Dear Hollywood:
First, let me say that the last few years - heck, the last fifteen years - have been magical for me. Really. I think it started with 'The Fellowship of the Ring,' one of my favorite books, and one that I certainly never expected to see on the big screen. I mean, how crazy is it that I got to see the Balrog and Rivendell and... just... everything? So I thank you for that. Then there was Spider-Man, the Raimi version. Excellent, and true to the story. Then there was Watchmen, another movie I never thought could be done in live-action. But you did it, Hollywood. And it was superb. Then there were the X-Men, and Iron Man, and the Hulk and the Avengers, all Marvel properties, which I don't begrudge you. Honestly, DC and Warner Bros. have yet to get it together for a large franchise. Harry Potter seven or eight times, Narnia, another go at Tolkien. There was Hellboy - twice - and Constantine and Ghost Rider and The Dark Knight and Captain America and Wolverine. Superman two or three times. And, yes, I'll even count Green Lantern. You discovered superheroes at last, Hollywood, and jumped in with both feet. The kid in me who always longed to see his comic-book heroes come to life has lived to see the day. Which makes what I'm about to say a little difficult.
It's got to stop.
I say this as a lifelong comic collector. I have 39 long boxes of comics- conservatively figure 10,000 issues - bought with my own money the hard way, once a week on Wednesday, every Wednesday, for decades. The comic store guys call me 'sir.' I know the material, I love the material, I love the movies, even the bad ones. I'm a fan. I'm the guy you most want in your corner, but I can't be, not any longer. Hollywood, you need to quit it with the superhero movies. The concept has run its course, it's not novel, it's not exciting, it's not anything I want to see.
Do you remember when you were a kid, Hollywood, maybe fourteen, and you knew your way around town and you had your own money? You could make your own decisions and not have to answer to anyone. Not until you got home, anyway. And that one time you decided what you really wanted to spend your lawnmowing money on was ice cream? Not a cone from the truck, but a half gallon from the grocery store. And you and your friend each bought half a gallon, and plastic spoons, and you went to the park and ate as much ice cream as you thought you wanted. When you were eating, it was great, wasn't it? But afterwards... oh, afterwards you realized that the reason your mother never let you eat an entire half gallon of ice cream was that it was a terrible idea.
You're eating too much ice cream right now, Hollywood. You're releasing too many superhero movies, and they're all starting to look the same. What began as a cause slowly became a business and now is becoming a racket.* Can't you see you're poisoning the well?
I get it, guys my age with my kind of life experiences run you now, Hollywood, and they want to see what I wanted to see. But it's not the only thing I wanted to see. Twenty years ago superhero movies were tough to sell and almost impossible to make, I get it, and now that technology has advanced you can put on the screen what you never could before. The challenge is to do that with new properties instead of retreading ideas and characters and stories that are seventy-plus years old. I thought I wanted to see my comic books up on the big screen, but it turns out I liked them better when they were on the page.
So, that's it, Hollywood. We're breaking up, you and I. No more superhero movies. I'm done. When you get a fresh idea that doesn't involve mining someone else's work, give me a call. I won't change my number, but I'm not going to hold my breath either.
Sincerely,
Don Hartshorn
* thank you Eric Hoffer
Showing posts with label fiasco. Show all posts
Showing posts with label fiasco. Show all posts
Tuesday, May 6, 2014
Thursday, July 21, 2011
Feeding The Five-Year-Old In Me
Guess what I had for dinner? Go on, I'll give you three guesses and I'm positive you're never going to figure it out.
A hot dog wrapped in a tortilla with cheese and some salsa?
Jeez... first try...
Yup, I ate a tortilla-wrapped hot dog for dinner. With some cantaloupe and grapes on the side. For lunch I had lemonade and yogurt and some bread pudding (not really sweet, but it's very good. From Sun Harvest.) For breakfast I had iced tea and Pop Tarts, the chocolate chip kind, which are much more honest than the fruit-flavored kind which pretend not to be the candy they so obviously are.
I'm regressing back to my childhood. When I was five this was what I thought it would be like to be an adult and to feed myself. Not junk food, not really (except for the Pop Tarts and hot dog), but not the most nutritious day I've had in my life either.
I don't know, lately I just can't be bothered. Either I'll go days subsisting on fruit and vegetables because I just can't quite make it to the grocery store for animal protein, or I end up raiding the pantry for whatever's in there that might go well together. No middle ground. I'm waiting for the 'leftover lemon chicken - ranch style beans' night that will inevitably happen some time soon.
I can cook meals. Really. I used to be a cook, years ago. I can make fifteen pans of lasagna and four-hundred-fifty hand-breaded cheese sticks and work the ovens and stoves on the line. And still have time to read to orphans. I'm good. But I'm terribly, terribly lazy, especially when the meal is only for me, myself and I. I dread what's going to happen to me next. When I was five I thought a stellar breakfast would be Lucky Charms but with all the pesky cereal bits taken out. I pined for a bowl of just Lucky Charms marshmallows but my mother foiled my efforts to bring my dreams to life.
Now that I'm good and grown I might just need to make that happen. Although maybe that's a cry for help...
A hot dog wrapped in a tortilla with cheese and some salsa?
Jeez... first try...
Yup, I ate a tortilla-wrapped hot dog for dinner. With some cantaloupe and grapes on the side. For lunch I had lemonade and yogurt and some bread pudding (not really sweet, but it's very good. From Sun Harvest.) For breakfast I had iced tea and Pop Tarts, the chocolate chip kind, which are much more honest than the fruit-flavored kind which pretend not to be the candy they so obviously are.
I'm regressing back to my childhood. When I was five this was what I thought it would be like to be an adult and to feed myself. Not junk food, not really (except for the Pop Tarts and hot dog), but not the most nutritious day I've had in my life either.
I don't know, lately I just can't be bothered. Either I'll go days subsisting on fruit and vegetables because I just can't quite make it to the grocery store for animal protein, or I end up raiding the pantry for whatever's in there that might go well together. No middle ground. I'm waiting for the 'leftover lemon chicken - ranch style beans' night that will inevitably happen some time soon.
I can cook meals. Really. I used to be a cook, years ago. I can make fifteen pans of lasagna and four-hundred-fifty hand-breaded cheese sticks and work the ovens and stoves on the line. And still have time to read to orphans. I'm good. But I'm terribly, terribly lazy, especially when the meal is only for me, myself and I. I dread what's going to happen to me next. When I was five I thought a stellar breakfast would be Lucky Charms but with all the pesky cereal bits taken out. I pined for a bowl of just Lucky Charms marshmallows but my mother foiled my efforts to bring my dreams to life.
Now that I'm good and grown I might just need to make that happen. Although maybe that's a cry for help...
Wednesday, June 29, 2011
Diet Poison
If you didn't already know that anything presented by American food companies was nothing more than a tarted-up lie smothered in rich, velvety caramel, yet another group of researchers has linked diet soda consumption to very bad things.
Even better, the work was done right here in San Antonio, currently the 3rd fattest city in the nation.* Seems that in a decades-long study, people who consumed lots o' diet soder had, on average, 70 percent more belly fat than those who didn't consume said soder.
