tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4880187132432011512024-02-22T16:48:01.762-05:00Another Way to Waste Time OnlineIf it sounds too good to be true, pay extra for it just to make sure no one outbids you. Put it on your credit card if you have to.Chrishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15796345438886867796noreply@blogger.comBlogger70125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-488018713243201151.post-71779780098337624042009-11-16T09:06:00.003-05:002009-11-16T09:25:46.994-05:00My story, in 100 words or lessJust for fun, I ran Microsoft Word's "autosummarize" tool over the 50,000 words of fiction that I just finished writing, to see how a computer-automated reader would sum up the story in 100 words or less.<br /><br />I think you'll agree that the Cliff's notes edition of this story is destined to be hugely popular. Here are the key "sentences" that Word picked out for me:<br /><br />*<br /><span style="font-style: italic;">Meet Professor Toulos</span><br /><br /><span style="font-style: italic;">Professor Toulos stirred his soup thoughtfully.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-style: italic;">"I'm Professor Stephen Toulos."</span><br /><br /><span style="font-style: italic;">"Hi Stefan."</span><br /><br /><span style="font-style: italic;">"Stefan, hey man."</span><br /><br /><span style="font-style: italic;">"OK, thanks Stefan."</span><br /><br /><span style="font-style: italic;">"How is Stefan doing?"</span><br /><br /><span style="font-style: italic;">"Hey, it's Stefan."</span><br /><br /><span style="font-style: italic;">"No, Stefan."</span><br /><br /><span style="font-style: italic;">Tiffany asked.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-style: italic;">"Stefan!"</span><br /><br /><span style="font-style: italic;">"Stefan!"</span><br /><br /><span style="font-style: italic;">Tiffany gasped.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-style: italic;">How did Professor Toulos know about her and Stefan being involved?</span><br /><br /><span style="font-style: italic;">"Tiffany?"</span><br /><br /><span style="font-style: italic;">"Professor Toulos?"</span><br /><br /><span style="font-style: italic;">"It's me, Stefan."</span><br /><br /><span style="font-style: italic;">"Stefan! What happened?"</span><br /><br /><span style="font-style: italic;">"No, Stefan."</span><br /><br /><span style="font-style: italic;">"Professor Toulos?" Stefan asked in disbelief.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-style: italic;">"Tiffany, hi."</span><br /><br /><span style="font-style: italic;">Professor Toulos stopped her.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-style: italic;">"OK, Tiffany."</span><br /><br /><span style="font-style: italic;">Stefan shouted in the professor's ear.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-style: italic;">Stefan asked him.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-style: italic;">Stefan paused and glared at the professor.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-style: italic;">Toulos asked.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-style: italic;">Professor Toulos expected that very answer.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-style: italic;">Tiffany knew.</span><br />*<br /><br />Summarized this way, it sounds much more melodramatic than I meant it to be -- feels almost like a soap opera. Of course, you still have very little concept of what actually happens in the story, which I think is why Microsoft all but dumped the autosummarize feature from its latest versions of Word.<br /><br />Useless tools like this give me some reassurance that the evil computers aren't quite ready to take over the world yet.Chrishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15796345438886867796noreply@blogger.com10tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-488018713243201151.post-67883271615054896612009-11-14T21:37:00.003-05:002009-11-14T21:43:29.685-05:00Woo hooDone.<br /><br />Microsoft Word counts 50,236 words. NaNoWriMo's website counts 50,339. But let's not dicker over 103 words. The important point is: it's more than 50,000. Feels pretty good, I must say.<br /><br />There's still work to do to make this a complete story. It's probably 90% complete. (Of course, that's a first draft, a very rough first draft. Once that's finished, there'll be more than a little rewriting to do.)<br /><br />It's been fun to feel like a writer for a month, instead of just some guy who claims to like writing but doesn't have the time or motivation.<br /><br />For now, I'm gonna take a break and celebrate with some Famous Amos cookies. Thanks for cheering me on, everybody. And thanks to Meaghan for taking several double shifts of caring for Logan while I wrote.Chrishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15796345438886867796noreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-488018713243201151.post-32896648216401984452009-11-13T23:46:00.002-05:002009-11-13T23:55:51.979-05:00Must... get... sleepWriting is hard work, apparently, even when you get to just make up all the details -- or maybe especially when you just make up everything.<br /><br />I had envisioned myself writing through the night and finishing up before Saturday morning dawned, but after writing 11,000 words today I am just a little tired. (It's good tired.)<br /><br />I am happy to report this long day of writing has brought me up to 47,000 words to date, which means I need a measly 3,000 more on Saturday. Psshaw.<br /><br />Well, seriously, it might be a little tricky. Throughout the contest, weekends have been the most difficult time for me to write because Logan is home all day. He demands quite a lot of attention, and he's cool enough that I'm happy to give it to him. But it does mean that I have a hard time getting anything else done.<br /><br />So... I'll be back in a few hours, refreshed and ready to top the big 5-0-0-0-0, I hope.<br /><br />For those of you actually interested in the story and not just my word count, I have realized without a doubt that the story I have begun telling will require more than 50,000 words to finish. I don't know how many yet, or how long it will take me to finish it, but it will not be finished when I hit 50,000 words tomorrow. But soon after, I hope.<br /><br />Good night.Chrishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15796345438886867796noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-488018713243201151.post-79687280408276820892009-11-13T08:08:00.002-05:002009-11-13T08:18:09.138-05:00The final sprintLet the countdown begin. I am now about 40 hours away from my personal deadline in the NaNoWriMo contest -- midnight Saturday.<br /><br />If there's good news for me, it is that I have kept a pretty good pace in the last week, adding 13,000 words since I updated you all last Friday. The bad news, though, is that I had not maintained that weekly average all along. Here I sit with 36,000 words in front of me, which means I have to write 14,000 today and tomorrow. Zounds.<br /><br />Well, I suppose I should get started. Recall that I have scheduled to take the day off from work today to write. Is that a sad way to use a vacation day? Maybe, but sometimes in life a man just has to set a completely arbitrary goal for himself and then skip out on work to get as close as he can to accomplishing it.<br /><br />So off I go to write. Wish me luck.Chrishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15796345438886867796noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-488018713243201151.post-15646151500013656712009-11-06T09:40:00.002-05:002009-11-06T09:48:17.574-05:00Down but not out... and something to readLadies and gentleman, as you have probably guessed because of my silence of the past week, I have fallen terribly far behind in my NaNoWriMo schedule. Last weekend was really busy with non-writing activities, and much of this week I have been an unmotivated slug. Excuses, excuses.<br /><br />Point is: here I am only eight days away from my personal deadline, and I have just crossed the 23,000 word mark. (The goal is 50,000, remember.) Yikes.<br /><br />I do plan to make a comeback, although it's going to be tricky. I might have to pull a few late nights, a la the days of college newspapering.<br /><br />Well, instead of an excerpt from my writing, today I recommend you read this really interesting social commentary <a href="http://www.vanityfair.com/culture/features/2009/12/cuteness-200912?currentPage=1">article from Vanity Fair on the rise of cute culture</a>. It will make you laugh and feel a little sick to your stomach.Chrishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15796345438886867796noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-488018713243201151.post-28949040697947020692009-10-29T16:21:00.002-04:002009-10-29T16:27:10.392-04:00Act 1, Scene 3Here's another excerpt, for those who are interested. This is currently set up as my third scene of the book, but the organization could change of course.<br /><br />Again, more scene-setting and foreshadowing and all that jazz. I hope those of you who want to know where this story is actually going don't get too frustrated. I promise, for anyone who's interested, I will e-mail the full rough draft when it is completed (just more than two weeks, yikes). Crap, I think I just dismissed my readers from this blog.<br /><br />Well, if anyone's still here:<br /><br />**<br /><br />Professor Toulos parked his car tight against the curb of his wide, unpainted street, lined with decades-old oak trees. His home, comparable to its neighbors, was a quaint bungalow, small but detailed in its architectural touches --- a bit of gingerbread trim lining the top of the porch, decorative brackets pretending to prop up the eaves of the roof, and thick wavy glass window panes telling the home’s true age, despite its well-kept, good-as-new appearance.<br /><br />The home, surrounded primarily by homes of other unmarried professors from the university, plus a number of retired couples and widows, sat roughly a half mile away from the university’s business school where Toulos kept his office. The close proximity allowed him to walk to work most days, barring bad weather or some longer range travel plans during or after his work day that would require him to drive his car.<br /><br />A gray cat meowed to him from its perch on the back of the couch as he eased the front door closed behind him. “Hello, Adam Smith,” Toulos said in a high-pitched voice, reaching out to pat the cat’s head. The cat ducked the hand and took a swipe at it with his clawless front paw.<br /><br />Toulos pushed off his leather loafers and slid them into their designated resting place, underneath a side table beside the foot of the stairs. He slipped off his sport jacket and hung it over the newel post, to be carried up to his bedroom momentarily, then made a detour into the kitchen, to refill Adam Smith’s food and water dishes. He poured himself a drink -- a glass of cognac -- and headed upstairs to his computer.