Wednesday, October 24, 2012

My Book Life

I own a lot of books.  I mean, a LOT.  I have them in bookshelves in my house, and in boxes in my house, and in boxes in my mother's house and in boxes in a storage unit.  Air-conditioned storage unit, so they don't deteriorate.  My book purchases may have slowed the last ten years but they haven't stopped, so I'm just getting more and more and more books.  And I like that because I like books.
   But I got to thinking that maybe I needed to get rid of some of them.  By which I mean put more of them into my already-crowded storage unit.  Then I had a thought - a blasphemous thought - maybe I'd give them away.  I have a lot of cool books, I know someone would appreciate them like I do.  Maybe a library* or an old folks' home or something like that.
   I looked at one of my shelves, trying to think of which ones should go to a worthy inheritor.  But each book had a story.  I knew when I got it, gift or purchase, how long it took me to read and whether I liked it or not.  No surprise - I like most of the books I own.
   Then I moved to another book case, another shelf.  Same thing.  Each one had a story.  I picked out a few and turned to a random page.  I remembered reading them all, sometimes even to the time of day and what was happening around me.
   It hit me then, the reason I keep books, even if I keep them in boxes in a building ten miles away, is because my life is narrated by them.  Looking at these books is like archaeology into the Ancient Don.  I know what I was reading when I was in middle school, then high school, then college, then young adulthood, all the way to now.  Getting rid of them would be like erasing part of me, the part that's led to the person I am right now.
   Long story short, I'm keeping the damned books.  My new ones are going to need company.


* or liberry.  You're welcome John West, my old boss at the Abel Liberry at Austin College.

Saturday, October 20, 2012

Franchise Fantasy

I need to come up with the Next Big Thing in franchising.  Because I'm very greedy and I want a gold-plated swimming pool.  A tasteful one.
   When I was younger I imagined - maybe I was told, I don't know - that a good way to start climbing the ladder of the American Dream was to open a franchise like a McDonald's, a Subway, what have you.  The idea was you put your meager savings on the line to risk opening a business that might not make it, but had been proved to work elsewhere.  At least that was the way I understood it.
   Years ago a friend of mine and I looked into franchising.  HA!  Not even a remote possibility, unless we had $750,000 liquid, meaning cash on hand in the bank.  I never did get that; if I had that much money laying around in cash, I certainly wouldn't be exploring the chance to open my own grease palace.  We did some checking and found that almost none of the franchises in existence were owned by a person, they were owned by a company, or a corporation.  And that company didn't own just two or three or four places, they owned twenty or thirty or forty.  Big business built out of small businesses.
   What I didn't get then that I do get now is that the money isn't in being the franchisee, it's in being the franchisor.
   Why expend your own blood, sweat and tears building a business from the ground up when you can get other people to do it, and then pay you a franchise fee for the privilege?  It's genius, really, and totally the American way.  Work smarter, make the other guy work harder.  So here are a few of my ideas.  Nobody steal them, okay?

For old people:
  The Paper 'Net.  A newsstand, just like in the old days.  We take articles and blogs and items of interest from the Web, paste them up into an actual print edition every day, and sell them for 50 cents each.  Large print too.   Kind of like the Huffington Post, but on real paper.  I know, I know, there are tons of copyright problems with stealing content like this, but if Ariana Huffington can get away with it, why can't I?
   Rent a Pet.  Pets make people live longer, it's true.  Or it should be.  Older people's lives are enriched by having a pet, but taking care of a dog or cat really is like taking care of a toddler who's never going to grow up and always gets into the garbage.  We would rent friendly, docile animals to old people for a few hours a day.  That way they get the benefits of having a pet with none of the headache and cleanup associated with owning one.  Like having a pet grandchild.

