Well done, sir!

Then wear the gold hat, if that will move her;
If you can bounce high, bounce for her too,
Till she cry “Lover, gold-hatted, high-bouncing lover,
I must have you!”

This is the epigraph to The Great Gatsby, which my son is reading for school. So beautiful, so sad . . .

(Thomas Parke D’Invilliers is a character in Fitzgerald’s This Side of Paradise, used by him here as a nom de plume.)

As a music teacher I often ask myself if we are truly preparing our students for success. I am not just referring to how well we teach the students to play their instruments, but more importantly if the students will take with them lessons/knowledge/experiences that will prepare them to be strong contributing members of any challenging discipline, and to any organization, in music and other areas of interest.

Approximately 70% of students in any youth orchestra will more than likely select a non-music related profession. Of the students who pursue music as a major in college, a strong percentage of them will end up pursuing a livelihood that is not centered around music.

So then, what skills will the young person take with him if he does not become a professional musician? … I began coaching chamber ensembles how to communicate and lead from within the ensemble, and play without a conductor. While the model was successful it required Team building aspects to make it whole. From this grew a set of core principles; Trust, Unfiltered Dialog, Commitment, Accountability, and Attention to Team Results.

This is also the critical issue with kids and sports, the main difference being that the percentage of kids who will not be professional athletes is closer to 100 than to 70.

Don’t forget Step 3.

Essence of Lean for People Doing Scrum

• Lots of concurrent tasks cause waste
• Focusing on removing delays will remove waste
• Adding value and getting feedback quickly is important
• If you make a mistake and don’t attend to why you made the mistake, it will likely repeat itself
• Minimizing work in process (WIP) is a way of improving efficiency and minimizing risk

We have artists with no scientific knowledge and scientists with no artistic knowledge and both with no spiritual sense of gravity at all, and the result is not just bad, it is ghastly. The time for a real reunification of art and technology is really long overdue.

That’s my son getting a haircut to start the new year.

I told the stylist to make him look like the boy in the photo.

He doesn’t know it yet.

Shhhhhhh!

SCOTTSDALE, Ariz. — Danica Patrick paid a $196 fine to settle a speeding ticket after the star racecar driver was caught going 54 mph in a 35-mph zone last month.

Was she in a hurry to obtain oral sex? Because that would be hot . . .

My son sees a book I’m reading lying on a table . . .

“Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance,” he says. “What kind of a title is that?”

I say, “It’s hard to explain.”

“Life,” he says in a mystical voice, “is like a motorcycle. You must maintain your motorcyle.”

He makes a gong sound . . .

I am in an enormous vault, dead, and they are paying their last respects.

It’s kind of them to come and do this. They didn’t have to do this. I feel grateful.

Now [my son] motions for me to open the glass door of the vault. I see he wants to talk to me. He wants me to tell him, perhaps, what death is like. I feel a desire to do this, to tell him. It was so good of him to come and wave I will tell him it’s not so bad. It’s just lonely.

I reach to push the door open but a dark figure in a shadow beside the door motions for me not to touch it. A single finger is raised to lips I cannot see. The dead aren’t permitted to speak.

But they want me to talk. I’m still needed! Doesn’t he see this? There must be some kind of mistake. Doesn’t he see that they need me? I plead with the figure that I have to speak to them. It’s not finished yet. I have to tell them things. But the figure in the shadows makes no sign that he has even heard.

— Robert Pirsig, Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance

I know the girl at the register because I stop here for a soda most days on my way to work and she’s always here.

“Hi,” I say to her. “These are my kids.”

She looks at the kids, who are all the same age and look nothing like each other — a tall Wasian kid, a stocky Asian and an Indian boy.

“Different moms,” I explain.

Afterward, the group was evenly divided on whether or not she believed me, just for a second . . .

Not only does it turn out to be better than Black Angus, they’ve got — mint juleps!

Ordinarily, I wouldn’t have an alcoholic beverage at a family lunch, but I love mint juleps and it’s rare to find a place that advertises their ability to make one.

“What kind would you like?” the waiter asks.

“There are kinds of mint juleps?” I ask.

