Category Life

Why do we write

Michael Leave a comment

When we started we grumbld at what national tv gaves us in the guise of reality, we knew that reality had hold to do with our perceptiontion of reality. It sures seems real, therefor it must be real.

Afterr a while the perception draws into presumption. The logic of realism exceeding the idea that it could be real.

Or another way to say, “darned, it think we’re on to something. Sort of like saying “Wouldn,t it be nice to hear someone say “hank you’ before being pawed for payment.”. And in another bit we became inner experts making ourselves content in doing what is right for us the writer, hoping to get it right for the reader.  Because now we interact. We ask partners to edit. We ask others to follow. We paraphrase winners.

And ocassionslly we ask favors. My turn.  I had a pretty rough patch in the hospital the last couple of days . I am not above myslef asking for extra prayers so we can continue our real world of realality.

Take’s what I think. How ’bout you?

Let me follow neither path but blaze a new trail for others

Michael Leave a comment

Last night the Grammy’s were awarded. Peer managed awards are great hings. These are common people of common challenges determining common excellence. They are the choices of the people who do and know, not of the people who watch and wonder.

Most of us won’t ever get the chance of such a strong peer review process. Maybe we’ll get a “shake it out” job review but not anything like having thousands of our peers pass judgement on our performance. Then I thought, maybe we do.

Last summer I left a job to have a surgical procedure taken care of. The time was right. The contract I was working on was expired and I would be moving on to a new position anyway. I had a couple of awards under my belt and knew I could win a Grammy. But I didn’t know how. I figured I set back and let the world beat the proverbial path. But my mousetrap wasn’t good enough.

What it did was open a small clearing that eventually, and very slowly, I had to blaze into a new trial. I’m mixing my metaphors. Let me start over.

I thought I didn’t need professional communication. Everybody in my world knew me. But I needed to not get bored so I turned to the old stand-by “how was you day?” talk at dinner with Daughter of He. And do you know what? It didn’t work. What did . . . and to make a long story short . . . was that eventually we started talking about what mattered. I was lucky enough to actually have someone to talk to and “How was you day?” turned into “Why did you do that?”

It might sound funny but that started with cooking. Cooking is that universal extra thing most everyone likes to do. It got us into real talk about why when this is added to that it tastes thus. And we understood the process so that meant that we were comfortable talking about it.

While we were busy critiquing my dinners we started speaking of more profound topics – finances, relationships, responsibilities – and becoming more comfortable with those. What was most important was that I was finally getting a peer review like no other.

Did I earn my Grammy? Don’t know, but keep reading. There might be some clarity opening up soon.

That’s what I think. How ’bout you?

This Blog is a Mess and I Am Too

Michael Leave a comment

Sometime in January I was admitted to the hospital. This has happened before. Since I wasn’t doing anything else when it happened I had packed up my laptop and moved along like nothing else happened. Hospitals aren’t good places for laptaps but I had a bunch a partially written posts and the mobile app on my tablet. Problem solved! It was untill I discovered instead of saving new drafts I was posting embarassingly, gramatically compromised final products. Ooops. Right on up to emails announcing my boo-boos. Double ooops.

I think I have fixed all of the messed up “new posts” and you should be able to go to home and read what I really thought. And can do it without thinking too poorly of me. At least I hope so.

Now that’s what I tink. How ’bout you?

The Things People Do

Michael Leave a comment

Recently, some crazy person was on TV expounding on the benefits of artificial milk products, justifying her opinion by declaring that “humans are the only mammals that (sic) drink milk into adulthood.” If you want to be crazy, be crazy. It’s one of the things humans do into adulthood. And then I started thinking of all the things humans do that other mammals don’t. I really hope the crazy lady is reading because these are all things she should not be doing and helping others is another thing humans do.