For college students:
   Party Buddy.  There are tons of people who will take a test for you for a fee, but who's got your back when you're invited to a party you really don't want to go to?  We've all been there, there's a raging kegger or a frat party and you really don't feel like dealing with the douchebags tonight, but if you don't go you'll probably not get invited again.  We'd get your photo and vital stats and send a lookalike surrogate in your place, the people at the party will probably be too drunk to tell the difference.  It'll be just like you did go, without all the beer spillage and vomit.
   Vice Scrubbers.  You know the people who clean up after a crime scene?  They get rid of the blood and spare body parts, that kind of stuff?  We'd do the same kind of thing, but for porn and booze and cigarettes.  Call us before your boyfriend or girlfriend from back home comes for a visit, or before the 'rents come by 'just to see how you're doing.'  We promise to expunge every trace of dirty mags or tobacco or beer bongs to make you seem like the sweet darling you never really were.  Cash only.  Electronic devices incur an extra charge.

For middle school students:
   Cool Parents.  Your parents are not cool.  You know it, but they really, really, really don't.  As a matter of fact, they're so uncool they think they're cool.  You absolutely cannot bring them to any event where other parents will be, otherwise your world will devolve into a year-long exercise in embarrassment.  So call us up, we'll send cool parents in their place.  No mom jeans, no black socks with sandals, just slender, hip, gleaming-smile models, who have absolutely no real interest in you or your day.  The way God intended.
   Touch It.  You know you want to.  Touch it.  It's right there.  I know it's gross, but that's why you need to touch it.  You must touch it.  But you just can't.  So we'll send a kid over to touch it for you.  Yes, it's probably going to be the weird kid, the one who smells like sausage and BO, but at least he's not too chicken to touch it.  Pansy.


See?  Each one a million-dollar idea.  So that's... six million dollars.  Where do I pick up my check?

Wednesday, October 17, 2012

Shop Hungry

They say you shouldn't go to the grocery store when you're hungry.  Whoever 'they' are... I think they're the same people who determine what colors are 'in' each year.  Yes, 'they' are Pantone.  Possibly.
   Back on track... I say that you should go grocery shopping when you're hungry.  When you're starving, in fact.  When you're so famished that you could eat the ass end out of a rhino.  That's when you need to go shopping.
   Because then you'll see what your bad habits really are.
   When you go grocery shopping on a full stomach, it's easy for your rational mind to overcome your reptile brain.  'Eskimo Pie?  I couldn't possibly.  Besides, you're not supposed to call them Eskimos.'  You actually consider buying tofu and making something of it on your own.  You buy tiny carrots.  You check labels and consider nutritional content seriously.  You skirt the edges of the store just like they tell you to, avoiding the center aisles and their sinful, shameful products.
   But when you're hungry?  Straight to the Circus Peanuts and Yoo Hoo.
   Grocery shopping while you're hungry you can't avoid the siren call of the Stouffer's Macaroni and Cheese, you seek out the Manwich and the Pringles.  You stalk the ice cream aisle just in case Ben and Jerry come to visit in person.  You forget that they actually stock produce, that they have raw meat just steps away waiting for you to buy and prepare.  Your world becomes a Hungry Man entree.
   Once you've shopped hungry - and I mean REALLY hungry - you'll know your triggers.  If you make a list of everything you wanted to devour right there in the store, you'll find most of it contains enormous amounts of preservatives, which are, I'm convinced with no scientific evidence, the reason we crave bad stuff. 
    When you've let your reptile brain satisfy its need to consume mass quantities, take a break, sit back, and don't buy all that garbage.  You really are better than that.  When you recognize what junk you crave you're halfway towards eliminating the craving.

Can you tell that I just got back from the grocery store myself?  An exercise in self control if there ever was one...

