Category: general

Thursday night already.  Early this week I said I was trapped in amber.  More like quicksand.  Time is fickle; my perception of it changes depending on the viewing angle.

Man the wind is really whipping the rain into the windowglass.  It’s cold out too.  Walking to the car after the gym reminded me of when I was a kid and I had a fever.   My mom used to bring me a damp washcloth and I’d fold it in perfect thirds and lay it across my forehead and eyes.  The coolness felt so good.  After physics brought it slowly to match room temperature I’d hold it by the corner and spin it around in violent circles for thirty seconds or so to get it ice-cold again.  That was me tonight walking.  Sweat-soaked like that damp rag and wind-whipped into iciness.  Dang it was chilly.

Let’s skip ahead and write, shall we?

People probably know I love data. Well, I love organized data. Data by itself is, ostensibly, crap. Organized data can tell stories or support facts or win and lose arguments. Statistics. It’s all about statistics.  In one manner or another I’ve written about statistics again and again and again and again and again and again.  Wanna know how important statistics are?  Did you know that the magnitude of computations required to launch an orbiting satellite is about equal to what McDonald’s does in determining how to advertise a new hamburger? OK, I’ll admit I made that last bit up. But it’s OK because 57% of all statistics are made up on the spot. Certainly it would be ignorant to downplay the role of statistics in our lives, they run everything from the stock market to the insurance industry to how much the stamp you use mail a postcard is going to cost you.

I mention my statistics fetish as a lead-in to a link I wanted to share. I don’t do a lot of link-sharing on the blog much anymore. I used to. Back in the early days I would share links all the time. Now I think I’ve gotten somewhat pretentious and I aim to fill an entry with some sort of introspection or interesting novel content. There’s nothing wrong with linking though, I don’t look down on it or anything, I guess the way I treat the blog as an “outlet” has changed. Or I’ve perceived my audience to have changed (those I know about and can safely “count” as somewhat regular readership). Uh-oh I’m writing a paragraph about nothing again. I completely blame the last book I read. A good 50% of it was all internal-monologue asides to the story arc. I better get to the point here…

Here’s a really interesting statistics-filled post on the internet dating site OkCupid’s official blog.

When I was “dating,” which was a very small period in my life, online dating sites weren’t around. I’ve never needed to use one. I don’t have anything against them, I suppose it’s as valid a way to whittle the prospects as any. Heck perhaps it’s even a smarter-than-average way if “average” means going to the bar every Friday and Saturday night. It’s just that since I’ve been with the same woman now for something like seventeen years (yes, really) I’ve never had the opportunity to have to choose to either use, or not, a site like OkCupid. That being the case I’ve never even thought about what a labor it must be to make some of the seemingly simple decisions around how to “market” yourself to a potential mate online.

But think about it… it’s a non-trivial thing. In my mind I liken it somewhat to writing a resume or an annual “self review” at work. Here I have a single sheet of paper and on it I am supposed to give an accurate representation of myself. My skills, my accomplishments, my attitude, my ethic, etc. All of this must be distilled into a very limited amount of space. Same with an online dating profile I’d assume. Here I have this little plot of internet to communicate who I am, what I’m looking for, and why you should be interested in me. Stopping to consider it for a minute I can see why there might be fair amount of apprehension in putting oneself out there.

So back to the OkCupid blog. What a great article! If you didn’t click and read it yet, it’s just talking about the various ways a person’s dating profile picture impacts how “successful” their online dating “return rate” is. They do a great job digging the meaningful and interesting nuggets out of what is likely a mountain of data. Some of the charts are really insightful, and could just as easily (I bet) be applied to how “successful” folks are on any kind of social-media website.  I’ll tell you, when I decide to make the move into the fast-paced world of online social interaction I’m gonna take me one humdinger of a profile picture.

Goodnight.

Several people lately have told me I should dispense with any hesitations and shave my head. These admonitions are usually accompanied by an insistence that my refusal to do so is because I am somehow loath to admit I’m actually balding. Let me try and address that for the here and now: I am clearly balding; I know this beyond a shadow of a doubt.

