Category: grindstone

All about breadwinning.

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lessons for the dunce

Molded like clay.
Two paragraphs on India and work-thought inspired by India, then I’ll politely say “goodnight” and you’ll all be left wanting.

Honestly, I can’t believe how easily I adjusted to this timezone. Nearly twelve hours out from sunny Northern California – but I took to it in just one night of solid sleep. This, and other similarly easy transitions to varied time zones, have convinced me that I am a body built for world travel. I read once that if you’re outside in the sunshine as much as possible during the waking hours, you’re body realizes that its internal clock is off and you should be awake during that time. Maybe spending Sunday tooling around the countryside in the awesome South Indian weather actually helped me adjust so quickly. I can only hope that the transition back to west coast time goes as swimmingly.

Staying thematic for once, I was thinking to day how much I appreciate the different “learnings” I’ve gained from my current employment. No, not just the “professional development,” which has been invaluable, they tell me, but moreso the cultural and “eye-opening” type learnings I’ve been able to pick up. Travel and exposure to a host of different cultures have really granted me a better worldview, I think. I mean, more than just understand a few scattered sentences in Mandarin, I’ve been exposed to peoples and traditions I’d’ve been wholly ignorant to otherwise. In some ways, I think that the more “eyes” through which you can look at the world, the better. Knowing, for instance, that things taken for granted by Joe America are luxuries to people elsewhere makes a man more humble, and, more importantly, better equips you to relate to folks from all over. Who’d have ever thought that I’d be sitting outside in India, enjoying the weather while a young Indian man in the courtyard below sings the Eagles’ “Lying Eyes” in perfect English, writing a paragraph singing the praises of my gainful employment. I’m here to tell you that I’ve decided I’m riding this one out – I know a good thing when I’ve found it.

Goodnight.

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monkeys and soggy cigarettes

What a goofy mug.
To start my first blog while in India, a brief roundup of my impressions of the place thus far. India is: A symphony of honking horns. Free-range cattle, heads-bent to gutters looking for trash to eat. Dirty barefoot people walking dirty dirt streets. Riiich rich and pooor poor. More tropical than I’d imagined. Still very much British. Where I first heard the Strokes’ leaked 3rd full-length. Friendly. Yummy food that doesn’t fulfill many ne’er-do-well-wishers’ predictions of 24/7 toilet-guarding. Broken, dusty, randomly-laid out roads that seem to have been paved as a need to arrive at a new place arose. Families living in tarp-tents erected alongside the road wherever a spare piece of land can be found, outside cooking breakfast in the morning over a smoking fire.

Bought some cigarettes while I was here, y’know, to “sample” the local Indian offerings. They pretty much have the same ass-flavor as American, Taiwanese, and Chinese cigarettes. However, I found myself drawn to them a little too much – kind of blowing the “sampling” thing out the window and trading it for a different verb, “smoking.” So tonight I doused them with water and threw them away – thus rendering them unsalvageable and certainly un-smokeable. Good for me, bad for the Indian tobacco industry and millions of barefoot workers that sweat to bring cancer to the lit-up masses. I was planning to insert a picture of the sodden, broken cigarettes strewn about a table below this paragraph, but the dang five-star hotel housekeeping staff is too efficient and liberated me of my trash before I could do it – sorry, I had planned it to be quite the artsy offering.

And, from above, you likely guesses that the Strokes’ 3rd LP has leaked in its entirety – and I’ve been filling my hotel room with the horribly treble-heavy laptop speaker rendition of it for the past couple days. As for a review, I’m going to reserve an opinion for when I can actually hear it through once with some bottom-end to it – but from a catchy melody perspective I think it’s gonna be a winner. They’re a band I’d like to see live again, as I really enjoyed the Halloween-eve show we caught in the city a couple years back before Room On Fire dropped. Our concert attendance has really dropped off since we decided the frequent trips to the city just weren’t paying off, and reserved them for big or important shows. I am, however, looking forward to seeing the Wolf Parade in January – that one was sufficiently important to motivate both Ben and I to buy the gas, fight the traffic, and find the parking.

Sometimes I love traveling; I think partly because I know my dad did so much traveling when he was younger, and I feel like I somehow following in his footsteps. I would love to be able to have been some of the places he’s talked about, and I feel like my job has at least helped me experience a bit of the “world traveler” bag. Sometimes, waking up in a hotel room with no one to report to and absolutely nothing on an agenda can be a really liberating feeling – miles away from any “real” commitments and real people, for that matter. Especially here, where I can wake up and throw open my balcony door to the sounds of running water and some kinda tropical birds – really makes a guy feel disconnected and content.

