Déjà Vu?

Sometime last year around September or October, we played my version of Settlers of Catan while drinking Gin & Tonics out in my parent’s the dining room. About mid-game, Robert reached across the board and spilt his drink all over my game and across the dining room table. Since then Robert has been issued a sippy-cup and we’ve avoided playing Settlers in that room (with my gin-soaked warped Settlers tiles).

That is until last night.

With no other solid playing surface in the house adequate enough for the game we thought we would once again play on the dining room table. We joked about last time and how fortunate we were not to have a sippy-cup-less Robert around for the game. Of course, we each had our own drinks as we sat around the board and started to play. This time it was Rachel that reached across the board mid-game to grab something when she knocked her drink over the table and about half the board.

Having gone through this once before, we were a bit more knowledgeable on how to act amidst this crisis. Even though we set the wet tiles out to dry overnight, I’m thinking that I might need a new version of the game. We managed to get through one drinking accident, but I’m not sure how it will hold up after multiple drinking accidents. Hmm… my birthday is coming up in 2-weeks. I’ll probably end up with two versions of the game for separate occasions: one as a regular version and one as a party version. That way as people finish their drinks, they can suck some gin or rum from the game tiles.

Stupid Sleep

My internal clock is off for some reason. The past two nights I’ve woken up at 4:30 and 2:30, respectfully. The end result is a very exhausted Chris at work. Fortunately my supervisor is gone for the week or else I don’t know how I’d get through the day.

For those who haven’t seen it yet, check out this menu.

I’ll be in training class tomorrow, but if I can manage it I might post some fun links I’ve collected over the past few weeks.

And Say Good-Bye To These Michael

It’s that time of the year when schools will intermittently be dismissing their students for a weeklong break they like to call “Spring Break.” Sadly, the grown-up world that I have now become apart of does not believe in such a thing. Rather, I must live vicariously through others home on their breaks and through memories of past breaks. I really didn’t want to come to work on Monday and have struggled each successive day in convincing myself to get out of bed. Fortunately, this week is my Friday off week so I can really pretend that I’m on Spring Break and maybe do something about it. Spring Break Whoo!

"Performance" Rating

I had my performance evaluation for 2005 yesterday; all six months that I was here. Considering I spent my first six months “learning the processes” and completely bored, for the most part, there wasn’t really much to talk about. About a month ago, I went through a similar process with my “mentor” where we discussed goals for the future as well as a self-evaluation of my past and the steps I need to take to “bridge the gap” so to speak.

My evaluation yesterday pretty much highlighted my own take of things and so I sat there bored and BSing about “change” or “growth”. I really can’t complain since my evaluation went well and as a result I earn another small pay increase for the evaluation bracket I’m in (though I don’t know when it’ll apply). Oddly enough, it showed a $2,000 bonus value still added in to my salary. I’d like to think I’ve earned another bonus for my “dedication” and “hard-work” from last year, but I know it’ll be removed from the system before I see a penny.

Judging from this post, I think I’ll start using quotation marks more to symbolize a sarcastic approach to company buzz-words. That should add some fun to these meetings.

Sunday Journal

6:00 AM – I suddenly feel myself forced awake as if something was wrong. My heart is pounding unusually rapid for someone who just came out of sleep. I soon realize what it is that has forced me awake – I’m going to be sick. I cautiously make my way into the bathroom and try sitting up for a change, leaning my head against the wall. Visions of last night fill my head as my stomach teeters on the edge of sickness. It started as a lovely evening out to a Basque restaurant for dinner with friends, and oh how delicious everything tasted. Afterwards we ventured over to my empty house and somehow a small party broke out. The next thing I know it’s 3AM and I’ve already gone through three drinks, two games and a trip into the spa. Pretty tame to my usual standards, but fun nonetheless. People leave and I look forward to a long stay in bed….

Now I’m sitting in the bathroom at 6AM; starting to feel slightly less queasy. I think a glass of water will do me good. As I walk through the kitchen, I notice the spa is still moving. Damn, I thought it turned off last night. I walk into my bedroom and see my dog at the foot of my bed asleep. I couldn’t find her last night, so where did she come from? I drink some water, crawl into bed and roll over.

