Helmets & Goggles

On Thursday I received a phone call from a person who we had hired. She was calling to let me know that she would not be starting on Monday. In fact she was not going to be coming to work at all. Her current employer made a counter offer and she decided that it was too good an offer/opportunity to pass up. It was a surprise to hear, not for the counter offer, but for the fact that she shared with us that one of the reasons she was looking to come to work for us was because her fiancee was here in town. She is currently in another city. It seemed to be a good fit all around.

I'm disappointed. Not for the fact that she is not coming to join us. Not for the fact that her company counter offered. I cannot blame anyone for making a decision based on facts that I do not fully understand. She has to do what she feels is best for her. You have to respect that.

I am disappointed because we had waited four weeks for her to start at our agency. I wish she had made this decision sooner and let us know so we could move on. Instead we were in limbo for four weeks and now have to start the interview process again.

Sam pointed out that it is better to have this information now before she started, than to have her make a decision a day, week or month into the job. Okay. I can see that. He's been through this far more often than I. I often wonder how an owner of a business does it. I think I have an idea.

At a former job there was a saying for the pace of work. We didn't have a lot of internal help, yet had a huge workload to tackle. The VP of Marketing told me that they way to survive was all about "helmets and goggles". Just put them on and keep on truckin'.

So, with that I am mentally putting on my helmet and goggles and getting ready to keep moving forward. Onward and upward.

Helmets & Goggles

I Cheated. I Feel Shame.

I thought there was no way I would go back. I was wrong.

The relationship I had been working on over the past three and half months was the right one. I knew it. I wanted it to work out. I really did. I knew cheating was bad. Cheating meant that I was weak. I'd had a long standing affair for many years. Who was I to think that I would be able to move on?

There was no pressure from the other party to get back together. There was no reason to abandon my new relationship. Sure it was new and new sometimes wears off, but it was healthy. No doubt about that. It was healthy.

I caved on Monday. Tax day.

I've tried to justify this in my head. After all when I cheated it wasn't with the one I'd been having an affair with for the past three years. I went back to the one I knew first.

Unlike Odysseus the journey I was on was self imposed. And no one nor anything was out to stop me from going back for another taste of that sweet, sweet nectar. No Scylla. No Charybdis. The only thing preventing me from going back was my own will power.

I feel I must admit my guilt publicly and ask for forgiveness from my recent partner and my previous drinking buddy. I've cheated on you both.

So I'm sorry bottled water. I owe you an apology. You were good, still are, but I could not resist the siren call of cola.

And to you Diet Dr. Pepper. I thought my affair with you was the right thing to do. After all you were diet cola. For a while I thought that was a healthy alternative.

But my first love. My drinking partner from my youth. The beverage I loved so much that I could and would drink it warm. I have come home. I missed you Classic Coca Cola. It was good to be with you again.

But if I gain back the ten pounds I lost while living with only water I will drop you like a rock. I am that fickle.

I Cheated. I Feel Shame.

Bedside Book List

I'm trying a little experiment tonight. I've got a stack of books on my bedside table. I haven't thought about doing this experiment until just now, so you'll have to excuse me if this doesn't work out.

What I am going to do is to try to make a sentence out of the titles of the books on my bedside table. Now, keep in mind that I usually have a pretty big stack there all the time. The books switch in and out, but I can usually count on five or six there each day. I don't know if this will work but here goes a few attempts with the books I have here tonight:

Sentence #1:
You will Never Be Lied To Again if you First, Break All The Rules, indulge in Sex, Drugs and Cocoa Puffs, learn The Five Love Languages of Children and find work at a Creative Company that has gone from Good To Great... that is The Future of Advertising. What Did I Just Say!?!?

Sentence #2:
A Creative Company that desires to establish The Future Of Advertising must not only understand the Five Love Languages of Children, but evolve from a Good To Great company that embraces the idea that you must First, Break All The Rules, limit the amount of Sex, Drugs and Cocoa Puffs and never Never Be Lied To Again. What Did I Just Say!?!?

