Another way to describe my bandanna/bandana adventure - although the former has always been correct, enough people have started using the latter, intentionally or otherwise, that now both spellings are seen as acceptable. This sounds like a load of nonsense to me. If everyone starts misspelling a certain word, we excuse it as becoming 'more common'? Next week, if everyone tells me the new word for sun is son, I have to call it son? I'm not ready to be a father; I'd rather move someplace that doesn't get The S*n.
It's like the kids who argued with the teacher until their test scores were increased; it was easier to appease the students than convince them to become better scholars. I can imagine their updated arguments; I guess it's possible corona is transmitted via the chin? No wonder we're struggling so much with getting everyone to wear a mask.
Monday, August 31, 2020
Sunday, August 30, 2020
trader joe-san means no offense
A couple of months ago, a story broke that Trader Joe's was under pressure to change the branding on certain international foods. The catalyst was an online petition which accused brand names such as Trader Giotto's of being racist. There was some ensuing speculation that the grocery store chain would make branding changes but recently this possibility was put to rest via an official statement.
Here is a quote (it combines two portions of the statement), which I pulled from a news report:
I mentioned last week that I've sometimes referred to Trader Joe's as "Racist Joe's", though only among close friends; the news about this petition did not surprise me. But I'd never brought up this joke seriously, even if it does sound serious, because I had never been offended by the packaging. You could say that it was my attempt to have fun with the product marketing, which I suppose I found cliched. But despite having a vague notion about the legitimacy of the claim, the process that led to the eventual outcome always felt like a formality to me. And yet, I couldn't ignore that thousands had signed this petition - how often are so many people wrong about racism? I suspected there was more to my joke than I had ever acknowledged, so I decided to seek out additional points of view about the situation.
One thoughtful piece expanded on the statement by offering a specific interpretation of what was likely intended by these brand names, which I welcomed given how Trader Joe's had helpfully provided "we were having fun" as their official explanation. Anyway, here is a quote that summarizes this interpretation:
This looks about right to me, and addresses the only portion of the petition that makes a direct claim about racism ("Trader Joe’s branding is racist because... it presents 'Joe' as the default 'normal'..."). I will note that the above is only a partial elaboration for two reasons. First, it doesn't address the portion of the petition that asks a serious question about 'trader' and the colonial legacy invoked by the term. However, I'll overlook it today because I suspect concerns about the word 'trader' might be better suited for a separate challenge to the full name as opposed to this petition about its branding.
The second reason is that this interpretation offers nothing regarding Trader Joe-san. If I were to accept that this interpretation applied to Trader Joe-san, I would be making a serious logical error by exonerating the whole thanks to a justification of a part; it would be like a doctor determining I was in perfect health based solely on an examination of my uninjured arm. The fact that Trader Ming acknowledges the foreignness of a Joe in China or that Trader Giotto is a nod to Italian names doesn't help me at all when I pretend that Trader Joe-san represents a playful acknowledgement of a local Japanese trader.
Of course, I am only speaking about this one opinion, and I don't mean to make too much of a cherry-picked quote from a piece that is only partially related to my claim; the above quote makes the case for most of the brands but it is under no obligation to speak for all packaging. Let's look instead at a second excerpt from the company's response:
I suppose if I take this portion of the statement as an explanation, I am being asked to accept that using the honorific '-san' is an acceptable way of showing appreciation for Japanese culture. This feels only partially correct. If a Hollywood movie set in Japan accurately portrayed the customs and mannerisms of the people, it would indeed be an example of showing appreciation for the Japanese culture. But as we know about Hollywood, it will cast white actors to fill Asian roles, and no amount of acting skill, scripting accuracy, or - perhaps most importantly - good intent will keep me from wondering who is being appreciated when a Joe is playing the default normal.