Christ on a crutch! SEVENTY percent?! If the guys who did the study weren't wearing white coats I almost wouldn't believe it. That's enough fat to float a boat, which is a truly disgusting image if you think about it long enough.
Of course, correlation does not equal causation. It could be that people who gained a lot of weight consumed more diet soda because they were trying to slim down, rather than gaining weight because of their aspartame intake. You need more to make the link between consuming aspartame and becoming a big fat sucker.
And there is more - in a related study, mice given a diet spiked with aspartame had elevated glucose levels but decreased insulin levels. In other words, they were becoming diabetic. Take this study with the increased belly fat study and it's hard to argue that artificial sweetener has any benefits at all.
So the verdict is essentially in with this one. Diet soda is poison. More specifically aspartame is poison. There ain't nothing good about it.
Which means I have no excuse now to keep drinking soda. Oh yeah, I'm off the wagon again, if I hadn't mentioned that. I need to stop drinking soda. For real. I wouldn't keep drinking rat poison if someone pointed out to me that strychnine was causing my convulsions, and I don't need any more diet soda now that someone has pointed out to me my spare tire is exacerbated by aspartame.
It's hard. Just look at the number of times I've stopped and started right back up again. The stuff is like cigarettes you don't have to light. But it's poison, and I need to give it up. So I'm gonna. Starting tomorrow.
* because we're not trying hard enough to be Number One, evidently
Even better, the work was done right here in San Antonio, currently the 3rd fattest city in the nation.* Seems that in a decades-long study, people who consumed lots o' diet soder had, on average, 70 percent more belly fat than those who didn't consume said soder.
Christ on a crutch! SEVENTY percent?! If the guys who did the study weren't wearing white coats I almost wouldn't believe it. That's enough fat to float a boat, which is a truly disgusting image if you think about it long enough.
Of course, correlation does not equal causation. It could be that people who gained a lot of weight consumed more diet soda because they were trying to slim down, rather than gaining weight because of their aspartame intake. You need more to make the link between consuming aspartame and becoming a big fat sucker.
And there is more - in a related study, mice given a diet spiked with aspartame had elevated glucose levels but decreased insulin levels. In other words, they were becoming diabetic. Take this study with the increased belly fat study and it's hard to argue that artificial sweetener has any benefits at all.
So the verdict is essentially in with this one. Diet soda is poison. More specifically aspartame is poison. There ain't nothing good about it.
Which means I have no excuse now to keep drinking soda. Oh yeah, I'm off the wagon again, if I hadn't mentioned that. I need to stop drinking soda. For real. I wouldn't keep drinking rat poison if someone pointed out to me that strychnine was causing my convulsions, and I don't need any more diet soda now that someone has pointed out to me my spare tire is exacerbated by aspartame.
It's hard. Just look at the number of times I've stopped and started right back up again. The stuff is like cigarettes you don't have to light. But it's poison, and I need to give it up. So I'm gonna. Starting tomorrow.
* because we're not trying hard enough to be Number One, evidently
Friday, June 17, 2011
Black Gold... Texas Tea...
You know what you almost never seen any more? Big puddles of oil in parking lots. That's not to say that there isn't any oil at all in parking lots because there is, but not like there used to be back in the old days.
I remember my grandfather would put down cardboard and newspaper underneath his cars in the garage, and he'd change out the newspaper weekly, as regular as mowing the lawn. Dripping oil was just a fact of car ownership, something you dealt with. You expressed a drive from San Antonio to Dallas in miles, gallons of gas, and quarts of oil. That's about 290 miles, sixteen or seventeen gallons of gas and at least a quart of oil, maybe two.
Not so much any more. It's so rare to see anything dripping in parking lots that when I see a fresh, glistening streak of wetness underneath my truck I'm instantly alert. I look at the placement of the drip, where it might have come from if it's from my truck, what kind of fluid it might be. I become a truck doctor. It's never from my truck, of course, it's always someone else's problem. Back when I had my '72 Chevelle the only time I would have been concerned is if I'd come out of a store and hadn't noticed any drips. That would have meant I was running dry on one of the car's vital fluids. I loved that car but it leaked like a Civil War battle survivor.
Are cars that much better-made now? Absolutely. And not just tighter engines built to smaller tolerances either, the whole thing's just better. I'd trust my convertible more in a crash than I ever would have my 3000 lbs of Detroit steel Chevelle.
But... I don't know... while no drips is certainly better for the environment - especially when multiplied by all the cars on the road - it's just not the same. I think people put too much trust in their cars now, they're too reliable. You ever see someone broken down on the side of the road these days? They're helpless, utterly beside themselves and at total loss as to how to get themselves out of the jam they're in. I used to drive with a tool box in the trunk so I could fix whatever went wrong as it was happening.
Less oil on the road means less need to know how to fix things which means more reliance on other to make those repairs which means we're becoming a nation of passive aid-seekers rather than a nation of problem-solvers. I think we need more oil in parking lots, more breakdowns, more self-reliance and less calling for AAA.
Unless it's too hot outside. Then you should definitely call the tow truck. AAAAARRRRGH! See? It's happening to me now!
I remember my grandfather would put down cardboard and newspaper underneath his cars in the garage, and he'd change out the newspaper weekly, as regular as mowing the lawn. Dripping oil was just a fact of car ownership, something you dealt with. You expressed a drive from San Antonio to Dallas in miles, gallons of gas, and quarts of oil. That's about 290 miles, sixteen or seventeen gallons of gas and at least a quart of oil, maybe two.
Not so much any more. It's so rare to see anything dripping in parking lots that when I see a fresh, glistening streak of wetness underneath my truck I'm instantly alert. I look at the placement of the drip, where it might have come from if it's from my truck, what kind of fluid it might be. I become a truck doctor. It's never from my truck, of course, it's always someone else's problem. Back when I had my '72 Chevelle the only time I would have been concerned is if I'd come out of a store and hadn't noticed any drips. That would have meant I was running dry on one of the car's vital fluids. I loved that car but it leaked like a Civil War battle survivor.
Are cars that much better-made now? Absolutely. And not just tighter engines built to smaller tolerances either, the whole thing's just better. I'd trust my convertible more in a crash than I ever would have my 3000 lbs of Detroit steel Chevelle.
But... I don't know... while no drips is certainly better for the environment - especially when multiplied by all the cars on the road - it's just not the same. I think people put too much trust in their cars now, they're too reliable. You ever see someone broken down on the side of the road these days? They're helpless, utterly beside themselves and at total loss as to how to get themselves out of the jam they're in. I used to drive with a tool box in the trunk so I could fix whatever went wrong as it was happening.
Less oil on the road means less need to know how to fix things which means more reliance on other to make those repairs which means we're becoming a nation of passive aid-seekers rather than a nation of problem-solvers. I think we need more oil in parking lots, more breakdowns, more self-reliance and less calling for AAA.
Unless it's too hot outside. Then you should definitely call the tow truck. AAAAARRRRGH! See? It's happening to me now!
