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Monday, August 13, 2001
OFIM, indeed...
As I made my way to work this morning, the typical news of the morning washed over me. Mother of five in Houston who drowned her children will be tried, and the prosecutors are seeking the death penalty. An elected official from California who was more concerned with his own image and culpability than the disappearance of someone with whom he had some form of relationship. Yet another Middle Eastern suicide bomber, this one just not as deadly as the last, fortunately. Drilling in ANWR, for domestic oil, since we're dependent on foreign oil and just can't seem to agree that one individual wrapped in a thirty-five-hundred pound chunk of metal and glass should be required to go two miles further before burning up that gallon of unleaded. A Japanese Prime Minister who "compromised" and visited a national shrine to military dead, and honored many brave men fighting for their country, and fourteen war criminals, in a country that has tried in recent years to erase the guilt and responsibility for horrific acts conducted sixty years ago (while the current citizens of Japan should not be held responsible for the actions of their ancestors, they should know what was done so that it doesn't happen again). Some jerk who was fleeing police Saturday night rammed head-on into a family returning from a day trip to Wisconsin - while I'm a bit hesitant to use the word "miracle" it does seem that for all of them to have survived the crash (including the mother, who is pregnant - she broke her leg in two places, but all else is fine, and she was driving the pickup that got hit). A grandmother was carjacked in Downtown St. Paul this weekend, and a road rage incident just a few miles from home lead to a stabbing. And, after all that, I watch a lunatic run a stop sign doing at least forty. Pleasant news all around. It's a good thing that I've got Louis Armstrong's "Wonderful World" in the music rotation at work...
But that's not the big deal for me this morning. Nope. Not post-partum depression, suicidal bombers, lying elected officials, oil, greed, or stupidity. None of it. The biggest deal in the Dominik household is that my little girl is growing up.
My "Daddy" days are numbered. I don't remember my first "mama" or "dada". I do remember my last. It was a big decision for me, because I was the oldest. I'd discussed it with my mother, first, and she reminded me that it would lead all of the other kids along with. I think she was trying to discourage me in an encouraging manner. If that's possible. I remember standing on the stairs in the "new" house (which would make me 11 or 12 - late, I know, but at the age of 12 I still had a four-year-old sister, you see), and asking my father "would it be ok if I called you 'Dad' or 'Pop'?"
In public I'd long avoided it by the simple expedient of saying "hey" or getting in front of them to make sure I had their attention. But being in fifth grade, one didn't say "daddy" or "mommy" any more except as a joke. I had to face the issue head-on, which I did, after significant hemming and hawing.
My daughter came into our bedroom this morning, dressed for daycare. She had her little black boots on (oh, stop - they're ankle-high, nylon, and she could probably stomp your butt with them - they have a heel of about an inch, though, which is why I mention it), and standing in front of the bookshelf I realized that my daughter is nearly five feet tall. Five feet! I knew nuns who never cracked that sixty-inch line, and here my baby girl is ready to burst through it and keep on charging up that ladder.
I'm not complaining for missed time. Not at all. I've actually made decisions which have avoided travel, to avoid being away from my wife and kids. In fact, I ended up leaving one company rather than travel more, as they'd have liked. Didn't regret it, because nearly every day I'd go to daycare and pick up her and later her brother, there'd be at least one brief smile from one of them to make it worthwhile. Some days it was amid tears, other days it was huge grins, and some days one or the other would pitch an absolute fit. But there'd be a smile from someone, somewhere, to make it worthwhile.
I look back, and it seems like only a few days ago I was swearing in frustration at a sleepy eater who would drain two and a half ounces of formula in a turtle-like two and a half hours. Now I look at her wolf down her lunch, ready to go back and play, and I'm amazed.
I'm also frightened. This fall, my daugher starts her second grade. My second-grade year was pretty big in my world. I joined Cub Scouts. It was my last year of school with a bathroom in the classroom. It was also where I got glasses, had oral surgery (the only kind I've ever had so far, knock wood) to remove three teeth and a "bud". I also met a pain-in-the-butt kid who, almost twenty years later, stood in my wedding, as I had for him four years earlier. And I still commiserate with him as he's going through a painful divorce.
I started a gradual transition in second grade. My parents were no longer the be-all, end-all in my life. I became more independent, more self-sufficient. More self-reliant. Sure, I had to come home for meals, but some summer days that was the only thing tying me to home.
Dave Farquhar this morning writes of love, and the nature of it. What is it, is this it, and other questions. Heinlein once said "Love is where another person's happiness is necessary for your own." If they're happy, then you're happy. It's a bit more than that, but that's a good start.
But what occurred to me this morning is that the easy years are now over. Parenting 101, the diapers, 3 am feedings, and gelatenous foodstuffs are long behind me, for now. Parenting 201, the "these are the rules and this is how you get dressed and because I said so" are also now slipping, mostly, into the background. Now comes the tough stuff. The "I need to be your parent, I'd like to be your friend, but I've also got to be your reason for leaving."
