I'm Feeling Productive

If I ever figure out a way to integrate tags into this blog, I'm sure the biggest would be 'reasons why I haven't posted'. I think I'll add one more to that heap. The reason I don't post very often is that I often am involved in other things--usually people--and that doesn't involve the internet. I thought it about time that I throw something out there, though, as a bit of an update. I have in mind a total site redesign one of these days, since most of the material on here is from 2004. As in four years ago 2004. In terms of the internet that is the equivalent of driving a pinto with an "I still like Ike" bumper sticker. I somehow doubt that it will be any time soon, however, as there are a number of other projects on the docket first. I'm currently working on a total site redesign for my church. I have a lot of photos I've taken recently to edit in my odd hours. I'm reading more again. I'm moving in a week. I'm writing letters to a girl in North Carolina. I find myself watching entire seasons of The Andy Griffith Show with uncanny speed. Sometimes I don't remember what day it is. And every once in a long while I'm able to get to a coffee shop, drink in some iced tea, and ponder what it means to have a website. I hope your days are as equally amusing.

Insert the Buckle

This is related to the previous post. I was sitting on the plane to Pittsburgh the other day listening to the stewardess tell everyone how to buckle their seatbelts. After almost a century of road and air travel we’re still worried about informing everyone how to use the seatbelt. Are we afraid that we missed someone? Or are we just afraid of change?

Dick Clark announced the New Year. Tom Petty played the superbowl. Every infomercial still uses the same voice. Rambo. Indiana Jones. American Gladiatoros. Knight Rider. A lot of people are spending a lot of money betting on the fact that we will always gravitate towards something we know. And we will won’t we? Yes, I saw Rambo. Yes there were a lot of guys with me. Yes I shouted at the screen. (No don’t go see it). But it makes me wonder how much I’ve wasted by just doing the normal, the comfortable, the ordinary. How much time, effort, money have I spent just trying to keep things the same, and do things because that’s how they’ve always been done? How many times have I missed purchasing the oil field because I was looking to buy a parking lot? How much time on the ground has been wasted by having to hear about how to use the seat cushion in the event of a water landing while flying from Missouri to Nebraska?

From the 10th Floor

I’m at Ball Hospital watching as my grandma lies recovering from an infection in the bed. She’s in one of almost a hundred rooms on this floor, 10 more of which lie beneath us: a big place with a lot of moving parts. There looking out the window I see the school where I used to attend summer camp when I was a teenager. Next to it is the dorm where I would go to haunted houses in the fall. Across the street is the restaurant where I spent every Friday for lunch when I was in college. The buildings are the same, but I know the people have changed. I guess somewhere in the back of my mind, though, was the thought that after I left this town everything would go on unchanged without me. That whenever I came back it would be to the same old houses, restaurants, and parks. Somehow hospital rooms were never in the picture. From the tenth floor it all looks like still life. But I know that between the window and the horizon a lot is happening. A big place with a lot of moving parts. In the room behind me things are changing too, hopefully this time for the better. It’s good to be home for a while.

An Open Letter to Commercial Terrorists

I was thinking recently after the new year of things that I might like to add into my life/character/other things that resolutions are made for. This also made me think that there are a number of things in life that I wish I could do away with. Somewhere towards the middlish-bottom of that list for me (but there nonetheless) is being the recipient of telemarketing, or what I call "commercial terrorism". Just when you thought a friend was calling to talk, you get the long telephone pause, then the background chatter, and finally the sales pitch. This is the dirty bomb of the marketing world, not really caring who it strikes, so long as it's a living person.

Recently at the office we were getting a lot of telemarketing calls all coming from the same source. Every time the receptionist would ask to be taken off the list. Every time they called back. So after repeating this dance a few times I decided to take matters into my own hands. I post it here to help encourage us in the war against hostile marketing. I've removed the names for since sending it they were quite hospitable in correcting the problem. In my opinion however, it's the system itself that is flawed. Maybe that could be my New Year's resolution: to strive to cultivate greater change. Hmm, perhaps next I'll start talking to the Missouri Dept. of Transportation . . .

"Dear______,

At my office, usually about once every two weeks we get a call from your subscription service asking us to sign up. Usually when the caller realizes they are talking with a receptionist they stop and ask “Oh, is this a business?” to which the receptionist always says yes, and then asks to be taken off their list (or speak to a supervisor and then ask). Two weeks later, repeat the same equation. Here’s the thing: we already get [insert product name here]. We’re not going to be receiving any more of it. All subsequent calls drive whatever fondness the office staff here has for you further into a dark dismal stewing upsetment (not a word, but I’m going for memorability here). Not only are we being disrespected by not honoring our request to stop cold-calling us, but also (and isn’t this the case with every telemarketer that calls you) it’s a bit frustrating to start over ever time because the person calling knows absolutely nothing about you. Heck, if you were to call us with a marketing proposal as to why every member of the staff here needed twelve subscriptions I might appreciate it, because at least then it would show us that you knew who we were and why you were calling. Sorry, I know I’ve been using the word “you” there, but I mean the entire entity as a whole. I know you’re not the person causing the problem, but maybe you could be the hero here and help us both out.