<br /><br />Switching on a little classical background music, Toulos sipped at his cognac and began to respond to comments on his latest blog, a semi-fictional piece about plastic surgery gone wrong for actress Tara Reid. His story ended with the twist that she surrendered her body for invasive experimentation by the likes of a fictitious scientist of questionable repute (based loosely on a number of comic book villains).<br /><br />“OMG, Tara used 2 B such a cutee, but now shez Trashy w/a cap T. Hope the sicntist figurs out the jeans that makes prety girls turn to skank hos,” reader 2Cool4Skool commented in response to the story.<br /><br />Toulos, writing under his screen name CelebriScooper, licked his lips and fired back a response: “That would be a terrific discovery in the field of genetics, 2Cool. So if they could find the gene sequence responsible for skankiness, would we want them to eliminate it or promote its spread throughout all of Hollywood? LOL!”<br /><br />The professor chuckled to himself and took another sip of cognac. The stereo softly played Tchaikovsky.<br /><br />Another reader, boicrazy14, wrote: “Awesome story as always, Scooper. Love love love Tara Reid and hope those scientists can get her all put back together again soon. Hey Hollywood: More Tara and Ashton movies!!! Those two are soooo cute together!!!”<br /><br />CelebriScooper replied: “Thanks boicrazy. We’ve got connections around here, so we’ll talk with Hollywood about your Tara-Ashton request.”<br /><br />The reader comments went on, 31 of them on this post, which had turned out not to be one of the blog’s more popular stories. The really hot topics commonly drew upward of 75 comments. Tara Reid and her surgeries were pretty old news by this point, but Toulos remained fascinated by her. It was not a sexual fascination, at least not in the usual sense, as Toulos actually found her rather repulsive. He tended to agree with 2Cool’s assessment of her. But something about her devil-may-care attitude had sparked his curiosity during the holiday break, and this post was the fifth story he had written on her in two weeks.<br /><br />Toulos always read every comment word for word, although he often replied to only three or four of them for each story. His strategy leaned more toward using the comments as feedback and guidelines, to know which way to steer his future posts to keep the readers interested – even though ultimately he would decide on his subject matter based on his own personal obsessions at any given time.<br /><br />His favorite subjects were generally pretty similar to the favorite subjects of the supermarket tabloids – the fouled-up love lives of famous actors, actresses and musicians, the bad-boy antics of hot-tempered tough guys, and the like. Plastic surgeries added some nice fodder from time to time. But Toulos toed a careful line between strict gossip site and fan fiction site. Since his first taste of celebrity gossip, his greatest interest had always been in exploring the subject imaginatively. Perhaps letting his mind add far-fetched details and structuring his blog posts as narrative works let him convince himself that this hobby held some intellectual merit and that he was not totally debasing his mind with superficial nonsense.<br /><br />Still, even if he had himself partially convinced of the respectability of his hobby, he remained sufficiently unconvinced that he felt it vitally important to keep this interest of his a secret from the world. Not only did his close friend Sandra not know about it, no one knew about it. On the blog, he was wholly anonymous. He made no mention of his identity, not even his first name. He did not disclose his location, not even “Iowa” or “the Midwest”. He never discussed celebrity gossip with his peers at the university or with his students, although he often discreetly listened in to their conversations on the subject.<br /><br />The closest he came to exposing his secret interest was in having a couple of celebrity-centric magazine subscriptions mailed to his home: People and US Weekly. Still, those were mainstream enough that he could perhaps pass them off as just ordinary coffee table material. And almost no one ever visited his home anyway.<br /><br />Naturally, the majority of his obsessions focused on actors, actresses, pop musicians and similar figures of national or even international fame. He took interest in the occasional political or sports personality, only if he or she had some exceptional bit of charm or intrigue. In this last category, he had found an opportunity to mix in a bit of local interest the previous year, when as a junior Iowa’s own All-American linebacker Stefan Jones was awarded the Heisman trophy. Toulos had never actually met Jones in person, nor even seen him up close so far as he could recall, but the fact that he studied and played football at the same university where Toulos taught made him an obvious choice to write about. Not wanting to give away his own locale or identity, the professor had been careful to blend Jones in with other sports figures, writing forward-looking fiction about his future glory days in the NFL -- partying with pretty ladies yet also serving as a heroic figure who tackled would-be robbers in convenience stores.<br /><br />Toulos’ interest in Jones had tapered off not long after his Heisman win, and he probably had not written about any sports celebrities at all in several months. As he sat at his computer on this night, crafting a tale about an unwed Hollywood starlet pregnant with triplets by three different men, the professor gave no thought to the young football player, who would very soon reenter Toulos’ life and lead him to a kind of notoriety that he had always strived hard to avoid.Chrishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15796345438886867796noreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-488018713243201151.post-37209278963332031462009-10-28T10:46:00.002-04:002009-10-28T11:24:16.950-04:00Day 13, Words 17,000-plusI am happy to report that the writing continues. With a current word count of 17,291, I'm a couple days behind schedule, although I haven't done any writing yet today. If I were precisely on pace, I would have just over 21,500 words by end of day, and I need to reach the halfway point by the end of the week.<br /><br />I must admit: I was fairly nervous and unsure of myself when I began this. I feared that I would run out of ideas to flesh out the story's skeleton or that my schedule would get too busy to write. I read on the NaNoWriMo website that last year only about 18% of the people who registered to participate actually completed the 50,000 words within the month. But I've got to say I'm feeling pretty good about it now. I'm determined to succeed, and I'm even scheduling a vacation day from work just before my deadline so I can catch up if I'm still a little behind schedule. It is rather motivating having you blog readers watching for my updates and excerpts.<br /><br />Got to tend to my day job for now. Maybe I'll add an excerpt later.Chrishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15796345438886867796noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-488018713243201151.post-28937308143742576702009-10-24T00:55:00.002-04:002009-10-24T01:12:13.450-04:0011,000 and countingWhew. I've had a late night here, trying to catch up on some NaNoWriMo-ing. I started off the day (Friday) way behind schedule on my word count pace, but I knew Meaghan was having a night out with some friends and figured I could catch up a bit tonight after putting Logan to bed.<br /><br />So, the count now is just over 11,000 words after eight days of writing. (If you do the math, I should have just over 13,000 now, to be on pace for 50,000 in 30 days. Ah... still some catching up to do, but not terrible.)<br /><br />I'm really feeling good about this. It feels good to be regularly writing and moving the story forward. Every time in the past I've "tried to write a novel", I have worked on it very very sporadically. (We're talking: write a 1,000- to 2,000-word section once every three months or so.) Obviously, that's a very bad method. For one thing, the story never actually gets written. Secondly, it's almost impossible to maintain any kind of steady flow or a consistent voice in the writing.<br /><br />Also different this time: I did a fair bit of planning ahead of time before starting to write. I actually know all the major events in the story and how it will end right now. I still don't know those details about any of the other drafts I have hanging around in the My Documents folder. I've even partially completed an Excel spreadsheet listing the individual scenes of the story, as part of the <a href="http://www.advancedfictionwriting.com/art/snowflake.php">Snowflake Method</a>, which I used as a rough guideline for my planning process.<br /><br />So... for an excerpt. I won't be offended if people don't read these. I know it's hard to enjoy them without the rest of the story in tow. But, if you're interested, this is actually what I plan to be the very first scene of the book. (Pretend you haven't read that other scene yet.) Fair warning, it's about 1,200 words:<br /><br />***<br /><br />The professor pushed his shopping cart up to the back of the checkout line, behind a trio of young girls, maybe 13 years old, who stood scanning through the magazines that lined the end of the candy and gum display rack on this Saturday evening.<br />His pressed with an index finger against the noise piece of his wire-rimmed glasses, each lens of which made a perfect circle around each eye, cutting an odd-looking line through each thick eyebrow. He moved the finger a few inches higher to wipe away a film of sweat he felt forming at his hairline. The store was warmer than he would have liked, but its managers probably set the thermostat with people like these girls, who wore tank tops in January, in mind, rather than Professor Stephen Toulos, who wore a long-sleeve shirt and tie, vest, tweed sport jacket, slacks and leather loafers everywhere he went, all year round. Whether intentional or not, he wore a vest of charcoal gray that was nearly a precise match for his dark but graying hair and neatly-trimmed beard.<br /><br />He stole a quick glance at what the girls were waiting to purchase. One held a purple blouse with a fringe of cream-colored lace lining the V-neck. Another girl held a two-liter bottle of soda, and the last held nothing but the magazine she was reading.