Humans are the only mammals who:

Read for pleasure,

Read for anything,

Know that war and battles are so wrong that one of us donated a lot of money to establish a prize to celebrate peace,

Laugh

Clean and cook food to feed to our families so we aren’t limited to dinners of furry rabbit tartar with a tall glass of rice milk,

Invent stuff,

Can write all of Shakespeare’s plays without the help of 1,000 close friends and random blind luck (in fact, one guy did just that),

Know that music soothes the savage breast,

Heal illnesses,

Discover vaccines,

Create and maintain safe habitats for other mammals,

Appreciate ballet, tap, jazz, break, and dirty dancing,

I don’t begrudge the crazy lady for voicing her views.  If it weren’t for us humans she’d not have the right to speak her opinion freely.  I am upset that she is inferring that her view must be the correct one based on faulty logic. It might be a fact but is has nothing to do with the argument. It is like saying that indoor plumbing works because humans are the only mammals who make doctor appointments for themselves.

There are no count of the things that make humans different from other mammals.   For that we should be infinitely grateful.

That’s what I think. How ’bout you.

Happy Groundhog Day

Michael Leave a comment

Yes, today is the most useful holiday of the year, determining if you keep your winter whoolies available or plan for early spring cleaning.  But first, a couple thoughts. If you aren’t interested in my thoughts, skip to the last paragraph. I won’t mind.

Used to be when you cheated and were caught, whatever it was that you got by cheating was taken away from you. That must have been before people paid a couple of thousand dollars to watch you cheat.  But that’s a post for a different day.  And besides, someone else already coined the word “deflategate.”

Of course I am referring to the AFC championsip game of two weeks ago. There weren’t a lot of people who said that if there was some question of how either team got to the championship game there should have been an immediate investigation and maybe even replay the game that decided who got to go to SB49. If you cheated on your test to become a doctor and were caught, you might get to still become a doctor but not on the strength of that test. Again, a post for a different day.

What was more unsettling was that toward the end of the game a fight broke out. Last fall in Pennsylvania at the state football championship, the team expected to win was losing. It was almost at the end of the game and a fight broke out. The officials stopped the game. Didn’t let them play out the ritualistic kneel-down. Didn’t even let them shake hands. Eventually the instigators apologized, were put on probation for a year and the coach was suspended for the next game which will be next year. It didn’t change any outcomes but it let coaches and players and administrators know that someone is watching. Still another day’s post.

Someday, someone will decide if a rule was broken (it was) and if someone did it intentionally (he did).  Maybe somebody will be punished but outcomes won’t change and people will continue to watch.

The most unsettling of it all was that it cast a cloud over Groundhog Day. Pun intended. Today’s post is being released a little later than usual because I had to wait for Phil to make his appearance. And appear he did, a bit after seven this morning, seeing his shadow regardless of those clouds, thus forecasting six more weeks of winter. Naysayers say nay, nay, the animal is right only 40% of the time. I say that isn’t so bad, it’s great even. Ask any major league baseball player htting for average. So to those who say we’re putting too much faith in what we can’t control I say too bad. I for one will not be pulling out my spring wardrobe this week. Actually, Phil is correct 100% of the time. It says so on his Internet site, groundhog.org.  If he says he’s right 100% of the time then he is right 100% of the time. After all, he’s a champion prognostigator and he didn’t cheat to get there.

That’s what I think. How ’bout you?

Mondays (and Thursdays) with Those Reality Blog People

Michael Leave a comment

It’s been 18 years since “Tuesdays with Morrie” by Mitch Albom was published. I saw a reference to that book a while ago and thought to myself (as most thoughts are), what a great concept for a blog. Then I thought again to myself not just what a concept but what a pioneer!

If this were then, or then were now, was now, was then…you get the idea. If there were blogs then we could have been graced with Morrie’s wisdom without Mitch’s intervention. Morrie could have posted his own blog!

Really, isn’t that what we do everytime a post is uploaded – share a little piece of ourseves and share our wisdom? Mitch and Morrie were indeed pioneers. They just didn’t know it yet.

