Category: Daily Life

Ramblings, often stream of conscious, journaling the events of my life.

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Calling Marriot Housekeeping

On Saturday the 13th of October, Sarah settled into bed midnightish at a Marriot Hotel near Atlanta. She was traveling with the high school band to perform flags. On Sunday the 14th she awoke unable to find her phone that she had left on top of her luggage so she assumed it was in her luggage (that’s her official story..personally, I think she woke late and groggily shoved everything in her bag and rushed out to see her friends without giving the phone a thought). Sunday at 9pm as she came off the bus I asked, "where’s your phone?" She replied, "In my luggage." On Tuesday, she finally confided that her Motorola RAZR v3xx was lost or stolen.

I scoured her phone and text messaging records. The last number called was to Phoenix, Arizona so there was hope that we had a way to contact the person with the phone. After a few calls and several text messages we figured out that Sarah had actually placed those calls on behalf of a friend. Hope was lost. I contacted the housekeeping manager at the hotel and he confirmed no phone had been turned it. I deactivated the phone. A week later I called again and still no phone. LissaKay comes to the rescue (aided by Twitter) with a replacement phone for Sarah and Sarah flips with excitement spending the next 6 hours customizing the phone.

Yesterday I get a phone call from someone explaining they found the phone! Yea! Housekeeping came through. No, wait, this is guest! The phone, lost on October 13th, was found under the bed by an honest person staying in room 517 on October 29th. It still had power because Sarah had turned it off so the honest person was able to lookup "Dad" and found me. This means that room 517 hasn’t had a thorough cleaning in at least half a month and that for at least 15 guests, assuming the room is occupied every day, don’t check the room very well. Ewww.

Now, who gets the phone? Sarah or Tommy.

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Oh Deer!

Cathy and I don’t get much adult social time. Between work and the children, we live fairly sequestered. Last night we took a break to have a social gathering with our friends that helped School Matters come be. The home of our host was not too far from our own and was lovely! Unlike the modern bulldoze and prefab on a flat property, this house was built with the contours of the land. Aside from visiting and conversing with adults, the best part was as we unloaded Amy and Evan from the van, two doe passed not 20 meters away from us!

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How do I help him?

His TCAPS (standardized testing) scores are through the roof. He doesn’t lack for intelligence. His eyes are fine. But my 11 year old son can stare at something and not see it! No it is better than that. He can kick something and still not find it. This morning he is looking for his tent and he goes in the garage where the tents are stacked. He says, "I found Sarah’s dome tent but I can’t find mine." I look into the garage and from 16 feet away I can see that his tent is directly under Sarah’s tent. I ask him to look again. He kicks his tent as he uses his foot to move Sarah’s. Then he stares down at his tent for a few seconds. Then he looks up at me and declares, "I just don’t know where it is."

This is where television dads have the benefit of a writing staff that has prepared their response. Your first drafts flash through your head almost as quickly as your response comes out of your mouth. Most of the drafts involve words you really don’t want your son to hear. Some are funny but still unspeakable. You try hard to remember the 7 Habits of Highly Successful Dads and resolve yourself to be moderately successful. I chose to tell him "you just kicked your tent" but I couldn’t help but inquire "how did you not see it?" He gave me clue, "I thought it was over there." I think he is predetermining an outcome and convincing himself that is the only possible outcome. As a father I want to steer him on a good path; as a philosopher I have to remember he has to walk his own path; as a stunned bystander, I have to pray that this is just a pre-teen, hormonal phase.

Of course, it prompts my daily reminder to Noah: "You should never do drugs!"

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Retraining the sleep pattern

Last night I began an experiment to change my sleep cycle. Most recently I have trained my body to go to sleep at 10:30pm and wake as early as 2am but more often between 4am and 6am.

My new sleep pattern will be to be at 8:30pm and wake at 12:30am, 1:30am or 2:30am. Last night was hard. I think I need coffee to make this work. Once it is stabilized and regular, I will have 4-8 hours of disturbance free productivity everyday!