<br /><br />In the professor’s own cart, he stored an assortment of grocery items that likely would not be available for purchase in this Iowa town if it were not for the demand from the university’s faculty: Nutella spread, an unpopular brand of imported wine, an assortment of specialty cheeses, meats and bread. <br /><br />Toulos took a deep breath, trying to create some form of cool draft in his lungs and to expel some heat. He stepped to the side of his cart and plucked a Newsweek magazine from the rack beside where the girls were congregated. He tried to be nonchalant but instead looked as if he were moving in slow motion, approaching the magazine rack and then slowly retreating from it, all the while examining closely each publication, most of them populated by attractive young women, wearing either highly fashionable clothing or else very little clothing at all.<br /><br />“Excuse me,” he muttered to the girls, although he hadn’t been in their way.<br />Stepping back behind his cart, he thumbed through the news magazine, pretending to read its contents. What he was actually doing was reading the headlines of the celebrity gossip magazines close by and eavesdropping on the girls’ commentary on the latest celebrity dirt.<br /><br />“God, Britney is so ugly and fat. When will she go away?” one girl questioned tactlessly and quickly flipped ahead in her magazine for something more interesting.<br />Toulos also could have cared less about Britney and would be satisfied to see her go away. He scanned the magazine covers again for some more interesting gossip – couples splitting up, couples getting back together, actors allegedly battling alcohol and drug addictions. It was the typical fare, but the professor was more of a special interest guy. He had a few particular people he wanted to know about, and the rest were just the subjects of trivial rumors. <br /><br />“Paula to launch her own TV singing competition… and taking Randy with her?!?” blared one magazine. This caught his attention. He found his obsessions came easily for performers who were popular more than a decade ago and continue to try to remain relevant. He desperately wanted to read more about this idea. Given the question marks at the end of the sentence, and despite the exclamation point sandwiched between them, the report clearly had no official confirmation, but Toulos wondered who the source was for the suggestion, or whether the rumor had been picked up by any mainstream news sources. He checked whether the girls or anyone else in line were watching him and nearly stepped over to pick up the magazine, but he stopped himself. Even here, in the grocery store, where he saw no one he recognized, Toulos considered it important that he maintain his image as a widely respected university professor. Devouring the gossip of the supermarket tabloids did not fit well with this reputation, he realized fully well.<br /><br />Just as he finished winning this internal struggle, one of the girls’ voices broke through his thought process: “Did you hear about Paula’s new show?” one of them said in her toneless, apathetic voice. <br /><br />“I think it’s BS. It won’t happen,” another answered without looking up from her magazine.<br /><br />“Oh, well I heard they were out doing auditions. Supposed to come to Chicago next month,” answered the girl who raised the topic.<br /><br />“Nah, that’s just a rumor. Try to find it online; they’d be advertising the auditions if it was going on,” the other girl replied confidently.<br /><br />Toulos found himself leaning forward and resting his arms on the handle bar of his shopping cart, having forgotten the need for discretion to hear what the girls were saying. The third girl, who apparently had no opinion or information on the singing show gossip, glanced in the professor’s direction as her friends debated the rumor. <br />After a few seconds, she took a second look, then leaned into the skeptical girl’s ear to whisper something with a smirk. Toulos straightened up but continued listening to the conversation. Suddenly the skeptical girl turned to look him directly in the eye: “What do you think, sir? Is Paula really starting a new show?” she asked him, then turned back to her friends who all laughed giddily.<br />“Me? Oh uh…” Toulos said, preparing to excuse himself from the topic and plead ignorance, but the girls had already returned to their own conversation, not really expecting or wanting an answer from him. <br /><br />The professor suddenly felt it to be unbearably warm in the store. He loosened his tie and waited impatiently for the line to move forward. Much to his relief, the girls checked out soon after the confrontation and left the store without ridiculing him further, at least not to his knowledge. Even with them gone, Toulos couldn’t help but feel embarrassed that the cashier might have witnessed the exchange and probably would be thinking what an absurd fool he was as she rang up his groceries. He returned the unread Newsweek back to the magazine stand while his items were bagged up, then paid the bill and walked quickly out the door and to his car.<br /><br />Toulos removed his jacket as he sat down in the car and his face gradually cooled off during his drive home. As much as he would have liked to laugh at himself over the incident, he couldn’t stop thinking how one of those girls could someday be a student of his at the university, and he hoped that they were young enough that by the time they were of college age they would have forgotten about this evening, or at least would no longer recognize Dr. Toulos as the professor who had eavesdropped on their girl talk. <br /><br />As he awaited the start of the spring semester on the coming Monday morning, the professor was clueless to the fact that his secret obsessions would soon bring him more than enough humiliation to make the grocery store incident seem entirely trivial and hysterically funny by comparison.Chrishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15796345438886867796noreply@blogger.com7tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-488018713243201151.post-41570365309481958012009-10-19T16:36:00.006-04:002009-10-19T16:59:51.615-04:00Slowly but surely...This is day four of my customized calendar for NaNoWriMo, and I'm happy to report that I have indeed been writing -- unfortunately though, not quite as fast as I should be. To hit my target of 50,000 words in 30 days, I should have roughly 6,500 words written by the end of the day today. Thus far, I have written 4,000.<br /><br />It's early in the "contest" -- as the organizers call it, even though you don't actually compete against the other writers -- and so I have time to catch up. I hope the story will flow more easily once I get deeper into the action of it. Right now, I'm sort of setting the scene and introducing the characters.<br /><br />I have written three scenes of the story so far, and my rough plan was to have 30 in total.<br /><br />Below is an excerpt of the scene I wrote today. As I explained Thursday, this contest is all about speedy output and so I must be excused if the quality is low. My hope is that I'll create a rough draft that can someday be revised into something readable. Also, this section is out of context with the rest of the story, of course, so I'm not sure how enjoyable it will be to read by itself.<br /><br />I'm quite the salesman, aren't I? You all must be dying to read this now:<br /><br />***<br />About 75 students trickled into Toulos’ Monday morning class of Economics 101, in groups of three and four mostly. The social scientist in him had observed that freshmen (which made up the majority of this intro-level course’s students) tended to travel in packs far more frequently than the university’s upperclassmen, despite the fact that many times they were clinging tightly to “best friends” whom they had just met a few weeks earlier. Toulos was tempted to conclude that students came to like each other less and less the longer they knew each other and therefore became less devoted to taking classes together, eating lunch together, etc. This might have been partially true, but he figured the more likely reason for the freshman pack behavior was to quell their insecurity about being at a new place and ranking as the lowliest members of this new society. Progressing through the ranks into sophomore, junior, then senior status meant students could traverse the campus with more self-confidence and less fear of social failure.<br /><br />Perhaps his fascination with this and other freshmen phenomena was part of the reason Toulos insisted on teaching at least one entry-level course every year. His seniority and impressive academic record at the university easily qualified him to demand only upper level courses, populated by business majors and graduate students. In fact, these were the courses to which the university preferred to assign him. Still, a part of him felt refreshed by revisiting the basic theories of his field each year. He also had traditionally liked the opportunity to scour the ranks of freshmen and sophomores for potentially promising minds that he could then recruit to the business school, but that was years ago, before his less intellectual interests had taken center stage in his mind and detracted from his former vigor for academia.<br /><br />This was the path of thought down which his mind was ambling when Toulos’ eye was pulled away from a group of students seated at the back of the lecture hall toward another group passing through the doorway. Leading the group -- flanked by more of a loyal, adoring entourage than a pack of insecure peers -- was a tall black man sporting a leather-sleeved letterman jacket, which matched one worn by a member of the entourage. He stood taller than his followers, at maybe 6’3”, and his thick neck muscles flexed against the itchy woolen collar of the jacket when he smiled and waved to a friend already seated in the hall. Toulos was almost certain he recognized the young man from photos, but the way that the rest of the class, even the unknowing freshmen, sat up at attention when he entered the room removed any doubt from the professor’s mind: Heisman winner Stefan Jones was taking his economics class.<br /><br />Professor Toulos felt his pulse speed up and throb against the side of his neck. He felt embarrassed, as if the artery might be visible to the students, hammering away beside his throat in nervous excitement. Since beginning his fan fiction hobby almost five years ago, Toulos had never met one of his subjects, not even in a chance encounter on the street. He lived in Iowa, after all, not exactly a hot bed of celebrity sightings. Now, he was not only meeting one of his subjects but would be teaching him for the next semester. ...<br /><br />Toulos swallowed what felt like a helmet-sized knot of anxiety and prepared to call the class to attention. He watched Stefan and his friends for another moment over the top of his glasses, ensuring the athlete had taken no special notice of the professor. It was silly, he knew, but he couldn’t shake a bit of uneasiness that somehow the linebacker might recognize Toulos as the author of some obscure, anonymous blog stories about himself. Even in the unlikely event that Stefan had seen the blog, the professor knew there was no way for him to know who wrote it.