Story Archive - November 2004

A Little Mud (11/27/2004)

When it comes to cars, only two varieties of people are possible - cowards and fools. - Russell Baker

Thanksgiving is one of the more challenging holidays from a logistics standpoint. With multiple families and groups of friends to attempt to appease scattered across a large range, there's much driving and calling and strategizing. Of course, having an overflow of people who want to spend time with you is not the worst thing in the world.

The most memorable thing this Thanksgiving will be the off-roading excursion. We took the cars out to the state park for off-road vehicles after a wonderful rainstorm. Overall, my Prius out 4-wheeled all the cars. Well, at least, it would have if I had taken it. Instead I drove around proudly in my fathers Yukon. It's off-roading the yuppie way. The worst case scenario was if the car got stuck, I could just hit OnStar for help and jump in the back to watch a DVD in comfort waiting for the tow.

Hello Twelve, Hello Thirteen (11/24/2004)

Burn them to ashes, then burn the ashes. That's our motto. - Montag (Fahrenheit 451)

It's official. Today, Wednesday, is my last day creating amazing relevance. It was a short run and I'm moving on. Next I will be enabling unsurpassed connectivity to personal account data. That sounds way less sexy! Even architecting the new economy, as horrible as that sounds, sounds better.

Today was a going away party for me plus a birthday party for two of my fellow hip-hop gansta's. So we have a lovely all in one cake for "J-Jiggy, Devo and K-Gristle."

The last company was easy to say goodbye at because I was completely working remotely by the end. The only real difference to most of my colleagues was that I would be less inclined to respond to work related messages. This time things were shorter and more abrupt and I had to face everyone on the way out the door.

When another one of my coworkers left they were asked the questions, "how do you most want to shoot and who do you most want to sleep with?" I'm thankful and not having to come up with fake and humorous answers to both of those.

Since it was a day of goodbyes, I took a moment on my way back to the train to have a moment out silence at 101 California as well. It was my first business home in the city. The new job is on the peninsula so my well-loved commutes on Bart are coming to and end. I fear joining the ranks of the gas-guzzling road commuters.

Nearly six years in downtown San Francisco and I'm surprised how little has changed. Frank is still protesting. The amateur saxophone player still plays his lame songs. The old decrepit homeless man stands with his cane and change cup on market. All sites I saw six years ago. Though, September 11 did cause the closer of all the bathrooms in the downtown Bart stations; something I am eternally frustrated by. The density of Starbucks is nearly the same, but the density of Subway Sandwiches has risen incredibly.

Why I Lock My Door (11/18/2004)

I have six locks on my door all in a row. When I go out, I lock every other one. I figure no matter how long somebody stands there picking the locks, they are always locking three. - Elayne Boosler

10:30pm.

*knock* *knock* *knock* on the door. Weird. I ignore it. I had gotten a call from a friend about meeting in SF earlier in the night, but I wouldn't expect the friend to surprise me at this hour.

*rattle* The door handle rattles as someone is attempting to turn it. For once in my life, I'm thankful I'm not Canadian, and thus, lock my door when I'm home.

*knock* *knock* *knock* "Dude, [expletive] open the door."

All right, time to pick up the mobile phone and dial in 911. Not time to press the send key quite yet.

*knock* *knock* *knock* *beep* (You know the annoying sound that a walkie-talkie style phone makes?) "Dude, where the [expletive] are you? I'm at your [expletive] door."

*beep* "Why didn't you [expletive] knock?"

*beep* "I did."

*beep* "Okay, I'm standing in my doorward, and you're not [expletive] here."

*beep* "Ohh [expletive], I'm at the wrong place. I'm so [expletive] stoned right now."

*thump* *thump* *thump* down the staircase.

Fall Showers (11/11/2004)

Rain! whose soft architectural hands have power to cut stones, and chisel to shapes of grandeur the very mountains. - Henry Ward Beecher

Winters are hard. I don't enjoy waking while the sun isn't up. I don't enjoy getting home at night when the sun is already gone. When the downpour is going I can't take my scooter to work for fear of arching electricity killing passersby. I walk the mile from the train station to the office. I don't use an umbrella.

I like the rain. I wear my boots because they're waterproof and squishy socks aren't that pleasant. As for the rest of me, I revel in being soaked to the bone by the rain when it's not cold enough outside to care. We have hot cocoa at work. I add marshmallows and a whisper of cinnamon to it. Coming in at night drenched from a thunderstorm only to change into something dry and curl up on the sofa with the balcony door open as to let in the susurrus of the drizzle is a paradise.

The best rain I ever experienced was in Maui. There was a hurricane in route to the island. The hurricane dissipated to tropical storm and when it finally hit it had dissipated to a tropical drizzle. It must have been in the mid-20s (Celsius). There is nothing like enjoying the warm rain.

Yep. This is how I spend my free time... (11/06/2004)

The Day After Tomorrow (11/02/2004)

The action we take and the decisions we make in this decade will have consequences far into this century. - George W. Bush

I wore all black today. I work for a French-owned company in the heart of San Francisco, so it was no surprise to find a large percentage of my colleagues dismayed and joking about transferring to the Paris office. I'm disappointed and a bit saddened that my country chose to legitimize a coup and consciously support American fascism, modern-era feudalism, and a new policy of global manifest destiny. As a heterosexual upper-middle-class Caucasian male living in California with no close acquaintances in the military, my life isn't going to be much different over the next four years under a Bush administration than a Kerry administration. I'm just along for the ride.

I'm somewhat concerned about what effect the enormous ongoing cost of the war on terror will wreak on the budget and national debt. It's going to bring the pain of our social security issues to bear on us faster than needed. I have the luxury that likely will not need to depend on my social security to protect my ability to retire, but I was hoping to push that problem off on my children.

I have a sense of sympathy with the red-states that I don't think a lot of my life-long blue-state friends have. I was in Colorado for the September 11th attacks. I spent a large portion of the post-September 11th time in Colorado and Tennessee. Much of that time was spent working with people whose job is to keep the homeland safe.

I often hear the question posed thusly: do you feel safer with Bush or Kerry? I've never felt unsafe. We've only lost a few thousand lives to terrorist attacks in America during my lifetime. In a country of over two hundred and fifty million, there are more pressing deaths and murders to concern myself with then random terrorist attacks. How many homeless Americans die each day of starvation or exposure? How many struggling families lose loved ones because they can't afford adequate preventative medicine? These are the actual deaths dwindling our numbers every day that concern me. Not the faint inference the some rogue terror network will get some sort of weapon and successfully use it on the US.

The other part of this election cycle that shocked me was the assault on gay marriage and gay civil unions. I'm fairly indifferent to the morality of it. All I know is that I'm not gay and that I don't really care what they choose to do. I know that if we open it up marriage to same sex unions, the next step will be allowing people to marry their pets and their furniture. You'll get the same response from me on this one; I don't care. It doesn't affect my life. I hope that people and their rocking chair have happy marriages.

I think there is some minor amount of concern that God, who is Love, will send down the wrath and hellfire to destroyed America. To remain consistent, we must make a preeminent strike against God to disarm him of his WMDs and facilitate a regime change in Heaven.

This is Jordan, and I approve of this message.