Wednesday, August 25, 2010
Un-Welcome Back
It's been a while since I've really had to deal with Microsoft's insanity when it comes to software installation. I've had my iMac for a few years now, and even in my current 1099 gig - where I use a PC - I'm not the one doing the installing. I've been isolated. Become used to an operating system that just works. Seamlessly. I'll admit, I've been spoiled. Until today. I'm helping a friend out, and installing some video conferencing stuff on the Windows XP instance I keep on my Mac for just such an occasion, it's only there if I really, really need it. So far I've spent the past hour installing, re-installing, and re-re-installing stuff, all so I can get Windows videoconferencing on my Mac that already comes with it.
Holy crap on a cracker, what a nightmare.
I'd forgotten what an ordeal updates and installations are on a PC. Really. I'd blissfully put all that out of my mind and let Steve Jobs and his crew whisk me away on a comfy carpet of no-worries. First I need the security updates. And, being Windows, there are a LOT of those. Then the extra stuff like Internet Explorer - which this video conference thing needs - and then the .NET framework, and the updates to that, and then the video conference software itself. And on and on and on.
And you know what? It's not going to work. You know it, I know it, Bill Gates knows it, the people who wrote the video conference thing know it. It's one huge pantomime opera we all agree to go through when we know the end result is going to be 'Just use Skype.' It's like a North Korean show trial, or elections in Libya.
Why do I bother?
Holy crap on a cracker, what a nightmare.
I'd forgotten what an ordeal updates and installations are on a PC. Really. I'd blissfully put all that out of my mind and let Steve Jobs and his crew whisk me away on a comfy carpet of no-worries. First I need the security updates. And, being Windows, there are a LOT of those. Then the extra stuff like Internet Explorer - which this video conference thing needs - and then the .NET framework, and the updates to that, and then the video conference software itself. And on and on and on.
And you know what? It's not going to work. You know it, I know it, Bill Gates knows it, the people who wrote the video conference thing know it. It's one huge pantomime opera we all agree to go through when we know the end result is going to be 'Just use Skype.' It's like a North Korean show trial, or elections in Libya.
Why do I bother?
Saturday, June 19, 2010
My Drunk Barber
I've written before about how it's impossible for me to get a good haircut. Since the quality of the cut never seems to vary, I usually decide to go with economy. As cheap as I can get away with, short of paying kindergarteners to practice on me with their safety scissors. Which might not be a bad idea, come to think of it...
Anyhoo, I have three regular places I get haircuts, I usually frequent one a few times in a row until I get the feeling that maybe - just maybe - I might be able to get a better cut at one of the places I haven't been in a while. And then I'll go there a few times in a row. You get the pattern.
One of places is a for-real barber shop, a tiny alcove in the basement of the YMCA (really), complete with an ancient linoleum floor, barber chairs that are just as old, and barbers that are only slightly younger than that. I've been going there for years, since I moved out to SoCal.
Out of the five barbers who work this place, one guy, Joe (really), is the worst. I know this because I've been avoiding him for years now. The first time I saw him he walked a little funny, like maybe he'd had a stroke or something, or had some sort of neuro-muscular problem. Either way, not the best candidate for a career as a barber. But I let him cut my hair anyway, mostly because I was next in line and his was the free chair. Guys, you know what I mean, ladies, just go with it for sake of the anecdote.
I got him the next time I needed a haircut, and he wasn't walking so funny. The cut wasn't bad, still a little rough, but manageable. I got him the time after that and he was back to his stiff-legged stagger and I got a particularly bad haircut. I started to suspect something was up. Two or three haircuts after that I happened to be walking into the tiny barber shop as Joe was walking out. It's a good thing I wasn't carrying an open flame or we would have had a fireball in the doorway made from the Scotch on his breath.
Dude was plastered. Blotto. Three sheets to the wind. Blitzed. Polluted. Hammered. Trashed. Loaded. Ripped. Stewed. Full of Irish courage. Which explains the stumbling and the varying quality of his haircuts.
I learned Joe's schedule - Tuesday through Friday, 10 to 3. Not bad, if you're not into making a lot of money. I avoided the barber shop when I knew he'd be there and the years went by, me without a really good haircut, but with no really bad ones either.
Fast forward to yesterday. I needed a haircut and I stopped in at the barber shop about 1 PM. On a Friday. And who was outside talking with one of the denizens of the YMCA? Joe. And who cut my hair yesterday? Joe. He was the one with a free chair.
He wasn't drunk. I got an okay haircut. Not great, but not terrible either.
Anyhoo, I have three regular places I get haircuts, I usually frequent one a few times in a row until I get the feeling that maybe - just maybe - I might be able to get a better cut at one of the places I haven't been in a while. And then I'll go there a few times in a row. You get the pattern.
One of places is a for-real barber shop, a tiny alcove in the basement of the YMCA (really), complete with an ancient linoleum floor, barber chairs that are just as old, and barbers that are only slightly younger than that. I've been going there for years, since I moved out to SoCal.
Out of the five barbers who work this place, one guy, Joe (really), is the worst. I know this because I've been avoiding him for years now. The first time I saw him he walked a little funny, like maybe he'd had a stroke or something, or had some sort of neuro-muscular problem. Either way, not the best candidate for a career as a barber. But I let him cut my hair anyway, mostly because I was next in line and his was the free chair. Guys, you know what I mean, ladies, just go with it for sake of the anecdote.
I got him the next time I needed a haircut, and he wasn't walking so funny. The cut wasn't bad, still a little rough, but manageable. I got him the time after that and he was back to his stiff-legged stagger and I got a particularly bad haircut. I started to suspect something was up. Two or three haircuts after that I happened to be walking into the tiny barber shop as Joe was walking out. It's a good thing I wasn't carrying an open flame or we would have had a fireball in the doorway made from the Scotch on his breath.
Dude was plastered. Blotto. Three sheets to the wind. Blitzed. Polluted. Hammered. Trashed. Loaded. Ripped. Stewed. Full of Irish courage. Which explains the stumbling and the varying quality of his haircuts.
I learned Joe's schedule - Tuesday through Friday, 10 to 3. Not bad, if you're not into making a lot of money. I avoided the barber shop when I knew he'd be there and the years went by, me without a really good haircut, but with no really bad ones either.
Fast forward to yesterday. I needed a haircut and I stopped in at the barber shop about 1 PM. On a Friday. And who was outside talking with one of the denizens of the YMCA? Joe. And who cut my hair yesterday? Joe. He was the one with a free chair.
He wasn't drunk. I got an okay haircut. Not great, but not terrible either.
Saturday, June 12, 2010
Tales From My Past - World Cup
Evidently it's time for World Cup Soccer again; I don't pay attention to this, as I've mentioned before. This time around the US news and radio is treating the whole business as some kind of event that I should concern myself with, which itself concerns me. Americans don't care about soccer - that's an established fact - so the media paying this much attention to it makes it seem like they're trying to set the agenda instead of reporting what's happening. It's a slippery slope when reporters set themselves up as arbiters.