<br /><br />“Hello,” Toulos attempted a loud call, but his voice hung up in his throat. He cleared it and took a deep breath. “Hello class,” he almost shouted. “I’m Professor Stephen Toulos. Welcome to Economics 101.”Chrishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15796345438886867796noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-488018713243201151.post-66419230425422743482009-10-15T09:59:00.002-04:002009-10-15T10:34:47.620-04:00Something to write aboutIt's always been a goal of mine to write a novel. I have enjoyed writing ever since junior high school and like the thought of being able to make a living by writing whatever I please (just as I declared in my "about me" description in the righthand column when I first established this blog).<br /><br />I realize that those of you who try to read this blog -- and are met with the frequent disappointment of me not providing anything to read -- might question whether I actually enjoy writing. Well, I do. Convinced? Good.<br /><br />I think the reason I so infrequently write on this blog is because I have significant doubts about whether my day-to-day activities or random thoughts are interesting enough to be worth reading, even for a small group of friends. I have often considered selecting a theme for the blog that would guide me, so that I wouldn't just end up writing sporadic commentary on the news or telling you about my son's loose bowel movements.<br /><br />Anyway, the point of all this rambling is that I have signed up to participate this year in the National Novel Writing Month, and I want you all to know about it because there's nothing quite as motivating as the fear of public humiliation. Or so they say. I'm not sure if that really works for me, but we'll see. At any rate, maybe each of you could provide a mindless word of encouragement, like: "I know you can do it!" or "Sounds like fun. Best of luck!" or "That's awesome. I can't wait to read it, if you decide to let people read it. But if not, that's cool too!" That would be swell.<br /><br />The idea of the project is that people all over the world spend the month of November writing a short novel of at least 50,000 words. It can be about any subject, and there's no requirement that you ever let anyone read it. The NaNoWriMo website features a computer automated word count program that verifies you wrote 50,000 words and then deletes your text without anyone ever seeing it.<br /><br />On the one hand, it's a rather daunting idea, to write 50,000 words in a month. I've tried (half-heartedly, at best) for the last seven or eight years to write a novel, and to show for it I've got two or three unfinished, plotless drafts of prose worth 20,000 to 30,000 words each. This is not to mention the fact that I can't even manage to come up with a single 500-word blog post per month.<br /><br />But, the key here is this: The nature of the project requires the writing to be so fast-paced and spontaneous that you have to excuse yourself entirely from quality. I can reassure myself that it's OK to write total garbage, and no one else ever has to read it if I so choose. All the pressure to produce quality prose is gone, and I suspect that is a major factor that has kept me from writing regularly all these years. (Of course, I'm secretly hoping it will be good, and then I will let people read it. Shh. Don't tell me.)<br /><br />The other positive factor is the deadline pressure. I've been in the journalism business for a while, and so I am accustomed to the idea of deadlines. I thrive under deadlines. This is probably the toughest one to which I've ever been subjected. And for some reason, it's very exciting.<br /><br />Speaking of the deadline, this brings me to a final important note, since you all will be my official scorekeepers in this game. The last week or two of November is very hectic for me, with Thanksgiving-related family gatherings, a first birthday party for Logan and also hopefully some form of birthday outing for Meaghan. So... I'm modifying the calendar for myself. Rather than writing my short novel in the 30 days of November, I'm going to write it in the 30 days running from Oct. 16 to Nov. 14.<br /><br />That's right: I start tomorrow and must finish by midnight, Saturday Nov. 14.<br /><br />I hope to provide updates along the way, perhaps with an occasional excerpt to keep you entertained or confused or both. Wish me luck.Chrishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15796345438886867796noreply@blogger.com12tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-488018713243201151.post-6994887157211840322009-08-24T08:55:00.004-04:002009-08-24T09:46:44.323-04:00Loose stools sink shipsHere's a fun fact to kick off your Monday: Georgia leads the nation this year in the number of bank failures. The FDIC announced two more on Friday, bringing the count to 18 institutions that regulators have closed down in the state so far in 2009.<br /><br />I don't know what you can do with that, but there it is. You'll think of something.<br /><br />I'm sure Georgia holds some other, more honorable records, but that's the one that sprang to mind after reading the news this morning.<br /><br />I suppose there's not much else to do but give you a mindless listing of my recent activities and whereabouts. Actually, let's just stick with the activities, because my whereabouts have just been here mostly, and most of you know where that is.<br /><br />My brother and I ran a 5K race together about a week ago. Not my best time, but not too bad considering my running has been only slightly more regular than my blogging this year. He beat me by 18 seconds, so I've challenged him to a rematch.<br /><br />There has been lots of poopy to clean up lately for me and the wife, some of it the runny variety (hence the title of this post). I'm talking about the baby's poop, by the way. Everyone got that, right? I know this is a mundane blog, but I'll be damned if I start telling you about my own bowel movements. (What I read during said movements, however, is an entirely valid topic, <a href="http://anotherwaytowastetimeonline.blogspot.com/2008/03/apparently-that-was-his-real-hand.html">as previously discussed</a>.)<br /><br />The vegetable garden soldiers on, although I suspect it has grown tired of the heat, overcrowding and neglect. Each plant has produced a little, but I have been far from overwhelmed by anything. I did get enough ripe tomatoes a few weeks ago to make some fresh homemade salsa. And last night I made zucchini bread.<br /><br />I just finished reading The World According to Garp by John Irving. I mostly read it because I had enjoyed A Prayer for Owen Meany so much. Garp was pretty enjoyable; I still like Irving's style a lot. But Owen Meany was better.<br /><br />So uh... apparently my strategy here is to bore away what's left of the readership that waits so patiently for these posts. I'll see if I can't come up with something more interesting to say in October or November, maybe.Chrishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15796345438886867796noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-488018713243201151.post-19785073653367312642009-06-02T09:26:00.002-04:002009-06-02T10:01:48.160-04:00This is a test of the emergency blogcast systemUm... so... what have you guys been up to? Anything fun?<br /><br />Yes, OK, scaling Kilimanjaro? That's good. Final engineering on your better mouse trap? Very nice. What's that? You in the back corner? Oh, sir, please put that away. This is not that kind of website.<br /><br />I myself have been a little on the busy side, you might say, which is a minor excuse for why I have not written on this blog since sometime in the 1970s. (They did have blogs in the 70s. You just had to go to the nearest research university and punch out your posts through a complex code of zeros and ones. Frankly, I think the quality of the Internet has really plummeted since just anyone can post anything from the comfort of their homes. See <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pfJKavxpvqs&feature=related">Exhibit A here</a>. And <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SJ9afRgToxE&feature=popular">Exhibit B here</a>.)<br /><br />Aside from being busy, I also have a tendency to get burned out on things and go looking for some more interesting outlet for my creative energy (or nonsensical babbling). Having found none, I have returned to this blog. I think.<br /><br />So, a quick catch-up... here are a few of the highlights of the last five months of my life:<br /><br />-Been raising a baby. I have reason to suspect he isn't mine, but he's adorable and so I've decided to play along for a while. He has mastered rolling over but is still working on crawling, sitting upright without assistance, and fetching. We'll be enrolling him in evil medical school in the fall.<br /><br />-Planted a small vegetable garden, consisting of four tomato plants, two bell pepper plants, and one zucchini plant. (There were originally more zucchini plants, but most of them died while sitting in our laundry room waiting to be planted, while the spring monsoons kept the ground too wet to work.) I also believe these plants to be illegitimate, but they're growing tall and some of them have flowered. What else can I expect from the bastards thus far?<br /><br />-Started a larger compost pile alongside the compost bucket that started last winter. The pile is corralled between a couple of homemade trellises, fashioned from the sticks trimmed off an overgrown crepe myrtle bush earlier this year. It's all very Little House on the Prairie.<br /><br />-Made more minor progress toward the Attic Insulation and Ventilation Project of 2008. (Yes, I know that it is now 2009, thank you.) I figured, I had so much fun working in the attic last July and August, that I should postpone further activity in there until the temperatures eclipse the three-digit mark again this year. Meanwhile, we're just going to have to fork out the money to add another A/C unit for the upstairs. At least there's a tax credit to be had for Energy Star units right now: for example, <a href="http://www.mehvac.com/taxcredit/">the unit we're looking at</a>.<br /><br />Jeez, this doesn't sound very convincing. I promise I've been busy. What have I been doing? Washing baby bottles, changing diapers, giving baths, playing, protecting the child from two dogs that desperately want to French kiss him, and so on. It's all very exciting, I know. Oh, and, miraculously, I still have a full-time job, even one that depends on the very financial services industry that has been crumbling all around us for the last nine months or so.