“We have seven different brands of bourbon.”

“Oh. Let’s go with the Wild Turkey.”

Ahhh, I’m in heaven . . .

[See post to listen to audio]

My wife is driving . . . she pulls a huge stack of coupons out of the glove compartment and hands them to our son in the back seat.

“Find the Black Angus coupon in there,” she says.

After a while, he says, “Why do we have ten 20% off coupons for Bed, Bath and Beyond?”

“Your job is to find the Black Angus coupon,” she says, “not to criticize people.”

I say, “If you combine all those coupons, they actually wind up paying you to take the merchandise out of the store.”

A while later, he says, “I can’t find a Black Angus coupon.”

I say, “Let me take a look.”

He hands me the coupon stack, which I look through and find it.

“Pwned,” I say. “Why couldn’t you find it?”

“It looks just like the Bed, Bath and Beyond coupons.”

“Do the Bed, Bath and Beyond coupons have a big picture of a steak on them?”

“It’s exactly the same size and the same cardboard and it was mixed in together with them.”

About this time, we pull into the empty parking lot in front of Black Angus to find out that they’re not open for lunch . . .

You can go to the NFL Shop and buy a custom Detroit Lions jersey like the one shown here for $99.99.

Well, not exactly like the one shown here, which I Photoshopped, because the NFL anticipated the joke. If you try to order an Owen 16 jersey, you get this message:

Your current entry cannot be processed. Some entries are prohibited due to guidelines for past and present player names. Please create a new entry.

My wife did the gift shopping. She’s passive-aggressive about it because she really believes that other family members, especially my mom, use the holidays to clean unwanted items out of their closets, wrap them up and give them to us as Christmas presents.

I’ve explained to her that these people simply don’t have any style or taste, so even those these are items that you would stuff in the back of a closet, they actually see them as pretty nice gifts.

Here’s a rundown on what she bought this year: My ex-sister-in-law is getting a box of Harry & David pears, normally $40 but obtained at a deep discount. My great uncle is getting a box of pears. My parents and my sister’s family — a box of pears.

“And the best thing,” she says, “is it says $39.99 right on the box.”

“I assume you’re going to take that off.”

“I don’t think I can. It’s right on the box.”

“Uh . . .”

“Don’t complain. Lucky enough they’re getting anything in this economy.”

Best wishes to everyone who’s taken the time to read this site over the past year.

Later, when I’m in the checkout line, they wander off, I assume to go outside, but it turns out they went back for seconds on the free samples.

“You guys are an embarrassment!” I say. “The free samples are supposed to be one to a customer, not all you can eat!”

“I don’t think she saw us the first time,” my son says. “So it’s okay.”

“Jesus, I can’t take you guys anywhere.”

We know lots of kids with terrific skills but if they just want to do their own thing out there, you put them on a team and they actually make the team worse.

Or to put it in a nutshell: You can’t win with knuckleheads.

I was reminded of that last weekend as I watched Dallas, with talented knuckleheads like Terrell Owens and Pacman Jones, get knocked out of the playoffs with a 44-6 loss to the Eagles, who cut Owens in 2005, and the Jets, who cut Chad Pennington to make room for drama queen Brett Favre, get eliminated with a loss to the Dolphins, who signed Pennington and went from 1-15 to 11-5.

Teamwork always beats individual talent. You can’t win with knuckleheads.

They didn’t, but I went to a different walk-in clinic this afternoon to work a second opinion into the process. The doctor gave me a prescription for Levaquin to replace the Amoxicillin.

I know, nobody cares about this. I only mention it because it reminded me of something important.

I was a consultant for many years and I’m going to share with you now one of the axioms of consulting:

Whatever the client is doing, advise them to do something else.

If whatever they’ve been doing was working, they wouldn’t need a consultant, right?

Is Levaquin “better” than Amoxicillin for ear infections? No, but you see what I’m getting at.

What a renaissance man I am!

Why, if you were here, we could talk about poetry, education, philosophy, sex, drugs, rock ‘n roll, existentialism . . . and we’d have a good time too, considering we’re all going to die . . .