Anyhoo... years ago I happened to be in Italy for a World Cup go-round. Three American ladies and I were in Rome to get footage of Roman stuff for a distance learning Latin class. The first night we got there was the night Italy made the quarter-finals and the Italians went nuts. Bonkers. Cukoo. Pazza. The streets were crazy all night long with Italians on scooters, in cars, on foot, blowing horns and yelling and carrying on. A deafening riot that could have woken the dead.
I didn't hear any of it because the ladies stuck me with an interior room, one that faced the courtyard, which was hot and close and unventilated. And oh-so-quiet. Score one for me.
Fast forward ten days, the last day we'd be in Rome. We'd been filming antiquities for so long that I thought I would strangle someone if I saw another piece of marble. We were at the Capitoline Museums for one last night of filming. The place opened at 7 PM on a Tuesday - for some reason - and since in Italy hours of operation are just a suggestion the courtyard was slowly filling up with tourists. 7:05 came and went. 7:10. 7:15. 7:20. This was getting late even by Italian 'standards.'
We heard a huge roar erupt out of a little tiny Renaissance-sized door at the far end of one of the buildings. The museum docents appeared, all thin little Italian men who had consumed a bit too much wine as they watched their national team make it into the semi-final round just minutes before. They opened the museum and rather cheerfully let us in as down the hill the horn-honking began again.
One of the ladies I was with needed a shot of some marble busts. The room was filled floor-to-ceiling with Roman busts, but she wanted a shot of the very top row, easily 10 feet off the ground. So she pulled over the docent's stool and stood on it. One of the docents saw immediately and he came over speaking Italian too fast and too wine-slurred for me to understand. I thought for sure he was going to toss us out, maybe call one of the Roman police forces. Or all of them.
Nope, still flushed with World Cup victory, he put his hands up to steady her. He waited patiently until she got her shot, helped her down, and put the stool back where it belonged.
In a sense, the World Cup helped keep me from getting arrested in Rome. So I suppose it ain't all bad.
I gotta tell you, though, even years later, if I never see another piece of Roman sculpture it'll be too soon.
Anyhoo... years ago I happened to be in Italy for a World Cup go-round. Three American ladies and I were in Rome to get footage of Roman stuff for a distance learning Latin class. The first night we got there was the night Italy made the quarter-finals and the Italians went nuts. Bonkers. Cukoo. Pazza. The streets were crazy all night long with Italians on scooters, in cars, on foot, blowing horns and yelling and carrying on. A deafening riot that could have woken the dead.
I didn't hear any of it because the ladies stuck me with an interior room, one that faced the courtyard, which was hot and close and unventilated. And oh-so-quiet. Score one for me.
Fast forward ten days, the last day we'd be in Rome. We'd been filming antiquities for so long that I thought I would strangle someone if I saw another piece of marble. We were at the Capitoline Museums for one last night of filming. The place opened at 7 PM on a Tuesday - for some reason - and since in Italy hours of operation are just a suggestion the courtyard was slowly filling up with tourists. 7:05 came and went. 7:10. 7:15. 7:20. This was getting late even by Italian 'standards.'
We heard a huge roar erupt out of a little tiny Renaissance-sized door at the far end of one of the buildings. The museum docents appeared, all thin little Italian men who had consumed a bit too much wine as they watched their national team make it into the semi-final round just minutes before. They opened the museum and rather cheerfully let us in as down the hill the horn-honking began again.
One of the ladies I was with needed a shot of some marble busts. The room was filled floor-to-ceiling with Roman busts, but she wanted a shot of the very top row, easily 10 feet off the ground. So she pulled over the docent's stool and stood on it. One of the docents saw immediately and he came over speaking Italian too fast and too wine-slurred for me to understand. I thought for sure he was going to toss us out, maybe call one of the Roman police forces. Or all of them.
Nope, still flushed with World Cup victory, he put his hands up to steady her. He waited patiently until she got her shot, helped her down, and put the stool back where it belonged.
In a sense, the World Cup helped keep me from getting arrested in Rome. So I suppose it ain't all bad.
I gotta tell you, though, even years later, if I never see another piece of Roman sculpture it'll be too soon.
Tuesday, June 8, 2010
Were-Squid
You ever have one of those days where people just get too close?
From time to time it's unavoidable that someone is going to invade your personal space. It happens. But there are days...
Like today. Seemed like everyone was trying to determine what I ate for breakfast by what my breath smelled of. Five people in a tiny elevator, too many guys in a small bathroom, someone looming over me in a meeting room, people standing right off my stern when we shared pie. Even when I voted this evening the polling place workers got close enough to feel my aura.
I want something to let people know they're getting too close. Aside from a solid punch to the solar plexus, that is. So I figure I'll cross my genes with a squid's. I'll fill my ink sacs with black fluid, and when someone gets too close - SPLAT! - I'll squirt them right in the face.
... make people think twice about invading my personal space ...
COMMUTE - there - 35 minutes back - 40 minutes
CONTRACT COUNTDOWN: 34 days
From time to time it's unavoidable that someone is going to invade your personal space. It happens. But there are days...
Like today. Seemed like everyone was trying to determine what I ate for breakfast by what my breath smelled of. Five people in a tiny elevator, too many guys in a small bathroom, someone looming over me in a meeting room, people standing right off my stern when we shared pie. Even when I voted this evening the polling place workers got close enough to feel my aura.
I want something to let people know they're getting too close. Aside from a solid punch to the solar plexus, that is. So I figure I'll cross my genes with a squid's. I'll fill my ink sacs with black fluid, and when someone gets too close - SPLAT! - I'll squirt them right in the face.
... make people think twice about invading my personal space ...
COMMUTE - there - 35 minutes back - 40 minutes
CONTRACT COUNTDOWN: 34 days
Saturday, May 29, 2010
You May Have Already Won...
Guess what? I just won $150,000. No, seriously, it's for real. I got a letter from England and they said my name was drawn from different sweepstakes and lottery databases around the world. Evidently they've tried to contact me for years now, and it's down to the wire, only three more weeks left before I forfeit this forever. And all I have to do is call a number in England... hold on a second. This sounds fishy. I'm beginning to suspect this letter from 'Standard Links Alliance' might be a scam. Or scam-ola...
You know, now that I think about it, I've never entered a British lottery. I don't even know if they have one. I know they have a lottery in Australia because I did buy lotto tickets there, but all I won was a kangaroo with a pouch full of beer. I'm kidding, the beer came in its own crate.
A while back I wrote about a Nigerian scam e-mail I received, one that claimed to be from our own FBI. I could tell immediately that was a scam because it wasn't from some prince, but from a US Federal police force operating on behalf of a foreign lottery and I was supposed to have won almost a million dollars. Only the truly desperate would believe that kind of pitch.
But these Standard Links Alliance guys are good. Really good. The letter was indeed mailed from England, and it's written on A-4 paper (what they use in Europe instead of 8.5 x 11), and the phone number they tell you to call is in London, England just like they claim. Aside from the complete nonsense of the letter itself, which never quite explains where they got my name or how I came by this sum, it's almost totally believable. Even the dollar amount itself, $150,000, seems within the realm of possibility. Not too large to be ridiculous like the Nigerian e-mail, and not so small that most people would ignore it. $150,000 is that Goldilocks spot for generating interest in free money. If, of course, you don't ask yourself why a British bank is issuing checks in American currency.