<br /><br />Good, I think we're all caught up then. I'll see you all again in six months.<br /><br />Kidding, kidding. I plan to return soon with riveting tales of adventure and mystery. Unless my wife brings home another child, in which case all bets are off.Chrishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15796345438886867796noreply@blogger.com8tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-488018713243201151.post-18328249018908993262009-01-21T12:18:00.004-05:002009-01-21T12:32:41.008-05:00How can big business not take these guys seriously?<div style="text-align: center;"><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEguHnqesTO-BtvJw_w617J2EQQGDMEIA0SIuzXpYABoxglJroyfy5dHVo9CUxo8KKhfJzGBjHkmCSJFapmDUqlow5U-3eG_fRfPwObV-JhWlksRcBQuSYqwp_zL1rpt93Ni5OQg8vbaktzg/s1600-h/TVA+PROTEST.preview.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 400px; height: 267px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEguHnqesTO-BtvJw_w617J2EQQGDMEIA0SIuzXpYABoxglJroyfy5dHVo9CUxo8KKhfJzGBjHkmCSJFapmDUqlow5U-3eG_fRfPwObV-JhWlksRcBQuSYqwp_zL1rpt93Ni5OQg8vbaktzg/s400/TVA+PROTEST.preview.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5293797767210779122" border="0" /></a><br /><span style="font-style: italic;font-family:times new roman;" >Accordion-wielding <a href="http://www.wdef.com/news/chattanooga_group_protests_tvas_use_of_coal/01/2009">protester</a> sets back credibility<br />of environmental movement by 25 years</span><br /><br /><div style="text-align: left;">Not much time or energy (or motivation) to blog these days, so here's just a passing thought:<br /><br />An accordion?!? Seriously?!? As if Mr. Scruffy's camo jacket and other dude's pink hat weren't enough to kill any chance of your message being heard upstairs, this genius has to show up with an accordion and, presumably, play it.<br /><br />Makes me want to build my own coal-fired power plant, just to distance myself.<br /></div></div>Chrishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15796345438886867796noreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-488018713243201151.post-55804890867617675402008-12-19T22:07:00.001-05:002008-12-19T22:16:23.376-05:00I'm the proud owner of a brand new baby boy<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhSuyUPCGEwao2U9lVs0heKG62sx0zC1aTM7NGudV8cMWGCc8gnQSooEQ7S1PzaZwBAnjmEYrrhoD6QKNu817QixkrSl5icDYnVcawb6EHJo5Y5SfOgkpxd8Lq90_ipQ3pogw5QCdIXX35-/s1600-h/IMG_0881.JPG"><img style="margin: 0px 10px 10px 0px; clear: both; float: left;" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhSuyUPCGEwao2U9lVs0heKG62sx0zC1aTM7NGudV8cMWGCc8gnQSooEQ7S1PzaZwBAnjmEYrrhoD6QKNu817QixkrSl5icDYnVcawb6EHJo5Y5SfOgkpxd8Lq90_ipQ3pogw5QCdIXX35-/s320/IMG_0881.JPG" border="0" /></a><br /><br /><br /><br /><br />He's not always quite this peaceful,<br />but we like him anyway.<br /><div style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><a href="http://picasa.google.com/blogger/" target="ext"><img src="http://photos1.blogger.com/pbp.gif" alt="Posted by Picasa" style="border: 0px none ; padding: 0px; background: transparent none repeat scroll 0% 50%; -moz-background-clip: -moz-initial; -moz-background-origin: -moz-initial; -moz-background-inline-policy: -moz-initial;" align="middle" border="0" /></a></div>Chrishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15796345438886867796noreply@blogger.com8tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-488018713243201151.post-81642289008726798802008-11-21T13:38:00.002-05:002008-11-21T14:29:59.787-05:00My chosen career just got more interesting?In the course of my job as a financial journalist and in following my oft-nerdy curiosity, I found myself reading a financial column today with this headline on top: <a href="http://seekingalpha.com/article/106445-general-electric-genuine-risk-of-collapse?source=trans_lb_popular">"General Electric: Genuine risk of collapse?"</a><br /><br />It was interesting and discussed a possibility I had not read about elsewhere. The writer pointed out that the gigantic corporation has more to do with banking and financial services than it does with innovation of earth-friendly technologies -- or "ecomagination" as the TV ads say. So, like any financial services company right now, GE could be in a bit of trouble.<br /><br />The signs point to a company that's at least a little concerned about its cash position and very heavy on debt, and so the writer of the column concludes that GE could be on the verge of a collapse.<br /><br />Or, uh, I think that's what he concludes.<br /><br />Actually, maybe he doesn't conclude anything. He just suggests a lot of things and tops them off with a question.<br /><br />Don't get me wrong: it's a valid discussion and an interesting read. But after reading it, I began to notice just how many of the "news" headlines I saw online ended in question marks today.<br /><br />I spotted headlines such as "Is Citigroup for sale?" and "An Obama New Deal?" and "Pam Anderson: Pinhead or Patriot?"<br /><br />Granted, the Obama article is obviously a commentary and speculation piece, and the Pam Anderson bit is Fox News dribble. But how about this one: "CNN Ticker: Obama picks national security advisor?" First of all, the very notion of a ticker is that it delivers breaking news. I'm not sure how it can be breaking news if you have a question mark at the end. Secondly, the headline is clearly a declarative sentence, designed to state a fact. It's totally illogical to end it in a question mark.<br /><br />Among my favorites of the day: "Does Mars photo prove aliens exist?" At least this sentence is actually a question.<br /><br />I have mixed feelings about this barrage of skeptically punctuated headlines. First, as a curious reader who wants to know about the important events of the day, I fear it is going to get even harder for me to keep tabs on the news that matters. If news organizations steadily increase the amount of forward-looking speculation in their reporting (which is not a new concept, I realize), readers will have to spend extra time and thought filtering out which ideas are worth consideration and which ones have been weakly imagined by reporters and editors as a way to fill the "news hole".<br /><br />As if <span style="font-style: italic;">information </span>overload wasn't enough.<br /><br />On the other hand, as a writer who likes both journalism and creative writing, I think this could really open up new possibilities for my career. See, the great thing about writing speculation is that you don't have to do so much damn fact-checking. Writers are free to look at a situation, think up possible scenarios that could result, and then write about that possibility, leaning heavily on words like "could" and "might" -- and of course, ending the headline with a question mark.<br /><br />(Honestly, this sounds painfully similar to my job now, but at least in this case my company's subscribers are investment professionals who know they're paying for speculation, not mass-media consumers who are prone to confuse the articles with affirmative announcements of breaking news.)<br /><br />At the extreme of this trend, I can envision a new offshoot of the narrative journalism genre -- creative journalism. You know: reporters take real-world people and events and create interesting subplots or side-stories to go along with the news of the day. Part of the fun for the readers would be trying to figure out what's real and what's totally made up.<br /><br />I'm kidding? Good journalists would never do that?<br /><br />They certainly aren't already doing it now? At the New York Times, for example?<br /><br />I know, enough already.<br /><br />(?)Chrishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15796345438886867796noreply@blogger.com8tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-488018713243201151.post-40092678164308371072008-11-06T13:52:00.002-05:002008-11-06T14:31:30.995-05:00If you all could just stay home a couple days, that'd be greatFunny how our brains work. Every day, we wake up for work and think, "Man, I wish I could just stay in bed and take the day off." What? Is that just me? Oh no, there, I see some hands in the back.<br /><br />But then, when you and few thousand co-workers get a <a href="http://www.financialexpress.com/news/Dell-to-axe-8-900-jobs--offers-unpaid-vacation/381734/">company memo suggesting you consider a brief vacation</a> -- unpaid, that is -- in order to potentially help prevent more layoffs at the company... well, it just doesn't bring the satisfaction you might have hoped. That's the letter that employees at computer maker Dell recently received, as the company struggles with soft consumer spending on big-ticket items like computers.<br /><br />Of course, I suppose when your company is in the final stages of an 8,900-person layoff, a memo proposing a five-day break doesn't seem so scary, relatively speaking. If nothing else, the break would give employees a little free time to look for different jobs.<br /><br />Unfortunately, Dell employees aren't the only folks a little nervous about their paychecks these days. A <a href="http://www.adpemploymentreport.com/">private report</a> estimated US companies eliminated 157,000 jobs in October, the largest single-month drop since 2002. I've been reading of layoffs and/or bankruptcies among restaurants, auto dealers, pharmaceutical companies, retail chains, and manufacturers, to name a few. And, in particular, I've seen announcements by some major manufacturing companies planning more major layoffs and plant closures in the fourth quarter this year, in preparation for what they expect to be a tough 2009.<br /><br />Why am I getting all business-and-economic-newsy on you? Mostly because it freaks me out a little bit. It's a rather scary time to be having a baby. Knowing that my paycheck comes from those big banks and investment banks that keep making headlines for their failures, I get a little uneasy at times. If I were to lose my job, the fact is I have few if any marketable skills beyond writing and editing, and I'm afraid those aren't the types of jobs that companies consider indispensable when budgets are tight.<br /><br />I'm not asking you to lose any sleep over me and the fam, though. My company keeps reporting decent sales numbers, including 13% growth over 2007, so far this year. And I haven't heard any buzz of layoffs -- although I don't work in an office, so I probably wouldn't hear it if there were any.<br /><br />It's all just a little weird to me. At age 28, this is the first time I've ever heard people talk about being in a recession and looked around me and seen how it could very well impact me directly, without much warning. Let's hope not.