I felt, as always, the emptiness they leave behind. It doesn't persist quite as long as it used to, and why should it? My children are growing up well, and they have reached ages where it's natural for them to make their own ways in the world. Time has caught up with the changes in my role as a parent.

An Administrative Note

2010-01-01T09:54:00.006-05:00

I am almost always glad when visitors to Babble On leave comments. More often than not, that means I have amused someone, and that's a pleasure to me. However, that was not the case with the comments on my previous post.

One comment, left anonymously, was nothing but links to girly, probably porn, sites. The other was an ad for an online gambling site.

I was a regular contributor to several Usenets sites during the last 10 years, and I have seen many troll-instigated flame wars. That is always a risk following unmoderated newsgroups.

Here, commentary falls under almost the same category. The difference is that this my property, and while I, should I ever have a high enough volume of readers, will gladly tolerate lively differences of opinion, I will be a host to neither pornography nor someone else's advertising.

I have therefore deleted the comments that have offended my sensibilities, and will do so in the future. Yes, this is censorship, but don't bother blathering on about the First Amendment; I am not abridging any one's political speech. I am muzzling trespass.

I Thought That Cover Looked Quaint

2009-12-16T11:49:00.003-05:00

Stanley Dudek, on behalf of his mother, returned Facts I Ought to Know about the Government of My Country to the New Bedford, Massachusetts library a little late. The due date was May 2, 1910. The $360 late fee was waived.

On the Off Ramp

2009-12-16T09:21:00.002-05:00

I have several different routes to and from work. The variety helps relieve tedium. This habit of mine drives my wife crazy, as she likes her routes well-mapped out and consistent. I try to remember this when she's riding with me and keep to the same routes, because giving her a nice comfort level is worth it to me.

Part of my route this morning was on the interstate. After taking my exit, I had to stop for a red light at the bottom of the off ramp. I was in the outside one of the two left turn lanes. There was no car next to me for a couple of minutes, and I had a clear view of a fresh cigarette butt. I watched the smoke rising from it as it rolled away from me toward the edge of the road, and I envisioned a tumbling, fiery wreck. After all, cigarettes are dangerous -- no one but those who are ignorant of a half-century of scientific research, those who are willfully delusional, or tobacco company executives can believe differently -- just much slower in the damage they inflict. And in this mental image, I felt strangely, strangely alone.

Then, the light changed, and I came on in to the office. I think I need another cup of coffee.

A Breakroom Exchange

2009-12-15T08:34:00.002-05:00

A co-worker was filling his water jug when I walked in to get hot water for my coffee. Here's a portion of our conversation:

Co-worker: And how are you today?
Me: I can't complain.
Co-worker: You could try.
Me: I could, but it wouldn't do any good.
Co-worker: I like that, a self-aware man.

Not a bad way to start a morning, being called self-aware.

The Things Twitter Leads You To

2009-12-12T22:06:00.004-05:00

The personal trainer t-shirt. If this doesn't have a bigger future than the pet rock, it should at least have a more practical one.

A Doggone Good Job

2009-12-11T19:30:00.001-05:00

Thanks, Sandy!

A Moment of Recognition

2009-12-10T22:30:00.003-05:00

Yesterday, I left work at 7:00 pm, in the late autumn evening darkness. I noted a clear sky, a warm temperature for the season, and twinkling stars. Once I parked my car outside the apartment, I looked through the open patio door and saw our Christmas tree and my wife sitting at her computer.

My thought right then? I'm richly blessed.

50 - 238: The Holiday Moratorium

2009-12-10T21:24:00.006-05:00

Monday starts an annual event at work. For three weeks, lacking executive management approval or a system outage affecting customers, we can't move any changes to production. This is a self-defense mechanism implemented by the European parent corporation, a reaction to the sheer number of people taking time off from the job. The reasoning goes, "Where is the production support coming from, if a change breaks something?"

While I enjoy my Christmas vacation as much as anyone, I've been on-call during the holiday period, and I've handled work calls on Christmas Day before, so I just can't imagine a purely American company operating so.

This is simply one of a myriad of cultural differences.