Every day takes me further from that wonderful evening when they placed my baby girl in my arms, and closer to the day where she says "but mom, my friends and I were gonna..." Closer to the day where she comes home, crying, because a little ... boy has broken her heart. Closer to the day where she leaves home, not for a week, but forever. Closer to the day where I'm going to have to hand her over, willingly, to some smirking punk in fancy clothes at the end of the aisle in front of a church full of people, and I'll have to be happy about it.
Don't worry. I'm not going to flick a switch and become Pappa SOB - not my style. And yes, I'm going to shed more than a few tears. And Dave - don't worry about it. The same guys who said "sissies cry" are the same ones who gave us other problems. Real men DO cry. We just don't brag about it. We pass the time by thinking of the things we'd like to do to the wretched little punks who would harm our kids.
And so, if you're attending a wedding and the father has this distant, bemused look on his face, it's a fair bet that he's lost in thought, contemplating the removal of some young man's private portions for later public display. We're not a bloodthirsty sort, really. We're just into protecting our own.
The other significant news is that I finished the basic performance testing on our most recent version, and I'm starting the new version after a couple of runs at some replication testing. Ah, there's a throwback. I should be able to find my notes after a couple of hours...
Oh, yeah. One other thing. Our Mortgage Broker called back, and he, frankly, was the bearer of news. Seems that the prevailing opinion is that they're pretty sure someone will allow us to be in debt to them for 30 years. Dear God, what have I done?
Oh well. I found the tent I think I really want... And REI's got it for $169! Cool! Just so I've got it in the search engine, Wenzel Brazos 9-man, four-room tent. Heh. Now, to convince the boss....
Tuesday, August 14, 2001
How appropriate. Today I bailed out of the Office Max web site after it insisted I had to allow it to deposit cookies on my hard drive after every single page. And then CNN weighs in with this little tidbit about Web Bugs.
I realize that there will be a certain amount of privacy that I'm going to give up in just surfing the web. However, I'm unwilling to give up that much. If a company asks if they can do this, that's one thing. If a company does it and doesn't tell me what or why, then they can go to hell.
Well, last night the monkey boy, and we, slept well. That's a good sign.
Of course, for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction. Therefore I stood before the mirror this morning with a hand full of shaving foam. About to shave. And I open the faucet to a slow, steady hiss... and nothing liquid coming out. I yell "DON'T Flush the..." too late. We called the apartment office - apparently a pipe broke somewhere, and we were waterless.
I am *SO* ready for a house of my own. Yes, I know I'd be paying to replace a broken pipe in my own home. Odds are, however, I'd have done something before this point. Noticed the trickle, etc. Sheesh.
As a public service, I should note that I've heard from the Belands, and they ARE alive. Just baking in weather like we had last week. And, this being the naturally air-conditioned Pacific Northwest, they don't have the mechanical kind. Oooof. One small favor? Please ship that shit SOUTHeast, instead of STRAIGHT east, thank you very much.
Beyond that, I'm still futtering with the house features spreadsheet. I've an excel spreadsheet which lists the things we want in our new house. Some things are "required". As in three bedrooms. As in at least two toilets and a tub/shower (more is very, very good). A Basement. Basic stuff like that.
One of the benefits of writing like this is that it allows me to "think out loud". For example, I've just excised four paragraphs because I was trying to figure out how to "rate" house features. And I did it. The required features are "zeros". Things we like are "negative" values. Things we don't like are positive. We look for a house with the lowest point total, overall. Negative points would be very, very good.
Of course, the rest of the day wasn't much better. I did finally get to log a bug in our tracking system - my role is primarily performance testing, testing fixes of previously reported bugs, testing stuff before we say "yeah, this works", and the like. Today I got to enter a bug I found. I'm soooooo happy. ;-)
And then, just to make sure I was staying appropriately sized, I fired up the "auld accounting computer". It was kept segregated from the rest of the world at least the last eight or nine months, and was actually the computer where the accounting was done prior to the purchase of this company by another. I set it down, looked up the requirements for Office XP for testing, fired up the computer, and got two quick bummers in succession ... 64 Mb RAM and a dead C drive. Good thing we've transferred all of our key information to corporate... we hope.
And yes, I'm painfully aware that Office XP's been out for a while - however, we cannot certify an application on Beta code - part of it's our desire to get something stable, and part of it's my desire to make sure we don't "certify" on a sandpile, instead of a solid base. That's why we aren't yet working on XP. Frankly, my preference would be to wait for XP Service Pack 1, or 2. Or not certify it at all. But that's not my choice.
Ah well.
Finally, my wife complains in her post this evening that I said she had a "God Complex".
As she's a relatively recent convert to Dungeons and Dragons (yes, it's true, I've been fiddling with it for, dear God, over 20 years now), I can see how she's confused. She does not realize, as she hasn't played it that long, that all true D&D players have God complexes. Nearly all of the good ones want to become good dungeonmasters, and for that job, a God complex is just the beginning.
Oh well. Age and treachery will always overcome youth and skill...
G'nite...
Wednesday, August 15, 2001
yes, yes. Wednesday.
Still haven't figured out why it's called "Hump day". It hardly ever works out that way.
My humps usually occur early in the week when the big problem shows up, or about 3:30 on Friday, when someone says "hey, this needs to be working on Monday - can you help?"