I'm half tempted to give these guys a call - from a work phone, of course - just to screw with them. But, nah, this will just go in the trash with the other garbage.
Still... you gotta give them an 'A' for execution on this one.
You know, now that I think about it, I've never entered a British lottery. I don't even know if they have one. I know they have a lottery in Australia because I did buy lotto tickets there, but all I won was a kangaroo with a pouch full of beer. I'm kidding, the beer came in its own crate.
A while back I wrote about a Nigerian scam e-mail I received, one that claimed to be from our own FBI. I could tell immediately that was a scam because it wasn't from some prince, but from a US Federal police force operating on behalf of a foreign lottery and I was supposed to have won almost a million dollars. Only the truly desperate would believe that kind of pitch.
But these Standard Links Alliance guys are good. Really good. The letter was indeed mailed from England, and it's written on A-4 paper (what they use in Europe instead of 8.5 x 11), and the phone number they tell you to call is in London, England just like they claim. Aside from the complete nonsense of the letter itself, which never quite explains where they got my name or how I came by this sum, it's almost totally believable. Even the dollar amount itself, $150,000, seems within the realm of possibility. Not too large to be ridiculous like the Nigerian e-mail, and not so small that most people would ignore it. $150,000 is that Goldilocks spot for generating interest in free money. If, of course, you don't ask yourself why a British bank is issuing checks in American currency.
I'm half tempted to give these guys a call - from a work phone, of course - just to screw with them. But, nah, this will just go in the trash with the other garbage.
Still... you gotta give them an 'A' for execution on this one.
Saturday, May 15, 2010
Convertible Smells
I actually had to drive to work today - I left my gym bag there Thursday - but since I was on a search-and-recover mission I took the hot rod instead of the truck. I had the top down and the heater cranked up, and I decided to see how long the commute would take on a lazy Saturday morning (details below). But with the top down I discovered a whole new science experiment.
Man, LA stinks.
And I don't just mean metaphorically, I mean actually. Without the hermetic isolation of rolled-up windows and blowing AC you can really experience the startling funk of Los Angeles. Coming down the 110 I got the familiar wafts of earth and plants, since there is a lot of open land around there. Open for LA, anyway. Not much to smell because it's a highway.
Coming into downtown I got a metallic/concrete sniff, then some exhaust, of course. There was also, oddly enough, onions. Must have been from a taco truck or something.
Going down Wilshire I really got into the Los Angeles-style of odors. Garbage, more exhaust, lots of urine, something rotten, cooking grease, beer, gasoline, wet dirt, and some sickly-sweet odor that followed me for a while but that I just couldn't place. Kind of like anti-freeze but that wasn't it.
Coming back I went down 3rd, and there the odors were eclectic. Cotton candy, more exhaust, grass, melted plastic, new electronics, sewer gas, BO (really, passing a bus stop, it must have been truly epic), old lady perfume, pineapples, gunpowder and spray paint.
In my experience the one way to really experience the spirit of a neighborhood is to walk it. But a close second would be to roll through in a convertible. It'll make you realize why you don't live there in the first place.
COMMUTE - not really a commute, since I wasn't working, but here's the best-case scenario when there is very little traffic:
there - 33 minutes back - 31 minutes
CONTRACT COUNTDOWN: 56 days
Man, LA stinks.
And I don't just mean metaphorically, I mean actually. Without the hermetic isolation of rolled-up windows and blowing AC you can really experience the startling funk of Los Angeles. Coming down the 110 I got the familiar wafts of earth and plants, since there is a lot of open land around there. Open for LA, anyway. Not much to smell because it's a highway.
Coming into downtown I got a metallic/concrete sniff, then some exhaust, of course. There was also, oddly enough, onions. Must have been from a taco truck or something.
Going down Wilshire I really got into the Los Angeles-style of odors. Garbage, more exhaust, lots of urine, something rotten, cooking grease, beer, gasoline, wet dirt, and some sickly-sweet odor that followed me for a while but that I just couldn't place. Kind of like anti-freeze but that wasn't it.
Coming back I went down 3rd, and there the odors were eclectic. Cotton candy, more exhaust, grass, melted plastic, new electronics, sewer gas, BO (really, passing a bus stop, it must have been truly epic), old lady perfume, pineapples, gunpowder and spray paint.
In my experience the one way to really experience the spirit of a neighborhood is to walk it. But a close second would be to roll through in a convertible. It'll make you realize why you don't live there in the first place.
COMMUTE - not really a commute, since I wasn't working, but here's the best-case scenario when there is very little traffic:
there - 33 minutes back - 31 minutes
CONTRACT COUNTDOWN: 56 days
Tuesday, March 23, 2010
Some Days You Just Can't Win
I'm not normally one to revel in another's misery... well, maybe I am. A little. I do love it when liars get what's coming to them, and cheats lose all their ill-gotten gains, stuff like that makes my day. I should say I'm not one to revel in an undeserving stranger's misery.
Until today.
I was at the gas station, putting a few gallons into the truck* when a lady drove up to the pump next to me. The credit card reader on that one was broken and I tried to tell her, but she realized she'd pulled up on the wrong side of pump, the cap was on the passenger side.
So she got back in the car and turned it around. Only to get back out of the car - this time with her back to me - whereupon she found the sign that said the card reader wasn't working.
She got back in the car and drove around to the other row of pumps. She got out of the car only to realize that once again she had lined up the driver's side, but the cap was still on the passenger side.
I tried not to be obvious as I watched her turn her car around AGAIN, this time facing the right way. But the story doesn't end there, I took my time cleaning the rear windows on my truck to watch. She tried a credit card, which didn't work. She tried another one, which also didn't work. She pressed the button to get the attendant's attention, and asked, a little irked, if any of the card readers on any of the pumps worked.
He told her both her cards had been declined.
The poor lady screwed the cap back on, got in her car and drove away.
Man, some days the best stuff just falls into your lap.
* by the way, has anybody noticed gas is still over $3 a gallon? During a recession when people are out of work and no one's driving? I smell a conspiracy.
Until today.
I was at the gas station, putting a few gallons into the truck* when a lady drove up to the pump next to me. The credit card reader on that one was broken and I tried to tell her, but she realized she'd pulled up on the wrong side of pump, the cap was on the passenger side.
So she got back in the car and turned it around. Only to get back out of the car - this time with her back to me - whereupon she found the sign that said the card reader wasn't working.
She got back in the car and drove around to the other row of pumps. She got out of the car only to realize that once again she had lined up the driver's side, but the cap was still on the passenger side.
I tried not to be obvious as I watched her turn her car around AGAIN, this time facing the right way. But the story doesn't end there, I took my time cleaning the rear windows on my truck to watch. She tried a credit card, which didn't work. She tried another one, which also didn't work. She pressed the button to get the attendant's attention, and asked, a little irked, if any of the card readers on any of the pumps worked.
