Reasons to be Thankless

Cripes. I've been putting-in about 4 hours a day since last Friday. It's a big adjustment for me. Going to an office every day reminds me of how dumb and inefficient time wasters office workers can be.

Now, I am an expert at malingering. I can spend an entire day doing absolutely nothing except staring out the window and wondering about the meaning of life. But I never have considered time spent doing nothing, sleeping or standing in line at at the coffee wagon as "wasted." Wasted time is when morons - impersonating busy people - are sitting at their desks surfing the web, or congregating in useless meetings, pretending to be getting something done, complaining about how stressed and "swamped" they are with work, or wondering what the boss thinks.

Here it is 8:30am and I am looking at another day of grueling database analysis. For the 4th consecutive workday, I will shower, shave, put-on clean pressed clothes and drive to an office. The office will be closed for Thanksgiving and Friday. I am Thankful for the long weekend, but will be doing about twenty hours next week as well. I miss the times when I could look at several whole days with no one expecting me to be anywhere, wearing the same clothes for a week, bathing only when the cats started following me around the house, shaving only when strangers would start handing me spare change.

This is the definition of Freedom. I will be Thankful when I can return to that blessed state.

Back to Work

On Friday, I got up early, showered and shaved. I put on clean, pressed pants and a newly laundered shirt. I went to an office in a nearby town and worked on their database for 4.5 hours. I must say that I survived this first stint of office work since I left my previous job in April of 2003.

The hardest part was looking out of the window and seeing that I was missing an unseasonably warm afternoon. This is defense exhibit 9233 proving that the gods hate me. They see that I am stuck in a stuffy office showing the administrative staff how to do mail merges, and they taunt me with a perfect day for staining the new screen porch mahogany deck.

As I say, I survived. I'll probably be back there tomorrow for three or four hours. Then maybe 7 or 8 more partial days. The office is closed on Thanksgiving and the next day. I have to re-structure the database, rewrite some report queries, do some necessary clean-up and reformatting of the actual business data. Then write up some pretty user documentation. The whole job will be about 40 hrs work.

Then I'll probably take some R&R time before looking for more work. After all, it is the season to reflect on one's blessings and hope for the future. More importantly, it is a time to renew fellowship over malt beverages, washed down with Bar-B-Qued ribs.

Games People Play

I am disturbed by the recent news from Iraq. The TV news reports that the occupation of Fallujah by US troops is almost complete. At the same time that we are clamping down on one troulespot, new problems are igniting in new places. This reminds me of the carnival game called whack-a-mole. You hit as many mole heads as you can in a race against the clock. Every time you whack the mole in one hole, he pops up again in another spot.
It's a maddening game that you cannot win, whcih is why carnivals run it.

How can we put down the new insurgency with troops tied up occupying Fallujah. If we leave, they will come back. If we stay, they will just go and cause trouble somewhere else. Like drug dealers and hookers here in the homeland. They just keep moving to the unguarded areas. Without civilian cooperation (and a bit of old fashioned vigilantism on the part of the civilian populace), we cannot win.

WARNING: When I was Googling the term Whack-a-mole, I got an item that describes a "game" that was going around the internet last year called "Whack-a-mole." Apparently the "game" is a devious way to keep you busy while a hacker installs a piece of nasty spyware on your machine.

Thundering Silence

It's quiet here today. This is the first weekday in about a month that there are no workmen here. They have gone to go and pound, drill, saw and pound again on someone else's house. They have taken their giant country and western playing radio and their dunkin donuts coffe cups and omwitch wrappers and their loud talking to the next victim - er, I mean customer. The screen porch is 93.7% done. All it needs is screens and a door, maybe some electical details. I think these will be done in the spring. This is ok with me, because the final payment is not due until the job is done. The dumpster is scheduled to be removed by Friday.
Finally, I have my house back.

I was somewhat dismayed to read an article today about how badly some lottery winners have fared. It seems that the sudden influx of a huge amount of money can be a bad thing for a lot of people. Especially people who have no experience with wealth. A lot of the "winners" have ended up bankrupt and despised by their families. One winner's brother hired a hit-man to kill him in hopes of inheriiting the fortune. I recall reading a profile a few years ago about a young woman who won something like twenty million. She was unhappy after a few years because her relationship with siblings and parents had become strained. "No matter what I gave them, they didn't think it was enough." she said after buying new homes for her family members that were slightly smaller than hers. They thought she was selfish. She thought they were moneygrubbing.
This would never happen to me. If I won, I would give all the money to charity: The Noonan Rectal Itch Foundation. This venerable organization is dedicated to finding not just a treatment but a cure for this agonizing condition.

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I am brushing-up on my Microsoft Access knowledge. Reading "Access 2000 for People Too Lazy to Read The Help Documentation." It's pretty informative. But I keep dozing off. My contract gig starts on Friday, and will probably run 7-10 days of maybe 4 hours a day. Not bad for a starter engagement. That's what we consultants call them: engagements.

Man, it is quiet today. Even the cats seem to be spooked by the eery silence. They have assembled in the doorway, looking at me for an explanation.


Ah, as if on cue, the landscapers have arrived next door with their big mowers and blowers and...of course the giant leaf-sucking machine.