That’s what I think. How ’bout you?

No Means Why Not

Michael Leave a comment

Jerry Seinfeld once said that the only warning label people really pay attention to is “Dry Clean Only.”  He has a point.  Just about everything else we are told not to do we do and do it with gusto.  If you take a warning label, put it on steroids, turn the fabric to metal, and hang it on a pole along the side of the road you get those big warning signs.  They don’t have anywhere near the impact of “Dry Clean Only.”

Perhaps it’s because we got back to real winter weather.  Perhaps it’s because all of the stars lined up just right and all of the blind, nearly blind, and soon to be blind-sided were out driving at the same time.  Perhaps it’s because so many people take traffic laws as suggestions.  For whatever reason, yesterday was not a day to be out driving in the local business district.

There are some “No” traffic laws that are never going to be heeded.  No passing on right.  No turns from shoulder.  No lane changing in tunnel.   Most people do them and get away with them without much problem.  There are other “No” laws that are to be heeded because they are more vital to life.  They usually involve aiming the car at a point that crosses traffic and that traffic is usually high speed and busy not paying attention to its own warnings.  No left turn.  No U turn.  No turn on red.  Yesterday was the day that for every “No” the signs said there was a driver saying “Oh yes I can.”

It’s along one span of a quite large business route that there are traffic lights every 500 feet or so.  Shopping centers, malls, clusters of stores and restaurants, and car dealerships line both sides of the 4 or 5 mile stretch of roadway.  To keep unnecessary traffic out of these various shopping areas’ parking lots, most of the lights permit U-turns.  But then, most of the road is only 2 lanes in either direction.  At the two lights where the road expands to 4 lanes each way the lights are clearly signed “No U Turn.”  At both of these there were cars literally lined up to reverse their courses rather than travel the quarter-mile to the next legal switching point.  At both of these the cars were still lined up after at one intersection the U-Turning car was struck by another and at the second the U-Turning car crossed two lanes of traffic and did half a donut to avoid being struck by a car bearing down on him.

Along a different road there are two “No Left Turn” intersections that, if permitted, would require the turning car to pass in front of three lanes of uncontrolled oncoming traffic.  At the first of these I had to stop while not one, not two, but three of the four cars ahead prepared to make an unlawful left turn.  To be safe about it, they all had their turn signals on.  At the second of these there was only one car making its illegal turn.  That car was a police car.

There just isn’t enough space to detail all of the No Turn on Red turns but one was absolutely spectacular.  That will be a post for another day.

There was no indication of how many of these scofflaws needed to have something dry cleaned.  By the end of the day, I did.

Now that’s what I think. Really. How ‘bout you.

 

Then I Lay Me Down to Sleep

Michael Leave a comment

I don’t want to get maudlin here but lately I’ve been wondering if there are some things I want to do before kicking the proverbial bucket.  Proverbially.  Not so long ago we posted a “Hole in the Bucket List,” or those things we really don’t want to do.  (See “I Would Do Anything – Not!” Feb. 11, 2013.)  That list ran the gamut from alligator wrestling to tornado chasing.  And even in thinking of those things I’d like to do there are more that I don’t and certainly won’t than those that I wish I had and will try to do.  But if one was to write a bucket list and if that one was me, what would be there?  First it would be of three parts – things to do, places to go, and experiences to um, experience.

Starting with the second first we find the easiest category.  There was once a time that I’d have been convinced that I couldn’t call it a life fulfilled if I hadn’t visited all fifty of the United States.  With apologies to the Midwest, once I got to Kansas, that goal tarnished.  There’s only so much flat and level one can take.  There just isn’t that much difference between North and South Dakotas, and ditto the Carolinas to require four stops on that Triptik.  Alaska is way too big and Rhode Island is way too small to compose jaw dropping long weekends. Fifty states are just too many for more than just weekends.  Regions are a different story.  New England, Mid-Atlantic, Southeast, Southwest, Midwest, West Coast, Northwest.  Those are manageable.  And I’ve been to them all so that’s off the list.  But within each region there are special places.  And some special places deserve special notice.