7:00 AM – My stomach is at it again, but this time it’s not queasiness. It’s slowly twisting itself into knots, once again waking me from my sleep. I get out of bed and head back towards the bathroom, now exhausted from this little game with my stomach. Maybe all that drinking on St. Patrick’s Day, coupled with last night affected my system. Maybe it was just a matter of time before the ticking time bomb went off. I finish up in the bathroom and start to walk back to my bedroom, but since I’m up I might as well check out the spa. After multiple attempts of pushing the one button by the back of the house and the one button in the spa with no results, plus stepping barefoot into something my dog left, I give up. I wipe my foot before I enter the house and once again in the bathroom. As I crawl back into bed, I notice that I still reek of chlorine from last night. Note to self – wash sheets.

12:20 PM – Something must have worked because I wasn’t forced awake again. I vaguely recall my brother saying good-bye sometime after I went back to sleep, but the rest was unadulterated. I go out into the kitchen to assess the damage from my weekend of debauchery. The house is a wreck from a general lack of upkeep and so I know my duty for the day is to straighten things out. Perhaps after some breakfast and television….

3:45 PM – The house is back up to standard after some slap-dash cleaning. Finally, the spa cooperated with me in shutting off, but the dishwasher apparently didn’t run yesterday like it was supposed to. Stupid technology – the ‘Start’ button should start the machine. I think Callie believes someone is coming home tonight will all the cleaning. I guess I’ll have to take her out briefly for another walk this evening as a consolation prize.

10:40 PM – I should be in bed by now. Instead, I am on my computer adding music to my new iPod, since my other one was sick. Imagine my surprise when I walked away with a brand new one when I took my old one in for a check-up. I hope that never happens with my dog. Fortunately, I have a meeting in town tomorrow so I can stay up later than usual. I guess that’s about as many songs as I’m going to add tonight. I get ready for bed, turn out the light and crawl into bed before I realize something. Note to self – wash sheets.

You know you’ve got it bad when…

… you actually look forward to working in the office on a Friday (St. Patrick's day nonetheless).

Actually, it’ll be nice to have a day at work without a meeting of any sort and where I can catch-up on my compiled work while working at my own pace. It adds a whole new twisted perspective to the phrase T-G-I-F!

Snow and Birthdays

Is it sad that this has really been my first opportunity to post since Thursday? This past week has been hectic. To start with, we had a good time in Mammoth, as was expected. What was surprisingly unexpected was how indifferent Rob, Becca and I were about going out on the slopes. Maybe indifferent is not the word, but we really were quite content sitting inside most of the trip as opposed to our usual “day-on-the-mountain” mentality. Maybe it was because Becca’s legs and feet kept hurting; maybe it was because my boots were really tight and uncomfortable; maybe it was because Rob wanted to be back in time to watch his basketball team play; or maybe because it was really cold and windy in the afternoon and we’ve grown accustomed to our nice Spring-y So. Cal. weather. Whatever the reason, it was nice to have a weekend with the right balance of activity and relaxation. Plus, spending time with good friends makes it worth while too.

Several things came out of this trip, such as Becca’s girth, Rob’s butt hole and my large head. We also played a game called Puerto Rico that put any complexity around Settlers of Catan to shame. We got back at a reasonable time on Sunday and I was able to sleep in a bit more because I had training in town both Monday and Tuesday. Unfortunately, that left me little time to spend around a computer to deal with both my work life and my personal life. That did not, however, hinder the spontaneous plans for Rachel’s birthday, where Becca and I randomly showed-up at her house and took her out for dinner and drinks.

So for the most part, it’s been a rather busy week and from the looks of things, my life is only going to get busier as the week goes on. I have til tomorrow morning to finalize my plans to travel to Chicago the day after my birthday for work, and I’ve got *gasp* more meetings to prepare for. Fortunately, this weekend will be fun and I’ll hopefully be around more to share some random thoughts.

So Much For...

...a commitment to shorter posts.

In other news, Mammoth ski trip this weekend, so I'll be back next week - very sore and I'm sure with stories (and quotes) to share.

Meeting Agenda for March 6th, 2006

Lately it feels like I spend more time sitting in meetings than actually sitting in my office doing work. It looks like another case of Reoccurring Wasteotimeinmeetengitus; a very serious infliction that has created an estimated $600-billion revenue loss for the year of 2005. I’ve created an agenda here to help us understand the damages inflicted upon our profits and create some discussion about mainstreaming a process that will break the mold of these conventional paradigms.

To begin with, let’s look at our previous agenda and address any action items that might have arisen or need to be addressed. Alright, there looks like there are a couple of comments below that seem to confirm the last post, so nothing new needs to be addressed. Moving on to the topic at hand, there seems to be some positive energy flowing around our current value stream process deficiencies and some opportunities that lie ahead. Some data gathering has taken place to provide a more well-informed open discourse on the topic, so we’ll dive right into that.