Right. Every network admin's heard that story at least once. And we
invariably respond the same way. "Let me see what I can do" and
then we work through the weekend. What we really should say is "Come over here while I open the elevator doors, dearie. And by the way, it only LOOKS like there's no elevator there..."
Unless, of course, "hump" has taken on some unsavory connotation of which I'm not aware. Ahem.
I'm working on a rather largish bit of work for later this week - I've got to find and cite some crime statistics which I'm hoping to find on the internet, rather than dig in musty old books - reason being they will be immediately available, and should be relatively recent. If I can find the damned things.
Should you lack for interesting reading, I strongly recommend you check out my friend Mr. Jim Kershner. He's going to gain a grandchild this week sometime (we know how that goes, don't we. Due date, BAH! When someone figures out how to teach a foetus to A) open mail, B) read, C) get a calendar, D) tell time, and E) follow a schedule, I'll believe "due dates". Until such time, you will not be able to prove to me that a "due date" is determined by any fashion other than the obstetrician throwing a dart at a calendar from over their shoulder. Scientific dating methodology, my ass). He also has a lot of computers. Some of which he uses for ... well, things. Near as I can figure, there's this "Route 66" program, running on Linux, which is an MP3 server of some sort. Gotta get me that. Sometimes he uses his powers for good, too. Just a brief note - he tends to dote on the young lady Miss Brooklyn - I'll warn you now, gentlemen - get in line, and be sure to have your proof of neuter in-hand - she's two going on twenty (she already eschews the toy department for clothes and shoes - Marcia, your crown seems to be in jeopardy!), and her grandpop's liable to brain you with a big old retired server should you have less than honorable intentions.
So should all fathers, of course. Brain male youths with dastardly intentions towards their daughters, I mean. If more men took that attitude, I wonder how many young ladies would be with men who abused them either physically, emotionally, or in any other way....
Wow - where did that come from? Must be the rain we desperately need and has finally arrived short-circuiting my brain cells. Done with performance testing now and back onto replication - boy, it's amazing how fast brain cells lose their content when they're not exercised daily.
Speaking of the weather, wind chill made the news last night. No, definitely not what you want to hear. The bloody heat wave breaks last week into decent, albeit September-like, weather, and the nits on TV wish to discuss a change in the windchill calculation. Right.
Basic facts to date are - Wind chill was calculated using a anemometer (wind measurement device) mounted 33 feet above the ground at MSP international airport. This winter, windchills will be calculated using wind measured at 5 feet above the ground.
Key difference? lower means less wind - less wind means "less cold". Frankly, when you're talking Frostbite in fifteen minutes versus frostbite in twenty minutes, damned cold is damned cold, thank you very little. I've been out in 100 below windchills (as a much younger lunatic attempting to impress others - sadly, the girls had too much sense to come out) - if you've never heard the phrase "BF Cold" before, you most definitely will at that temp. And yes, BF stands for an unsavory (and unsanitary) activity which I recommend to no one unless it's one hundred below zero windchill-wise.
The major technical change is that a temperature which used to be minus forty will now be in the minus twenty-two range. Conditions which used to produce a minus fifteen reading will now likely produce a zero reading. Cold, damned cold, either way.
Why is this big news in August, you ask yourself? Well, first of all because some smug laughing "meterologist" says "you'll just have to deal with it" (right - bud, here's my foot. Now deal with it where you find it. And those soft, squishy bits that are much softer and squishier? Yup, completely and totally unnecessary for you now - hey, don't black out on me...). The key portion of the news is that schools, etc., who keep children indoors once the temps fall below zero, wind chill, will now have to adjust the temps upwards. Which is unfortunate. Kids need room to run, to roam, to get wild, and in the winter (which comprises about 2.75 of our four seasons here) with the long nights, short days, and everything else, they really need it.
Certainly, there are answers - walled playgrounds, with walls sixteen feet high or thereabouts, would protect many kids from the worst of the wind. Of course, a wall with a height of sixteen feet and a peak sun angle of something like 23 degrees in late December gives you ... oh, heck, I can't find it, but someone knows the formula - three angles, 90, 67, and 23.
A sixteen foot tall wall forms one side of the triangle; I know the pythagorean
theorem as well as anyone (the sum of the square of the hypotenuse of the right
triangle is equal to the sum of the squaws of the other two hides - or something
like that 
). I should be
able to figure out the rest from there.
Oh well. It's been a long time since high-school algebra, and frankly, college statistics just didn't cover this stuff.
And with that, I'm off to bed. G'nite.
Thursday, August 16, 2001
And we roar into Thursday like a putt-putt motorbike... That is to say loudly, under-powered, unprotected, and with a great deal of trepidation... Oh well. At least tomorrow's Friday. Thank God.
I've got lots of thoughts wandering my head. Most of them get lost between "reset" and the final desktop screen. I wonder how many great novels are lost between those two events... Thanks, Microsoft. Some day Linux will be a viable desktop alternative. And boy, will I be ready for it.