<br /><br />And good luck to the Dell folks. Enjoy your days off, but I'd recommend you spend at least a couple of them sending out resumes.Chrishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15796345438886867796noreply@blogger.com7tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-488018713243201151.post-58913770304133601432008-11-03T13:10:00.003-05:002008-11-03T14:19:10.192-05:00The Palin prank -- what the others haven't told youNews outlets have widely reported on the prank phone call recently made to vice presidential nominee Sarah Palin. A Montreal radio personality called and spoke to Palin, claiming to be French President Nicolas Sarkozy. Speaking in an exaggerated French accent, the interviewer sneakily jabbed at Palin about Joe the Plumber, her comments on seeing Russia from her home and a porno made to spoof her. Palin responded with hesitant, polite conversation until the prankster revealed himself as such, and a campaign aide took the phone to end <a href="http://www.courant.com/entertainment/tv/hc-ap-palinprankcall-1104,0,2749320.story">the call</a>.<br /><br />Hysterical.<br /><br />OK, well, a little funny.<br /><br />Actually, it was mostly dumb, but I give the interviewer an E for effort (which is naturally right between D and F on the standard U.S. grading scale).<br /><br />Palin's camp has appeared largely undisturbed by the prank, at least in its public statements. One spokesperson described Palin as "mildly amused" by the incident -- although I contend that "mildly amused" is her natural, default demeanor.<br /><br />In reality, there's another reason why Palin and her people are purportedly passive about the prickly pranksters (conclusion of gratuitous alliteration). It's because Palin is just moments away from revealing a much bigger, more impressive prank.<br /><br />This blogger has learned that at 9 p.m. Eastern standard time, in a presidential election special of "Saturday Night Live," Palin and her accomplices will reveal that her candidacy for VP has been a carefully executed prank on the people of the United States.<br /><br />While I have not been able to obtain an exact script of the sketch, SNL insiders say the revelation will occur midway through the program as the real Palin and the Tina Fey version engage in a mock debate, during which they apparently compete to see who can make the most over-the-top idiotic statements. After the real Palin blurts out a serious of comments so ridiculous and offensive to human reasoning that even the staunchest GOP voters in the audience will reconsider their choice, Ashton Kutcher will rush out onto the stage and shout: "America, you've been Punk'd!"<br /><br />Campaign insiders tell us that a new vice presidential nominee will then be introduced. They wouldn't name him for fear of spoiling the surprise, but they did hint they he was older, whiter and better endowed (in the penis department) than Palin.<br /><br />The stated motives for the Palin stunt vary widely depending whom we ask. GOP campaign insiders describe the intent as two-fold: A) The party wanted to appear hip and in touch with the young, TV/Internet generation by dropping a major news item for some last-minute publicity, and B) They couldn't get a real candidate to agree to join the ticket in time for a traditional announcement.<br /><br />However, people close to Kutcher and Fey (who were both instrumental in the prank since its beginning) say the TV stars will describe the prank as one carried out strictly for entertainment purposes. Meanwhile, there's chatter that the liberal Hollywood types have been secretly steering the plan in a direction that would discourage voters from electing the GOP ticket.<br /><br />Whatever the case, this hoax obviously took a lot of cunning and coordination. One insider suggested that McCain himself hasn't been told yet that Palin is not his real running mate. The same source also said Barack Obama was even in on the prank: "Think of him as the hedge fund short-seller to the plan -- betting on failure by the GOP."<br /><br />Well, McCain/Palin, it's been a zany ride. Boy, do we all feel silly now.Chrishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15796345438886867796noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-488018713243201151.post-84994537107828638442008-10-13T12:42:00.003-04:002008-10-13T13:27:00.376-04:00BofA's NASCAR Banking: The financial markets are saved!!!You've all heard the painful news from the world financial markets: Major banks and investment banks have failed. Stock prices have plummeted (and taken down retirement accounts with them). The credit markets are tight and getting tighter, which means some businesses lack the working capital to effectively operate and pay their employees.<br /><br />It's bad news. People have thrown around doom-and-gloom words like "depression" and "bread lines." And while I can't deny that there are some fundamental economic problems that will take time to work out, I also think the average consumer and investor needs to try not to panic. What we need is a little confidence, to keep at least a reasonable amount of spending and investing alive.<br /><br />Well, today, I found the confidence that I needed in the form of a radio ad. Today I learned about <a href="https://www5.bankofamerica.com/myexpression_banking/segment.do?segmentid=NASC">Bank of America's NASCAR Banking program</a>.<br /><br />Thank heaven. We are saved.<br /><br />Before, I might have been a little concerned that banks were unstable and maybe I should consider stuffing a little cash and maybe <a href="http://anotherwaytowastetimeonline.blogspot.com/2008/04/darn-you-nutella-im-yuppie-after-all.html">a jar of Nutella</a> into my mattress, just to be safe. But now I've found something that makes all that precaution unnecessary. What could possibly be more secure than a free, no-minimum-balance Dale Earnhardt Jr. checking account? (Also available in Jeff Gordon, Mark Martin and about a dozen other varieties.)<br /><br />Seriously, Earnhardt has been the rock of a multi-generational racing family ever since his father's untimely demise in 2001. The guy has ranked in the top 10 in four out of the last six NASCAR seasons. Plus, his success has naturally bolstered his finances, as he's averaged about $5 million a year in winnings since 2001.<br /><br />I think it's safe to assume that my Dale Earnhardt Jr. checking account will be just as sturdy, reliable and lucrative as its namesake driver. I'm moving all my money over there today. Nevermind that Bank of America had to cut in half its quarterly dividend and raise $10 billion in capital last week to keep racing through this series of yellow-flag laps. This NASCAR Banking program should be just the thing to keep BofA leading the pack of US banks, and hopefully let the rest of the financial system draft off its success.<br /><br />Some might say I'm being overly optimistic. I say: those people have never met Jr.<br /><br />OK, so I've never met Jr. either, but he seems pretty cool.<br /><br />At any rate, if this plan doesn't work and the financial markets truly do collapse, we can always go back to <a href="http://www.allbusiness.com/accounting-reporting/cash-flow-management/1158972-1.html">a bartering system</a>.Chrishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15796345438886867796noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-488018713243201151.post-15513611419489942212008-09-12T14:26:00.003-04:002008-09-12T14:55:43.115-04:00I couldn't say it any better<blockquote></blockquote>On the day after a terrible anniversary for our nation, I found an article in my e-mail that I think is worth sharing.<br /><br />The following letter was drafted by a handful of religious leaders including Jim Wallis, founder of the progressive Christian organization Sojourners, shortly after the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001. About 4,000 of the nation's religious leaders (from a number of faiths) endorsed the letter and it was soon printed in the New York Times as an advertisement.<br /><br />I hope everyone can appreciate the sentiments of these words, regardless of your own religious beliefs. I can only wish that the nation's political leaders had heeded them over these past seven years:<br /><blockquote><br />"Deny Them Their Victory: A Religious Response to Terrorism<br /><br /> We, American religious leaders, share the broken hearts of our fellow citizens. The worst terrorist attack in history that assaulted New York City, Washington, D.C., and Pennsylvania has been felt in every American community. Each life lost was of unique and sacred value in the eyes of God, and the connections Americans feel to those lives run very deep. In the face of such a cruel catastrophe, it is a time to look to God and to each other for the strength we need and the response we will make. We must dig deep to the roots of our faith for sustenance, solace and wisdom.<br /><br /> First, we must find a word of consolation for the untold pain and suffering of our people. Our congregations will offer their practical and pastoral resources to bind up the wounds of the nation. We can become safe places to weep and secure places to begin rebuilding our shattered lives and communities. Our houses of worship should become public arenas for common prayer, community discussion, eventual healing, and forgiveness.<br /><br /> Second, we offer a word of sober restraint as our nation discerns what its response will be. We share the deep anger toward those who so callously and massively destroy innocent lives, no matter what the grievances or injustices invoked. In the name of God, we too demand that those responsible for these utterly evil acts be found and brought to justice. Those culpable must not escape accountability. But we must not, out of anger and vengeance, indiscriminately retaliate in ways that bring on even more loss of innocent life. We pray that President Bush and members of Congress will seek the wisdom of God as they decide upon the appropriate response.<br /><br /> Third, we face deep and profound questions of what this attack on America will do to us as a nation. The terrorists have offered us a stark view of the world they would create, where the remedy to every human grievance and injustice is a resort to the random and cowardly violence of revenge -- even against the most innocent. Having taken thousands of our lives, attacked our national symbols, forced our political leaders to flee their chambers of governance, disrupted our work and families, and struck fear into the hearts of our children, the terrorists must feel victorious.<br /><br /> But we can deny them their victory by refusing to submit to a world created in their image. Terrorism inflicts not only death and destruction but also emotional oppression to further its aims. We must not allow this terror to drive us away from being the people God has called us to be. We assert the vision of community, tolerance, compassion, justice, and the sacredness of human life, which lies at the heart of all our religious traditions. America must be a safe place for all our citizens in all their diversity. It is especially important that our citizens who share national origins, ethnicity, or religion with whoever attacked us are, themselves, protected among us.