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Hope you all are enjoying the extra daylight, colorful birds and spring blossoms as much as I am.
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234 days in the office with an hour round-trip commute divided by 24 hours to get the number of days I've spent sitting in my car. No wonder I'm sick of NPR.
]]>Here's a quick experiment I hacked up based on Seth's map technique.
]]>Still not perfect, but the powers-that-be thought it looked fine in its original state so it's all gravy anyway.
Thought I'd share the best part with you - the chance to obsessively toggle back and forth between dirty & clean.
For best results, say the words out loud as you toggle, "dirty, CLEAN!".
In the beginning, clients start off being happy with your good work. When I say, "Your good work", I mean you as a company. However, after you exceed their expectations a few times they become happy and comfortable with you, the person.
The business-to-business relationship begins because of surface-y things: A good reputation, word of mouth, etc. Long-term the client begins to develop a deeper connection secured by trust and dependence. And who can blame them? You make their problems go away. Sometimes magically.
As you grow and become busier you have less and less time to spend with each client. If you get big enough, you may have to put someone else from your company in touch with them — hopefully someone as conscientious and service oriented as yourself. When you do, remember that the client doesn't give a rat's ass how great the new person is. They want you.
Your client can be the coolest, most rational and mature professional in the world, but when you pull the switch-a-roo be prepared to nurture them through a little pouting. And make sure your new guy has their best interest in mind, pays them some respect and gives super-human service.
Just sharing an observation. I'm not that big, yet, by the way.
]]>I don't like too much brass in the morning.
Count Basie
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Apple's doing their part to set me straight, though. They Under-Promise on the delivery date and then keep that promise.
Tough love.
]]>It provides the sort of insider snapshot of the state of the regional tech union that we'll never get from the newspapers. Not because they self-censor, but because they don't get the 'pre-press release' insight Michael had.
Full MP3 audio of Michael DeAloia enlightening a room full of people at the Midtown Brews gathering.
Good stuff. Thanks to Vince Frantz for communicating its significance.
]]>My wife, for example, successfully completed more projects in the last three months of her pregnancy than most people get done in a year. If she wasn't physically able to do it herself, she recruited me or some other available person.
If the beginning of the story was: Colleen decided _________ needed to be _________.
then the guaranteed ending to the story was: And it became so.
She did it all with a smile on her face, too.
What I didn't know about until recently, however, was that the arrival of children can also be a catalyst for powerful change within the father as well. Simply put: They experience a sudden and rapid growth of their inner-cajones.
Sometimes the changes are subtle: Polite and non-confrontational becomes assertive, sofa time gets replaced with sweat time, and BS tolerance plummets.
And sometimes they're conspicuous: Unquestioning loyalty to anyone outside of the family unit is displaced by a spirit of mutually beneficial collaboration and the employee transforms into the entrepreneur.
A percentage of new fathers experience inner-cajone shrinkage and bail out. Fortunately my family and peer group is full of examples of the former rather than the latter.
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Some time in the early morning of Thursday, Sept. 6, a large beaver successfully felled the auxilliary trunk of a maple tree measuring 9" in diameter. The large trunk narrowly missed a large, highly populated ant hill.
It was obvious to this reporter that the beaver knew exactly what it was doing. The tree fell parallel to the beaver's path and downhill toward the pond, thus reducing the number of paces required to excavate the fallen lumber and move it to the water.
It is believed that the beaver will use the limb for construction material to augment its hut.
Inspired by a chat conversation with Brad Deilman:
bdielman: Eric. What's shakin'?
bdielman is online.
bdielman: Does anyone say that anymore? ;)
Eric: siesmologists
bdielman: Ha!
The actual point of this post is to share his cartoons with you.
The catering companies always overstaffed so the gigs were easy. Not to mention they paid well and we got to gawk into the homes and workplaces of the very rich & famous. There was always plenty of down time between setting up and tearing down so the catering folks would fade into the darkness and chat to pass the time.
On one of these occasions I crouched between luxury vehicles and smoked a cigarette with a guy named Dax. He had never had a 'real' job in his life. He felt that the nine-to-five model was very stupid because everyone knows that human beings aren't productive for eight hours straight, so why should they be expected to sit there and pretend? He and I saw eye-to-eye on that topic. The difference between us was that he had either managed to fulfill his financial obligations without violating the basic tenets of his principals or made peace with the fiscal loose ends.
For the next six years Dax maintained confidence in his writing and acting ability and continued to build his reputation. He started to land small movie roles and development deals. He persevered through tough times that would have sent most people running for the temp agency. After years of fits and starts, he made an ingenious move and all of his hard work and determination instantly paid off. He did something that would open every door in Hollywood, increase his per movie rate by millions and guarantee him the starring role in at least three upcoming films. Dax made the master stroke that spelled "check" and "mate" in the game of life.
Dax Shepard made out with Kate Hudson in front of paparazzi. Brilliant!
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