Now that I’ve been assured you read my entire boring post, I’ll drop a link for you: here are some pictures from my first few days in India.

Until tomorrow, goodnight.

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i guess it’s better than malaria

Taking my chances.
Evening folks. Not that much tonight, just a single topic, but I make up for it with pictures.

Today I went to the doctor to get my anti-malaria pills for the looming India trip. Apparently there are several varieties of pills that can be prescribed to ward off the disease – and the doctor began by explaining that the one she’d chosen to dispense to me was one with “the least amount of adverse side effects.” “What kind of ‘adverse side effects?'” I asked. Well, this one can cause diarrhea and some patients experience “strange” dreams (can’t wait for that, based on some of the things I’ve been dreaming of late). “Hmmm…” I wondered aloud, “How much worse are the other drugs?” “Well,” she began, “Some can cause hallucinations.” Wow; hallucinations. How much good am I going to be to my customers if I’m up there, completely malaria-untouchable, but tripping balls and out of my head? For reals y’all, check this out:

A sampling of the various omens of doom stuck to the side of this “medicine”:

Take this medication at least 2 hours before or 2 hours after magnesium or aluminum containing antacids, iron, or vitamins/minerals.

Do not lie down for at least 30 minutes after taking this medication.

Prolonged or excessive exposure to direct and or artificial sunlight should be avoided when taking this medication.

Warning, do not use if you are pregnant, suspect that you are pregnant, or while breastfeeding.

This medication should be taken with plenty of water.

Do not play basketball or ride horses/donkeys, or play basketball while riding horses/donkeys, for at least 3 hours after taking this medication.

OK, so I made that last one up for comedic purposes – but, honestly. So lets get this straight – I can’t lie down, can’t go outside, can’t breastfeed (dang). I’ve never seen a pill bottle with so much instructional text and warning labels. When I picked up the prescription, I paid and began to walk away – but before I got to far, the cash register guy told me, “Wait a second sir, the pharmacist wanted to talk to you about this one.” “Great,” I thought, “this is some serious stuff.” The pharmacist basically just wanted to go over the various warnings, and give me the dosage directions: Take one pill a day beginning two days before arriving in malaria risk area, one each day while in risk area, and one each day for four weeks upon return. Extreme to me, but I guess it’s better than malaria.

Speaking of India, I broke down and went into work today. I had been on the fence about going into the office or “working from home” today, with both my brother and my brother-in-law both still in town – and my boss out. I know, however, that should I not come in, I’d get next to nothing, if not nothing, done with my time. So, I begrudgingly set the alarm for the standard 6:40am-snooze-snooze 7am wakeup and took up my week-forgotten pre-work routine. And, although I didn’t finish my India material, I did go from about 0-to-30%. More importantly though, I took care of a bunch of “housecleaning” activities that had been monkeys on my back this past week. So, while I’m still not 100% ready for this trip, I gave myself a heck of a lot more confidence that I can be ready before I have to get up in front of others and prove it. Not only that, but I’m otherwise “prep’d” for the trip and have taken care of the little things that you always need to take care of before international travel. Go me.

Done early; no late-night obsessing over an entry tonight. Until tomorry.

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thanksgiving day

Turkey is good.
Thanksgiving. One of the best sanctioned-lazy days of the year.

I woke up around 8:30am, hopped in the shower and, after drying, pulled on my most comfortable t-shirt and a pair of shorts. Making my way to the living room, everyone was awake and the kitchen was already bustling. The parents-in-law were both busy putting the finishing touches on dishes that were prepped last night, making them ready to slide into the oven come time. Pouring myself a cup of coffee, I sat down to watch the parade and see what that latest internet goings-on had to offer. The weather is gorgeous, 70s and sunny with the mornings still crisp and cool, and the atmosphere at the house is all family and chatter. I love it; absolutely love it. It feels unlike any Thanksgiving I’ve yet had. Sharaun and I six months into our new daughter and family all around, it really feels grown-up; established, familiar.

Moving on to the weekend’s writing.

I wrote a lot this weekend, but most of it on the to-be-posted “best of 2005” entry. I plan to finish it up in spurts over the next week and drop it sometime while I’m in India. Excited? I thought so. Now on with the now.