The most prominent difference is that the parent culture prizes consensus, the prolonged decision making where everyone is welcome to question and to provide input, up to the point that the group realizes a decision has been reached. At that point, everyone is expected to conform to the group decision and not rock the boat.

American culture prizes individual initiative, giving the one who takes the lead the freedom to rock the boat, as long as the path taken works without exorbitant costs in either money or process.

In the current structure of my company, this difference is exacerbated by a recently completed reorganization. Here in Greensboro, we used to act like the internal IT department for our largest local client company; we're under the same corporate umbrella. Now, the parent company's mantra is that we work with common methods on global solutions. Further, over the next few years, the company will be creating centers of competency, thereby locating specific functions at one or two sites, each serving the entire corporation. This means that jobs will be rightsized to a rationalized cost structure.

Because I have a good deal of contact with my customers, because I have accepted the function of maintenance manager for multiple applications, and because I already work on a global application, I'm not really scared of losing my job. At this point, I'm more concerned that the nature of my job is going to change into something that is less enjoyable than what I do now.

Be that as it may, I have a job that I am reasonably well compensated for, that lets me support my wife, that lets me pay my share of the college tuition for my two oldest children, that provides shelter and clothing and a few luxuries for my family. I have programming challenges that keep my mind engaged, customers that I generally keep happy with the support I provide, and colleagues with whom I enjoy mutual respect.

And oh yeah, quite a few genuine friendships at work that I treasure.

So, how's the holiday moratorium going to affect me this year? Well, I got the last of several required user approvals on a package of enhancements to my global application this morning, IT approval to implement this afternoon, and tomorrow right after the end of the business day, I going to move this set of changes to production. Good for me.

There's a change to one of my web services that I'm working with a European consumer on, and we've had coordination problems for the last month. I've already started the process to get executive approval on a moratorium exception on this one, since project funding runs out at the end of the year. There's still testing to do, but I'm optimistic that this will work out.

A Christmas Greeting

2009-12-06T10:02:00.001-05:00

Compare And Contrast: A Trans-Siberian Orchestra Concert And A US Airways Flight

2009-11-27T07:58:00.005-05:00

In the past two days, I've attended this year's TSO concert in Greensboro and taken a flight on US Airways to visit my kids at Thanksgiving. Let's examine a few aspects of the two experiences.

Food. We ate a meal at CiCi's Pizza before the concert. It's certainly more expensive there now than when I could take all the kids and feed all four of us for under $15. Still, it's filling (very), there's plenty of variety, the pizza is quite tasty, and we were satisfied.

I took a couple of breakfast bars on the flight out Greensboro, Chex Mix Turtle bars, to be exact. They're my favorite quick breakfast this side of Chick-Fil-A's chicken burritos, but they left me feeling hungry.

My connecting flight was through Philadelphia, and I had enough time to get a larger breakfast of scrambled eggs, home fries, and sausage. Yummy, and reasonably priced for airport fare. It's a little bit surreal that I got this from an Italian eatery...

All told, the concert experience wins the food battle.

The wait. We got into the parking lot at the Coliseum with very little delay. TSO scheduled two shows in Greensboro this year, the four o'clock show started a half-hour late, and since they perform for 2.5 hours, we had to wait to enter the arena for the 8:00 show. Of course, that show started about 20 minutes late...

Both of my flights arrived at their destinations on time, but they were stuck on the tarmacs before departures. In fact, the flight from Philadelphia to Indianapolis left Philly about 20 minutes late, but we still arrived early in Indy.

This one's a tie.

Seating. There was more room on the airplane than at the Greensboro Coliseum. The flight wins this leg.

Noise. Who are we kidding here? TSO puts on a rock concert, wired for sound and light and light and sound, and they rock hard. Next category.

Speed. Greensboro to Philadelphia to Indianapolis in less than six hours, including 2.5 hours of airport wait time. Point to US Airways.

Atmosphere. The air at the Greensboro Coliseum was smoky from the pyrotechnics used in the show. The air before the flight from Greensboro was foggy, enough so in Philly to make us wait on the runway. Tie.

So, Eddie, who won? I did, in every way imaginable.