Oh and I must admit I’ve been tempted at times to give the whole thing a high-and-tight that’d do a boot camp barber proud, I’ve just never gone the distance. Mostly, I think, because Sharaun has discouraged me. Second-mostly, I think, because I have a really hard time envisioning what I’d look like sans hair. Well, sans all hair, that is. In some way I think shaving the dome would be nothing short of luxury. I could cease worrying about hats in summer and instead slather the entire bald thing with sunscreen. I could throw away the old hairbrush I keep at work for those days when I do a midday gym. I could save money on shampoo. I might look younger. Then again, I might look older.

I had this discussion with a friend of mine from work who was visiting. We run into each other every few months it seems, but when we do I always enjoy our conversations. Ten years ago I worked with this guy before he moved onto a different job at the sawmill, in another sawmill location that is. And no, I think I’ve mentioned before I don’t actually work at a sawmill. In the non-blog world it’s an international technology company; personnel-wise a huge stable of nerds slaving away in front of computers. Anyway he’s had a shaved head for years now, did it sometime after he left where I work and went to work where he works now. He was encouraging me to do so, even while admitting his stubbly head shreds pillowcases.

His argument was compelling, not because his head looked so magnificent or he’s a gifted salesman, but (I think) owing to his current situation. See, this buddy of mine is on the precipice, about to make a large-scale transition in his life. About to leave his career at the sawmill (a quite successful and well-run career thus far, additionally). He’s weeks out from moving into a winery in the desert and taking over lock, stock, and barrel. He and his bald head are trading the shoulder-high cubicle maze and HR reps for days under the sun in the grape rows. Looking at the light in his eyes as we talked varietals, soil conditions, acreage, and supply/demand, I began imagining his head shining under the harsh desert sun as he tallied sugar content in the chardonnay. In every way I romanticized his current lot…

Somehow the allure of working the earth to produce something even Jesus deemed an “upgrade” to water, a substance already molecularly perfect and life-sustaining, transferred onto the discussion of whether or not I should shave my head. So it was that I found myself sitting there contemplating if liberating my skull of its furry covering might not also liberate my soul from its corporate prison. I doubt it… but the subconscious connection was made. Maybe my thinning crown is holding me back from my own desert winery… from my own hours toiling in the hot sun or down in cool dry cellars smelling of oak. How much might I gain by casting away so little? Look… I’ve turned it into a parable.

Yeah, I know, and I’ve written before, I have a good gig at work. It’s not too hard, just stressful; I’m compensated well for what I do and the demand on my time is far from unreasonable. It’s just fashionable to denigrate your job, right?

Maybe if I just shaved my head…

Goodnight.

In the end, this turned out to be more fun than I’d expected.  Also, a bit sad in places.

I stayed up too late last night.

Anything past midnight these days for me usually results in punishment come morning. So it was that I had a hard time rousing myself today. I snoozed the iPhone at least three times and only finally pulled myself from the sheets after I saw the time was well past seven. As I dragged to the bathroom for my pre-shower morning sit-down I could hear the rain tink-ta-tink-tinking on the windows. Through the tightened blinds I could tell the morning light wasn’t quite as light as the hour should have allowed. Sitting, flipping through the online news and working the dry out of my eyes, I noticed the sound of the wind on the roof. It wooshed and sang through the various attic vents. I could hear it against the outside wall, gusting. All omens of another stormy day.

The weatherman says it’s supposed to rain here for something like two weeks straight. That’s a long time. I have these cameras setup in the front and backyard of the house; they are mounted into the eaves, tucked away from the weather. They broadcast live video wirelessly. Originally I put them up with some notion of “security.” A misguided notion, to be sure, as they really serve no purpose above allowing me to randomly view what’s going on at my house via the internet. Sure, they can send me a note when they detect motion – but they are incredibly imperfect at detecting motion. Such as, they do nothing positive and have been reduced to novelty usage. For instance, I logged onto them today to watch the wind and rain I mentioned above. From my desk at work I spent a few minutes hypnotized, watching it bully our big empty garbage cans and rattle the spindly limbs of our fruit trees. Watching the video of home really made me homesick though, so I had to turn it off and get my brain back on sawmill-stuff.