It seems there are 21 working days in the month of March (excluding of course weekends and Friday’s off), which leaves us with 165 working hours to deal with. That number of course comes from the standard 80-hours of work on a bi-weekly basis, subtracting the time spent for lunches and non-meeting times when no meeting would ever potentially take place, theoretically. Of course the actual times for these dates are subjective to change, but barring any unforeseen schedule breaks, let’s assume that 165-hours is our potential meeting time for the month. My current estimate of meeting hours already scheduled for the month (not including the potential add/drop of meetings for the month) comes out to approximately 74 hours. Using these hypothetical values we come up with a result of about 45% of my time at work is spent in meetings.

If we extrapolate this percentage out as a yearly average then we could use it to also represent the percentage of salary made while in meetings (and thus money lost due to idleness). The result we’re looking at annually is a $31,500 revenue loss, which of course is just for one employee and if our average meeting attendance is 12-people for the year, then the loss becomes $378,000/year. This is just one part of one company so expand this out exponentially world-wide and you’ve got some serious revenue loss occurring.

There aren’t any action items to follow up on this info-sharing process, and I think what we should all take from this is an awareness of the severity of Reoccurring Wasteotimeinmeetengitus. Maybe in the future some steps can be taken to streamline these processes and build some proactive measures to address the main opportunities faced here. Thank-you all for participating in this forum and I’ll send out a notice about our next scheduled appointment.

Oscar Rant

The Academy Awards came out with their awards for 2005 films this past weekend, and the controversy began when “Crash” won the Best Picture Oscar over “Brokeback Mountain.” In the aftermath of it all, what this has turned out to be is not really about the movies themselves, but the issues they represent. According to most news sources (see link below), America is “homophobic” because it won’t select a movie about gay cowboys to win Best Picture, but rather a movie about racism. All of the top nominated films covered controversial issues, and yet only those issues raised in “Brokeback Mountain” are the ones the media really cares for. Why? Of all the articles I’ve perused I have not seen one reference to a “controversial” loss by the other Best Picture nominees. Not even “Capote” that features a gay main character showed mention in these slanderings of a “homophobic” Academy. So why does “Brokeback Mountain” hold more clout than these other films in terms of the issues addressed? Maybe it’s not necessarily a topic of issue, but a topic of quality of picture. “Brokeback Mountain” gets more attention because it’s a better film then “Capote.” Maybe. Maybe not. But then who’s to say “Crash” wasn’t the better film?

Ultimately, the truth here is subjective to the opinions of the moviegoers and the Academy. I’m not really certain what all the fuss is about since these awards hardly acknowledge the dichotomy of mainstream cinema. For the most part, the movies that win these awards are not the same movies that the majority of the population sees in their local theaters. It’s becoming increasingly obvious that these awards are steadily relying on independent films to create the “good” movies, while we locally watch the “mega-buck crap” each studio is pumping out for profits. This is the direction Hollywood is going and it is becoming increasingly difficult for those who live outside of New York or Los Angeles to see what is slowly becoming the reliable, quality movies. What these award shows highlight are not a year’s achievements in cinema, but rather a small sampling of what a few individuals.

Ultimately Roger Ebert comes up with a better discourse on the topic than I can present here in my befuddled mind. The links below will take you to his article on the situation and to a summary page of other article’s comments. My take on the issue is that these controversial films box you in a corner where you’re forced to either extol the movie because of the issue, or become phobic. I saw both “Crash” and “Brokeback Mountain” and I just liked one over the other regardless of the issues. It’s as simple as that, and that’s all it should come down to.

http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20060306/SCANNERS/60306004

http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20060306/OSCARS/603070301

3rd Annual Top Ten Films of 2005

With the Oscars coming this weekend I must close the balloting on my 2005 movies and generate my annual top ten list. This year’s entrees come from a large range of venues from my film class I took last year, to the summer blockbusters, to the Oscar buzz movies that came to Bakersfield, to FLICs. And while I didn’t get to see all the films I really wanted to see because I live in Bakersfield, I think I did fairly well through it all. I watched 32 of the films from last year, and here are my Top Ten:


10. Reefer Madness (SHO)
This position really came down to which comedy I liked the best between Wedding Crashers, The 40-Year Old Virgin, and this film. If I really could, I would consider it a tie and have them all as 10a, 10b, and 10c. But since I can only really have one here, I chose the movie I laughed the most during. Just because it was a made for Showtime movie doesn’t discount it’s “movie” status. This musical had some great songs and many memorable moments.
Memorable Moment(s): Practically every song (especially the Jesus Song) and Steven Weber looking like Joe Piscopo in Johnny Dangerously.