This Makes Me Happy

2009-11-25T10:30:00.004-05:00

I had a similar experience, way back in the dark, dark pre-YouTube days. I didn't have a camcorder back in 1994, so there's no record of David shakin' it to Alan Jackson's Livin' On Love on the radio, but the memory gives me great joy.

50 - 254: Where He Says "If", I Am

2009-11-24T19:01:00.003-05:00

In my Taking Stock series, I usually do not rely on the words of others, but the publisher of Skeptic magazine captured my belief on religion vs. science perfectly.

If one is a theist, it should not matter when God made the universe -- 10,000 years ago or 10 billion years ago. The difference of six zeros is meaningless to an omniscient and omnipotent being, and the glory of divine creation cries out for praise regardless of when it happened.

Likewise, it should not matter how God created life, whether it was through a miraculous spoken word or through the natural forces of the universe that He created. The grandeur of God's works commands awe regardless of what processes He used.

As for meanings and morals, it is here where our humanity arises from our biology. We evolved as a social primate species with the tendency of being cooperative and altruistic within our own groups, but competitive and bellicose between groups. The purpose of civilization is to help us rise above our hearts of darkness and to accentuate the better angels of our nature.

- Michael Shermer, cnn.com

I'm Just Wondering

2009-11-22T11:57:00.004-05:00

Would the world be a better place if folks did like I did at the grocery store this morning? After I unloaded my cart and pushed it over to the cart return, I took the time to gather the scattered carts together. I normally only do that with my cart, but there were only three others this time, and by taking about 30 seconds out of my day, I made things easier for the next store employee who will be sent out to bring carts in, and I made sure that three carts were less likely to roll around the parking lot.

It's a simple courtesy that I didn't used to care about, but I find now that, like giving a smile to someone as I walk by, it costs me next to nothing and brightens my small corner of the world.

From 4 To 5

2009-11-21T12:54:00.004-05:00

There's always been a periodic something, throughout my whole career, about that last hour of the workday. I experienced it twice this week, for the first time in quite a while. It's something you'll probably understand, if your labor is more mental than physical, as mine is when I'm deep into a programming task.

I literally cannot count the number of times that I've opened my work day optimistically, just knowing that I've picked apart a knotty bit of logic and that I was going to dazzle myself and my fellow developers. Almost every time, I would have been better following the old saw about being a pessimist -- you're pleasantly surprised when things turn out well.

Programming is described by Fred Brooks, the project manager behind IBM's OS/360 and the author of The Mythical Man-Month, as the discipline of building things out of pure thought stuff. This means that there's no limit on the raw material needed for the job. It means as well that there are hundreds, if not thousands, of ways to do any particular task, and even more ways to it wrong.

Programming is an exacting discipline. Computers make no assumptions, provide no defaults. This means that developers must supply all the details in every layer, from the bare metal and plastic and silicon to the operating system to the network to the database to the web page in the browser.

It's those little details that trip me up: the need to specify an absolute path to the directory where I want to write a file rather than a relative path from the web page I'm programming; drilling down to the exact property of an object to get the value I want to work with rather than stopping at too high a level; forgetting a period or a semi-colon (depending on the punctuation a programming language demands) and thereby blowing the scope of a conditional statement.

These are just a sampling of the reasons that programming, testing, and debugging are still more art than science.

So after the optimistic start to a day writing computer code gets shot and left dying in the dust, after frustrating hours of echoing obscenities in my head, how is it that in that last hour of the workday, my subconscious mind is liable to offer up a solution? Not only a solution, but one that is usually not only workable, but even elegant?

I rather hope this remains a question whose answer eludes me. Otherwise, I'm afraid I'll have graduated from craft to engineering, and I'll feel more like a cog in a wheel than a mystic.

The Lil' Spittle Maker

2009-11-09T20:39:00.009-05:00

He drools. He sticks one leg straight up in the air when he licks his nethers; I think of this as his "little teapot" pose.

There are commercial opportunities to be had here. I wonder if anyone is cybersquatting on TheLilSpittleMaker.com.

Yankees 4, Phillies 2

2009-11-07T11:07:00.003-05:00

Well, I can't honestly say that there's a lot of joy in the World Series results for this National League fan. However, I must acknowledge that the best team in Major League Baseball did win.