Let's see. We'll start off serious - Mr. Thompson notes today that Our President isn't all that highly thought of overseas. And that's a good point. We elected Mr. Gore - whoops, some confusion there - something over 50% of us voted for him, and that other fellow... but by now we all know that story - so it's Dub, sorry - to lead the U.S. of A. Look out for our interests on the global stage, and take care of the United States. That's his job. Good. Fellow's paid by my taxes - I have no choice in that. He'd better work for me. So if I hire a pit bull, I want the pit bull to bite the other fellow. If, on the other hand, I end up with an in-bred, brain-damaged mutt, well, we'll watch him lick his privates and have a good old time. And we'll suffer along in silence. Or mutter quietly. Whichever.
What's painfully apparent to me is that Dubyah and Co. are still stuck on the big old map on the wall portion of the geography quiz - it's a big map; but it only shows North America. So that's a nice idea. Dub, however, hasn't yet connected the fact that the beach ball he plays with at Camp David is actually a globe, and while it's all well and good that he's looking out for the United States of America, were he an intelligent fellow, he would also note that when we dump trash off our eastern seaboard, it floats up along Greenland, over past Iceland, down past England and France and the Spanish/Portuguese coast, along the western coast of Africa, down past Antarctica, and then up along South America. In other words, sure, look out for number one - it's in the water - so's number two, come to think of it. But while we're hoping the trash will get picked out of the water by the time it gets back around, wouldn't it be smarter not to dump the trash in the water in the first place? Wouldn't it be smarter to look at ways to reduce the amount of abuse we put this planet through? Shouldn't we be looking at the planet and saying "since we've yet to develop any way to get off this planet and make permanent homes elsewhere, let's try not to foul this one up."?
Makes sense to me, at any rate. Guess that's why I'm prohibited from running for elected office - I've got me a brain, and if you're not careful, I'm just gonna have to use it...
And one other thing that's bothered me. Locally, on Wednesday, over seven hundred Hmong refugees originally from South-East Asia took the oath of United States Citizenship. In Hmong. I'd link to the news stories but the Associated Press requires that the local sites remove the news after two weeks - what's the point? Anyway - What's wrong with this picture? Not much, I guess, if you want to make sure that I can't talk to my neighbor. The act allowing this abomination was sponsored by the late Bruce Vento, Democrat from Minneapolis, who passed away late last year from lung cancer, caused by several years working in an asbestos factory. Vento's idea was that since the Hmong were primarily agrarian, were mostly unfamiliar with formal schooling and formal studying methods, they should be extended some extra slack for their military contributions during the Viet Nam war.
This is something I've touched on before, if only I could find it. A common language is essential in establishing a community. Lacking a common language, all you've got is a bunch of "us folks" and "them folks" and "them other bastards". That's how things work. People who do not communicate grow apart, rather than together.
And for those of you who tell me "learn Hmong" let me ask you - what country did they come to? Sure, I'm an "ugly American" but I do not expect for one minute that you can claim allegiance to any other country or flag without knowing the language. If you wished to become a Mexican citizen, would you expect to be able to take the oath of citizenship in English, or Mexican Spanish? How about Russia - Russian or English? How about Japan? English or Japanese? Seems to me that if we could talk to one another, we'd be much better off.
All right. Bounding around to other semi-related topics, I'm still researching statistics for a couple folks... We'll see what we'll see.
On to personal topics. There's a couple of houses in the south metro which, folks, really, really, REALLY suck. You'd hate them. Promise me you won't even bother to look. They're wretched examples of construction and design and ... well, everything. So basically stay out of all of the South Metro suburbs until I get a chance to check them out for you and I'll let you know. Really.
In other words, yes, we found two really promising houses - really, REALLY promising places. If we can get everything moving fast enough, one of them could well be "home" for the next few years. Unfortunately, Ann spoke with the Mortgage guy today, and his comment to her was "your stuff is looking good - if it keeps going like this we'll just submit a computer request and the computer can generate automatic approvals."
There are so many, many levels on which I find this pathetically humorous, sad, hilarious ... and I'm more than a little bit paranoid about it. With all of my experience with all different computers, why is it that this particular portion of my life ends up hanging on a computer's decision? Good grief. I'm sure some of you are laughing until body parts drop off. Personally, I'd feel so much more comfortable sitting next to this computer with an arc-welder and a screw driver. Just to let it know who's boss, and who's likely to turn it into scrap metal should it ... decide wrongly.
The good news is that, were I so inclined to feel sorry for myself, I could talk to some friends and find out that they've got it much, much worse...
Oh well. Off to see if I can find another virgin to sacrifice... G'nite.
Yippie Skippie it's...Friday!, August 17, 2001
Seems it's yet again time for another three-way conversation here at the Daynoters. Please note that I hold both Mr. Thompson and Mr. Ricketson in the highest regard - and value their opinions.
If you haven't read Mr. Thompson's post of yesterday, or JHR's post of today, check them out. Then, buckle your seatbelts. If you'd prefer to avoid this all, click here...