<br /><br /> Our American illusion of invulnerability has been shattered. From now on, we will look at the world in a different way, and this attack on our life as a nation will become a test of our national character. Let us make the right choices in this crisis -- to pray, act, and unite against the bitter fruits of division, hatred and violence. Let us rededicate ourselves to global peace, human dignity, and the eradication of the injustice that breeds rage and vengeance.<br /><br /> As we gather in our houses of worship, let us begin a process of seeking the healing and grace of God."</blockquote>Chrishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15796345438886867796noreply@blogger.com7tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-488018713243201151.post-30942906492528042442008-09-03T12:46:00.003-04:002008-09-03T13:16:03.478-04:00September is a new day: A personal pep talk in five stanzasSeptember is a new day, and I shall be a new man. I shall water the ferns more regularly and walk the dogs at least every other day. I shall read more and work fewer crossword puzzles. I shall comb my hair and brush my teeth first thing each morning, even though I do not plan to leave the house. I shall whistle while I work.<br /><br />I shall eat less fast food and exercise more. I shall finally buy life insurance and e-mail the photos to my uncle that I promised him months ago. I shall clean my floors twice weekly.<br /><br />I shall spend more of my work hours working. I shall spend any free work hours pursuing the freelance writing opportunities I have long claimed to want. I shall more frequently foster creativity through blogging, which shall mean bettering my recent average of three to four posts per month. I shall spend far less time playing <a href="http://freepuzzlegames.biz/game/7/Bubble-Shooter-Puzzle.html">this game</a> and <a href="http://tennis-game.freeonlinegames.com/">this game</a>, and for goodness sake I shall not play any more of <a href="http://freepuzzlegames.biz/game/269/Tactical-Assassin.html">this game</a>.<br /><br />I shall be more content and less restless, yet I shall boldly go where no man has gone before. I shall try something new in bed. I shall not pay anyone $1,500 to $2,000 to paint the exterior trimwork of my house, the scoundrels. <br /><br />I shall resist evil and seek justice. I shall give to charity. I shall stand my ground against the neighborhood cats who defecate in my yard. I shall be a new man.Chrishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15796345438886867796noreply@blogger.com11tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-488018713243201151.post-29221961945751371112008-08-25T14:53:00.002-04:002008-08-25T15:35:34.548-04:00A lifetime of learningAs much as I value the knowledge I gained through formal education, sometimes life's most important lessons are learned through day-to-day experiences. So, to help you and me both avoid work and productivity for a little while, here is a quick list of lessons I've recently learned:<br /><br /><b> 1. August is not the time of year to do home-improvement projects inside your attic. </b> This sounds like common sense, I know, but yet I have been (and continue to be) determined to complete a radiant barrier project in my attic <i>before</i> Georgia's sweltering summer ends. The idea here is to see whether and how well the radiant barrier works, as its mission is to deflect away some of the sun's heat energy, cooling down the attic on hot summer days and then cooling down the upstairs rooms. <br /><br />Despite knowing that the attic temperatures easily top 100 degrees on sunny days, I attempted to work in the space two days straight a couple of weekends ago. It was very slow-moving work (applying the radiant barrier mixed with paint by roller), and my clothes were entirely drenched with sweat, as if I had jumped into a pool. I knew I had to call it a day at about 1:00 on Saturday afternoon, when I found myself sitting on a plank between two ceiling joists feeling so sluggish that I considered taking a nap inside the attic.<br /><br />I'll be back attic, and I'll defeat you. But on rainy days when the sun has not baked through the roof all morning. <br /><br /><b> 2. My best solution in the what-baby-stuff-to-register-for crisis (See prior post) is this: Register for almost everything and then return to the store the things you don't use. </b> Seriously, it was really hurting my head for a while, trying to figure out a way to be a minimalist at the whole raising a baby thing. Trouble is: I've never raised a baby. I've only seen other people do it, and I've never seen anyone else do it in a way that I would consider even close to minimalist. Plus, I know many family and friends are going to buy us lots of stuff, whether we register for it or not. So I've decided (and I think Meaghan agrees) that we're going to err on the side of getting things, and then when we see what we are not using we'll take that stuff back to the store. <br /><br />That's not so much a lesson learned from day-to-day experience as a decision to escape my usual indecisiveness. <br /><br /><b> 3. In any garden or area of self-installed landscaping, the most expensive plants always die first. </b> This is a repeat lesson, exactly the same as the one nature taught us last summer, but we had hoped this time it would be different. Of the various flowers, bushes and ferns we set out this year (not an overall expensive lot, mind you), the only ones making any effort to continue flourishing are the absolutely cheapest white flowers in the garden. There is one fern on the front porch that continues to do well, looking like its own miniature rainforest, while its counterpart (which received the exact same watering treatment) is the equivalent of Charlie Brown's twig of a Christmas tree. <br /><br />I suppose maybe the real lesson here should be: <b>Plants die without water. </b> We are pitifully neglectful about watering our plants. If I do go to the trouble of ever planting a vegetable garden in my yard, I will most certainly have to install some of those drip-irrigation hoses to keep it watered. <br /><br /><b> 4. Wherever there's a hole in a fence that you're pretty sure your dog can't get out, the dog will most certainly get out. Maybe two days in a row. </b> Especially if that dog is Jewels. <br /><br />No worries; we got her back. She had just gone next door to visit another dog. And the hole is officially repaired now. She's not getting out at that spot again unless she learns to use a pry bar and pop the nails loose. I'm pretty sure.<br /><br /><b> 5. Gently jogging a couple times a week on an indoor track is poor preparation for running a very hilly 5K road race. </b> Seriously. Some of you may be familiar with a certain hill topped by a tower topped by a clock. Well, try running up that hill in the middle of a 5-kilometer footrace. It hurts. I haven't been that sore in a long time. <br /><br />That's pretty much all. I hope that, deep down, I have learned much more valuable lessons than these in the last several weeks, but they're escaping my mind at the moment.Chrishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15796345438886867796noreply@blogger.com12tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-488018713243201151.post-87261307339892317152008-08-14T15:38:00.002-04:002008-08-14T16:45:05.532-04:00Is it sad that I'm excited about diapers?A quick prologue here: I realize it will be tempting to comment on this post with a simple, "Yes. Yes, it is." Resist that temptation, or risk having your comment deleted by the administrator (that's me). I'm looking for something a little more thoughtful, despite the forbidden yes/no-question title.<br /><br />The wife and I have recently discovered that there's a whole lot of crap out there for babies. Mostly plastic crap. <br /><br />Crap for them to sit in, sleep in, ride in, drink out of, eat out of, pee in, vomit on, swing from, make noise with, chew on, and of course crap for them to crap in. I shouldn't really say we've "discovered" this abundance, because we kind of already knew about it. We had been to stores before and seen much of this crap in passing, but the reality sank in hard when we recently visited an area megalo-store (whose name started with a "Tar" in case anyone is wondering) to begin creating a baby gift registry.<br /><br />Apparently some kind, generous people whom we know and in some cases share DNA markers with are planning to buy gifts for us to be used for the baby's benefit. (In reality, probably just a few of them are kind and generous, while many others will feel obligated by some ancient tribal tradition to buy tiny baby outfits by the case-full, complete with cute shoes that the child will never wear. Regardless, the point is: we'll get stuff.)<br /><br />So, to help them select this stuff to get us... well, we select it for them, walking around the store(s) with a little barcode-scanning gun to compile an electronic list. <br /><br />The point of all my rambling is that we, as first-time parents and wanna-be environmentalists, had no idea how to distinguish the stuff that we'll really need from the stuff that Gerber just really wants to sell us. (Good environmentalists don't buy stuff just because Gerber tells them to.)<br /><br />Meaghan did find several articles on the Internet on the subject --- the general theme of which was the baby mostly just wants to eat, sleep and be loved, so don't stress about the stuff. It was morale-boosting advice, but didn't really get us any closer to deciding whether to buy one car seat with two snap-on bases (one for each car), or two car seats, or a car seat-stroller "travel system", or a car seat that's adjustable for all stages of baby-toddler-young childhood.<br /><br />The good news is -- and this is the uber-dorky variety of excitement of which you were warned -- we have found an earth-friendly alternative in the diaper category that I can feel really good about as a parent-to-be. (Do I need to stick the word "advertisement" in tiny print at the top of this post? Cause that last sentence sounded like one of those "advertorial" letters in a cheap magazine -- you know, you get halfway through the letter and then realize it's about how some nutritional supplement changed this woman's life and saved her marriage.)<br /><br />We have decided we're going to use <a href="http://www.gdiapers.com/">gDiapers</a>. (Cue the dramatic music.)