9. Dust To Glory
I’ve never been much of a fan of racing or documentaries, but I really enjoyed this film. I think the fact that these people are not on a racetrack and are actually going somewhere (imagine traveling 1,000 miles non-stop on the ground! I get tired just flying in a plane) it actually becomes interesting. They catch some awesome footage and it actually keeps you in suspense throughout most of the movie.
Memorable Moment(s): A motorcyclist racing along a beach to gain ground on first-place.

8. Kung-fu Hustle
I love the Asian fantasy movies that tell tales of extraordinary people in ordinary settings. This movie had a great plotline that opened the way for the humor and action sequences concerning some of the world’s greatest fighters. It doesn’t try to just be a comedy and it works for them here with some great fight scenes between these cartoonish characters. And I haven’t seen gangster dancing like that since “West Side Story”!
Memorable Moment(s): The battle between the town and the harpists.

7. Howl’s Moving Castle
When I told my dad that I was going to see a Japanese animated movie, he thought I was watching some “Power-Ranger-Movie.” Well, not quite. Actually, watching this film made me feel like I was playing a Final Fantasy game (in Belgium, no less). Though this one doesn’t work as well as Spirited Away, it was still a good movie that looks wonderful and just perplexes you. Then again, most Miyazaki films are that way.
Memorable Moment(s): I’m still trying to piece this one together, but I did enjoy the little dog in this film.

6. Wallace and Gromit in the Curse of the Were-Rabbit
The best animated film of the year came from England and was not made digitally (although some computer special effects were used to enhance some scenes). The whole movie felt like one long W&G short that I never grew tired of and was constantly bettering itself as it went along. The humor in this movie makes it very much a “Chris” movie.
Memorable Moment(s): Gromit as a puppeteer for a large Were-Rabbit lady.

5. Dear Frankie
A bittersweet story that tells the tale of a Scottish deaf boy and his fake relationship with his father. It sounds sad and weird, I know, and I need a couple paragraphs to fully explain the movie, but really it’s an amusing tale of a mother’s love. I guess the real moral of the story is that lying to our children is okay as long as you can depend on the kindness of strangers. Good music too.
Memorable Moment(s): What I’ve dubbed at the “forever” kiss, because that’s how long you have to wait for it.

4. Brokeback Mountain
I think this film is slightly over-rated amongst the critics, but I do think it is good enough to earn a spot this high on my list. Aside from the whole homosexual thing, I thought the story of how these guys tried to live normal lives amidst their love for each other was rather intriguing. After the movie ends, you realize how they really ruined their own lives and it makes you think of how that type of relationship can transpose into other relationships. Some of the music was really good as well.
Memorable Moment(s): “I wish I knew how to quit you!” – makes me laugh every time I hear it now.

3. Millions
There’s just something about these British films every year that that works, and they keep rising hire on my list with each passing year. The character play between the two brothers in this movie is great and how they each approach the money they inherit. I loved every aspect of this film from the story to its humor to how it played out the suspense. Plus I learned about the saint of television.
Memorable Moment(s): There are so many memorable parts like: “Money Jenga!” or the meeting of each saint.

2. Kontroll
This originally was my favorite movie of the year before it got leapfrogged. I don’t know exactly what it is about this film that appeals so much to me, but I love the range of genres it works so well at. It’s another movie that doesn’t have a defined label of how to describe it, which is slowly becoming the theme for this year. Last year if you had told me that I would rate a Hungarian film this high, I’d probably laugh; followed of course by a challenge to go “railing.”
Memorable Moment(s): The extensive chase scene where they try to catch their “White Whale”.

1. Crash
I recently rewatched this film and consented to this being my favorite film of the year. When I first saw the movie I described it as a serious “Love Actually” type movie (several people said it reminded them of Magnolia, but I never saw it). It’s rather amusing how writer/director Paul Haggis really pokes fun at every race and really scratches underneath the surface of people. I think he also has fun playing with the audience by giving us characters to love/hate and then changing our perspectives of them. Life isn’t as simple as good or evil, but usually it resides somewhere in the middle.
Memorable Moment(s): The gunshot. That’s all I’ll say.

In case you were counting, yes, there were 6 foreign films in my Top Ten for this year (thank-you FLICs). I’ve never thought of myself as a foreign film enthusiast, but somehow they dominated this past year. For those interested in watching some of these films, I currently own four of these movies (numbers 1,2,5,9) and hope to own more soon.