Who is Trader Joe-san? I think the most likely answer will go back to some of the expressions found in the above quotes ("an attempt to have fun", "a playful... gesture") and I wouldn't disagree at all. In a sense, the most likely explanation is that there is no explanation; I suspect Trader Joe-san represents the residue left behind by other deliberate actions. I can imagine the scene in the Buying Team's meeting - one person suggests José as a Spanish-language alternative to Joe, another builds on the point and offers Giotto as an Italian name. There are chuckles, there are nods of agreement, there are dollar signs glittering in the eyes around the table; it is fun and everyone is capitalizing.
In such a situation, I'm not surprised that no one pointed out what seems obvious to me: using 'Joe-san' to represent Japanese products is inconsistent with the logic of the other brand names. And although Trader Joe-san isn't racist and it's not necessarily wrong, it's trite. It's just another example of the careless banality that enables a common assumption - invoking anything remotely associated with another culture will suffice as a show of appreciation to its culture. It reminds me of the day my new boss offered me some wasabi peas, adding "you look like you would like these". Where did he learn that method for relating across differences, and what is tolerated in our culture that reinforces, perpetuates, or excuses this behavior?
I didn't see the point in challenging my boss, which was perhaps reflected in my reaction - I felt not anger but resignation, because I had just learned something ordinary about a person with significant influence over my life; the label for his question was just a detail. But I believe now that if I did challenge the question, the answer would likely have been the same one I've heard in countless other similar situations - I meant no offense. To be honest, it's probably the truth, because it seems impossible to mean offense in this society, which is so obsessed with preserving even the most pointless features of its routine that it seems incapable of grasping the nuance that offensive does not require racism. I am sure without having asked that my boss meant no offense, just as those Hollywood directors meant no offense when they didn't hire Asians for Asian roles, or that Trader Joe's meant no offense when it didn't use Tanaka for its Japanese branding. I am not wagering on petitions to drive change; my money is on collective embarrassment. But until that day comes, when Trader Yukiko - excuse me, Trader Yukiko-san - is winking at me from the wasabi peas, I'll have to remember that when you have no defense, you say no offense.
Here is a quote (it combines two portions of the statement), which I pulled from a news report:
"We do not make decisions based on petitions," the Trader Joe's statement reads. "Recently we have heard from many customers reaffirming that these name variations are largely viewed in exactly the way they were intended—as an attempt to have fun with our product marketing."
I mentioned last week that I've sometimes referred to Trader Joe's as "Racist Joe's", though only among close friends; the news about this petition did not surprise me. But I'd never brought up this joke seriously, even if it does sound serious, because I had never been offended by the packaging. You could say that it was my attempt to have fun with the product marketing, which I suppose I found cliched. But despite having a vague notion about the legitimacy of the claim, the process that led to the eventual outcome always felt like a formality to me. And yet, I couldn't ignore that thousands had signed this petition - how often are so many people wrong about racism? I suspected there was more to my joke than I had ever acknowledged, so I decided to seek out additional points of view about the situation.
One thoughtful piece expanded on the statement by offering a specific interpretation of what was likely intended by these brand names, which I welcomed given how Trader Joe's had helpfully provided "we were having fun" as their official explanation. Anyway, here is a quote that summarizes this interpretation:
"Couldn’t Trader José be taken as a playful but progressive gesture acknowledging that in Mexico or another Spanish-speaking country, a trader named Joe would be a foreigner, a “gringo,” and that a local trader would more likely go by José?"
This looks about right to me, and addresses the only portion of the petition that makes a direct claim about racism ("Trader Joe’s branding is racist because... it presents 'Joe' as the default 'normal'..."). I will note that the above is only a partial elaboration for two reasons. First, it doesn't address the portion of the petition that asks a serious question about 'trader' and the colonial legacy invoked by the term. However, I'll overlook it today because I suspect concerns about the word 'trader' might be better suited for a separate challenge to the full name as opposed to this petition about its branding.