I'm in a weird position. Being born in 1963, I'm sometimes lumped into the group with those "baby boomer" folk who, according to my college sociology, covered the period 1946-1961 (said "generation" being a twenty-five year range, I'm told, for the infant to be born and reach average child-having (not bearing, but HAVING) age, and then do so). I'm sometimes lumped in with the over-hyped and over-marketed Gen-Xers, who haven't yet learned how to dress (what would you call it? I don't care how much you paid for your undergarments, or who's name is on them - I don't want to see them in public. If you think it's cool, take a look at your parents. What they're wearing on the weekends was once considered "cool" for them. Case closed). I tend to not fit either bunch particularly well. I remember things like the moon landings, War protesters, and the like. However, my childhood music wasn't "rock and roll" but more classical and big band - my parents were older (Dad was 41 when I came home from the hospital - I was born three days before his birthday. Thus my mother started the Dominik tradition of using the birth children as an excuse to skip shopping for one's spouse's birthday - just kidding, ma ;-). So I'm a bit of a throwback in many ways (more than the back hair would indicate).
As someone with a foot in two different groups, I often get very very frustrated with what I see as a lack of understanding of the world at large. So it is with the present leadership of our nation. Mr. Ricketson points out that I blame the US for fostering aid overseas, when there's much we could do at home. Yes, I'm aware. And frankly, I think a little - well, a LOT - of my money's going to places that just aren't in desperate "need" of it. I'm all for helping out starving children. Certainly they shouldn't be left to rot and die. But let's not just feed them a few weeks and forget about it. Or worse yet, just keep feeding them. Let's teach them how to fish...
I don't see why we need to send "foreign aid" to countries who are not starving, however. Countries who are successful, going concerns shouldn't need our money. Sure, they want it. Who doesn't? I'd love to win the lottery, too, but I'm more likely to get hit by a lightening bolt. Three times. These other countries get to take my money, which comes from my hard work, and ... do what? Imelda Marcos bought plenty of shoes, so I guess that was a good investment there, eh? And how often do we hear of some tin-pot little nutball running off to some country we can't lay hands on them through and taking the national treasury with them?
Unfortunately, we've gotten to the point where we give money and we end up taking crap from the same people we give the money to. What's wrong with this picture? Apparently a new form of Gratitude. At least in the old days, when you bought a country, it stayed bought (</JOKE>). These days, we're liable to be giving money to some country that's badmouthing us to the press, voting against our actions in every global body we have in common, and generally behaving like the spoiled children we turn out daily here. We take a lot of garbage we didn't used to, and we haven't got a charismatic individual to step up and do the job. We've got people who run for the job because they think it's owed to them.
Speaking of garbage, I mentioned that our "trash" floats around the Atlantic when dumped off the eastern seaboard. By "trash" I also include chemical wastes, toxins, and all of the other stuff we just blithely dump overboard, into landfills or garbage pits or deep holes in the sea because we can't decide where else to dump it. Small point here, folks, but once we finish trashing this joint, where are we gonna go? You gonna rely on NASA to get us off this planet? I'd sooner rely on my son to balance my checkbook.
And yes, I'm aware that other countries are polluting, as well. So's our west coast. The point? There's been a subtle shift in America in the last fifty years. We used to be willing to lead. To do the right thing. To get the facts out, and do something about it. And instead, we now "look for consensus" aka "wait for someone else to lead" - or we just walk away. We point fingers and assign blame. Hell, the "Spin Doctor" is not only the name of a band and a joke, it's also an accepted profession! We no longer even have "science" - we have competing groups, funded by other organizations with vested interests, producing report after report of authoritative gobbledygook which, when translated to laymanese, produces a funny smell and not much else.
In high school, I was a five-year member of marching band. That means I marched for at least part of the summer before my freshman year, and the summer after every year including my senior year in high school. I learned a lot about leadership there.
You see, in Marching Band there are three types of leaders. There's the fellow you're supposed to notice - or the lady - who is out in front of the band, sometimes marching ramrod straight (like ours was), calling the shots - other times they're just strutting like a peacock. They lead by the simple expedient of being up front. They can't help it. They stop or make a wrong turn, and they're no longer leaders - they're goofy people walking funny down the middle of the street, likely to get killed.
Then there's the type of leader like I was - you can't help but notice them. The drummers. Or the "damned drummers" depending on who you talk to. They DRIVE the band - they set the tempo - too fast and we run up the back of the color guard. Too slow and we get run down by the fire truck behind. Just right, but too loud, and no one else is noticed. Just right, but too soft, and people get out of step (more than they already are). Drummers are ballsy, gutsy, cocky, and, they (or we) believe, a gift from the divine to the rest of the mortals, and the only thing that makes their insufferable air of superiority the slightest bit tolerable is that they are 100% right.
But there's a third type of leader. They're seldom noticed by the general public. Sometimes walking with the band wearing dark suits, sometimes walking along the curb, and sometimes walking behind the crowds. They call the shots, they speed or slow the tempo, they tell the band when and where to turn, and what you do not see at a parade, that you would see in practice, is that the band director is everywhere, keeping people in step, shortening or lengthening strides, keeping people in line, in column, and in rank.
Street marching doesn't require a lot of courage most of the time. Some band uniforms do, but frankly, marching in a bunch of people's pretty easy. It's a hell of a lot tougher to be the lone individual out in front trying to lead the rest of the bunch. It takes the strength of belief in your own convictions, it requires the strength of character to stand up and say "I believe this regardless of what you believe."