Certainty, fidelity
On the stroke of midnight pass
Like vibrations of a bell
And fashionable madmen raise
Their pedantic boring cry:
Every farthing of the cost,
All the dreaded cards foretell,
Shall be paid, but from this night
Not a whisper, not a thought,
Not a kiss nor look be lost.

How many students, for example, were rendered callous to ideas, and how many lost the impetus to learn because of the way in which learning was experienced by them? How many acquired special skills be means of automatic drill so that their power of judgment and capacity to act intelligently in new situations was limited? How many came to associate the learning process with ennui and boredom? How many found what they did learn so foreign to the situations of life outside the school as to give them no power of control over the latter? How many came to associate books with dull drudgery, so that they were “conditioned” to all but flashy reading matter?

— John Dewey, Experience and Education

And I ran up the stairs to my parents’ bedroom
Mommy and Daddy was sleeping in the moonlight
Slowly I opened the door, creeping in the shadows
Right up to the foot of their bed
I raised the guitar high above my head
And just as I was about to bring the guitar
Crashing down upon the center of the bed,
My father woke up, screaming
“Stop! Wait a minute! Stop it boy!
What do ya think you’re doin’?
That’s no way to treat an expensive musical instrument!”
“God Dammit Daddy! You know I love you, But you got a hell of a lot to learn about Rock ‘n Roll”

They were offered the choice between becoming kings or the couriers of kings. The way children would, they all wanted to be couriers. Therefore there are only couriers who hurry about the world, shouting to each other — since there are no kings — messages that have become meaningless. They would like to put an end to this miserable life of theirs but they dare not because of their oaths of service.

I ask him, “Why don’t you forget about the computer and do something else tonight? Read a book or something?”

He says, “I need the computer so my friends and I can talk to each other.”

“Use text messages. Or a phone. There’s an idea.”

“We need video.”

“Video? What do you need video for?”

“Don’t worry about it.”

“Exactly. So you don’t really need the computer.”

“‘Don’t worry about it’ doesn’t mean I don’t need it. It means don’t worry about it.”

“What are you going to do? Have a biggest dick contest?”

“Is that what you used to do?”

“We didn’t have webcams when I was your age. We had to take ‘em out and do a side-by-side comparison. Everything’s easier nowadays thanks to computers.”

It seemed to me as far back as Unforgiven and In the Line of Fire that while other actors were trying to stay artificially young forever, no one else was putting on screen an honest portrayal of what it’s like to be an old man, what it’s like to feel yourself diminished.

And that was 15 years ago, when Eastwood was in his early 60s. He’s now 78 and looks it.

I was trying to think of another leading actor who’s doing roles where the central fact about the character is that he’s gotten old and tired and scared . . .

Robert De Niro? No, he’s still doing the same cops and mobsters roles he’s been doing for decades.

Al Pacino? Dustin Hoffman? No. Same roles, plus they’re both around 70 years old with absurd fake pompadours piled on top of their heads. In order to do these roles, you can’t be someone with cosmetic surgery and fake hair who has to use makeup effects to look his own age.

I once read where Michael Douglas is proud of the fact that he has taken on “challenging” roles. You want a challenge? Knock it off with the facelifts and the young wife and show people what it’s really like to get old.

They can’t even admit it to themselves, these guys.

Jack Nicholson? He looks his age, but he’s doing wacky old guy roles in Rob Reiner and Adam Sandler movies. Eccentrics. Not the same thing.

Sylvester Stallone? He’s only 60 but you can tell already that he’s not going to do it. He’s still making Rocky and Rambo movies, for god’s sake.

Rating: Four stars (out of five). I added one star for Clint Eastwood being the only man brave enough to get old in front of a camera.

A family member was explaining to me that she is “good in a crisis.”

I have to say that’s true, that this person is in fact at her best in a crisis, which explains why, in times of tranquility, she’s always looking for some way to escalate things into a crisis.