The second reason is that this interpretation offers nothing regarding Trader Joe-san. If I were to accept that this interpretation applied to Trader Joe-san, I would be making a serious logical error by exonerating the whole thanks to a justification of a part; it would be like a doctor determining I was in perfect health based solely on an examination of my uninjured arm. The fact that Trader Ming acknowledges the foreignness of a Joe in China or that Trader Giotto is a nod to Italian names doesn't help me at all when I pretend that Trader Joe-san represents a playful acknowledgement of a local Japanese trader.
Of course, I am only speaking about this one opinion, and I don't mean to make too much of a cherry-picked quote from a piece that is only partially related to my claim; the above quote makes the case for most of the brands but it is under no obligation to speak for all packaging. Let's look instead at a second excerpt from the company's response:
"Decades ago, our Buying Team started using product names, like Trader Giotto’s, Trader José’s, Trader Ming’s, etc. We thought then—and still do—that this naming of products could be fun and show appreciation for other cultures."
I suppose if I take this portion of the statement as an explanation, I am being asked to accept that using the honorific '-san' is an acceptable way of showing appreciation for Japanese culture. This feels only partially correct. If a Hollywood movie set in Japan accurately portrayed the customs and mannerisms of the people, it would indeed be an example of showing appreciation for the Japanese culture. But as we know about Hollywood, it will cast white actors to fill Asian roles, and no amount of acting skill, scripting accuracy, or - perhaps most importantly - good intent will keep me from wondering who is being appreciated when a Joe is playing the default normal.
Who is Trader Joe-san? I think the most likely answer will go back to some of the expressions found in the above quotes ("an attempt to have fun", "a playful... gesture") and I wouldn't disagree at all. In a sense, the most likely explanation is that there is no explanation; I suspect Trader Joe-san represents the residue left behind by other deliberate actions. I can imagine the scene in the Buying Team's meeting - one person suggests José as a Spanish-language alternative to Joe, another builds on the point and offers Giotto as an Italian name. There are chuckles, there are nods of agreement, there are dollar signs glittering in the eyes around the table; it is fun and everyone is capitalizing.
In such a situation, I'm not surprised that no one pointed out what seems obvious to me: using 'Joe-san' to represent Japanese products is inconsistent with the logic of the other brand names. And although Trader Joe-san isn't racist and it's not necessarily wrong, it's trite. It's just another example of the careless banality that enables a common assumption - invoking anything remotely associated with another culture will suffice as a show of appreciation to its culture. It reminds me of the day my new boss offered me some wasabi peas, adding "you look like you would like these". Where did he learn that method for relating across differences, and what is tolerated in our culture that reinforces, perpetuates, or excuses this behavior?
I didn't see the point in challenging my boss, which was perhaps reflected in my reaction - I felt not anger but resignation, because I had just learned something ordinary about a person with significant influence over my life; the label for his question was just a detail. But I believe now that if I did challenge the question, the answer would likely have been the same one I've heard in countless other similar situations - I meant no offense. To be honest, it's probably the truth, because it seems impossible to mean offense in this society, which is so obsessed with preserving even the most pointless features of its routine that it seems incapable of grasping the nuance that offensive does not require racism. I am sure without having asked that my boss meant no offense, just as those Hollywood directors meant no offense when they didn't hire Asians for Asian roles, or that Trader Joe's meant no offense when it didn't use Tanaka for its Japanese branding. I am not wagering on petitions to drive change; my money is on collective embarrassment. But until that day comes, when Trader Yukiko - excuse me, Trader Yukiko-san - is winking at me from the wasabi peas, I'll have to remember that when you have no defense, you say no offense.
Saturday, August 29, 2020
proper corona admin, vol 80 - running the water station
I mentioned a couple of weeks ago that I thought the recommendation to walk through water stations during a marathon was the best (running) advice I heard during the pandemic. The advice is included in this link under the section 'Walking Breaks'. It's allegedly a fairly well-known bit of wisdom, but I don't recall hearing it in my ten years of running (and I don't know any healthy runner who walks with the regularity described in the link).