Speaking of India, I leave in four days, that’s way too soon. I have nothing prepared – nothing ready; I have almost no idea what I’ll be doing there. I really, really, don’t want to go. I’ve been feeling so slack about work lately, maybe it’s because there’s so much more family stuff to focus on… I have no idea. I am excited about going to India, if just for the travel opportunity and bragging rights – but the “working” part of it has me worried. Ah, whatever, I do this every time I go somewhere. I have one week to pull something, anything, together – I suppose if I knuckle-down I can get something workable together – but will I do it, that’s what I want to know. In reality, I’ll likely do like I’ve done so many times before – I’ll wing it. Just fly across the world with nothing but my limp cock in-hand, relying on my smile and handshake to make the trip worthwhile. Man, this writing-cycle does tend to get old, I can only imagine the reading-cycle… sorry y’allz, let’s move on.

Crazy dreams last night, one in particular that I can remember was super-crazy. I was standing in line for confessional, two people waiting in front of me. I can remember feeling nervous because I wasn’t sure of the proper protocol once I actually got in the confessional. As a kid, I was hardly Catholic long enough to get baptizes, let alone be confirmed – so everything I know comes from movies. Soon I was the lone petitioner in line, and I knew something was wrong when person before me finally came out. I entered and sat down, “Father forgive me, it’s been blah blah since my last confession.” To my horror, I could see that the priest was laying on the ground, blood around his mouth. Despite this, he heard my confession and, instead of assigning penance, told me in a raspy dying breath to find that man who just left, at any cost. I left the church, walking across a green field, scared. Somehow, as things do in dreams, I looked back to find that the priest turned into a small dog, also with blood around its mouth, which was now chasing me as I ran towards my car. That’s it, crazy eh?

Before I go, I wanted to share this with y’all. A long time ago, someone left a message on our answering machine, a wrong number. It was funny. You can listen to it below:

[audio:holdinitdeeown2.mp3]

See ya.

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i guess you’ll need that soon

All that hard work pays.
A day spent working, not at work, but working still. Brushed sand into the paver porch as a joint stabilizer, poured some river rock on the new pad where we erected a shed the other day – Frank helped out with it all. It was good, working in the sun with my brother, smoking my pipe while we rocked an Allman Brothers show from the Fillmore that’s some thirty years old. After that I mowed the lawn and cleaned the shower – a good working Monday, none of it in a cube or in front of a monitor. Breaking a sweat outside is good, especially for the good of your own property – makes a guy feel accomplished, worth something.

Sharaun’s folks get in tomorrow (today as you read this). For the first time in five years, Sharaun’s gonna do Thanksgiving dinner here at home. We’re serving six: her folks and her little brother, and my brother as well. I’m actually excited, we’re always gone for the major holidays – so we’ve never really had the chance to “christen” our house with a good Thanksgiving meal or Christmas morning. It’ll be nice, one more step towards us being a full-fledged family; a family who stays up late on Christmas putting together Castle Greyskulls and Ewok Villiages while their children sleep. I dunno, I guess I’m somewhat obsessed with what I perceive to be our “transition” to parents, to a “family” moreso than we were before just the two of us. Frank and I were sitting in the backyard today, admiring our work, when he asked me what I planned on putting in a largish open area of grass. “I dunno,” I said, “A swingset maybe.” “A swingset,” he repeated, “Yeah, I guess you’ll need that soon, huh?” Yeah, I guess I will.

Right here, where you’re reading this, I had three different paragraphs started – and subsequently deleted. With that as my track record, and considering it’s late and I’m tired – I’m calling this match here. Blank page-1, Dave-0.

‘Nite.

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paid vacation

Put 'em in the wind.
The first person I told that Sharaun and I were having a baby was the drummer from the band Autodrone. I told him as we were in Manhattan, walking down Broadway I think… heading to Smith & Wollensky for a fat steak. It sounds more glamorous that it is. The drummer is Ben’s brother Dave, and I was in New York for work. Still, on it’s own, that first sentence sounds totally awesome.

Last Thursday night I was getting ready for bed, thinking about my vacation next week. Thinking about my India trip after that, my trip to Oregon after that, and my trip to Florida after that. Then I started thinking about my “bonding leave” after that. For the past two weeks, I’ve been agonizing over that schedule; fretting. See, I’m a little terrified. Terrified that, after being away from work for what will amount to months, I’ll become irrelevant, lose touch, fall out of respect as a contributor with an opinion that deserves to be heard. I’ve shared this fear with some, and they maintain that it’s irrational. “Not all that much changes in 6wks,” they insist (see, I’ll be “gone” twice, each time about 6wks long), “you’ll fall right back into the swing of things,” they say. And, while those assurances do lend some small comfort, my issues with earning workplace respect still gnaw at me – poking me, chiding, “They’re all gonna forget you, you’ll simply cease to be relevant.” So, I still have some hesitation, and it was in the throes of mulling that hesitation that night when I had a revelation, when I saw the flipside of the coin.