Tuesday, October 16, 2012

Miserable Bastards

I've been around a while - not as long as some people, longer than others - and my faith in human beings has gone through phases.  In college I was a cynic, which is cover for a disappointed idealist.  Just out of college I determined that people are basically good, mostly because I hung out with essentially good people.*
  Then I got a job in corporate America.  My views changed and I determined that most people are sheep, still essentially good but lacking in that essential spark that makes them stand up and say 'No.'  Then I got another corporate job, then another after that, and I began to realize that maybe, just perhaps, some people are naturally miserable bastards.  At least in the finance industry, which may attract more than its share, I admit.
  Now I own my own business, and currently I'm working at a local school district, where the people are genuinely nice and really committed to doing right by the students, even in a time of shrinking budgets.  I can honestly say I have not met one miserable bastard during my year-plus working there.  So I'm kind of back on the side of the angels here.  Most people are good.
   Except...
   I've been paying attention to politics more and more as I get older.  Not that I like what I see, it's really more of the same fascination you have with a wreck on the highway.  You wonder if there's going to be blood, and you hope there's not, but you really kind of hope there is so you keep glancing over as you creep by.  That's me and politics.  I have to say that I've never seen a greater collection of miserable bastards in my entire life than I see in politics right now, today.
   Let me correct that.  I've never seen a greater collection of lying, cheating, greedy, gleefully strutting miserable bastards.  I remember a time when miserable bastards kept it on the down-low, when they knew they were awful people and tried to keep others in the dark about their miserable bastardy.  Not no more they don't.
   And let me point an accusing finger.  It's the GOP I'm talking about.  Sure, there are liars and cheats and probably a few miserable bastards on the Democratic side, but Republicans have taken the lying, cheating and greed to a high art.  They're so confident as miserable bastards they don't even try to hide it any more, they put it right in our faces and dare us to do something about it.
   So here's what we do.  We vote them out of office.  As many as we can, so we send a clear message.  It's time to get rid of the miserable bastards and replace them with genuine, caring people.



* with a few glaring exceptions, Tiller I'm looking your way here.

Sunday, October 14, 2012

Good-bye CIO

You ever watch a boxing match - or MMA bout if you're into that - and you see a guy who's clearly had it, he's done, not gonna win, but he's sticking it out?  Too tough to put down, too stupid to quit?  Everybody in the arena knows he's going to lose, it's just a question of whether he goes the distance or gets KTFO?*
  That's today's CIO.
   The Chief Information Officer - or Head MonkeySpanker -  didn't exist thirty years ago, and I predict that job title will be encased in amber five years from now along with other Jurassic job titles like Copy Boy and Buggy Whip Maker.  Lemme 'splain...
   Anyone who works in corporate IT knows that every IT organization is exactly the same.  Dysfunctional.  The difference between companies is just varying degrees of broken.  The problem is that companies try to run something that's pure overhead - Information Technology - like it's a revenue center.  And running IT as if it were making money for the company leads to all sorts of idiocy, like IT and the CIO having their own internal goals and metrics that have nothing at all to do with the goals of the company.
   When you have a sales staff they know their job.  They have goals.  Sell stuff the company makes.  When you have a legal staff they have goals.  Protect the company from lawsuits because of bad decisions the executives make.  When you have an R&D staff they have goals.  Make the next generation of bad products the sales staff can sell and the legal staff can litigate. 
   In contrast, the IT staff's goals are usually far less concrete.  One might even say jell-o like.  Or completely made-up and divorced from reality.  Maintain uptime.  Reduce TCO.  Improve TTD.  Make up more monkey-spank justifications to employ people like project managers who would otherwise starve in the street.**  Almost never do you see an IT staff's goals read 'provide measurable support to the lines of business.'  Because that's a goal most IT groups don't know how to measure and couldn't meet even if they could measure it.
  So the CIO's day consists essentially of:
   1)  protecting his phony-baloney job
   and
   2)  keeping the servers running
   I know they spend most of their time on 1), but it's really 2) that is the main justification for their position.  Companies spend a very large portion of their income in IT support, wires and servers and software and people, and that's what a CIO tells his kids he does when they ask him about his job.  Which he hopes they never do.
   Here's the problem:  many American companies now can outsource everything the CIO claims responsibility for.  Rackspace does this, IBM does this, Microsoft does this, they're all hosting providers.  A hosting provider will do EVERYTHING computer-related.  They will buy the servers, they will install the software, they will maintain security, they will keep up with updates, they will provide backups, and they will provide solid metrics about their performance.  Even better, they will do all this for less than it costs any company right now to do the same thing in-house.
   In a grand irony, the CIO's job is being outsourced.  And, unlike most outsourcing, this time the company you hire to do the job really will do it better than the guy doing it right now.  Better, faster, cheaper.  The CIO is being crushed under the great Karmic wheel, and I think it's poetic justice.
   If I worked for a company and my title included the letters CIO, I'd be desperately maneuvering my way up or out.  Finding a different position in the company or getting a phony PhD from an online diploma mill and doing my best to do anything else to make a living, because I know my time in the corner office is coming to an end.
   CIOs you have been warned.  Ignore me at your peril.