This made me wonder about rest in general and how little we understand it. Most of life is spent acquiring and developing new skills - resting is a notable exception; most of us were better sleepers at one-day old than we are now. Do you know the right balance of effort and rest in all your activities? It seems like the most important knowledge; naturally, most of us have no idea.
This made me wonder about rest in general and how little we understand it. Most of life is spent acquiring and developing new skills - resting is a notable exception; most of us were better sleepers at one-day old than we are now. Do you know the right balance of effort and rest in all your activities? It seems like the most important knowledge; naturally, most of us have no idea.
Friday, August 28, 2020
leftovers - reading clearout, august 2020
I went back into the (recent) archives and noticed that I hadn't consistently shared the same information in all my reading reviews since the June restart.
Let's fix a few of these omissions today - first, I noticed that my review for The Game did not include a link to my book notes, so here you go. More importantly, I left a few book ratings blank - in fact, since June my completion rate has been under 50%. Here's the catchup:
Strangers In Their Own Land - Three paradoxes out of four
The Empathy Exams - Three social norms out of four
Seeking Wisdom - Three regressions to the mean out of four
100 Essays I Don't Have Time To Write - Three exeunts out of four
As you can see, the TOA book ratings are meant to be taken extremely seriously.
The more important skill is to get in the habit of knowing how to read a review. I think I've improved quite a bit in this regard over the past couple of years (and I hope these gains are reflected in the way I write reading reviews to highlight the strengths of a book). When I'm considering a book, I try to find a couple of reviews that fall in the center of the scale (on Goodreads, this means three stars out of five) because I've learned that this is the most likely place to learn the strengths of a book. This is almost never true of the other reviews - the five-stars tell you what they liked and the one-stars overstay their welcome (message to the boo-birds: the one-star rating is pretty clear, no need to elaborate) - but anyway, neither high or low on the rating scale seems capable of providing an unbiased explanation of what the book does uncommonly well.
What does a book do uncommonly well? It's not a question I hear often, but I feel it should be asked of every published work; what would be the value of knowing anything else? Some strangers telling me they liked (or disliked) a book has no meaning to me; half the country is going to disagree with the other half very soon, with the only remaining question being which half. The three-star review gives me everything I need to know about whether I'll enjoy reading the book.
Let's fix a few of these omissions today - first, I noticed that my review for The Game did not include a link to my book notes, so here you go. More importantly, I left a few book ratings blank - in fact, since June my completion rate has been under 50%. Here's the catchup:
Strangers In Their Own Land - Three paradoxes out of four
The Empathy Exams - Three social norms out of four
Seeking Wisdom - Three regressions to the mean out of four
100 Essays I Don't Have Time To Write - Three exeunts out of four
As you can see, the TOA book ratings are meant to be taken extremely seriously.
The more important skill is to get in the habit of knowing how to read a review. I think I've improved quite a bit in this regard over the past couple of years (and I hope these gains are reflected in the way I write reading reviews to highlight the strengths of a book). When I'm considering a book, I try to find a couple of reviews that fall in the center of the scale (on Goodreads, this means three stars out of five) because I've learned that this is the most likely place to learn the strengths of a book. This is almost never true of the other reviews - the five-stars tell you what they liked and the one-stars overstay their welcome (message to the boo-birds: the one-star rating is pretty clear, no need to elaborate) - but anyway, neither high or low on the rating scale seems capable of providing an unbiased explanation of what the book does uncommonly well.
What does a book do uncommonly well? It's not a question I hear often, but I feel it should be asked of every published work; what would be the value of knowing anything else? Some strangers telling me they liked (or disliked) a book has no meaning to me; half the country is going to disagree with the other half very soon, with the only remaining question being which half. The three-star review gives me everything I need to know about whether I'll enjoy reading the book.
Thursday, August 27, 2020
proper corona admin, vol 79 - the business bro says nothing
I've realized during my remote work that non-verbal communication is the best way to say nothing. This was counter-intuitive, as I've long felt 'non-verbal' meant replacement - words becoming gestures, postures, or eye contact. But I was only describing options - if someone can't see me nod, I can always just say "yes". What I mean is literally saying nothing - silence.