I don't know where we lost the courage to do the right thing first - perhaps Viet Nam. We did what we thought was right. We leapt in, and found that "right" and "wrong" in the 1950s sense just weren't the clear black and white we thought. We found mud in the jungle, and plenty of gray in our nice neat comic-book world. And we backed way, way off and saw ourselves as "equal" to the Soviet Union. When we were, in some ways worse, in few ways equal, and in many ways superior to them. Sure, they kicked our asses every Olympic with their piles and piles of gold medals. How many remember the joke of the day? "... and a four from the East German judge." Didn't matter the sport, it was just understood that someone would be chopping their numbers way down. But how many of our female atheletes still looked female? How many of the men could father children that didn't come out with extra limbs or brain defects? But I digress...
It's a sad commentary when we're reduced to saying "well, I will if you will." Seems to me that's been our foreign policy of late. We neglect all of the sticks and carrots we bring to the table as one of the most vibrant, powerful, and dominant economies in the world, and instead fight like small children. It's sad to watch Europe unite and point their collective fingers at us, and cry "shame". Sad, because it's true.
Leaders don't do things right. Leaders do Right Things. They don't wait for everyone to decide what "right" is - they know it, and they do it. Managers, however, do things right.
I think our problem came when we had such a collective crises of conscience over Viet Nam. It sucked our confidence out. We began to second-guess ourselves, and decided we needed "management" instead of "leadership".
Sad to say, but the last real leader I've seen out there in a while has been (sit down and prepare to be shocked) Ollie North. Misguided, perhaps, and a bit too gung-ho, but he saw a need, did what was needed to fulfill that need, and didn't worry about the consequences. He was willing to get out there and do what it took.
We're not. We're more concerned with getting our under-occupied, over-priced, oversized Sport Utility Vehicles to the over-sized malls to purchase things we haven't a NEED for to fill our oversized homes and to go deeper into debt to the credit companies who really own America. When I was a small child, I lived in a house my parents PURCHASED, for CASH. Some twenty-five years later, I purchased a car - a fairly stripped-down, small-sized Ford Tempo. This vehicle cost more than the land and house had, twenty-five years earlier. Now I'm looking for a home for my family. That home will quite easily exceed ten times my father's first home.
While that does fill me with excitement at the prospect of having an "investment" appreciate like that, there's another thing that niggles at me. When did a house go from a "home" to an "investment"? When did we stop looking at "home" and "hearth" and "heritage" and "history" and instead changed to "what's in it for me?"
Perhaps I'm having a problem here because as a father, much of my perception is colored by my children's lives and livelihood. For example, the single biggest bill I pay now is not rent, but Daycare. Why? I want my kids to have a good head-start with some teaching, some learning; I also want them to have fun. Sure, it was a choice to send my kids to daycare. However, it's been mostly a requirement that one of work for the benefits, and one of us work for the money. If I could find a company that paid well AND had good benefits, I'd try to get on there - of course, I'd probably have a LOT of competition.
But that's my choice. I don't complain (much) when I have to pay what I do. It was my choice.
As, apparently, it's America's to withdraw from the role of a leader, and prefer instead the role of "outsider."
It's a sorry excuse for a country that put a man on the moon. We've had some great times, and done some great things. We've also fallen far. I look at my kids and think what they'll see. My wife's grandmother passed away in 1996 at the age of 88. Born after flight was invented, she'd seen airplanes and cars go from rickety experiments to conveniences to necessities. She'd seen indoor plumbing become a requirement in homes. She'd seen farming go from back-breaking hell to a profitable way to live to a soul-sucking, wallet-eating way to die. She'd seen the atom bomb dropped, Man go into orbit around the world, and planes that could fly around it. She'd seen the early rise of the internet from a box she didn't understand and couldn't use.
I look at what I've seen in my life, the miracles that are now commonplace. My son will watch the library channel with me at home when there's a shuttle in orbit. We don't give a second thought most of the time that there are three people orbiting this globe CONSTANTLY. In an environment so hostile that they could freeze to death in direct sunlight, only they'd burst like an over-inflated balloon first without their protective gear. And it's COMMON for us to ignore this miracle.
I sit in front of a device that, twenty years ago, was as expensive as my parent's house. At work, I'm surrounded by a dozen computers; some of which aren't even turned on because I don't need them today. I've got more processing power at home than colleges had imagined of fifty years ago. I've got at my fingertips (when the damned phone company cooperates) access to nearly all of the information available in the world; I just can't find those specific bits I need.
My children take this in stride. This wonderful stuff that we do is common-place to them. The other night my nearly five-year-old son said "we can send stuff through the internet to Tommy" (his friend from daycare who left months ago, and he still talks about). Five, and he "gets" it.
I hope and pray that my children will sit in vehicles the size of jet-skis when they get into their "cars" and those vehicles will levitate, transport them to their destination, and land, without them doing anything other than voice commands to tell the device the destination. I hope and pray that they will have access to unlimited renewable power, be it wind, solar, water, nuclear, or some as-yet-undiscovered new method.