One city that I have to get to while the getting is still getable is Punxsutawney Pennsylvania, home of Punxsutawney Phil, the world’s greatest weather rodent.   Another go to place is the home of the world’s greatest, and first pizza, Naples.  Naples is also the home of half of my heritage so a trip there would kill two tomatoes with one wheel of cheese.

Things to do before that bucket tips are probably at the top of everyone’s list.  I guess I never have been that conventional.  If I wanted to do it, it has already been done.   There aren’t that many noteworthy things that I feel I have to do again.  Drive across country – done that.  Jump out of a flying object – once was enough and I did it more than that!  Race around a race track in a race car just like a race car driver – no desire.  Nope, there aren’t many things to do to be done or else feel like there is something missing in my life.  Two things to continue to do are to wind down in the hot tub and to wind it up cruising top down along a country lane.  And if I get to pick a companion it would be She.

Part place to go, thing to do, and experience to experience is the last item on the list.  Last here is certainly not least but is at least the least likely to be experienced, or done, or gone to when last call is called.  That would be the Mediterranean Wine Cruise.  Years ago while dreaming of vacations to consider, She and I ran across an ad for a two week cruise across the Mediterranean Sea and all the ports of call were where “wine country” was one of your first thoughts of the area.  Whoever put this together did not use Mediterranean euphemistically like we feel compelled to in this country.  It was not code for Turkey or Greece.  It covered all of the countries that touch that body of water and there are a lot of them.  And they all make wine.  We didn’t get there and for why ever that was it never seemed to be a big deal except for now when I think of places I’d like to go or things I like to do or an experience I’d like to have that I didn’t, or hadn’t, or wanted.

So they aren’t the most adventurous things and places and what nots.  That’s my list and I’m sticking to it.  I wonder now, what would happen if you compare this list with the Hole in the Bucket List?  I guess that makes these sort of the pros and cons of things to do today.

Now, that’s what I think. Really. How ‘bout you?

 

If Not For Bad Luck

Michael Leave a comment

A recent Reuters news article reported that 65% of cancers can be attributed to physiological bad luck.  Some 22 of 31 identified cancer types were traced to unexplained, random cell mutations.  These cancers included leukemia, pancreatic cancer, and ovarian and testicular cancer.  The other nine types which included lung, skin, and colorectal cancers, could be attributed to environmental or hereditary changes.  One of the researchers whose work was examined for the article was quoted saying the real reason that people get cancer in many cases, “is that person was unlucky. It’s losing the lottery.”

Well, that’s a relief.  I thought I had done something wrong to earn my cancer.  Fortunately now I know that it was just plain old bad luck.  It was probably bad luck that I had a surgical wound open up after the operation to remove that fluke.  That was compounded by more bad luck when the infection popped up.  And let’s not forget the bad luck of the revisions to the original surgery that had to be performed, all of that keeping me in the hospital some six months out of the past eighteen.

And it was during those same eighteen months that the company I was contracted to sold off the facility I was assigned to dropping me into the ranks of the unemployed as well as those of the unlucky.  The unlucky circumstances thus continued when all of the treatments and therapies though quite effective in keeping me alive couldn’t keep me with enough stamina to work a full business day so I continue to be unemployed while searching for an employer compassionate enough to understand that someone who has been extremely effective can still be so while working only half days at a time.

Of course there was the additional unluckiness of not being a child, a single mom, a returning veteran, a celebrity, a politician, or a television or movie character that may or may not be based on an actual person.  Nobody was submitting my name to any foundation to cover the expenses of a trip to Pisa or to Punxsutawney while arranging for free housekeeping, a new suit, and an interview on the late show thus garnering enough new found publicity that the previous paragraph’s ill fortune was quite handsomely negated.

