Letter Never Sent Tell me when to go.

1. A piece of good advice on clothing that I can attest to. When purchasing jeans, fit is very important. If you cannot find the perfect medium between a tight fit and a loose fit, err on the side of tightness. A better fitting pair of jeans will look better than a pair of sagging or loose-fitting jeans, and a pair of jeans that feel somewhat tight will stretch with wear.
2. An observation: You know you haven’t been home in a while when you find a spider occupying a web in your bathroom sink. I washed my hands around him, although I’m skeptical of his choice of location. How many bugs can you really expect to fly into a sink?
3. My advice: When trying to talk to a customer service rep over the telephone about a problem be sure to ask for the representative’s identification. Most will not give their full name, but often have an identification code or number that can be used as a reference.
4. A simple CMS for in-line editing of web sites, especially useful for computer illiterates or semi-illiterates: contentEditable. Be sure to try the demo.

I had trouble sleeping last night because I had to give another speech this morning at the club meeting. It didn’t help that my left ear has been plugged by some strange phenomenom I attribute to swimming at Barton Springs Pool. Maybe the ghost of that dead Chinese student hexed a curse on me that day. Whatever the reason, I am now in possession of what I like to call “muffle stereo”. I hear fine out of my right ear, but I only hear internal sounds with my left ear, so when I try to talk I hear myself talking really loud inside my head while at the same time I hear the sound of my voice outside. As a result, everything is muffled and it’s hard to gauge my own volume. I’m either too quiet or too loud and I barely hear what anyone else is saying. I am George Bailey from “It’s a Wonderful Life“. Hee haw.

But really, I was worried about waking up late and missing the meeting. I can’t blame it all on the trick ear. I kept waking up in a cold sweat out of the middle of some crazy war or espionage dream, a mental tableau I attribute to a combination of reading Robert Ludlum thrillers (Bourne Identity and The Scarlatti Inheritance) and playing Battlefield 2. Once awake, I’d almost instantly start to obsess over how well I prepared for my speech then I’d fall right back to sleep. I specifically remember a dream where I was trudging through some Vietnam-like swamp with a sidearm. Maybe that was part of the cold sweat thing.

I finally got out of bed at five in the morning and went down to set up for the meeting since that is part of my responsibilities now. When I got there at six our oldest member, Hollis, was nearly done setting everything up, which irritated me in my fragile cocoon of sleep grumpiness.

But mostly I was envious of his high spirits. Hollis is a miracle of age and energy, like the tightly wound spring of an antique pocket watch. Well past eighty years old, he has more life than a busload of all the people I know in their twenties combined. When I asked him why in the hell he was there so early, he said his wife was out of town so he just popped up out of bed around 3:30, fixed himself some breakfast, and headed out the door.

When J.D. showed up, Hollis told us about the traveling medicine shows and tent revivals that would come through town when he was a kid out in Burnet, Texas. At these medicine shows they would peddle their wares (snake oils and cure-alls) while providing sought after entertainment. There would be a stage where comedians, musical acts, and acrobats would perform. After about a week the whole affair would pack up and move on to the next town. He told several more interesting tales, but the most memorable thing he said was that looking back things were much rougher and more uncomfortable in the first half of the last century, and while he did not long for the “good ole days” he sometimes wished he could take the modern conveniences back to what was, a simpler time.

My eyes are tired. I’ve been up since 5:15am. I woke up right before my alarm was scheduled to shock me out of bed for the weekly Toastmasters meeting. It’s weird when that happens almost as if part of your brain was busy watching the clock. I’m glad I’ve stuck with going even though I’ve belly-ached to the woman about having to be there so early in the morning to talk in front of people I barely know. The people I meet in Toastmasters are from many different walks of life and not people I would have met on my own. I like that about it. I also like that most of the regular people show up even though no one makes them. They have plenty of other things to keep them busy: families, careers, businesses. It shows a great deal of committment both to their decision to be a member as well as their committment to their fellows. These are people who welcome involvement and responsibility. I find that incredibly impressive. So much so that I feel guilty when I feel like quitting because I get uncomfortable extending myself in new directions each week. I’ve decided that it is a worthwhile type of discomfort, although I still get butterflies every time I have to do something else.

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I haven’t posted in a while since we’ve been moving offices. We moved from downtown over to north central Austin off 183. The area is not as cool, but the space is better and the commute about the same. We have about twice the square footage now in the new offices, which is a big change. There will be more privacy as a result.

I noticed Breen put his BF2 sig up at his website, so I thought I’d put my rank up, which puts me at a Private since I haven’t played much time on ranked servers.

I like to sit back and think of all the tiny moments and events that make up my day:

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On my way from work I stopped to pick up my brother from where he works and we went swimming out at Town Lake below the damn near Red Bud Isle. Red Bud Isle is a park where they allow dogs to run off the leash so there were all types of dogs and dog people there. The water looked swift and chilly. The only people swimming were tan scruffy types with week old beards and blurry tattoos clutching Lone Star tall boys as their cut-offs drizzled onto the rocks and roots of the tree-lined banks. Since I was unprepared to go swimming we stopped at Target and bought a pair of cheap black trunks. I found a hidden spot in the bushes and changed out of my work clothes and we ran off to find the rope swing.

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Did some serious driving over the weekend and I had the following sentiment reinforced by repeated experiences.

If you’re driving down the highway in the left lane enjoying the empty expanse in front of you, take a look in your rearview mirror. Chances are you’ll see several cars lined up behind you. Even if you’re going the speed limit, this means you’re going too slow. The left lane is for passing only. Do everyone else a favor and park the “stop and smell the roses” attitude in the right lane where it belongs.

This weekend was thought provoking on the subject of time and life. Jody and I took another seven hour roadtrip up to Oklahoma for two reasons: to see her newly arrived niece and nephew, boy and girl twins who were born last week, and to attend her ten-year high school reunion. They’re the first grandkids in the family and everyone is excited to have them. It’s been a long time since I have seen a newborn and I forgot that babies don’t always start out chubby, but can actually be so thin and fragile looking. It’s so strange seeing a tiny little person who is just learning how to focus their eyes and experience the world for the first time with no preconceptions about their experiences. It’s strange to think that we all started this way, from a single cell to a tiny helpless infant to a full-grown adult and then into senescence. We are fleshy flowers, reaching up into bloom, then to fruition, and then shrinking with age as we prepare for the next season’s harvest.

It’s not an entirely unpleasant thought to know you play some role in this chain.

1. At the drive-thru teller NEVER get in line behind a minivan.

Anyone who drives a minivan is either handicapped, elderly, or a parent. In any case, when it comes to doing the bank thing they’re unprepared or just naturally slow. This is confirmed by significant anecdotal experience. Today I followed my own rule and did not get behind the minivan. I was able to see the driver from my adjacent lane once I made it to the front. She had her entire brood in tow including a dog or two. Meanwhile, she had a nice long conversation with the bank teller over the intercom about her kids and all that cute stuff.

I came across a good link (via) to a collection of interviews featured in Esquire magazine in a monthy section they call “What I’ve Learned”, which features the thoughts and insights of well-known people. It is well worth your time to read every one of these interviews. This is exactly the kind of material that makes Esquire enjoyable and thoughtful to read. It’s the kind of information you can only get from people when you listen to them talk for a good long while. If you listen long enough the heavy personal insights bubble up to the surface of conversation where you can fish them out. Here are a few that got me thinking and nodding to myself:

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