I want my kids to look at me when I ask them to explain the latest gadget they've brought home to me, and say "it's magic, dad". And I want to believe them.
Well
now. What you see to the left there is a little indicator of how my day's
gone. Lynne Walder, when she
posts (dig, dig) has "pants" days. This is a little less risque.
I guess...
Anyway, today is slightly above half-way. Why? Well, I think it went pretty good - things at work were working, and I was making progress. Ann was a bit frustrated. After getting up and then having our children literally re-invent the word PUTZ again, she went off without them, and I shepherded their little butts to daycare.
After that, I should have known today was going to be one of those days. The fellow next to me at the stop light this morning was sitting on his big fat Harley, revving the engine, and wearing Gucci loafers. Sheesh. So I figured I'd share the weirdness, and fiddle with CSS. Comments to the usual address
And the whole house mess has us bouncing up and down again. After yesterday's "you're damned near approved" came today's "gee, I forgot about that."
And my wife isn't exactly the optimist. Or, as I put it to her earlier
today, some people are optimistic and see the glass half-full. Those more
pessimistic folk see the glass as half-empty. My wife, however, is one of
those that see the glass as half a glass of something to spill on the
carpet. My basic philosophy is hope for the best, plan for the
worst. That way, you'll get something in-between. Hers is hope for
the worst, plan for the worst, and be pleasantly disgruntled when it doesn't
happen. Something to do with her desire to control everything. Which
isn't exactly a God complex, per se, but more of a dictatorial nature.
Good thing I'm of stubborn aristocratic German stock, or this relationship of
ours could end up being quite difficult. 
Time for me to put away laundry. I might take the weekend off and catch up with other stuff I've really got to get done... We'll see what we'll see. I think I really need a hamster dance fix - I miss the music. Isn't that sick? In the mean time, have a good weekend... G'nite.
Saturday, August 18, 2001
Go Here.
That's far, far more interesting than anything I could
post.
The big problem now in the Dominik Hovel is that I'm back to fighting a half-hearted rearguard action on the whole "just one more baby?" question.
The slope is slippery, my shoes are greased, and then this sort of thing happens. Sheesh.
Oh well. Could be worse. Back to playing catch-up...
Sunday, August 19, 2001
Alrighty, then. Things are definitely looking weird today.
Since I've been
such a royal b*stard this week with the grouching, I suppose I'll toss a bit of
humor up here...
In not quite four days from now, "The Great Minnesota Get-Together" starts. Now, having lived in this state for the entirety of my not-just-yet-thirty-eight years, I know all the jokes. Since a majority of you do not, I'll share some of the better ones.
The State Fair grounds themselves are a permanent installation of several acres (Okay, 210 or so. It takes up several city blocks) in the capitol city of St. Paul. Most of the buildings are huge, older structures. The state fair "grandstand" is a set of brick bleachers that stand something like six stories tall.
The Minnesota State Fair is one of those that will remind you of the movie - or vice versa. Everything from pigs to carnies (I know, not a very big leap there, but bear with me) to talent shows to chart-topping performers to tractors to shopping to food.
And, if you've ever spent any time near the Minnesota State Fair, you'll know that the food is all ... on a stick.
The joke originally started a few years ago - corndogs and pronto-pups came on a stick (important distinction - Corn dogs are hot dogs dipped in corn-batter, and deep fried - pronto pups are dipped in a wheat-based coating (which is sweeter), then deep-fried. Yes, it's healthy - I promise. Grease in August is a requirement in your diet. Trust me. Would I lie to you?). Then some nit started with a gag - "Pickle on a stick". And from there it just went way, way downhill.
In recent years we've been treated to such culinary "treats" as alligator on a stick (sausage on a stick, basically - very, very good), Cheese on a stick (breaded and deep-fried, of course), and the usual and unusual. Pizza on a stick, peanut butter on a stick - chocolate on a stick, corn on the cob on a stick... The list goes on for some time. Every year there are one or two new "stick foods" introduced, and a few of the weirder ones drop off. If memory serves right, a couple years back there was "deep-fried ice cream on a stick."
The joke's even spread to other areas. Some years ago to promote the launch of Internet Explorer 3, Microsoft and one of the local ISP's produced "internet on a stick". A CD-case glued to a popsicle stick.
While this doesn't give you the full "flavor" of the "... on a stick" experience, it should give you enough to get by. And speaking of getting by, this will give you a shudder. Deep-fried, breaded ... candy bars. Ye Gods. No one's going to listen to us again. "No, trust me, really, it's good."
Cripes.
Later: What a day. Dropped off mortgage paperwork, did more shopping (yes, I got some pants and a shirt - me, spending money on clothes again. Last time I did that was ... December. Last year. Gee, where does the time go? ;-). More running around, more shopping, more fiddling, and here we are again. Sunday night.
Yup, bottom of the weekend again. The forthcoming week will be another short week at the Dominik Hovel, as we will be packing like squirrels with nuts come Thursday night (no, not male squirrels - squirrels who wish to live through the winter - sheesh), as we're off to the Great State of South Dakota for a family function - a wedding, no less. Likely the last we'll see until my daughter marries, I guess. I've two younger sisters who would make wonderful mates for some young fellows; they just seem a bit ... blindsided by the modern world.