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The 7 Habits of Highly Successful Fathers

The ririanproject brings us today’s words of wisdom. Go read the the details!

A great father makes all the difference in a kid’s life…

  1. Keeping stress to yourself.
  2. Leading by example.
  3. Being consistent.
  4. Staying involved.
  5. Scheduling family recreation.
  6. Teaching.
  7. Creating family rituals.

[Source, ririanproject]

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How green are you? Open your windows!

In case you haven’t noticed, the weather has turned. Fall is here! And right now, at least in Knoxville, the temperature couldn’t be more perfect. Several days ago I turned off our air conditioner and opened the windows. Not only am I enjoying the outdoor sounds, such as rain and birds, I can expect a lower electrical bill. Imagine if an entire city turned off their air conditioners and opened the windows!

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This sums up my job

If architects had to work like programmers.

Dear Mr. Architect:

Please design and build me a house. I am not quite sure of what I need, so you should use your discretion.

My house should have between two and forty-five bedrooms. Just make sure the plans are such that the bedrooms can be easily added or deleted. When you bring the blueprints to me, I will make the final decision of what I want. Also, bring me the cost breakdowns for each configuration so that I can arbitrarily pick one at a later time.

…

You must be thrilled to be working on as an interesting project as this! To be able to use the latest techniques and materials and to be given such freedom in your designs is something that can’t happen very often. Contact me as soon as possible with your ideas and completed plans.

PS: My wife has just told me that she disagrees with many of the instructions I’ve given you in this letter. As architect, it is your responsibility to resolve these differences. I have tried in the past and have been unable to accomplish this. If you can’t handle this responsibility, I will have to find another architect.

PPS: Perhaps what I need is not a house at all, but a travel trailer. Please advise me as soon as possible if this is the case.
[Source]

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Driving Patterns – Let the Ass Merge

Slow merge

fast merge

Narration: [audio:http://realityme.net/wp-content/uploads/2007/10/drivingpatternslettheassmerge.mp3]

We all know the guy. You are stuck in a slowdown usually for no reason other than rubber necking. Sometimes traffic just slows for no apparent reason at all. Maybe there was a sign encouraging people to merge right or left. You want to be doing 113 km/h but you are stuck at 32 km/h. To make the situation more frustrating you catch a glimpse in your mirrors of car speeding past all the nearly parked cars in hopes that it can merge in ahead of some poor sap. You curse, "why can’t he just get in line like the rest of us!" Then you decide to do your part for society. You will bring justice by moving your car so close to the car in front of you that he can’t possibly merge between you two. If only all the other cars would do the same! We could leave this self-important jackass parked while a solid line of cars cheerfully passes leaving him further behind than ahead. Of course, that never really happens. Some weak person 4 cars ahead of you lets him in. Where’s the vindication?!

William Beaty helped me realize that I am the problem, not the other guy. In his essay, Traffic "Experiments" and a Cure for Waves & Jams he suggests a simple cure to the merging-lane traffic jam I just described. Let them in! I have started doing this and even if 3 cars (or more) merge in front of me it has little to no impact on my arrival time at my destination. It does feel good to have not fought someone (positive karma). I have put my family at less risk by not tailgating another driver or inciting road rage in the merging driver.

Drive by looking down the road. We should be doing that anyway. When you see a slowdown, not when you start experiencing it (although it is never too late), create a gap in traffic between you and the car in front of you. If a car merges into that gap, recreate the gap. It works! It feels good! Traffic moves better. And you have been a safer driver.

Note: Conversions to metric courtesy of http://www.onlineconversion.com/. Images borrowed from Bill Beaty.

Update 7/24/2014: And 7 years later, this hits the news: http://arstechnica.com/cars/2014/07/the-beauty-of-zipper-merging-or-why-you-should-drive-ruder/