He told her both her cards had been declined.
The poor lady screwed the cap back on, got in her car and drove away.
Man, some days the best stuff just falls into your lap.
* by the way, has anybody noticed gas is still over $3 a gallon? During a recession when people are out of work and no one's driving? I smell a conspiracy.
Thursday, March 4, 2010
Appease The Spirits
I've been thinking lately about animal intelligence, chimps, for instance, or whales, or dogs, and the implications that has for the existence of animal souls. Tribal religions included animal spirits, and religions like Shinto include nature spirits for mountains, trees, streams, and what have you. Animism like this is a very, very old tradition, prehistoric as a matter of fact. So I got to thinking some more, why would spirits be confined only to people, or animals, or big chunks of nature like mountains?
What if our modern things have spirits?
Like my TV. What if there's a Sony 42" LCD spirit in there that I need to appease? Or the oven? What if there's a fire spirit in there just getting angrier and angrier that I'm not performing the proper rituals to it? And I'm fairly certain there is a spirit in my refrigerator, given the noises it sometimes makes. But I pay a lot of attention to the refrigerator, so I think I'm pretty safe there. Maybe all that attention I'm giving the ice box is pissing off the spirit of the toaster.
But what about cars? Or pencils? Or couches? Or buildings? Or compact florescent bulbs? God help us if there are garbage spirits all gathering together at our colossal landfills, we're in trouble.
And what about food? If animists say trees have spirits, then shouldn't things that come from trees have spirits? Like apples? Then things made from apples, like apple pie or cider would have spirits too. And tacos would have spirits. Spicy, delicious spirits that give you gas later on in the day.
I think I need to appease the spirit of my bed now and go to sleep. I hope the spirit of my pillows agrees with me.
What if our modern things have spirits?
Like my TV. What if there's a Sony 42" LCD spirit in there that I need to appease? Or the oven? What if there's a fire spirit in there just getting angrier and angrier that I'm not performing the proper rituals to it? And I'm fairly certain there is a spirit in my refrigerator, given the noises it sometimes makes. But I pay a lot of attention to the refrigerator, so I think I'm pretty safe there. Maybe all that attention I'm giving the ice box is pissing off the spirit of the toaster.
But what about cars? Or pencils? Or couches? Or buildings? Or compact florescent bulbs? God help us if there are garbage spirits all gathering together at our colossal landfills, we're in trouble.
And what about food? If animists say trees have spirits, then shouldn't things that come from trees have spirits? Like apples? Then things made from apples, like apple pie or cider would have spirits too. And tacos would have spirits. Spicy, delicious spirits that give you gas later on in the day.
I think I need to appease the spirit of my bed now and go to sleep. I hope the spirit of my pillows agrees with me.
Friday, February 26, 2010
Gettin' A Little Punchy
What is it about American business - especially big corporations - that leads them to be increasingly blind to the consequences of their actions? I see things every day in the news that show the decision-makers in these companies believe themselves safe behind the faceless facade of a corporate logo and a high-priced legal team. For instance, in California Anthem is raising insurance rates 40%, Toyota has lied for years about the severity of its runaway cars, and banks that needed bailout money eight months ago are giving out the highest bonuses they've ever given, to men and women who failed utterly at their jobs.
It's as if they think nobody will notice, or if somebody does notice, there's nothing anyone can do about it. There are human beings who made these decisions, people who've taken leave of their senses and let greed and apathy take over their more charitable virtues. They're secure in their anonymity, and that's dangerous. People will do all sorts of things when they think nobody else is looking or nobody else will ever find out. When there are no consequences people tend to let their baser instincts rule them. So let's make consequences.
I say we create a Punch In The Nose Patrol, staffed with the biggest, meanest, most tattooed, punching-est ex-cons we can find. When Anthem decides to raise rates 40%, we send out the Punch In The Nose Patrol, who will find the person who made the decision - there's always somebody who gives the go-ahead - and punch them square in the puss. Maybe twice. Not enough to kill them, but more than enough to humiliate them and send a clear message.
What better consequence is there than corporal punishment? When you can't reason with someone, when a person has proved again and again and again that they can't be trusted to do the right thing on their own, they need to have some negative incentive. I guarantee you, if the President of Toyota thought for one second that he might be visited by the Punch In The Nose Patrol, he would never have ignored concerns about his cars. If Wall Street brokers thought they might get a knuckle sandwich they'd think twice about their lying, theiving way of business. They might decide the risk isn't worth it and move to another career entirely.
I'm no ex-con, not by a longshot, but I humbly volunteer to be on the first Punch In The Nose Patrol. And I'm guessing that the list of applicants would be long enough to keep the Patrol staffed up for some time to come.
It's as if they think nobody will notice, or if somebody does notice, there's nothing anyone can do about it. There are human beings who made these decisions, people who've taken leave of their senses and let greed and apathy take over their more charitable virtues. They're secure in their anonymity, and that's dangerous. People will do all sorts of things when they think nobody else is looking or nobody else will ever find out. When there are no consequences people tend to let their baser instincts rule them. So let's make consequences.
I say we create a Punch In The Nose Patrol, staffed with the biggest, meanest, most tattooed, punching-est ex-cons we can find. When Anthem decides to raise rates 40%, we send out the Punch In The Nose Patrol, who will find the person who made the decision - there's always somebody who gives the go-ahead - and punch them square in the puss. Maybe twice. Not enough to kill them, but more than enough to humiliate them and send a clear message.
What better consequence is there than corporal punishment? When you can't reason with someone, when a person has proved again and again and again that they can't be trusted to do the right thing on their own, they need to have some negative incentive. I guarantee you, if the President of Toyota thought for one second that he might be visited by the Punch In The Nose Patrol, he would never have ignored concerns about his cars. If Wall Street brokers thought they might get a knuckle sandwich they'd think twice about their lying, theiving way of business. They might decide the risk isn't worth it and move to another career entirely.
I'm no ex-con, not by a longshot, but I humbly volunteer to be on the first Punch In The Nose Patrol. And I'm guessing that the list of applicants would be long enough to keep the Patrol staffed up for some time to come.
Wednesday, January 27, 2010
Why Are All The Fire Trucks Here?
As I left the building this morning to go work out I heard sirens. With the way the sound was echoing down the various streets, I had my suspicions immediately about where they might be headed. When I rounded the corner by the cooking school I saw that my hunch had been correct: the fire trucks - all six of them - were outside the gym.
I saw civilians leaving the building and fire fighters gathered around the entrance, so using my Batman-like powers of deduction I concluded the fire fighters had ordered the building evacuated. The fact that several of the people exiting told me that exact thing only confirmed my amazing skill at piecing together information. But I know how these things go, and the firemen weren't in any sort of hurry. No hoses, no ladders, no axes, no urgency meant no fire. So I wandered up to the front door to wait for them to re-open the building.
Here's the scene - six fire trucks in the street with lights flashing, fire fighters in reflective gear outside the door, gym employees outside the door, gym patrons outside the door. You'd think that anyone arriving would be able to figure out the situation immediately. And you'd be wrong.
