Love is in the air...

Mood: Serendipitous
Listening to: "It's Oh So Quiet" (the SHHHH song) - Bjork
Reading: The Cell - Stephen King
Watching: The Pink Panther

At least I hope love is in the air for all you deviants out there...

I, for one, fully embrace this day. I know it's easy when you've got someone to love, but I've always enjoyed Valentine's Day, even without someone to share it with.

I've got a wondeful wife of almost 8 years, an imaginative, creative, silly daughter who is 3 1/2 going on 15, and a kooky, smiling, happy son who is 10 1/2 months old. If any one of those three even looks my way, I get goosebumps. That's love.

The song I chose is one that I almost always think about now when I think of love and Valentine's Day. Bjork has such emotion in her song, even though she is a freak (a cool freak, but a freak, none the less), and this song is no different.

The Book has absolutely NOTHING to do with the day, but it's what I'm in the middle of right now, so there...

The Pink Panther is the movie we saw on Saturday to celebrate today. It was good, and had some nice comparrisons to the original Blake Edwards movies, but probably could have been even better. Still, some really fun comedic performances by Steve Martin, Jean Reno and Kevin Kline, three of my more favorite actors.

I truly hope you have a great day today, and even if you aren't sharing it with someone, find the time to treat yourself to a nice lunch, dinner, or treat somehow.
-m-

What a day!

Mood: I'm in a family mood
Listening to: "Christmastime Is Here" - Vince Guaraldi Trio
Reading: DaVinci Code - Dan Brown
Watching: The Lord of the Rings - The Return of the King XV

Well, I won't make this long, but I did want to post a very Merry Christmas to all those of you that celebrate it. Otherwise, please enjoy a very happy holiday season, or failing all that, enjoy the Winter Solstice that recently passed...

We hosted this year, for the first time in a long time, and while we had 13 people staying at our house, 2 of which are toddlers/babies, it was relatively calm today. My wife made a killer meal of prime rib and all the fixins, and it was just...nice.

Nice to have my family and extended family around.

Made me realize that this is truly what life is all about.

So, anyway, here's the scoop on the data up there...

Song - We listened to the Vince Guaraldi Trio do the soundtrack to the Charlie Brown Christmas special that they play every year. It has been and will continue to be one of the best jazz albums ever, and especially at Christmastime.

Book - I got this from my wife...I'd been begging her for it. I had read "Angels and Demons" first, and I am really looking forward to this one.

Movie - I put the LOTR movie in here, because I got the XV (Extended Version) for Christmas from my wife. I truly love that series, and this is the final piece of the trilogy. Good stuff!

Anyway, I hope you had a great Christmas!
-M-

"Happy, happy Christmas, that can win us back to the delusions of our childhood days, recall to the old man the pleasures of his youth, and transport the traveler back to his own fireside and quiet home!"
--Charles Dickens

Ah to be two again...

Mood: Totally Stoked
Listening to: Cake - "Mahna Mahna" from "For The Kids"
Reading: Curious George Comes To America
Watching: Shrek 2

So, my daughter turned two yesterday, the Summer Solstice, June 21st. Wild how she changes my life, almost every day.

For all you dads out there, especially dads to daughters, I know you know how I feel. Children are the best things that can happen to you if you're ready to allow them to jump into your heart.

It could be the worst day at work, and VOILA! I get home, and hear the chorus of "Daddy, Daddy!" and everything else doesn't matter, if only for a few minutes. It's enough...that's for sure.

I dedicated all the questions to her today, although to be fair, I enjoy those things as much as she does, if not more.

The Song - I love listening to Cake's version of "Mahna Mahna" which was an OLD song from the early days of Sesame Street. For those of you that watch this with your kids, recently they've been doing a retrospective on the last 25 years (or is it 35?) and the big one was "The Street We Live On" which was clips from the last few decades intermingled with Elmo's World. If you get a chance to watch it, you'll love it. It might even bring a tear to your eye (they show the clip from when Big Bird drew a picture of Mr. Hooper, and then found out that Mr. Hooper had passed away, as well as a clip right after 9/11 about being scared and having people to count on, etc.). But at the end, during the credits, they play the original clip of these three Muppets singing that song...totally took me right back to being 5 years old. Awesome, powerful stuff...and they say TV is bad for you...BAH!

The Book - "Read George monkey! Read George monkey!" is what I get now at night from her. And believe me, I'm more than happy to oblige! Although I do love Dr. Seuss more than any other children's writer (and most "regular" writers, too), this has always been a favorite of mine...mostly, I think, because nowadays it's funny to re-read and see what was in those old books. Mainly, I'm talking about all the trouble George gets into. My favorites are when he goes to the doctor and knocks himself out with the ether (I have this on a t-shirt, and it is GREAT), and in the original book when, after they get to the man in the yellow hat's house, they have "a good meal, a good pipe, and then off to bed." A WHAT?! heh...yeah, a good pipe...totally cracks me up.