He looks up the trail trying to see what’s ahead even when he knows what’s ahead because he just looked a second before. He goes too fast or too slow for the conditions and when he talks his talk is forever about somewhere else, something else. He’s here but he’s not here. He rejects the here, is unhappy with it, wants to be farther up the trail but when he gets there will be just as unhappy because then it will be “here.” What he’s looking for, what he wants, is all around him, but he doesn’t want that because it is all around him. Every step’s an effort, both physically and spiritually, because he imagines his goal to be external and distant.

— Robert Pirsig, Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance

Is Owen Wilson in that? I HATE Owen Wilson!

Whenever I meet a new bitch at the dog park, the first thing I ask her is “Do you think Owen Wilson is funny?”

And if she says yes, I am OUTTA there.

Rating: Two paws down.

— Lightning

My wife and son brought home some Pillsbury cookie dough sheets (see photo) but we’ve got a problem. Even though the packaging shows cookies with festive holiday shapes (”I want the ones shaped like Christmas trees,” my son says), the sheets are not pre-cut, and we don’t have cookie cutters.

I say, “It looks like what you’re going to get are cookies shaped like rectangles.”

I tell my son I’m going to the urgent care walk-in clinic.

“What for?” he asks.

“I want to find out why I’ve gone deaf in my left ear.”

“You’ve got an ear infection,” he says. “I had one when I came back from Thailand. I was also coughing 24/7 so I had to take this insane cough syrup and ear infection pills.”

“I’m not coughing 24/7. I’ve got a lot of congestion though.”

“You’ll just get the ear infection pills then.”

“When you took them, could you feel your ear canal cracking open? Man, that’s the best! It’s almost worth it to have a clogged passage just to feel it cracking open again.”

“Yeah, but it takes a couple of days.”

II. At the doctor’s office

The nurse takes my blood pressure. “100 over 60,” she says.

“Is that good?” I ask. (I already know it’s good . . . I just want to hear her acknowledge that, even though I’m much older than she is, I’m in excellent physical condition and could undoubtedly satisfy her sexually.)

“Yes. Now I’m going to take your pulse.” She takes it and writes it down on the chart.

“What was it?” I ask.

“Sixty-four.”

“Is that good?”

“Yes. The doctor will be right in.”

The doctor looks in my ear and tells me I have an ear infection. She gives me a prescription for antibiotics and recommends Sudafed — “the kind you have to ask for” — for the congestion.

III. At the Pharmacy

I pick up my prescription and I ask the pharmacist for Sudafed.

“What kind?” he asks.

“The kind you have to ask for.”

(A couple of years ago, the original Sudafed, and all other products containing pseudoephedrine (PSE), was moved “behind the counter” by federal legislation because PSE can be used to produce methamphetamine, also known as crystal meth. The over-the-counter version of Sudafed is now called Sudafed PE and contains phenylephrine instead of PSE.)

So the pharmacist brings the Sudafed, asks for a photo ID, and says, “You have to initial the form there to indicate that you’re not going to resell it.”

“Really? How much do you think I could get for it?”

“Kids resell them at clubs for 3 to 10 times market value.”

“Wow. That really highlights my lack of initiative. I’m just hoping it makes the inside of my head feel less like a toasted marshmallow.”

The woman said “Hold ‘im, Cody” to the kid in a chain-smoker voice and I veered Lightning in another direction.

I wasn’t taking any chances because they looked exactly like the kind of people who’d own a violent pit bull. You’ve got Ma, the chain-smoking meth addict, and her boy Cody, the kid with the white trash name.

Whenever I hear someone say “Hold ‘im, Cody” to a guy with a pit bull, I am outta there . . .

FYI — I’m a small dog, but I’m not a “pretend to be brave at the end of a leash” small dog, I’m a “this leash really is holding me back” small dog, as a neighborhood rottweiler learned when he bounded across the street at me a few minutes ago.

I don’t like big dogs running up on me — it’s disrespectful — but the woman walking him was too small to hold him back. So I put my front paws on his shoulder and growled in his ear, and when he couldn’t look me in the eye, I knew everything was okay.

My owner said later he thought at least one of us was going to be killed . . .

— Lightning

Outside the window, snow,
A woman in a hot bath
Overflowing.