It's easy to communicate silence in person; it's our natural state. It's almost impossible on Zoom; is your connection unstable? I feel like the guy who had to invent zero; the road to hell is paved with thumbs-up emojis. For now, I'm stuck stupidly announcing "I have nothing to say" like a news anchor thrown off by a glitching teleprompter; it beats watching my days disappear in five or ten minute chunks as I proofread, edit, and sweeten my email nothings.
It's easy to communicate silence in person; it's our natural state. It's almost impossible on Zoom; is your connection unstable? I feel like the guy who had to invent zero; the road to hell is paved with thumbs-up emojis. For now, I'm stuck stupidly announcing "I have nothing to say" like a news anchor thrown off by a glitching teleprompter; it beats watching my days disappear in five or ten minute chunks as I proofread, edit, and sweeten my email nothings.
Wednesday, August 26, 2020
reading clearout, august 2020
Hi folks,
Here are some condensed thoughts about a few books I recently read for which I don't anticipate posting a full review (1).
The Beautiful Struggle by Ta-Nehisi Coates (April 2020 - book notes)
Around a year and a half ago, I wrote about Coates's collection, We Were Eight Years in Power, and noted his insistence that honest writing is constantly threatened by cliches and truisms. It was fascinating to see his commitment to that concept in The Beautiful Struggle, his 2008 memoir about growing up in Black in Baltimore. Coates writes like someone who accidentally set his dictionary on fire and is trying to get as much down before it defines ash; I appreciated the instinct given his distinct style, perspective, and voice. This read at times like a graphic novel thanks to its searing focus on specific moments and their associated feelings; I related to that representation better than I would have to a more linear retelling, which I often finds distances me from the experience of the author.
Lost Cat by Caroline Paul (June 2020 - no book notes)
I originally planned to read this in December as part of my annual rereading month; when the pandemic hit I decided it was necessary to roll out an old favorite ahead of schedule. Wendy MacNaughton's illustrations are a delightful companion to the main story, which is mostly a hilarious account of Paul's increasingly frantic quest to understand where her cat went when he disappeared for a few weeks. If you want to get a sense of the book, I suggest checking out this review from Brain Pickings, or getting a cat.
The Apology by Eve Ensler (June 2020 - book notes)
Decades after suffering years of sexual and physical abuse at the hands of her father, Ensler imagines the apology she never heard in this indomitable work of empathy, imagination, and courage. It's the longest one hundred and twenty-eight pages I've read this year but likely the most important; I think the following quote from this review sums it up:
I was having a hard time pulling together my thoughts about how this book might fit into a larger context but I think the new car analogy steered me in the right direction; I've seen something like The Apology before, but I've never seen anything like this book. I think many writers will someday look back to this work and credit it for demonstrating yet another dimension of the craft's potential to help us heal the wounds from yesterday, make the most of today, and envision a better tomorrow.
Footnotes
1. Is it that hard to post a few hundred words per book?
It's not always a question of difficulty. There are some books for which I don't have much to add beyond a comment or two in reference to an interesting quote, idea, or argument. In other cases, the book simply defies review, or at least in the sense I approach the task. The most common (and relevant) reason I skip the full review is time - each reading review is one less post about something else, and these days I think it's a better use of my time to write on topics that are not explicitly tied to a book.
Here are some condensed thoughts about a few books I recently read for which I don't anticipate posting a full review (1).
The Beautiful Struggle by Ta-Nehisi Coates (April 2020 - book notes)
Around a year and a half ago, I wrote about Coates's collection, We Were Eight Years in Power, and noted his insistence that honest writing is constantly threatened by cliches and truisms. It was fascinating to see his commitment to that concept in The Beautiful Struggle, his 2008 memoir about growing up in Black in Baltimore. Coates writes like someone who accidentally set his dictionary on fire and is trying to get as much down before it defines ash; I appreciated the instinct given his distinct style, perspective, and voice. This read at times like a graphic novel thanks to its searing focus on specific moments and their associated feelings; I related to that representation better than I would have to a more linear retelling, which I often finds distances me from the experience of the author.
