Monday, February 15, 2010

nordic combined

For all of you watching the Winter Olympics, if you thought the biathlon was a strange sport, then you should look into the nordic combined. At least the biathlon has some reasonable basis to actual hunting with the idea of having to pursue an animal, then shoot. But nordic combined? When, praytell, did people ever jump off really big ramps and then go cross-country skiing?

Sunday, February 14, 2010

hurt locker / super troopers

I watched The Hurt Locker last weekend. And then I watched Super Troopers. The former because I wanted to and it seemed like an intense, driven movie. It was. The latter beceause our new manager really, really, rally likes that movie. Meh. It was ok. It had its moments, and some were very funny, but it takes the right mood to really enjoy it.

starting to push the number down

I'm slowly pushing the number of e-mails in my personal account down. It's like tamping the earth. (There's a word I don't get to say often: tamping). The good news: the number of unread is under 100 and the total number is back under 300. In fact, it's closer to 200. The bad news: while I am working my way backwards through time, I have only made it to November. Also, the next 100 only get me back to the beginning of last year, which means I have 100+ items in my inbox that are 1+ year old.

The result is that many of you may have gotten an e-mail from me in the past 6 hours. Splendid. The downside is that my replies will become increasingly short as I go further back in time or I may not provide one at all if it just seems like the moment, topical relevance, and/or general insight is lost. Timing is so critical to correspondence and I am admittedly terrible at it. It's nothing personal, it's just that I have probably determined that failing to write back to you will not cost people their jobs or potentially millions (or at least several hundred thousands) of dollars. Business beckons. All the time.

valentine's is so odd

Or not. As a big proponent of the days are just days movement, Valentine's Day is, well, just another day. And while I cannot speak for the ladies, if you replace video games with e-mail, then this graphic sums up my day pretty well.

gung hay fat choy

Cantonese, not Mandarin like a lot of my non-regular readers. I'm sure this is shocking to many of you who are not my parents.

Saturday, February 13, 2010

so many people engaged

So many people engaged. At least 4 couples now, probably several more secretly plotting weddings behind everyone's back. But just so you all know, the drive-through party bus wedding is my idea.

Tuesday, February 09, 2010

keeping the number down

Before I left on vacation at the end of December, I tried (and mostly succeeded) in whittling down the number of e-mails in my inbox at work. Getting under 30 was a big success and probably half of that remaining 30 was lingering long-term items that I kept nearby for handy reference. Part of this will always have to do with Outlook, which I strongly dislike because it is simply such a poor program for organizing AND searching through past correspondence. As a result, I have developed the habit of CCing myself on most of the e-mails I send so that I have a convenient copy to file away instead of the mess that is the 'Sent' folder.

Since I have been back, I've made what I feel to be very acceptable progress and have stayed well below 100 inbox items (which is my general goal). Since you don't know how I organize, structure and prioritize correspondence, such a number may seem like a lot or a little. Suffice to say, I use my inbox as a holding area of sorts for open items so many of the e-mails are from myself which I leave in the inbox as a reminder until I get a reply. Reference items will also remain for extended periods of time simply for ease of access.

My e-mail experience changed today. After multiple e-mails from IT on the matter, I have grudgingly moved from Office 2003 to Office 2007. That move will be acceptable enough, though I already dislike Excel 2007 if only because I do basic things and liked what I had gotten used to using. I am a bit of luddite despite my apparent demographic. The greater difficulty lies with the changing of mail servers. The process is ongoing since I have now received nothing (not even from subscription lists) for six hours which is a sign of a problem somewhere. But I am getting e-mails from myself (from both internal and external sending addresses) which may simply indicate the bulletin boards are not working.

E-mail drives correspondence. Yesterday, I sent 39 e-mails. That's 39 (literally) hand-crafted pictures of prose so elegant that you would weep. Each one, a literary masterpiece greater than the one before. Or not. At least the spelling is better than in this blog since I proof what I write and run spell checker. (See, when it's not late at night, I actually try.) I don't even bother to count the number I receive since many of them are (or at least used to be until the program change) automatically filtered to various folders based on the subscription list rules I have (or had) set up. Twelve of these e-mails had attachments of some kind meaning work product, proposal, analysis, draft agreement, or whatever that had to be meticulously sculpted and balanced just so between form and function, between zesty excitement and useful information. It was simply one of those days, grinding away at everything.

Here's the problem. I write a lot of things most days. And I don't exactly come up with lots of energy to read and write more late at night most of the time when I get home. And that's assuming the other laptop isn't here with me. The end result (aside from the infrequent blogging) is that my personal e-mail account is an unmitigated disaster. Over 300 items in the inbox and 100+ are unread. I have only been replying to the most critical items. Maybe. I suppose I'll start into it all eventually, though I'm not sure when. And I'll start, not at the beginning, but at the end, and trudge through them in reverse chronological order. I'm sorry. Orders will not be processed in the order in which they were received.

Friday, February 05, 2010

ad placement

Why did I just see an ad for UFC 109 at the USA Today crossword page? And while that may prompt you to ask what I was doing there, I really cannot say.

Monday, February 01, 2010

poland

In Poland for a few days. I think that was the first time I have ever had a flight land while it was snowing. Too bad all business hotels look the same after a while. Especially when they have us stay at the same chain most of the time.

palindrome date?

I suppose it depends on where you are. Order is important. Is it 2010-02-01? Or perhaps 01-02-2010. But for most of you, it's probably 02-01-2010. The U.S. looks so out of place, kind of like with the metric system.