Sentence #3:
The Future of Advertising involves Sex, Drugs and Cocoa Puffs. What Did I Just Say!?!? Going from Good To Great requires that you First, Break All The Rules and learn The Five Love Languages of Children. You'll find that if you do this you will not only Never Be Lied To Again, but also discover that you work at a Creative Company.

Okay... #3 contains more than one sentence, but this is really hard to do as just one! Try it yourself. It's tough.


If you want to try this at home follow these steps:

1) Don't plan in advance. Quick - look over a the bedside table... these are the only books you are allowed to use and you must use all of them!
2) Try to use as few words as possible to link the titles together. You'll likely need to create some copy to connect the titles, otherwise it might not make sense at all and will merely be a list of books. And this is boring.
3) Try a writing the sentence a few different ways. Change the order around.
4) Link the titles to Amazon so we can check out the books in more detail.
5) Let me know if you've done this. I'd love to see what others come up with

Bedside Book List

Grey Hair Where?

Okay... Let's get this out of the way... I have thinning hair. Okay... really thinning hair. I'm waiting for the day when I go for it and shave it down just to get rid of it. No comb overs for me.

Thinning hair is usually a good indicator that a guy is getting older. The emergence of a bald spot is definitely a key life marker. If a guy has older brothers he can pretty well watch their hairlines and gauge when his will reach the same points. Not for me though. My thin spot appeared around the same time as my eldest brother. So I was never really able to gauge when my hairline would reach certain stages.

So I cannot gauge my age by where the hairline is. I know, I should really know how old I am right? The thing is I like to keep track of things and be able to manage my own expectations. Stages of hair loss as a marker of age makes sense right? Right.

The good news is that I've found another way to gauge my age. Grey hairs.

Now it's not uncommon for guys in their twenties to get random grey hair here and there. And it's not uncommon for some guys to go prematurely grey. The key again, I think, is to keep track of what is going on with the older siblings.

I've got three older brothers so I've also got great research resources. All I have to do is to find out from them how much grey they have, when they went grey and plot it out on a calendar. An added twist to this is not to ask them how many grey hairs they have, but to find out when they first saw it on different parts of their bodies. You see, last week I found a single grey hair on my leg. I wonder when Kevin first found a grey hair on his calf?

I'll have to call each now and ask. This might be a weird conversation.

Grey Hair Where?

The Montessori Redemption

Hannah goes to a great school. She really likes it. Her teacher is wonderful, the class size is just right and they have a great playground out in back. In fact, I think it's the playground she likes the best. Scratch that. I know it is the playground she likes best. And I'm talking the actual ground on which she plays, not the equipment.

Oh sure, they've got a really nice swing set, a red car and a blue car. They've also got that industrial strength play equipment that only the really nice playgrounds have. It comes in several large sections with stairs, slides, monkey bars. It's bright red, yellow and blue. Someone was nice enough to donate it to the school. It is really nice.

But what Hannah really likes is the ground on which it sits. I'm talking about the pea gravel. It's all over the place. How do I know this? Because every day she brings a pocket full of pea gravel home with her to keep in her "collection".

She's brought so much of it home over the past year that I'm beginning to think she's trying to dig a tunnel from the playground to the Sonic down the street. She loves Sonic too, though I think she's only been there once before.

I don't think she's caught on yet, but Hannah's collection doesn't seem to grow. She often brings home two pockets full of rocks, which I in turn return to the school playground each week. I feel like Andy Dufresne from Shawshank Redemption.

On the mornings when the kids are outside before school begins I find myself shuffling my feet on the ground as I head to the clipboard to sign Hannah in for the day. As I shuffle along I subtly drop the rocks in my pockets back to the ground from whence they came. My shoes may get dusty, but this is where the rocks belong.

I'm sure she'll have more collections throughout the years, I just hope whatever she takes from school for a new collection is small enough to fit in my pockets so I can return them as needed. I'd hate to have to get special pants made.

The Montessori Redemption