So _________, what do you think? I don’t like to see my staff get driven to the plummeting brink of madness, and I’m sure you don’t like to see the PR of _________ dragged through the proverbial mud. I promise that if anyone here starts to think that they might like a subscription, they’ll call. In the meantime, your subscription service is creating a culture of passionate anti-users.

Sincerely,
Kent Needler"

Happy 2008.

What I'll Miss About Christmas

2008 is almost here, which means the Christmas season has to leave us yet again. I try to postpone the inevitable farewell as long as possibly by keeping the tree lit right up until New Year's. This year as my final post of 2007 I thought I'd compile a list of the things I will miss the most about Christmas. As a disclaimer I should point out that I've left the most glaring answers off such as friends, family, presents, etc. Those are gimmes. Here are just a few of the more subtle holiday varieties that make the season festive:

1. Sitting at Chic-fil-A and watching as the West County Mall for once lives up to its name in that it contains every single resident of West County St. Louis.
2. Watching men dressed as elves hold back a line of impatiently waiting children hopped up on cinna-bons as Santa sits alone and slightly cathartic with a far-off look in his eye.
3. The soft rock station stops playing soft rock and starts playing Christmas music (one or the other would have been good; but getting both is just tremendous).
4. Having a cause (gifts for the family) and a deadline (when I return to visit) that turns the season into more of a clandestine operation. If only I could have a gift list delivered to me in a manila envelope by a guy in a suit with an earpiece.
5. The Christmas tree at the office. I work in a building that used to be a house, so having a tree lit at night makes things feel more cozy when I'm working late.
6. The search for the greatest Griswold. It's always fun trying to find the houses that take exterior illumination to a new level. It's great to be able to drive by slowly and be in awe, and then have pity upon their neighbors.
7. Dirty Santa gift exchanges. More commonly known as White Elephant, though I don't know why. This year I got a 13" television. I should have gone with my instincts on this one and realize that you never go for the biggest boxes in these sorts of things because it means more of someone else's junk to carry home. So thanks for that Craigslist reject, Brad. (Sidenote: not all dirty santa's are truly dirty. I was an observer for another in which plastic army men, coffee beans, and Chuck Norris' autobiography were given away. I wish I would have had my televette with me to regift then).
8. The Snowfall Driveway Challenge. When the garage is beneath the house, the hill getting out becomes an ESPN event. Unfortunately, though, this one isn't limited to the Christmas season.
9. The red cups at Starbucks. I'm not there very often, but I like the holiday design. Truth be told, the red cups were part of the inspiraton for my redesign of this page a year ago.
10. Egg Nog. The drink so thick it doubles as dessert. Or, if you've already had dessert, 2nd Dessert (also a beloved holiday tradition). A special thanks to the Garringer's on this one.
11. The plastic holiday apparati that play music and move when you get near them. Honestly, it's not the postal workers we should be worried about. It's the employees at Walgreens. They are exposed to these sorts of things for a good three months before Christmas.
12. Holiday Mall Challenge. Another extreme holiday sport but involving friends (and much more fun than the SDC aforementioned). We tested this one out for the first time this year after Thanksgiving, when all of the friends who were back in town went to the mall together and formed a competition for who could see the most people they knew. Points are only awarded if you talk to the person. Points are deducted if you mention the game. The entire point system is very complex and can be changed depending upon the environment (I was in competition only because I won the Largest Mullet Sighting Award) and I won't get into its complexities here, but congratulations to Lindsay for being this year's winner.
13. Christmas movies. I plugged my cable back in so that I could catch Turner Classic Movies in its prime. Until next year fellas.
14. Getting to see the flightiness of conventional retail. There may have been a person in Sheboygan, Wisconsin who bought a pair of socks and got upset because the cashier at JCPenny's wished them a merry Christmas, and so subsequently every single retailer in North America pulled the word out of their store vocabulary thereafter. Not that the "Keep Christ in Christmas" email forwards and bumper stickers are going to do much good, but it seems as though we're all just getting a little goofy here.
15. Calvin & Hobbes. I keep all the books at my parents' house so as to always give myself something to look forward to reading while I'm there.
16. The time to blog. . . . sigh.

The list could go on but I'll stop there for now (Man vs. Wild television marathons, people in tents outside of Best Buy, corn casserole, and others come to mind). Suffice it to say I'll be missing Christmas. But then who knows what 2008 has in store? Maybe this will be the year that Christmas comes twice! Until then, I've enjoyed the past 364 days with all of you. I'll see you next year.