— Nobuku Katsura

See the river flow
In a long unbroken line
On the field of snow.

– Boncho

Confined within doors
A priest is warming himself
Burning a Buddha statue.

— Natsume Soseki

Through snow,
Lights of homes
That slammed their gates on me.

— Buson

One of my owner’s friends gave me a Christmas pug to use on my blog. My first present of the season! Thanks, MS!

The pug looks a little sad, probably because someone made him wear that stupid Santa hat. Pugs don’t like to wear hats. We may look like funny little animals, but don’t forget we are descended from the mighty gray wolf. Before you put a Santa hat on a pug, try putting a Santa hat on a wolf. That will teach you a good lesson.

Don’t think that the pug is sad because of the snow. Pugs love snow! A day in the snow is the best day ever! Now that I think about it, every day is the best day ever!

Oh, one more thing: I do NOT endorse Popdarts.com. Do not go to that site. Go to sites that support pugs.

Oops — my owner just told me that if you tell people not to do something, that just makes them want to do it even more. It’s called “reverse psychology.” That doesn’t make sense to me. Pugs can be a little stubborn, but mostly we like to do what we’re told, because it makes our owners happy.

Here’s another phrase my owner taught me recently: “eating your own dogfood.” To humans, it means doing what you tell other people to do. To dogs, it means . . . well, I guess it’s pretty obvious what it means.

Merry Christmas, everybody! I’ll post some more Christmas pug pictures later.

— Lightning

I’m having a Willy Loman moment where it seems like after all the highways, and the trains, and the appointments, and the years, you end up worth more dead than alive . . .

Thus spoke The Programmer.

We always spend a few minutes talking about my wife, who, to use the medical terminology, is “really crazy.”

“She is really crazy,” the doctor says. “I don’t know how you keep your sanity. You always seem so calm. I bow to you.” And she stretches both arms out and actually bows.

I’m glad someone is able to get a laugh out of it.

Then she refills my Paxil prescription so I can make it through the next six months . . .

My son had a drum set part in the Northwood Holiday Concert last night . . .

Drum set parts are a showcase for high school percussionists because usually they stand at the back of the orchestra, the audience can’t actually see the instruments, and nobody knows what they’re doing.

He told me after the concert that was the worst he’d ever played that song but it sounded great to me, maybe because I’m a parent . . .

When I ask him why he’s the best IT customer, he says it’s because he understands that we in IT are very busy so he doesn’t bug us too much.

That’s funny because the person I think is our best customer is just the opposite — she knows what she wants, and she doesn’t mind being difficult if it leads to better results.

Yes we’re busy, but we’re trying to do this stuff as well as we can do it and it helps to get a sense from the customer that the work is important and that doing it well is worthwhile.

This guy is beyond satire:

[Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich] rarely turns up for work at his official state office in Chicago, former employees say, is unapologetically late to almost everything, and can treat employees with disdain, cursing and erupting in fury for failings as mundane as neglecting to have at hand at all times his preferred black Paul Mitchell hairbrush. He calls the brush “the football,” an allusion to the “nuclear football,” or the bomb codes never to be out of reach of a president.

— International Herald Tribune

So instead of “The Lakers didn’t play very well last night but they still won the game,” they’ll say “We didn’t play very well last night but we still won the game.”

We?! What position do you play?

I saw a woman on TV this morning standing in a blizzard to tell me that it’s snowing in the Cajon Pass.

Really?! It always snows in the Cajon Pass. She could have told me the same thing from inside a heated studio.

Some day, one of these women is going to get pneumonia or frostbite and sue this whole sadistic practice out of existence . . .

The rising cost of college — even before the recession — threatens to put higher education out of reach for most Americans, according to the biennial report from the National Center for Public Policy and Higher Education.

Good! Long overdue!

There are way, way, way too many unqualified people getting college degrees. Higher education has been devalued to the point that you can’t swing a cat without knocking down some idiot with a graduate degree.

DOGBERT (typing): “Always postpone meetings with time-wasting morons.”
DILBERT (reading over his shoulder): How do you do that?
DOGBERT: Can I get back to you on that?