Lost Cat by Caroline Paul (June 2020 - no book notes)
I originally planned to read this in December as part of my annual rereading month; when the pandemic hit I decided it was necessary to roll out an old favorite ahead of schedule. Wendy MacNaughton's illustrations are a delightful companion to the main story, which is mostly a hilarious account of Paul's increasingly frantic quest to understand where her cat went when he disappeared for a few weeks. If you want to get a sense of the book, I suggest checking out this review from Brain Pickings, or getting a cat.
The Apology by Eve Ensler (June 2020 - book notes)
Decades after suffering years of sexual and physical abuse at the hands of her father, Ensler imagines the apology she never heard in this indomitable work of empathy, imagination, and courage. It's the longest one hundred and twenty-eight pages I've read this year but likely the most important; I think the following quote from this review sums it up:
Talking to me from her home in New York, she [Ensler] breaks down briefly as she tries to describe just how different the world suddenly feels [after writing the book].
“I don’t even know what this place is going to be now,” she says, her tears turning to laughter. “My heart feels so open in a way it hasn’t been able to be open. It’s like driving a new car — I don’t know how to drive this car!”
I was having a hard time pulling together my thoughts about how this book might fit into a larger context but I think the new car analogy steered me in the right direction; I've seen something like The Apology before, but I've never seen anything like this book. I think many writers will someday look back to this work and credit it for demonstrating yet another dimension of the craft's potential to help us heal the wounds from yesterday, make the most of today, and envision a better tomorrow.
Footnotes
1. Is it that hard to post a few hundred words per book?
It's not always a question of difficulty. There are some books for which I don't have much to add beyond a comment or two in reference to an interesting quote, idea, or argument. In other cases, the book simply defies review, or at least in the sense I approach the task. The most common (and relevant) reason I skip the full review is time - each reading review is one less post about something else, and these days I think it's a better use of my time to write on topics that are not explicitly tied to a book.
Tuesday, August 25, 2020
leftovers #2 - tall tails
A month ago - exactly one month! - I posted this analysis of a piece that, despite my comments, I enjoyed a great deal. I feel my perspective on 'The Tail End' added some precision to the main idea. But it came at the expense of a certain consideration - it no longer tells people what they need to hear.
In other words, those who agreed with my thinking probably didn't change their behavior, which means my thinking reinforced certain relationship problems. In the context of how people should approach their remaining time with others, what they need to hear is in the original, not my analysis. That's not to say that I'm incorrect, but I certainly didn't motivate any behavior changes; an accessible good idea always beats an inaccessible great idea.
In other words, those who agreed with my thinking probably didn't change their behavior, which means my thinking reinforced certain relationship problems. In the context of how people should approach their remaining time with others, what they need to hear is in the original, not my analysis. That's not to say that I'm incorrect, but I certainly didn't motivate any behavior changes; an accessible good idea always beats an inaccessible great idea.
Monday, August 24, 2020
leftovers - close enough to write
Despite my many hundred words about how to spell bandanna, the reality is that when I type bandana in this space Google still puts that famous squiggly red line underneath it. So although bandana might be OK, it's still considered incorrect by the standards of the spell-checker Google offers TOA.
This isn't really an issue, but I do sometimes worry the squiggly red line is a hint at a much darker reality. Who puts it there? I fear the answer - no one. Technological advances mean companies like Google have unprecedented power; AI tools allow constant 'production' even if the entire payroll calls in sick. If no one decides how to spell bandanna - and everyone accepts the decision - what will no one decide next? We give our tech companies their power, but we can take it away; we must make the future a place we want to visit.
This isn't really an issue, but I do sometimes worry the squiggly red line is a hint at a much darker reality. Who puts it there? I fear the answer - no one. Technological advances mean companies like Google have unprecedented power; AI tools allow constant 'production' even if the entire payroll calls in sick. If no one decides how to spell bandanna - and everyone accepts the decision - what will no one decide next? We give our tech companies their power, but we can take it away; we must make the future a place we want to visit.