The Movie - I've liked Shrek from before she was born, and she now demands to see it at least once a week, if not more frequently. It's fine with me, because I love the movie...so, when Shrek 2 came out, my wife and I decided that it was time to see if a movie would work for her...turns out it wasn't too bad, but it could have been much better...she ended up being fairly squirrelly, and did manage to see most of it, but at one point, she fell off the chair and landed on her back, which scared her a bit...but all in all, we had a good time. I loved the movie, by the way, and recommend it to anyone who was even remotely entertained by the first one.

So, I guess to sum up - love your kids...learn from your kids...and have fun for God's sake! As Dennis Miller says, "they are the sponge and you are the super soaker." Fill them with all of life's joys. There's plenty of time later for heartache and disappointment...actually, there's not time for that, but sometimes we have to make time...o.k., enough on that tangent. Time to go play with the ol' Fisher Price barn with her!

-M-

"The best place to go with a child is in their imagination."

Well...damn.

The union and the company came to a tentative agreement at 5 a.m. this morning, basically putting an end to the strike...for now.

I guess the next steps are to get the agreement ratified by the voting union population (not me) in the next few weeks.

I guess I'm a little sad about this, only because it would have been interesting to see the strike happen, since I've never been a part of that, and another part of me is releived since I've heard horror stories about those that cross the line and what can happen.

It's also nice because the stress level at work as seemed to plummet overnight, which is good, because there are a couple of die-hard union people in our department that were making life at work a living hell. Bad attitudes, pushing the fringe of the line, stepping over it in some cases, and making everyone feel uncomfortable.

Well, I guess there's always a chance that it won't get ratified and the strike will still happen, but I don't know.

More when I do...

-M-

Something completely new to me is happening around me.

Our office is about to go on strike.

I won't tell you what company, because it really doesn't matter. If you know who I am, then you know what company. But that's not really the point.

See, I've never been in a union environment. Sure, I've read things about unions and I know a little bit about them from various articles and books that I've read in the past, but that's nothing comparred to what's going on around me.

I guess I should mention where I stand on this stuff.

Overall: There is probably a need for this kind of thing in certain industries (car mfg., mining, construction, and sometimes schools). Some industries have a history and there is a need for the people to be protected. I don't deny that. I think it sucks, but that's life.

My environment: I work in a white collar environment. I work as a web designer. I'm pretty sure there's no need for us to be a part of a union. We have a 1000-member sales force. I'm pretty sure that a sales force doesn't need to be part of a union. The worst we have to look out for is ergonomically incorrect desks and papercuts.

I should also mention that this unionizing of positions came without warning and without choice. I found out, months later, that it was a move by the parent company who was getting ready to sell us. The union was going to shut them down because they were going to "downsize" (another thing I hate) by roughly 1,000 people. The union was up in arms until the parent company told them they could unionize another 750 positions in our portion of the company. Thanks!

My main bitch about the whole union thing is that it breeds mediocrity. Because we are all considered union drones, there's no incentive to do better work. In our group, we all get paid the same, regardless of the quality and/or quantity of work done. I consider myself a good web designer, and I work alongside a few people who think that crappy, templetized sites are just fine for customers. They put no effort into learning new design skills, or bettering themselves through school. Why should they? It will make no difference in their pay as to how good they are.

This infuriates me.

Mostly because I can't stand to do inferior work. I put more time, effort and certainly creativity into each project I do. My customers love the work I do. In fact, I have very few cancellations from year to year because the quality is better than what they had before.

I have some peers who are on the same page as I am when it comes to all this, and we are the ones who bounce ideas off each other, who learn from each other and who mentor each other in our daily work. It's this small group of people that will be crossing the line tomorrow to do the work of the rest, and I have a feeling that we will do better and quicker work without their attitudes around. It will be more like 1999 for a while...maybe a week, maybe 2.

Oh, and before you get on my case because of the picket line, let me explain that in Colorado, and specifically in our company, the position is union, not the person. You can choose to join the union, but whether you join or not, you get all the perks and pains of the union. If you join, you can vote, you can get cute little discounts at stores around the area, etc., but if you join AND cross the picket line, then you get fined. Thankfully, I never became a " member" of the union, so they can't fine me for going to work.

There are some in our upper management that are telling me that I am brave to be doing this, and that they definitely appreciate it. To me, this is no different than standing up for what I believe in politics, religion and any other tough subject. You gotta choose where you stand on these things at some point in your life, and on this point, albeit a forced move, I choose to not support the dealings of the union.

I don't believe that this company should have a union, and I believe that if the company is going to grow into the company it could be, then they should definitely look into getting rid of it, and soon.

Anyway, I will probably post more, if I'm not innundated with work, but I'm kind of excited to be a part of this, albeit on the minority side. I've never had the opportunity to experience something like this and I look forward to seeing this take place from the inside.

-M-