I was right a couple of years ago when I said that Alex Rodriguez would succeed in the post-season when Curt Schilling did not. After all, retiring from the game would preclude success in the October (and November) baseball.

Homecoming

2009-11-06T22:27:00.003-05:00

This past Sunday was Homecoming at Pleasant Plains Baptist Church. My parents' church, the one I grew up in. It was also the final celebration of the church's 175th anniversary.

The usual order of the day at Homecoming is, as with the invitation to family and friends and former members, to invite a former pastor to come back and deliver the message. This time, instead, there were three speakers, members at Pleasant Plains, who gave testimonials to what the church has meant to them, to the history of the church.

The most noteworthy of the speakers, to me, was Dan Gore. He's a scholar, a farmer, a preacher, and an accomplished storyteller. He rambled a bit, as all the best Southern spinners of tales do, and one of his vignettes concerned a heavy church bell installed in the steeple belfry back in the 1930s. About a year after they got the bell, several church members were concerned that it might be too heavy for the structure to bear long-term. Several trustees of the church were nominated to climb up in the belfry and inspect the bell. Dan's dad Scott was one of the trustees, so he got to tag along.

The stairwell up through the steeple was dark, Dan recalled, but there was plenty of light at the top. They examined the timbers holding up the bell, and one of the trustees said, "You couldn't blow that out of there with a charge of dynamite."

That's all there was to the story, except for two small details. The trustee didn't pronounce the word "dine-a-mite"; he said "din-a-mite". And the trustee's name was Don Ward.

My granddaddy. I heard him say "din-a-mite" many, many times.

This was a new story to me. It's been nearly 30 years since Granddaddy passed away, but for a few minutes last Sunday morning, in a rare and precious gift, Dan Gore brought him back to life for me.

This Old Lady Has It Down Pat

2009-10-29T12:38:00.002-04:00

Two old women meet for the first time since graduating from high school. One asked the other, "You were always so organized in school. Did you manage to live a well planned life?" "Yes," said her friend, "My first marriage was to a millionaire; my second marriage was to an actor; my third marriage was to a preacher; and now I'm married to an undertaker." Her friend asked, "What do those marriages have to do with a well planned life?" One for the money, two for the show, three to get ready, and four to go!"

via Varley.net

Quote of the Day

2009-10-28T16:04:00.004-04:00

There are a lot of voices calling for sf/f to get the recognition it deserves, but I think that's wasted breath. We're trying harder and harder to get recognized and admitted to a club that just keeps getting smaller and duller and less important. What we need to understand is that sf/f is the seat of innovation, modern creativity and true cultural relevance. Of course the literary establishment is borrowing from our toolbox. It's the best toolbox there is, and they're welcome to borrow it. It's kind of amusing to watch them treat time travel, or the apocalypse, or whatever else as a shiny new plot device. They probably won't hurt themselves. - Tim Akers

via SFSignal.com

Quote of the Day

2009-10-27T09:23:00.003-04:00

Someone in the 2009 World Series will likely hit a home run with a piece of carefully turned, meticulously sanded wood that a year ago was living on the 8,000 acres of woodland that Louisville Slugger owns in Pennsylvania and New York. Babe Ruth held a Louisville Slugger when he called his Game 3 shot in Wrigley Field in 1932. Jackie Robinson had a special bat for the Series in 1955 when next year finally came to Brooklyn. Roberto Clemente got his 36-inch, 37-ounce World Series model in time to hit .414 over seven games for the Pirates in 1971. The players change and the game does too, but one thing remains the same: get to the World Series and the folks at Louisville Slugger will make a bat for you. - Kostya Kennedy, si.com

Quote of the Day

2009-10-26T14:15:00.003-04:00

A computer without Microsoft is like a chocolate cake without mustard. - Walter Bushell

Quote of the Day

2009-10-25T08:20:00.002-04:00

A man who uses a great many words to express his meaning is like a bad marksman who, instead of aiming a single stone at an object, takes up a handful and throws at it in hopes he may hit. - Samuel Johnson, lexicographer (1709-1784)

via Wordsmith.org