But I had a meeting with someone. At work we have these hallways between the many buildings, we call them “breezeways.” The suits have setup little tables and chairs there lining the long ceiling-to-floor windows that look out. I’m on the third floor so this view is actually pretty nice. I can see a bit of the city and I can watch people walking to and from their cars in our huge parking lot. For cubicle folks like myself, windows are something of a fascination. Imprisoned so at the computer these snatches of the “world outside” become filled with some sense of nostalgia. “Oh dear it’s really beautiful ‘out there,’ isn’t it? Makes me remember the times when I was outside.” Maybe this is just me. Either way I enjoy having meetings in the breezewere where I can look out the windows. Today I sat and watched the storm during the hour I was there talking office politics, annual reviews, and technical crap. That kind of stuff is a lot more palatable when you have a visual reminder that a real world exists just beyond a thin pane of glass.

Cold and wind and rain dampen not only the ground, but my designs on productivity as well. I’ve been meaning to go out in the backyard and do some colder-weather cropping. Planting, tearing down dead summer stuff, arranging, etc. I thought on this yesterday after work, as it wasn’t raining – but the outside temperature in the car on the way home read 46 and I couldn’t muster the go-get-‘em required to go to work in the soggy outdoors in those conditions. Yes I know it’s not like I’m in Wisconsin or something… but the warm house was too inviting and I once again pushed the work off, mentally, to the weekend. Perhaps feeling a bit guilty, I changed the air filter in the house. Had to get out the step-ladder and everything. Even this little bit of productivity improved my spirits, likely because I’d also mentally pushed it off more than once.

Goodnight.

Happy coming weekend to us all. Tonight I went all blitzkrieg and wrote four full blog entries. For a second I contemplated just combining them all into one but instead chose to prepare them all for auto-posting a day at a time. Boom; all done for tomorrow and half of next week. Beautiful.

This morning, for the first time in my life, I sat and blacked my dress shoes. I suppose people still polish their shoes, but it seems somehow arcane. An activity of yesterday. I vaguely remember my dad shining his shoes. He had a fancy “kit” with a brush and a rag and he looked like he knew what he was doing. Probably learned proper shoe-shining protocol in the service; toned boots to see the CWO’s face reflect in the gloss. Me, I had no idea what I was doing. The instructions on the back of the Kiwi can verified that I already know everything there is to know about the basics: it’s just like waxing a car – put it on, buff it off. But the mechanics befouled me on my first time.

Even getting into the can was initially a mystery until I figured out the little rotating key is to be used as leverage in lifting the lid. For some reason this made the whole thing seem more old fashioned to me. This simple little tin with the clever lever action turnkey thing, it all seemed like an example of the brilliant-simple engineering from the war years. Everything now is overkill. Garbage cans that need to be plugged in so their motion sensors can see you approaching with your refuse and mechanically open and close the lid for you and machines that “clean the air” with negative ions. Over-engineered in the name of modernity and “cool.” Stupid. Here was a little formed tin with a blob of black junk inside and a little key to help you pop the lid. Function without excess. Like I said, made it all seem the more anachronistic an activity.

But I made do. I stuck my hand in the shoe and made what fist I could to hold it tight so I could move the cloth around it and paint on the black. I don’t have a fancy kit with brushes and rags like my dad, so I just used an small microfiber towel (I bought a 10,000 pack, or some such ridiculous example of excess, of them from Costco nine years ago and I’ve since found a multitude of uses for the things). I’d darken the surface with the stuff using one end of the towel, and then go back over it and rub it in with the clean end. I sat at the kitchen table using the light from the sliding glass door to help me see my work. Afterward, I was pretty happy with things. I managed to obscure all the scuffs and little lines and improved the overall “blackness” of the things. I turned the shoes around in my hands admiring them before slipping them on and getting on with getting ready.

Made me feel old… sitting in pinstriped dress pants and a blue dress shirt and black socks shining my shoes.

Like I’m at that point in my life.