Sunday, August 23, 2020
coining professor average
I've been casually following the story about our national coin shortage, one of those very real problems of the past few months that - like The Great 2020 Toilet Paper Rush - many are trying to navigate while dealing with far more significant concerns. It seems like the news coverage of the situation more or less follows the same tired template - summarize the situation (people don't have the coins required to complete cash transactions), list a series of facts that may or may not be relevant (people don't want to linger in front of coin exchange kiosks, bakeries are closed, etc), acknowledge that "coin shortage" is a technically imprecise label (semantics, but it is true that circulation hasn't been reduced), and maybe include one or two anecdotes that demonstrate the human side of the situation (a child writes a letter to the tooth fairy offering to accept bills instead of quarters).
In other words, I've read a few thousand words about the coin shortage without learning anything; there is no shortage of inane coverage. Could we at least get some insight into why it's happening in America, but not in Europe? Anyway, I'm here with my offer to help: a classic TOA examination of this situation, where I don my well-worn Professor Average hat to help analyze the situation, and maybe come up with an observation or two. At the start, I will helpfully highlight any particularly important principles, but once I've laid out the main argument I will leave you to reach your own conclusions. Most importantly, I will make a significant effort to avoid the pitfall of the coverage I've seen thus far - allowing trivia to deputize for explanation.
In other words, I've read a few thousand words about the coin shortage without learning anything; there is no shortage of inane coverage. Could we at least get some insight into why it's happening in America, but not in Europe? Anyway, I'm here with my offer to help: a classic TOA examination of this situation, where I don my well-worn Professor Average hat to help analyze the situation, and maybe come up with an observation or two. At the start, I will helpfully highlight any particularly important principles, but once I've laid out the main argument I will leave you to reach your own conclusions. Most importantly, I will make a significant effort to avoid the pitfall of the coverage I've seen thus far - allowing trivia to deputize for explanation.
Let's start at a hypothetical coin laundromat, which to keep it simple for this example we'll say has advanced machines that wash AND dry your clothes (but no folding). In other words, customers use a machine once per load, and the cost is $1 in quarters. So how many quarters does the laundromat need to run itself? The answer is FOUR. If it sounds crazy, that's because it is, but it would still work; one customer would exchange a dollar for the four quarters and start Machine #1, then an employee would remove the four quarters and exchange those with the next customer for another dollar bill. There are 500 million quarters in circulation but you only need four to run this laundromat - you don't need much cash to facilitate transactions.
Of course, you don't need me to tell you that although four quarters is a theoretical minimum, this is a very precarious environment for our laundromat; imagine going out of business because you can't reach a quarter that rolled behind a machine. Plus, it requires some additional cost burdens, such as needing to have an employee on the premises at all times to unload The Four Quarters anytime someone started a machine. Technically, the minimum number of quarters you need to run any coin laundromat is the cost of the most expensive machine, but that's like saying the minimum number of socks you need to get through the week is two. In practice, the laundromat will keep some quarters in reserve, with the exact number reflecting their tolerance for the risk of running out.
The problem with having an onsite quarter reserve is that idle cash has no intrinsic value; in fact, idle cash is costly. The laundromat pays an endless list of hidden costs to hold the extra quarters - it forgoes potential income from savings or investments, buys depreciating equipment for storing the quarters, devotes space in the laundromat solely for storage, and so on. To avoid paying these storage-related costs, a clever owner might pass the burden on to the customer and refuse quarter exchanges, essentially implementing a 'bring your own quarters' policy. Initially, this might be a good idea as each customer ensures a healthy quarter reserve, but since the laundromat's entire revenue now comes exclusively in quarters, it means a lot more work to handle the money compared to collecting revenue in dollar bills. It's going to take more time for the boss to use those quarters to make purchases, pay employees, or even just bring the money to the bank. And if the bank doesn't want to accept a burlap sack full of coins, the owner must budget additional time for rolling quarters (or pay the commission rate imposed by coin sorting machines). 'Bring your own quarters' solves the issue of having reserve quarters in the back room but the eventual cost increase is enormous, measured mostly in longer processing time.