* Knocked The Fuck Out - from 'Friday,' Ice Cube's earliest and best film role
** and who, in a just universe, would become food for coyotes.  I'm not fond of IT project managers.

Thursday, October 11, 2012

E-Ettiquette

Maybe Miss Manners has addressed this already, I don't know and I'm not inclined to find out.  But I've noticed a definite lack of civility around our little computers these days, and it's pissing me off.  Time was using a computer meant going into an office and turning on a beige monstrosity that had Bill Gates stink all over it.  Now our computers fit in our pockets.*  Whence come the distractions and my own little Hell.
   There needs to be a New Consideration, along with an enforcement arm to beat compliance into ne'er-do-wells.
   What am I talking about?  I'll tell you, sit back and get comfy.  Everybody but Great Uncle Joe already knows that ALL CAPS READS AS YELLING in electronic communication.  So most non-octogenarians have abandoned the Caps Lock key, as well they should.  But there doesn't seem to be a consensus as to when to call, when to text, or when to e-mail.  No rules.  And no common sense, it seems.  We're given an embarrassment of riches when we want to communicate but the end result is we're communicating worse than ever.  I've developed Seven Rules to a More Polite Society.  Follow them or I'll mop the floor with you.

1.  If you're not a very close friend or related to me, you don't get to text me.  If you have to ask if you're a close friend the answer is 'No.'  Texts from people I know and love are annoying enough - the electronic equivalent of tugging on my sleeve - I don't need some random schmoe interrupting me with his idiocy too.

2.  Business communication means you use my last name.  That's 'Mr. Hartshorn,' especially if I have never met you.  When you assume familiarity you haven't earned I instantly hate your guts and fantasize about punching you in the back of your head over and over again.

3.  Unless we've agreed on other arrangements, the method you used when you began your communication stays your method.  If you called me, keep calling me.  If you e-mailed me, keep e-mailing me.  Nothing creams my corn more than having someone switch to e-mail when we've been talking.  A simple 'hey, I'll e-mail you' is enough, but don't surprise me by switching e-horses mid-stream.
   Also, if we've talked about going to a movie don't switch to text or e-mail at the last minute to bow out, you chicken shit bastard.

4.  No response does not mean 'no.'  No response means no response. Or you're ignoring me.  Or you can't be bothered to reply.  Or you're a simpering little milquetoast who avoids confrontation.  When I ask you a question - e-mail, phone, or text - you're obligated to reply, just as if we were in the same room.  I reply all the time to people I don't want to deal with, you don't get a free pass because your computer fits in your pocket.

5.  PUT THE FUCKING PHONE DOWN.  Seriously.  Put it down.  I'm right here in the room with you, why are you texting someone else?  That's the exact same thing as interrupting a conversation to hold a conversation with another person, the fact that you're typing doesn't alleviate the jaw-dropping rudeness.
   True story - I've been in a room with three other people, all of whom were texting others, completely ignoring everybody else there with them in person.  Astonishingly inconsiderate.

6.  Put it on vibrate.  All devices do this now, figure out how yours works.  Why?  Because you have crap taste in ring tones, sorry if this is the first time someone's let you know.

7.  No, you cannot use my wall socket to charge your phone.  Unless you're my mother, then it's perfectly fine.  If you're not my mother you should have thought of charging your phone before you came to my house.

There.  Read them, know them, live them.



*  and Bill Gates hasn't been a household name for ten years