In a touch over 14 hours, I’ll be headed to Charlotte on the short leg of tomorrow’s itinerary. I always think my packing for TDY is bad until I have to pack for one of my own trips. I’m serious this time, though… I’m only checking one bag and will cram as much electronic gear as humanly possible into my carry one. I know it’s true that I pack like a girl, but I rarely get somewhere and think, “damn, I wish I had insert-name-of-item here.” With that being said, I’d better get back to it… I have a lot of empty suitcase that needs filled.
Author Archives: jdtharp
Lost, Damaged, or Destroyed…
After one of the longest four-day weeks in recent memory, I managed to get away from work nearly on time. I pounded out a txt on my way to the parking lot, put my bag on top of the truck bed cover, sat my phone down beside it, and tossed my coat in the back seat because I hate driving with my coat on. The bag is tossed in next, I settle in to the driver’s seat and I’m off to start a week and a half of vacation time.
You might have noticed that I didn’t mention picking my phone up. Well that’s because I apparently didn’t. Of course I didn’t know this as I pulled out of the parking lot, drive through the gate, and made best possible speed for the house. I only realized this ten minutes later when I reached down to grab it off my belt clip. There was the clip sure enough, but the phone was ominously missing. I reach behind me, thinking it probably had just popped out of the clip or maybe slid between the seat and center console. No dice there. Not paniced yet, I pulled my coat over the seat and rummaged through the pockets. Sill no phone. It wasn’t in its usual spot on the center console either. This is where the dread starts setting in. I pull to the shoulder, check under the seats, check my coat again, and actually check every place a phone could possibly end up. It, of course, was in none of these places.
So now I backtrack to the office. No one has turned in anything to the gate guard and it’s not lying in or near the parking lot. It’s not lying anywhere inside the fenceline for that matter. I scouted that area pretty well. It’s not outside the gate where I would have made my first quick acceleration. It’s not at the exit where I turned onto the highway. By now it has begun dawning on me that I’m not likely to find it. In a shower of curses not often heard from me, I admitted defeat and accepted that my phone was lost, damaged, or destroyed.
So yes, my pretty and still relatively new 16 gig iPhone is now officially listed as missing in action. I only hope that flying off the back of a fast moving truck damaged it beyond repair because the thought of some schlep using my phone as a high powered iPod makes me crazy at the moment.
I’ve switched over to a back up phone and my number still works, so all told I was off the grid for about three hours. Three absolutely terrifying hours.
Getting in the mood…
Believe it or not there are times when I have had to actually work on getting myself psyched to go on vacation. There’s always work piling up and the backlog when I return from where ever I wandered off to will certainly be enough to stun a team of oxen in their tracks. Some of it is usually the busybody in me just hating to be out of the loop for more than a day or two. For the record, this is not one of those times. I’m ready for this one and can’t cut the feather soon enough. The only question now is whether I have the self discipline to leave the blackberry at home.
Decisions…
I’ve never understood why there is so much resistance by so many people to the simple act of making a decision. I’m not thinking about things like what movie to see or where to go for dinner. It’s the ones about what projects should get priority, which ones need more incubation time, or which simply need to go away. Get the best information you can, decide the best course of action, and move out. Don’t whine and complain about how hard it is. Grr.
Adiós Comcast… almost
With DirecTV now beaming 500+ channels of goodness into the house, I thought for sure I could finally be rid of the devil called Comcast. Trying to find an reasonable alternative to their cable Internet service, however, has proven to be an exercise in futility. The DSL that is available here just doesn’t stack up after a few speed tests. So, for now it’s an uneasy truce with the devil I know as I wait impatiently for Memphis to slog its way into the 21st century.
Good…
Sometimes I need to be reminded that despite the petty annoyances, the universe may not just be stringing us along after all. And it’s always amazing that it’s the small things, the things like an offhanded remark, an unexpected message, or a late night phone call that do most of the reminding. Sometimes that’s just enough to carry you through to the finish line. Hey universe, thanks for tonights’ reminder. Seriously. Well timed and greatly appreciated.
200…
It’s the 200th birthday of Charles Darwin which makes it about 150 years since he published On The Origin of Species. According to a poll published today only something like 39% of Americans believe in the kind of evolution outlined by our English friend. That’s 39%. Are you serious? It boggles the mind that 61% of those polled either disagree or don’t know what they believe. By the way, it’s a question about what you *believe* how can you possibly not know the answer?Where ever it was that this 61% of the American public was educated, they should demand a refund or at least a repeat of Intro to Biology, as they have been badly misserved by the educational system.
I weep for the future of the Republic.
St. Thomas
I didn’t really make it anywhere fun last spring and have decided to make up for that by taking a rather spur of the moment trip to St. Thomas at the end of the month. A week of sun, sand, blue water, and rum is likely just what the doctor ordered to start getting out of my traditional winter funk. Add in pleasant company and it should be a real event. With only 13 days left in the count, it can’t get here fast enough. I’m not saying I’m the hardest working man in showbusiness, but I think I’m overdue for a break (and no, three week training classes don’t count as a break)!
Managing expectations
Through most of my life I’ve never been terribly good at managing expectations. Or rather I should say that my expectations tend to swing wildly from puppy dogs and sunshine to the absolute bleakness usually reserved for 19th century poets. And all of this over the span of five minutes. Sure, I’ve learned to mask both of them fairly reasonably, but still, that’s what’s going on behind the scenes. You learn at an early age that if you keep those kind of thoughts in check you can save yourself a good deal of trouble in the long run.
I like black and white, the known versus the unknown. Some people seem to have a natural capacity or even a bit of a love for the unknown. I’m not one of those. It’s strange and different and therefore scary. Far easier to retreat back to the comfort and ease of what we know.
Maybe I’ve chosen comfort and ease for so long that it’s really all I know for certain and it becomes my default setting. Perhaps, it’s time to to move beyond that. I really don’t know how the rest of the world deals with the dichotomy between blind optimism and abject pessimism. If there’s a trick I’ve got to learn it, because swinging from pillar to post is quite simply exhausting.
A note to retailers…
If you are a retailer facing what most are saying is the most foul economic climate in the post war period, the response to a customer walking in your door at 1:55 prepared to spend a few hundred dollar shouldn’t be, “oh we close at two.” Maybe you should find some time to focus a little more on “May I help you?” Really, though, go ahead and stick with your current customer relations model and let me know how that works out for you.
JEFFREYTHARP.COM 