This week's been one where I've been rolled up like a tube of toothpaste. Unfortunately, unlike around here, this particular tube has been carefully rolled from the bottom (remember those tubes with the little key thingies at the bottom? Me, just barely). Not much left to come out if you pounded on me with a hammer, but this one last thought on the whole preceeding.
Mr. Ricketson asked me, in our continuing semi-public discussion via e-mail, who decides what "right" is. I guess that's as open as anything else to interpretation. However, my rule of thumb on that sort of thing has long been "if a decision requires more time to explain the whys and wherefores than it does to describe the decision, you might want to look at it again." Another part of "right" is motivation. If you work for company X, and you propose a solution to a problem I have that uses products from Company X, obviously, I'm going to expect that as part of your job. If, however, you're elected mayor, and you select products from Company X, you can rest assured I'll suspect your motivations. As will most folks.
Most decisions we make these days seem to be pretty off-the-cuff-fast ones. Bush's recent decision on Stem Cells was one of the few where you heard that the man was wrestling with the issue. Do I think he was wrestling with it? I dunno. I think he was stalling for time and information.
Heinlein called the process "grokking". Waiting for fullness, over time. Waiting for understanding of the issue, when all the facts had been presented. Waiting for all of the implications to be apparent before charging into the thick of the problem with a decision that might, or might not, work out. Valentine Michael Smith would wait to understand all of the pertinent factors of a problem/issue before moving on with it. As we presently lack full access to the immortality machine Dick Clark's got in his basement, we'll have to hope that we can pass our understanding on to our children.
However, in one rather small matter, I guess I'd like to point this particular bit out - through the twentieth century, asthma and other respiratory ailments have risen. While some of this is certainly due to improved diagnosis of the problem, you have to acknowledge that breathing is a fairly fundamental requirement for life. And, if you're having problems taking air in and putting it back out, you've got severe problems that will not immediately be corrected without a lot of specialized, extensive, and expensive assistance.
During the same period that respiratory ailments were increasing, there was also a measurable increase in the amounts of pollution and toxins in the air - produced from various factories, power plants, restaurants, motor vehicles, and all the rest. This was noted and measured and produced various laws in this country, including the Clean Air Act.
Now, we have as yet no definitive and incontrovertible evidence that there is a "global warming" issue. I submit to you that until we've got verifiable and accurate records for at least five hundred years, we aren't going to know which direction the temperatures are actually going. Back just a few years ago, there were books that said "the coming ice age!" Now we're saying "the ice caps are melting, the ice caps are melting!" Either way, Chicken Little is shortly due for a trip to the Colonel's farm, where he'll take a nice long dip in a heated pool. Granted, he'll have to be breaded to do it, but everything's a tradeoff...
So, we have a three-legged situation here - ailments up, pollution up, and concerns, but no concrete evidence, that global warming is taking place.
What do we do? Do we keep going in the direction we're going, burning and soiling and pumping and dumping and fouling and destroying what limited land we have? Or do we take a half-step back and say "you know, I'm not sure about this last bit here, but let's investigate fuel cell technology. Let's build those newer, safer reactors. Let's put together large windmill farms to take advantage of the breeze - why should Kite Flyers have all the fun?"
It's simple, but straightforward. The "right" thing in this case would be to look hard for alternative energy sources - work hard to develop the technology, so if, some day, that straw we've stuck into the world's oil bubble suddenly gurgles like one in the bottom of a glass of Coke, we can say "oops, quicker than we thought, but Oh well, we've got this other thing - give us a week and you're back in business."
Instead, our present leaders show they've got literally no clue - "drill and spill" seems to be their message when it comes to energy policy, which, conveniently enough, would benefit those friends they left behind in Texas to watch their energy interests while they're gone in Washington "doing the country right". Certainly, there's some benefit to increasing supplies - of course, if there were an increase in supply and a corresponding emphasis on conservation, that might work. However, the conservation thing would impact the profits of the oil companies, so...
Bottom line - "Right" isn't going to be favorable to everyone. That's the nature of a decision. "Right" is, however, something that you can "trust". You don't question their motivations, their decision-making process, or have to listen to hundreds of experts explaining the whys and wherefores. "Right" engenders "trust". And I do not trust this president.
Clinton I wouldn't trust to babysit my children. Running a country, however, is another matter entirely. Bush, I have no problem with watching my kids on a Friday night for a few hours. Running a country, especially one this big, is not a job for amateurs or idiots. And I fear Bush is both.
With that, I'm off to crash into bed to prepare for the week ahead. Ha! I'm a poet! Which, in turn, guarantees there are several thousand corpses merrily spinning their way deeper and deeper into the bowels of the earth as I continue to type. Ah, the power. With supreme power such as this, who needs to win the powerball?
me me me me
me me me me ME!
Yeah, I'm greedy. What of it?
Oh, nuts. The phone's still in use, so this will get posted when it gets posted... G'nite.
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P. Dominik. All rights reserved. No reproduction without express
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