Author Archive: Paul Epps

Snow Diary

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I’m supposed to be doing some stuff in London today, but the snivelling tossers cancelled all the trains and buses because there was a bit of snow. On the bright side, shutting down our financial services industry for a day will save the country billions. — Harry Hutton Read more →

EppsNet Music Review: Springsteen Halftime Show

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What year did Asbury Park come out — 1973? Man, that was a great album. So Springsteen must be what now — 60? He looks great, with his hair transplants and cosmetic surgery, shilling his new album on the Bridgestone Halftime Show. Bruce Springsteen — authentic blue-collar friend of the American working man! I couldn’t even watch it . . . Read more →

Before ADHD Was Invented

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The school thought Gillian [Lynne] had a learning disorder of some sort and that it might be more appropriate for her to be in a school for children with special needs. All of this took place in the 1930s. I think now they’d say she had attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, and they’d put her on Ritalin or something similar. But the ADHD epidemic hadn’t been invented at the time. It wasn’t an available condition. People didn’t know they could have that and had to get by without it. — Ken Robinson, The Element: How Finding Your Passion Changes Everything Read more →

Failure is an Orphan

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For centuries, historians have debated whether history is propelled by Great Men (and Women), human forces of nature who bend events and systems to their will, or by vast impersonal forces (communism, capitalism, globalization) that render even the most powerful of us a mere reed basket floating in a massive river. There’s no session on the subject at the World Economic Forum in Davos. But at least with regard to finance and business, the consensus seems to be clear: Success is the work of Great Men and Great Women, while failure can be pinned on the system. — Daniel Gross, “Why the world’s economic leaders blame the catastrophe on the system instead of themselves” Read more →

How to Get an A in Honors History

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First semester grades are out. My son missed getting straight A’s by a point and a half. He had an 88.5 in honors history. He got an A in honors English with a 90.14. The honors classes at Northwood are very demanding. Even the best students get low A’s and high B’s. Three kids got A’s in the history class. The high score was a 91.1. “The 91.1 is Ted,” my son says. We know Ted. “Ted is history. He’s bad at math, average in English, but he knows everything there is to know about history.” “Make sure you touch base with the history teacher,” I say. “Let him know you’re really doing your best for him and ask him what you need to do to get that extra point and a half this semester. He’ll tell you.” “He’ll say, ‘Study hard, get a good score on all the assignments,… Read more →

Added Comments Feed

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Someone asked me last week if the EppsNet RSS feed includes comments. It doesn’t. So — I just added a comments feed and a Subscribe by Email option, both available in the right sidebar . . . Read more →

Dear Landlord

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Now, each of us has his own special gift And you know this was meant to be true, And if you don’t underestimate me, I won’t underestimate you. — Bob Dylan, “Dear Landlord” Read more →

That’s Not Leadership

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We can’t drive our SUVs and eat as much as we want and keep our homes on 72 degrees at all times … and then just expect that other countries are going to say OK. That’s not leadership. That’s not going to happen. — Barack Obama, May 16, 2008   Mr. Obama, who hates the cold, had cranked up the thermostat. “He’s from Hawaii, O.K.?” said Mr. Obama’s senior adviser, David Axelrod, who occupies the small but strategically located office next door to his boss. “He likes it warm. You could grow orchids in there.” — The New York Times, January 28, 2009 Read more →

User Surveys on the Web

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Look me in the eye Then tell me that I’m satisfied Hey, are you satisfied? — The Replacements, “Unsatisfied” What is a reasonable target for user satisfaction with a web site? We did a user satisfaction survey last year and found that 14 percent of respondents felt that our web site didn’t measure up to their expectations. This year, we have an incentive goal of reducing that number to 8 percent, not based on evidence that any web site has ever achieved a number that low, but based on the opinion of the company that did the survey that anything over a 10 percent dissatisfaction rating is always bad. Or to flip it around, we’re trying to achieve a 92 percent approval rating. I wish we hadn’t set the bar quite that high. I don’t want to be a pessimist but not only is that considerably higher than, say, Google… Read more →

LinkedIn Meta

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If you’re not on LinkedIn this isn’t going to be funny but I got this email today from my brother: I’m going through a social media epiphany…so “I’d like to add you to my professional network on LinkedIn.” 🙂 Read more →

Where is the Change?

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More than 144 hours into Barack Obama’s presidency, the economy is still in recession, the country is still at war, and in many parts of the country it’s still cold outside. Citizens are growing impatient: Wasn’t President Obama supposed to bring change? — Best of the Web Today: WSJ.com Read more →

Not Knowing Things

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But I don’t have to know an answer. I don’t feel frightened by not knowing things, by being lost in the mysterious universe without having any purpose, which is the way it really is, as far as I can tell, possibly. It doesn’t frighten me. — Richard P. Feynman Read more →

Semester Break

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My wife is telling me that because Northwood finals are over today — Thursday — the boy now has a four-day weekend. “You’ve got to be kidding,” I say. It kind of makes sense to have Friday off, but why Monday? “It’s semester break,” the boy says. “Semester break?!” “That’s right. It’s like the off season.” The off season . . . it’s so ridiculous I have to laugh. “Isn’t it nice you have a funny family?” my wife says. “It’s like the all-star break,” the boy says. Read more →

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