So This is Christmas

The past six weeks have gone by quickly. I've been in St. Louis only one weekend during that time. I've enjoyed every minute of it, but there never seems to be enough time. And now it is Christmas, at least for the next fifteen minutes. It's nice to have a bit of time to sit on a couch and watch out the window as the neighborhood turns out its lights. Of course whenever I have free time my mind wanders to how many books or films I can fit into it, and always as a last resort my hand, out of an unknown compulsion, reaches for the remote. But for now I'm content to just sit-surrounded by blankets, a few opened presents, and stuffed bears dressed as santa (not mine). I guess this is a good end to a good Christmas. I hope yours went well too.

Outsourced

I’m sitting in a hotel lobby (in Orlando this time) watching a lady erect Christmas trees. It’s only mid November (and there are palm trees outside) so I’m not exactly ready yet to snuggle on the couch with the Charlie Brown Christmas Special. The interesting thing, however, is that the lady is wearing a shirt that says “Holiday Crew” with a phone number on the back. This means that she gets paid to go places and decorate. The question this leads me to isn’t so much “I wonder how much they pay to outsource their holiday cheer,” but rather, “I wonder how many of my hobbies I could get paid for?” Hmm, I wonder if this is how Scrooge got his start.

Downtown

I'm sitting in the lobby of the Millennium Hotel, downtown St. Louis, looking at the big bending metal landmark across the street. I went up inside the arch in 5th grade, when I was on vacation with my family. We stayed at a hotel just down the street, went to a ball game, visited the once-floating McDonald's on the Mississippi, the whole package. I can remember thinking at that time that this city was just that-a city, unlike anything I was ever used to-big, old, and intimidating. It's funny how things change. Not the city so much as me. Sure the downtown is still tall and cold, but now my view has been filled out with a lot more: specific places, actual people. I'm finding that anytime there is a close community around me, it lights up any environment. What once seemed cold and foreign now is much different. When talking with someone from Nashville yesterday I asked him what he thought of where he lived. He said that it was good, but what made it that was the people. He's right. I've been here over three years now. I don't think this place is so bad.

Why the 9?

While on the road today I kept noticing the gas station billboards that were listing prices at $2.599, or $2.569. Why the extra number? With gas prices the way they are there's no way you're squeezing anything out for less than a cent, so why advertise it? I would think that this is bad marketing for the gas companies as it advertises the fact that if there were some way to get coins in smaller increments than pennies, the gas station would charge us as much of this newfound coinage per gallon as economically possible. Am I the only one noticing this?

Not a profound way to come back from a long pause perhaps, but hey folks, it's the weekend and I'm on vacation.

Where's Your Lightsaber?

One topic from a previous post that has come up more than a few times lately has to do with what I shall call the belt-cell-phone-phenomenon and the accompanied trembling that it produces within me. It marks, I believe, a turning point in human history in general. Not since the invention of the Swiss Army Knife and the bifocal has man invented a technological device that commonfolk have deemed integral (and appropriate) to attach to one's person. I say commonfolk because there was a time when the calculator watch made a foray from the laboratory environment into the broader world of humanity, suggesting that math and number-crunching were a valuable part of daily existence (thankfully, however, it seems we have sobered up from whatever hallucinogens they slipped into the making of Coke II or Clear Pepsi and realized that math, like firearms, is not something that should be used by the general public). But now the time has come, and we have evolved once more.

You can tell a lot about people by what they attach to themselves. A watch says you want at least a somewhat ordered life and understand that the days are fleeting. Knives (be they utilitarian or of the butch sort) hearken to a somewhat primordial desire within all men to tame the wilderness about them (or at least be like MacGuyver). And now with the phone we can show to the world that we have the desire within us - sometimes very badly - to communicate and be communicated with. Sometimes, however, this desire can procreate in our subconscious, and convince us that we should be carrying the cell phone, and the pager, and the pda, all on the belt: such as the man sitting currently to my right as I type this.

Why do I bother mentioning all of this? Because deep down I fear, nay almost nervously vomit, that someday, somehow, that man will be me.

I was at a costume party the other night in which I was dressed as Dwight Schrute. One of my friends, who doesn't watch The Office, came up to me and said "Are you supposed to be yourself in twenty years?" Funny? Maybe. Frightening? You bet. So I say all of this to you, the indefinite blogosphere, so that someday if one of you witnesses me attempting to make the jump from technological convenience to compulsive nerdonic obsession (it's only a matter of when) you may politely tackle me and remind me that there are better things to live for.

And so how may I help this Jedi of Futures Past sitting beside me? If his desire to be communicated with is this intense maybe I should just say Hi.