So now I spend most days filling out insurance forms and sweepstakes entries with about the same odds of success, job applications with even longer odds, or call an old colleague to see if he or she has any spare hours or opportunities with the longest odds of them all.  On the bright side, I have been catching up with my reading and writing.  Seriously, on the bright side…come on, seriously a bright side?

Imagine playing the lottery with a 65% chance of hitting.  Oh wait, the researcher said that was like losing the lottery.  I manage to do that every week, twice a week.  That is ok.  If I hit the lottery I’d probably just squander the winnings on things like food and mortgage payments.  What a relief that choice doesn’t have to be made!  And here I thought I was just plain old unlucky.

Sorry, not every post is going to be up-beat.  Just real.

Now, that’s what I think. Really. How ‘bout you?

 

Let’s Stay In Touch

Michael Leave a comment

It’s much too early to make any New Year’s resolutions.  (If you haven’t already, you can see our thoughts on New Year’s resolutions at “Revolving Resolutions (Dec. 30, 2013), Resolving to Keep It Real (Dec. 31, 2012), Be It Resolved (Jan. 2, 2012), and/or Be It Further Resolved (March 22, 2012).)  However, it might be just the right time to make a New Year’s Eve resolution.

It was sometime last week when there were five people and four oh-so-smart phones at the table all at the same time.  This was He’s extended family and usually that group can never find any of their phones.  But for some reason, on that day everybody but one (and oddly enough that was the youngest of the group and a true card carrying member of the “Don’t Leave Home Without It As Long As It Is a Phone Brigade”) had his or her cell phone strapped, perched, or holstered onto his or her body or close by.  Miraculously, nobody’s phone made a peep during the meal which is why all of them were at the table at the same time.  But the site of all that electronic wizardry did start a story.  And so it went.

Once upon a time, staying in touch was easy.  If you wanted to speak with someone you called that someone.  Landline and then cell phone calls were an easy push button distance to just about anyone.  If nobody answered there was usually an answering machine or voice mail willing to take a message.  Even as home computing became the norm, e-mail was available and handy for sending large amounts of information or even sharing files.  And thus we managed quite well getting our lunches planned, our rides scheduled, and our points across.

And then the madness struck!

It was even before the smart phone revolution.  Texting.  At first, only the 13-18 demographic texted.  It made perfect sense.  Texts were free.  Calls were still charged by the minute.  Parents knew about every call made.  Parents cared less about texts.  They showed up on bills as numbers of but followed by NC – No Charge.  HW!  (How Wonderful).  As the 13-18 year olds aged, their favored means of communication improved.  Texts became faster and clearer.  And as the texting became easier, the parents and other fogies suddenly realized they too could be saving time and money.  What two better things are there to save.

With the time saved they all became users of Twitter, Facebook, Pinterest, Linked In, Skype, YouTube, and YouNameIt.  Many, many ways to stay in touch.  Then problems started arising when people started realizing they were on too many services to stay on all of them as much as they wanted.  And thus, each picked a favorite.  All different favorites!  But they rarely shared which was their favored favorite.  So if you want to reach your best friend you have call, leave a message, then text, then private message on Facebook.  At least one of those will be ringing, humming, or vibrating your recipient’s phone.  If all else fails, there’s always e-mail and maybe a landline phone call, possibly to the work number.

So what’s the resolution?  For the callee, everybody should resolve to tell everybody they really want to hear from how to reach them.  And don’t get miffed if someone picks the wrong means.  Stuff happens you know.  And for the caller, make certain you listen to all your contacts and somewhere mark their preferred means of…. No, how about once you send out the message you give your intended recipient enough time to get back before you…. No, make sure you’re using the right platform for the right…. No, how about don’t assume that your favorite means of being gotten hold of is everybody’s favorite…. Oh heck, was it really that important anyway?

Tell you what, have your people get hold of our people and we’ll do lunch.

Now, that’s what we think. Really. How ‘bout you?