I stood there for fifteen minutes and nine people - I counted - came up and tried the door. And they all seemed genuinely surprised when the gym staff told them the place was evacuated and that they couldn't go in. One guy in a business suit said, and I quote him verbatim:
"Really? Was there a fire?"
I guess he thought the fire fighters were having a pancake breakfast fund raiser? That the fire truck ten feet away - literally - was for the kids to play on?
Just when I start having faith in my fellow man again, somebody comes along to knock some sense into me. Are people that clueless, or are they that self-centered that they think fire trucks and evacuations are for other people?
Yeesh. Some people just don't get it. This is why reality television is still profitable.
On the plus side, I know now where the lockbox for the firemen's keys is. If you keep your eyes open you notice a lot of stuff.
And, for complete closure on that anecdote, the fire was caused by a short in a wall plug (I overheard the fire fighters' radio), into which was plugged a vending machine. With an extension cord.
I saw civilians leaving the building and fire fighters gathered around the entrance, so using my Batman-like powers of deduction I concluded the fire fighters had ordered the building evacuated. The fact that several of the people exiting told me that exact thing only confirmed my amazing skill at piecing together information. But I know how these things go, and the firemen weren't in any sort of hurry. No hoses, no ladders, no axes, no urgency meant no fire. So I wandered up to the front door to wait for them to re-open the building.
Here's the scene - six fire trucks in the street with lights flashing, fire fighters in reflective gear outside the door, gym employees outside the door, gym patrons outside the door. You'd think that anyone arriving would be able to figure out the situation immediately. And you'd be wrong.
I stood there for fifteen minutes and nine people - I counted - came up and tried the door. And they all seemed genuinely surprised when the gym staff told them the place was evacuated and that they couldn't go in. One guy in a business suit said, and I quote him verbatim:
"Really? Was there a fire?"
I guess he thought the fire fighters were having a pancake breakfast fund raiser? That the fire truck ten feet away - literally - was for the kids to play on?
Just when I start having faith in my fellow man again, somebody comes along to knock some sense into me. Are people that clueless, or are they that self-centered that they think fire trucks and evacuations are for other people?
Yeesh. Some people just don't get it. This is why reality television is still profitable.
On the plus side, I know now where the lockbox for the firemen's keys is. If you keep your eyes open you notice a lot of stuff.
And, for complete closure on that anecdote, the fire was caused by a short in a wall plug (I overheard the fire fighters' radio), into which was plugged a vending machine. With an extension cord.
Tuesday, January 5, 2010
The Chef Bubble
First we had the dot-com bubble of late 1999 and into 2000. To work our way out of that mess, our government engineered a housing bubble, which burst in late 2007, and which is still bursting even as we speak. So how are we going to work our way out of this housing bubble/ credit crisis/ totally fubar economic situation? By engineering a chef bubble, evidently.
When I go work out, I usually walk past the cooking school a few blocks up. Been doing it for years, but it's only been in the past six months or so that I've noticed a dramatic increase in the number of cars parked along all the side streets. Used to be that all the cooking school people parked in the parking garage right behind the main building. Not no more. The students are crusing up and down every street for blocks around, emerging with their little white hats, hounds-tooth-checked pants, and gargantuan recipe books. There are a lot more cooking school students now than there were even a year ago. A LOT more.
This is understandable, when times are tough trade school enrollment goes up. People want to know they have a skill they can actually make a living with, as opposed to, say, being an expert in putting together Power Point presentations. But there's a problem here, one I don't think the cooking school faculty is letting their students know about.
There are far fewer chef jobs than there were before. Americans are eating out less, restaurant profits are down overall, and restaurants are closing their doors across the country. So when all these new cooking school students graduate, where are they going to go? Sure, right now they're greasing the gears of the economy with their tuition money, the school employs more instructors, they build more classrooms which employs more contractors, they buy more food which keeps the delivery companies and ConAgra in business. But then what? The economy can only absorb so many classically trained and accredited chefs, and right now there are definitely more on the supply side than the demand side of this economic curve.
Before you know it, we'll have rank after rank of cooking school graduates with nowhere to work, making crepes on the exit ramps for spare change.
So how do we work our way out of the chef bubble? Maybe we start a carpet cleaner bubble. Or a board game bubble. Wait, I got it. A stripper bubble. Yeah... a glut of strippers would put a definite spark back in the economy. At least in the glitter, baby powder, and 6-inch transparent shoe sectors.
When I go work out, I usually walk past the cooking school a few blocks up. Been doing it for years, but it's only been in the past six months or so that I've noticed a dramatic increase in the number of cars parked along all the side streets. Used to be that all the cooking school people parked in the parking garage right behind the main building. Not no more. The students are crusing up and down every street for blocks around, emerging with their little white hats, hounds-tooth-checked pants, and gargantuan recipe books. There are a lot more cooking school students now than there were even a year ago. A LOT more.
This is understandable, when times are tough trade school enrollment goes up. People want to know they have a skill they can actually make a living with, as opposed to, say, being an expert in putting together Power Point presentations. But there's a problem here, one I don't think the cooking school faculty is letting their students know about.
There are far fewer chef jobs than there were before. Americans are eating out less, restaurant profits are down overall, and restaurants are closing their doors across the country. So when all these new cooking school students graduate, where are they going to go? Sure, right now they're greasing the gears of the economy with their tuition money, the school employs more instructors, they build more classrooms which employs more contractors, they buy more food which keeps the delivery companies and ConAgra in business. But then what? The economy can only absorb so many classically trained and accredited chefs, and right now there are definitely more on the supply side than the demand side of this economic curve.
Before you know it, we'll have rank after rank of cooking school graduates with nowhere to work, making crepes on the exit ramps for spare change.
So how do we work our way out of the chef bubble? Maybe we start a carpet cleaner bubble. Or a board game bubble. Wait, I got it. A stripper bubble. Yeah... a glut of strippers would put a definite spark back in the economy. At least in the glitter, baby powder, and 6-inch transparent shoe sectors.
Friday, November 20, 2009
Tales From My Past - Dot-Com Madness
Do you remember the good old days? 1999? Back when Y2K was making people dig holes in their back yards? When the Euro was new and worth less than a dollar? When Brandi Chastain stripped for America at the World Cup? When the dot-com bubble hadn't yet burst, when companies who made nothing and provided no service were trading for $50 a share? When people who had no business playing in the stock market got their own personal accounts and traded their salary like it was Monopoly money?
Ahh.... good times.
Back then I worked for a soul-less, privately-held corporation - which is different from a soul-less public corporation in that it's easier for the private corp to lie - that was spending money as if they printed their own. Which they may have been doing. They were just figuring out the power of the Internet to drive their business, and one of the projects I was working on was creating a centralized customer database. I used specific software to get this done, and that software company held a 'user's conference' every year, which was, as we all now know, just another sales call and an excuse to spend far too much money. But since I was overworked and underpaid I got to go. Score one for Don.