I’ll embrace the second-order effects of my very own fears – I’ll give up. I’ll trust the well-wishers, believe the re-assurers implicitly. Things will be the same. Afterall, I’m not delusional enough to think I’m in-expendable; or that the organization will fall apart in my absence, void of my wisdom and guidance. I’m not that puffy-chested. So, regardless of any lingering doubt, I’ll assume I’ll return from all this away-time as if returning to work on any Monday like today. I’ll imagine I’ll walk right in and pick up where I left off, that my time away will in no way effect my impact. This will be a forced belief, of course, as I truly think quite the opposite – but it won’t matter. Wanna know why? Because taking this approach, I get one very clear benefit – I can rest on my laurels for a bit and enjoy a very fortuitous alignment of travel, holidays, vacation, and “leave.” Who cares if I become irrelevant. I have the skills to become relevant again. So, let’s do this; bring it on – I’m ready to not care like I’ve not not cared before. And believe me, I’m the king of not caring.

Mind you, I can’t really do this… my self-confidence-centered paranoia will ensure that. I won’t let myself sabotage what I’ve strived to build up, either nature or nurture instilled me with too much common sense to just waste what makings of a career I’ve already managed. Still, it’s a nice counterpoint to salve my nervous fears, and it gives me a sort of rebellious comfort. Through some twisted thought process, becoming irrelevant by being an absentee is somehow sexy to me – a bucking of the system in some sense. Reconciled internally by me as an outward show of hubris; me hanging my nuts in the wind for the world to see. Oh yeah, sexy.

Anyone else think the only way the OC is remotely watchable these days is by fast-forwarding through the crappy grownup segments? God that show sucks, and how I used to fawn over it. Who spliced a storyline from Days of Our Lives in between the indie-rock kids drama? They should be fired.

Goodnight, I’m out.

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vacating

Vacating.
Wrote some of this for the never-happened Tuesday entry, and some of it for an intended-to-happen Wednesday one… but I’m not gonna go back and change verb tenses or preface stuff by when it was written… you can figure it out. Seems crappy to have a solid week last week and then to fall off completely this one… but that’s how it goes. In Oregon today, returning early tomorrow – fast trip cutting into my normal weeknight sleep allotment. Bah.

Haven’t talked about music much of late, guess I really only resort to that when I can’t think of much else to write. After all, who really wants to know what I like by the week anyway. But, in the spirit of writing for me and not you, I’ve been listening to the new-to-me (but in reality, dirt-old) album (link contains lotsa streamy goodness) by the Shout Out Louds lately, stuck it on my cellphone for the flight and general listenin’ while traveling. Damn fine album I think… right down to the Pole Position “doot-doot-doot-deet” rip that kicks the whole thing off. You should listen to it, it’s radawesome. That album and the truly-new Joggers, both been occupying my eartime pretty exclusively.

Hey guys, back from slackin’… no time to write Sunday as I was completely overwhelmed with a late breakfast, mid-afternoon nap, and dinner at Pat & Cyn’s. But now I’m back, writing. Power musta went out at the crib today, welcomed home by blinking clocks and a dead internet connection. And, no doubt as you read this, I’ll be jetting my way up north for a meeting and an overnighter. Don’t want to go, of course, but will go anyway… for wont of paycheck-continuity and all. If I had time I’d go see my folks, but with a one-day turnaround and a quasi-work evening engagement, there just ain’t time. It’s not that I don’t love ya, moms and pops, you just gotta understand the life of a young billionaire CEO.

Was working on finalizing the December travel plans today; India, up to Oregon to visit my folks, then over to Florida for the in-laws. It’s a pretty quick pace… I scheduled the flight out to visit my folks on the same day I fly in from India (tried to change my return, but they couldn’t do it without a hefty penalty). I don’t even leave the airport… fly in after 15 hours, pick up and re-check my bags, meet Sharaun and fly back out. Extreme, yeah… but it’s the only time we had. After blocking off my work calendar to reflect the travel, I was pretty surprised to see that I’m only at work three days the entire month… and only in town about a week. Not bad for a guy who likes his time away from work. Yup; nearly a week off for Thanksgiving; and December’s gonna fly by. Then January, then February, then six weeks off to spend with Lil’ Chino. Bring it on. I won’t even remember what it is I do come April.

Whatever, OK… whatever. Goodnight.