Here’s an idea: Try leading a thirsty horse to water and see what it does. If the horse is tired, lead it to shade and a soft place to lie down. If the horse is hungry, offer it hay and oats. If the horse doesn’t need anything, maybe leave it alone. — Dale Emery Read more →
May 2008
It’s Not Easy Being Green
“If we shortened our showers by one minute, we’d save $100 a year,” my son informs me, pausing for a moment to let the news sink in. “And if we shortened our showers by two minutes, we’d save $200 a year. If we didn’t take showers at all, we could be rich! “As for the AC, we leave it off and everybody gets one of those personal fans and points it at their face.” “Why don’t we get the old-fashioned fold-out fans and wave them back and forth?” I ask. “Now that’s just stupid,” he says. Read more →
Scrum Doesn’t Do Anything
In the end it doesn’t matter what names you use for your processes, good people will do good work and continuously improve what they do. So much of the discussion around Lean versus Scrum (etc.) is about marketing hype, selling consulting and training services, and cornering the market with new name-brands. . . . Scrum is not a methodology, it is not a process. It is a simple framework underpinned by some common sense principles. Scrum offers individuals and organizations the opportunity to continuously improve the way they work. It provides a space for people to behave like human beings, with trust, respect and passion. That’s about it. But that is huge. — Tobias Mayer Read more →
Another Reason I Like to Just Stay Home
ROME – Italian railway police say an American tourist was hit and killed by a train at a Rome station as he was walking on the tracks in a daze after being drugged and robbed. Police official Giovanni Piccolantonio said Monday that 74-year-old Frank Phel from California died early Friday at the suburban Tiburtina station. — Associated Press Arrivederci Roma! Read more →
More Words and Phrases I’m Sick Unto Death Of
Serial Entrepreneur — I hope there’s a special place in hell for people who refer to themselves as “serial entrepreneurs.” What the heck is the difference between an entrepreneur and a serial entrepreneur? I suppose Bill Gates is an entrepreneur and e.e. cummings’ Uncle Sol was a serial entrepreneur — farmer, chicken farmer, skunk farmer, worm farmer. Length — For some reason, people who talk about basketball now describe players as having “great length.” Nobody says, “He’s very tall.” They say, “He’s got great length.” News flash: People don’t have length. They have height. They even have width. But they don’t have length — except at birth and shortly thereafter, when we measure them lying down because they can’t stand up yet. Describing a basketball player as having “great length” is as uninformative as saying, “He’s a tall black guy with long arms.” Read more →
Hockey Practice
I was watching my son’s roller hockey practice last weekend . . . during a scrimmage, he skated the puck up the rink, faked the goalie to the right, then snapped a shot into the top left corner of the net. “Oh my gosh!” I yelled to anyone within earshot. “Just like I taught him!” A few minutes later, he got a pass in front of the net and one-timed it so high and hard that if not for the protective netting around the top of the rink, I don’t know where it would have come down. “I didn’t teach him that,” I said. Read more →
Go Ask Alice
One pill makes you larger . . . A musclehead co-worker is talking to someone on the phone about nutritional supplements: “It changes the metabolism of the . . . en-DOC-rine? . . . EN-do-CREEN? . . . system, so it releases more testosterone.” Yeah, you should definitely take some of that. A product that claims to alter the function of bodily organs you can’t even pronounce. What could possibly go wrong? In fact, you should go to the vitamin store right now and just gobble up everything they’ve got. Did you ever read Alice in Wonderland? She finds a cake that says EAT ME so she eats it. Next thing you know she’s nine feet tall. Draw your own parallels . . . Read more →
Political Analysis from a 9th Grader
“It’s too bad Hillary Rodham Clinton’s name isn’t Hillary Rodman Clinton,” my son says. “Maybe she could rebound from her current situation.” Read more →
Scrum Cheat Sheet
Read this doc on Scribd: Scrum Cheat Sheet Read more →
The Secret of All Secrets
I am letting you into the secret of all secrets, mirrors are gates through which death comes and goes. Moreover if you see your whole life in a mirror you will see death at work as you see bees behind the glass in a hive. — Jean Cocteau, Orphée Read more →
Political Season
How small of all that human hearts endure That part which laws or kings can cause or cure. — Samuel Johnson Read more →
People Who Bear Watching
Anyone with a stock over-amped response to a question about how they’re doing, e.g., “FAN-TASTIC!” or “I’m terrrrrrrr-IF-ic!” Especially if accompanied by a gesture, like an arm-swinging fist pump . . . Read more →
Asian Gang Activities
A co-worker informs me that a Santa Ana elementary school teacher has been charged with child endangerment for keeping a gun in her classroom. “Well, that’s Santa Ana,” I say. “What do you expect from people? Not a day goes by that you can’t pick up the Orange County Register and read about a gang-related slaying in Santa Ana. If I were a teacher in Santa Ana, you best believe I’d be packing heat too. Thank god this kind of thing doesn’t happen in Irvine where I live.” “There are Asian gangs in Irvine.” “Asian gangs in Irvine?! What a racist you are. I’ve lived in Irvine for seven years and I’ve never seen or heard of any Asian gang activity. Unless studying for AP exams counts as a gang activity. Blowing their brains out with mathematical formulas . . .” Read more →