The software company rented out Universal Studios in Orlando, FL. The entire place, just for four hundred or so conference attendees. They had plenty of food and performers in costume and all the rides were open. It was crazy and fun, and had absolutely nothing whatsoever to do with the software product. Even though I felt a little guilty about it, I did eat their food and ride their rides and talk to the guy dressed as Captain America.
Our regional sales manager took us to a very expensive Italian restaurant and picked up the entire tab, liquor included, for seventy people. When they found out I used to work at an Italian restaurant they made me pick the wines, and when I balked at the $90 bottle - we'd have needed at least six bottles to cover everyone drinking, minimum $540 - they just laughed and told me to get what I thought was best. So I did. I'm sure the liquor tab alone was over $1000.
We got tons of branded crap. Empty notebooks, scratch pads, pens, watches, spiral-bound ledgers, and acres of slick product marketing junk. All of it free to us, none of it free to produce.
When I think of the money that one company wasted in just four days, and how much better their financial position would be right now if they hadn't spent it...
Aww, who am I trying to kid? I want those old days back. The spendthrift, crazy dot-com days, when a simple analyst got treated like a king, on the off chance that he might tell the decision-makers at a company to keep using a product they'd already bought. Come on, people, whatever happened to irrational exuberance?
Ahh.... good times.
Back then I worked for a soul-less, privately-held corporation - which is different from a soul-less public corporation in that it's easier for the private corp to lie - that was spending money as if they printed their own. Which they may have been doing. They were just figuring out the power of the Internet to drive their business, and one of the projects I was working on was creating a centralized customer database. I used specific software to get this done, and that software company held a 'user's conference' every year, which was, as we all now know, just another sales call and an excuse to spend far too much money. But since I was overworked and underpaid I got to go. Score one for Don.
The software company rented out Universal Studios in Orlando, FL. The entire place, just for four hundred or so conference attendees. They had plenty of food and performers in costume and all the rides were open. It was crazy and fun, and had absolutely nothing whatsoever to do with the software product. Even though I felt a little guilty about it, I did eat their food and ride their rides and talk to the guy dressed as Captain America.
Our regional sales manager took us to a very expensive Italian restaurant and picked up the entire tab, liquor included, for seventy people. When they found out I used to work at an Italian restaurant they made me pick the wines, and when I balked at the $90 bottle - we'd have needed at least six bottles to cover everyone drinking, minimum $540 - they just laughed and told me to get what I thought was best. So I did. I'm sure the liquor tab alone was over $1000.
We got tons of branded crap. Empty notebooks, scratch pads, pens, watches, spiral-bound ledgers, and acres of slick product marketing junk. All of it free to us, none of it free to produce.
When I think of the money that one company wasted in just four days, and how much better their financial position would be right now if they hadn't spent it...
Aww, who am I trying to kid? I want those old days back. The spendthrift, crazy dot-com days, when a simple analyst got treated like a king, on the off chance that he might tell the decision-makers at a company to keep using a product they'd already bought. Come on, people, whatever happened to irrational exuberance?
Thursday, November 12, 2009
Industry For The New Milennium
After the financial fiascos of the past year or two, it should be clear to everyone that 'finance' should be a means to an end, and not an entire industry to itself. And any economy based solely on financial institutions is doomed to failure when those institutions fail - just ask Iceland or Charlotte, NC. Our economy shouldn't be based on imaginary dollars moved from one place to another, we need to get back to making stuff, our economy needs to be the sum total of goods moved and services provided.
"But Don," you say, "the auto industry has failed just like the steel industry did. And the time for railroads was two centuries ago. What could the United States possibly make that the rest of the world wants to buy?" Well, thanks for asking, I have a few suggestions.
Garbage-based Deodorant. Americans generate a lot of garbage, and much of the rest of the world smells bad (pretentious Eurotrash, I'm looking your way). All we have to do is figure out a way to make our garbage smell better than stinky foreigners and it's an instant growth industry. And, let's be honest, we don't have all that far to go.
Discarded CD Solar Reflectors. Steve Jobs was right, the iPod changed everything; it killed an entire industry, as a matter of fact, which makes you wonder why pretentious record store douchebags were the first to go digital. Who buys CDs any more? And once you load your music onto your computer what do you do with the old ones? Solar is a growth industry, and they need shiny stuff. CDs are shiny and otherwise useless. Picture acres upon acres of worthless copies of 'Pocket Full of Kryptonite' shining valuable sunlight back into solar cells. Brings a tear to your eye.
McMansion Holidays. We have a glut of hastily-built, overpriced, immense homes all across the country, standing vacant and waiting for banks to realize they're never going to make back the money on those overextended mortgage notes. People in developing countries will have money for vacations, and rather than stay in an impersonal hotel that looks like every other hotel on the block, they can stay in an impersonal home that looks like every other home on the block. Oooh, look, granite countertops! And a jacuzzi in the master bath!
Soylent Green. Just hear me out on this one... the developing world is hungry, and the best innovations in the next century are going to come from third world nations, as long as they get enough to eat. Here in the US we have an overabundance of 'reality' performers whose only claim to fame is that they once showed up on TV. We take our surplus, make Soylent Green out of them, a high-protein easily-digestible food, and 'voila!' problem solved. I think the first to go should be Jon and Kate, then the big-booty Kardashians.
I'm available for consulting, once the 'captains of industry' catch up to me.
"But Don," you say, "the auto industry has failed just like the steel industry did. And the time for railroads was two centuries ago. What could the United States possibly make that the rest of the world wants to buy?" Well, thanks for asking, I have a few suggestions.
Garbage-based Deodorant. Americans generate a lot of garbage, and much of the rest of the world smells bad (pretentious Eurotrash, I'm looking your way). All we have to do is figure out a way to make our garbage smell better than stinky foreigners and it's an instant growth industry. And, let's be honest, we don't have all that far to go.
Discarded CD Solar Reflectors. Steve Jobs was right, the iPod changed everything; it killed an entire industry, as a matter of fact, which makes you wonder why pretentious record store douchebags were the first to go digital. Who buys CDs any more? And once you load your music onto your computer what do you do with the old ones? Solar is a growth industry, and they need shiny stuff. CDs are shiny and otherwise useless. Picture acres upon acres of worthless copies of 'Pocket Full of Kryptonite' shining valuable sunlight back into solar cells. Brings a tear to your eye.
McMansion Holidays. We have a glut of hastily-built, overpriced, immense homes all across the country, standing vacant and waiting for banks to realize they're never going to make back the money on those overextended mortgage notes. People in developing countries will have money for vacations, and rather than stay in an impersonal hotel that looks like every other hotel on the block, they can stay in an impersonal home that looks like every other home on the block. Oooh, look, granite countertops! And a jacuzzi in the master bath!
Soylent Green. Just hear me out on this one... the developing world is hungry, and the best innovations in the next century are going to come from third world nations, as long as they get enough to eat. Here in the US we have an overabundance of 'reality' performers whose only claim to fame is that they once showed up on TV. We take our surplus, make Soylent Green out of them, a high-protein easily-digestible food, and 'voila!' problem solved. I think the first to go should be Jon and Kate, then the big-booty Kardashians.
I'm available for consulting, once the 'captains of industry' catch up to me.
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