<br /><br />This crowd can immediately see the problem with standard disposable diapers, I'm sure. You do an awful lot of disposing, not to mention the ills of the plastic manufacturing process. I read that diapers are something like the No. 3 single largest contributor to U.S. landfill waste, an annual dump of 3.5 million tons of poop and plastic (but that came from the gDiapers website, so the data might be skewed for impact).<br /><br />gDiapers look to be an excellent alternative to the disposables (says the guy who really has no idea how much work this whole diapering process will require). As explained on the website, though, it looks like the changing process is not much different from disposables.<br /><br />The gDiapers are outer cotton pants, with an inner protective liner and then a refill liner. The refill liner is meant to catch all the pee and poop, in most cases. (Sometimes there's leakage or squishing, as with any diaper. A gross truth of child-rearing that I somehow already know.)<br /><br />So at each changing, you just tear out the refill liner and flush it down your toilet. The main liner stays put (unless there was leakage or squishing) and you just put in a new refill liner. You wash the outer pants and main liner as needed; the frequency of washings will depend on how many pairs of the pants you have.<br /><br />There's nothing to throw away! It's fantastic! It's earth-friendly. It's... it's... greentastic!<br /><br />OK, calming down...<br /><br />The refill liners actually are made of fluffed wood pulp with some standard absorbent material, so they can be flushed or thrown away if you've got old plumbing that gets clogged easily. We'll see what works at our place, which does have old plumbing, I'm afraid. But, even if you do have to throw the refills away, they're biodegradable, so much so that you can actually compost the wet ones in your own home compost pile. (Not the poopy ones. Don't compost the poop of any being that eats meat or dairy.)<br /><br />Not only do we escape the guilt of producing a lot of waste this way (and hopefully keep a lot of stink out of our trash cans), but the materials are safer for baby's health. No plastic, no bleaching used in manufacturing, and so on.<br /><br />I suspect these gDiapers will end up costing us a little more than disposables, but probably not much more in the long run, since the flushable refill liners are the only piece that we'll have to keep buying over and over. The cotton pants seems somewhat expensive, at $17 to $19 a pair, although we can get a little break by buying the "starter kit". <br /><br />Regardless, the cost won't be exorbitant (any more so than other diaper options) and I'm happy to be going with this option. I hope the concept will catch on quickly in the U.S. Apparently gDiapers originated in Australia, where they're already fairly popular.<br /><br />It will be great peace of mind for me that Mickey, my environmental conscience, won't be scolding me in my head every time I change a diaper.<br /><br />So, if you come across any other marvelous green innovations (how about greenovations? yes? no?) in baby-raising equipment, send them my way.Chrishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15796345438886867796noreply@blogger.com15tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-488018713243201151.post-39687059492431554362008-08-07T21:09:00.003-04:002008-08-07T21:37:05.261-04:00Guess what's growing in my wife's uterusSome (if not all) of you have already read about this over at Whatever Happened to Schoolhouse Rock, but just for the record: we're having a boy.<br /><br />We took this as good news, since now the lone nephew on my side of the family will have another boy to play with at family gatherings as he grows up. Also we had already settled on a name for a boy, whereas we were still debating girl names. (Logan Matthew, by the way. You already know all this. There's no suspense here.) Plus, Meaghan confessed she was a little nervous at the prospect of raising a girl, especially through the teenage years, and she's even more excited than I am about traditional boy things like Little League.<br /><br />More "for the record" stuff: we would have been happy about a girl too, probably for slightly different reasons. Most importantly, the baby appears to have all his parts in all the right places.<br /><br />It's amazing what you can see on the most basic "level 1" ultrasound. The technician verified a beating heart, with four properly divided chambers. She pointed out specific parts of the brain, the names of which I've forgotten now. She showed us that the spine has appropriately formed inside the skin.<br /><br />And, of course, he's got the usual twig and berries that make him a him, and he was not a bit shy about showing them off for the "camera".<br /><br />So, I think this officially puts us in the second half of the pregnancy. Roughly 20 weeks (give or take a week) down and roughly 20 more to go.<br /><br />Then, it's on to the easy part -- raising the child.Chrishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15796345438886867796noreply@blogger.com7tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-488018713243201151.post-36555420128952327742008-07-29T13:54:00.003-04:002008-07-29T14:22:59.893-04:00Who knew ants like metal?<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEisKiNglJOWU_IZEeizSjxBa3dbJNheTTC8qZ3jiLLMJkYNue0PrFPKJMY6q95dx7GTZldcldx8Ek2nL2Z9qVHXAkVymzOcSgN-Jj976shC3XreWCoC6lXV93DIIGLeBCVM4RmqEnhH8vwd/s1600-h/Ants.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEisKiNglJOWU_IZEeizSjxBa3dbJNheTTC8qZ3jiLLMJkYNue0PrFPKJMY6q95dx7GTZldcldx8Ek2nL2Z9qVHXAkVymzOcSgN-Jj976shC3XreWCoC6lXV93DIIGLeBCVM4RmqEnhH8vwd/s320/Ants.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5228500113426198738" border="0" /></a><br />Learned something new today. It cost me and the (pregnant) wife a night spent in a really hot, un-air-conditioned house, plus about a $120 repair bill. But hey, education is priceless, right?<br /><br />Apparently, ants like to swarm on metal, and that's not my clever way of describing their behavior at loud music festivals. I'm talking about thousands (a careful guesstimate) piling onto the metal contacts inside electrical equipment until their little corpses clog up said contacts and the device in question stops working.<br /><br />Exhibit A is at right. It's not a great picture, but if you look closely you can see a lot of little ant bodies packed inside this contraption, an electrical contact that the repairman just removed from my outdoor A/C unit.<br /><br />Now, I don't know whether the ants in my air conditioning unit technically qualify as <a href="http://www.dailygalaxy.com/my_weblog/2008/05/houston-we-have.html">crazy ants</a>. The repairman didn't say, and I did not conduct a psychiatric evaluation. But apparently my electrical equipment is not the only enticing variety. Even NASA's Johnson Space Center is <a href="http://www.newser.com/article/d90lo70o0.html">reported to be watching out for the little twits</a>.<br /><br />Allegedly, there is an odor created when the silver electrical contacts arc, and the scent appeals to the ants' pheromones. This is according to the A/C repairman, so it must be true.<br /><br />Moral of the story: when you're looking for ant beds to poison around your house, check for little troops marching around and into your air conditioning unit. Then, kill them. Also, the repairman warns me, you'll need to keep going back and killing them over and over.<br /><br />The good news is: The cold air, she's a blowin, Brother John, Brother John. That's an old Appalachian spiritual, isn't it? Yes, I'm confident it is.Chrishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15796345438886867796noreply@blogger.com11tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-488018713243201151.post-34534289397908105592008-07-22T10:52:00.003-04:002008-07-22T14:51:00.046-04:00Dream-aholics anonymousA businessman told me last week, as I interviewed him about possibly buying competing businesses to grow his company: "Getting bigger isn't all it's cracked up to be."<br /><br />In his line of business, combining two medium to large companies would not create a lot of "synergies" or economies of scale, he said. The whole process would likely not be worth the trouble. Nevertheless, his company has bought competitors in the past.<br /><br />Funny how ambition can tempt us to pursue things that in our logical mind we strongly suspect to be unwise. It's true for businesses that spend all the money they have plus as much as a bank will lend them to expand, expand, expand, as if a rainy day will never come or the trendiness of their crazily overpriced coffee will never fade. It's true for cheating spouses who want to prove to themselves they are still sexually marketable to the general public, or at least some tiny fraction of it.<br /><br />It's true for young writers who have a good-paying job with ample benefits and flexibility of schedule -- not to mention a loving wife, nice home and an all-around happy, hearty lifestyle -- yet struggle to commit wholeheartedly and with full mental attention to all of the above because of the constant distraction of dreaming of some more meaningful or fulfilling or broadly-impacting life's work.<br /><br />Stupid young writers, whoever they may be.<br /><br />Well, I have sworn off ambition more than once (albeit never on the Internet, I don't think), and I am here again today to repeat said swearing off. I swear: no more ambition for me.<br /><br />Life is good, and I really ought to consider the possibility that I'm having all the impact and fulfilling all the purposes that I am meant to right here and now --- or, more likely, that all of those opportunities are right here in front of me if only I would pay attention to them instead of living a constant daydream about some bigger, more important occupation for which I must keep constant vigil.<br /><br />I'm not making my point well, I'm afraid. This is really better-suited to a diary entry than a blog. But, this is the closest thing to a diary that I keep. (Imagine how infrequently I would write in an actual diary, if I had one.)<br /><br />I think my message here (to myself, primarily, so sorry if I've lost everyone else) is that I can and should devote my life to savoring and doing my best with the people and tasks in front of me right now -- and not feel like that will amount to a selfish kind of life, because I haven't done some great project to change the world or impact thousands of people, as I'm afraid my subconscious is prone to think.<br /><br />Mother Teresa made the point much better and more concisely than I. During her acceptance of the Nobel Peace Prize in 1979, when asked what people could do to promote world peace, she responded, "Go home and love your family."<br /><br />Sorry for such a squishy return to my blog. I'll try to serve up some of my usual mindless entertainment real soon-like.Chrishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15796345438886867796noreply@blogger.com7