Snow Job

The porch guys have one or two more days work, finishing up the trim and electrical. Then, they will go away and work on inside jobs until March, when they will finish installing the screens. I will be glad to have them gone. The noise and distraction from their hammering and power sawing activities (not to mention their boombox) have been driving me up a wall, and out of the house. I (reluctantly) have agreed to allow them access to the bathroom, rather than having one of those unsightly portable toilets sitting in the driveway, next to the dumpster. During the inhumanly cold weather, I feel obliged to offer them the option of coming inside to warm-up periodically. Although it has only been about two weeks since they started, it feels like 6 months since I have had the house to myself.

This morning I had to shovel about 4 inches of wet snow. Winter has arrived. Thoughts are wrenched away from screens and decks to ice and snowthrowers. Thanksgiving. Christmas (and grandsons).

The news is full of world events. And problematic questions.

The sight of the adoring throngs of Palestinians at Ramallah yesterday gives one a real sense of what we are up against when we say we are at war against terrorists. Not only do they worship the man who ruined their hopes of peace and independence, but they are habitual wasters of valuable ammunition. Don't those bullets come down, somewhere? Maybe landing on people? Does Allah like being shot at?

Now they are reporting that all the enemy strategy guys escaped in Fallujah . Duh! Does anyone else think we might have helped more insurgents to become martyrs if we had not announced the attack two weeks in advance?

Nine Iraqi police stations were looted by militants yesterday. How come the cops didn't shoot the looters?

Presidential assassin John Hinkley wants to get more walking-around time. He's just fine now. I would make it mandatory that any shrink who lobbies for freedom for a former homicidal maniac would have to co-sign a guarantee that the said former mental patient will not violate any laws - or the shrink will be accountable for any crimes committed by the nutcase, and will serve the appropriate sentence as the mentally accountable party. Also the guys who were shot must sign-off on any plan to let this guy out without a chaperon.

The Peterson trial is almost over (we still need to go through the spectacle of the sentencing.) The amazing statistic that has been in the news is that the leading cause of death for pregnant women is homicide. More shockingly, the father of the baby usually commits the crime. Should the prolife movement get involved with this extreme form of abortion? Why aren't they speaking out?

The Big Dig tunnel system has sprung a leak or two - but nobody is responsible. Gov. Mitt wants the Turnpike chairman to resign. But, this will accomplish nothing.
We want our money back!

One Flake Does Not a Snowstorm Make

I had a job interview yesterday. The hiring VP reminded me of the guy who didn't like me when I was starting up the Data Warehouse Project at the Diploma Factory; I probably reminded the hiring VP of someone who would soon need to be demoted. I don't think it was the right situation for me - they were looking for someone who had actually succeeded in starting up a data warehouse. Hah, I told him. That's the boring part.
He didn't even smile at some of my wry humor ("Why, 2 years ago I couldn't even spell XML...." and, "You're not offended by fag jokes are you?"). I figured he was giving me a strong hint when we said goodbye and how nice it was to chat, when he added, "Good Luck in your job search."

Still, it was an interview. The first time in 15 months that I had gotten past the phone screen to an in-person meeting. That indicates something. Perhaps not a trend, but remember: every blizzard starts with a single flake. The Globe reports that the national job numbers are starting to look better. Can a full-time job be around the corner? Now that the garden is put to bed, and the construction workers are a distraction, I am anxious to get out of the house these days.

My wife thinks I would hate going back to work-a-day routine: everyday, getting up early, daily ablutions (as opposed to showering every third or fourth day whether I need it or not), sitting in commuting traffic, working with (and for) assholes. Sitting in a stuffy office, talking about data models and budget line items. Or arguing with the insane network admin. Meetings. Going to the bar for beers. Hey, wait. That last one is the chief work related activity that I do miss!

I am not desperate. I have had several business writing jobs lately. The last one was an executive letter inviting C-level Captains of Industry to a really boring IT records management conference. The client loves my work and wants to book me for another series of letters. Ok, I said, why not? The research I do for the letters is interesting. They send me all the info I need and I just write it up pretty. Takes about 8 hours over about three days, counting research, draft and finished composition, haggling with client over nitpicking edits, complete re-write, final edits and nitpicks, calming cocktails.

I make more than Dave Barry, and I'm just as funny.

Letting the Chips Fall

Some years ago I read a book that had a title something like "Machiavelli and Management." The gist of it was that the strategies and tactics of many managers seem to be wrenched from the playbook of that pre-renaissance despot-philosopher. One of the most useful truths that I have embrace from that reading was the inspired observation, which I paraphrase, That which you take by force you must keep by force.

I am not just laying-down an allusion to the current situation in Iraq. In fact, I am thinking about a job opportunity that has come onto my radar. The job title is Manager of IT Business Information Systems for company that fits within my job search parameters: Within 5 miles of home, no higher than third floor, no heavy lifting, exorbitant salary.
(Actually, the last criteria has not been established, yet.)

Apparently, I applied for this job via one of those web job boards, and now they want to talk to me. The prospect of a real interview (after more than a year of drought) raises some serious issues for me. After ruthlessly bashing management in print and orally for eons, how can I now credibly interview for a job with the word Manager in the title? Answer: it's easy to rationalize nearly anything. More importantly, the question arises: How can I fool them into thinking I am evil management material?
Then, the Machiavelli quote comes to mind. My corollary is : That which you achieve with a lie, must be maintained with a lie. This Truth presents an untenable problem for me. You need an excellent memory to support a lying personality. I do not have the instinct or energy to be a career liar.
So, I'll just have to go in and be myself.
I know what you are thinking: Bad move. Well, let's see...

Time to go to the polls and vote. You too.