Given the inefficiency of the two extremes, I think it's pretty clear that we'll end up with something in the middle, which was life in February - laundromats have extra coins for exchanges but customers still bring in a few of their own; both parties save time. The system leans on the excesses of our mints and printing presses - there is around $1.5 trillion in circulation, or just over $4,000 per American, which seems like a lot given that I almost never have more than $100 in cash at any one moment. This informal measurement suggests that there might be as much as 40x more cash in circulation than necessary (40x is highly unlikely to be the true factor, but illustrates the larger idea that we have more supply than necessary to complete daily cash transactions). And yet, as we are learning this summer, when it comes to cash we always have plenty of excess capacity... until we don't. But is there a better solution for this current situation than releasing additional cash into circulation?
This cycle is fueled by an underlying problem with our economic system while also serving as a microcosm of it - there is no incentive to produce (or purchase) anything 'just in case'; output (and spending) must have measurable present value. In theory, we buy umbrellas for a rainy day; in practice, we get soaked, then buy two umbrellas for next time. It doesn't seem like a huge deal when we are talking about the way people pay for laundry. But each shortage for something like toilet paper or laundry quarters is further evidence that any sector in our economy which operates with similar free market principles will someday face this issue.
A more serious consideration is ICU capacity. It's too early to say how many people will suffer in this pandemic because their local hospital ran out of treatment capacity; it's certainly unlikely that we won't learn from our errors. But what can we expect based on the history of similar errors? Let's just say I assume whatever happens in the hospitals will stay in the hospitals. Titanic didn't gross $2 billion for its commentary on why no one felt 'just in case' was good enough reason to stock sufficient lifeboats; I suppose we felt the lesson was applied once all ocean liners met modern safety standards. Our laser focus within domains ensures we don't hit the same rock bottom twice; the strict application of lessons within narrow confines suggests every domain will hit rock bottom once. I'm confident there will soon be a push to expand hospital capacity to prepare for future pandemics, but will the lessons extend beyond the healthcare realm? I'm not even sure these lessons will ensure sufficient stockpiles of PPE.
There are very few true surprises; most risks are simply ignored. And yet, we are constantly surprised when things go wrong. So what is going on here? We've seen so far that in a truly efficient setup, the minimum resource requirement can be very low (four coins for the laundromat) yet intuitively we know it's foolish to do anything at the bare minimum (two socks example). We've noted that the balance between survival and excess is controlled mostly by cost considerations (idle cash produces nothing) yet we leave ourselves exposed to risk by prioritizing present cost reductions until the risk harms us; we eventually eliminate the risk with an excessive overreaction (umbrella example). Finally, although we understand all of this in a broad sense, it seems like we don't apply lessons across all domains (the Titanic ensured sufficient excess capacity for lifeboats, but not all other concerns). To put it all into one sentence, we can get by on very little, but we build in some slack just in case, which lulls us into a false sense of security despite history being filled with endless examples demonstrating why this is the first step toward disaster.
This essentially helps us put the coin shortage into proper perspective as part of an ongoing cycle of creating slack, eating it up, and creating more slack, but there is a missing piece in the puzzle - why do we bother using up the slack at all? I think the coin laundromat offers a hint. The system strains from the moment people fear there will not be enough coins to conduct laundry transactions, which means laundry customers might start hoarding quarters in anticipation of a future shortage. But why would people believe in the possibility of a coin shortage? I worked this out by inverting the question - how would someone refute reports of an upcoming coin shortage? The solution is labor-intensive, but I think it's the only way - you would need to talk to enough people until you were convinced that in an absolute pinch you could rely on someone else for quarters (and everyone else could rely on you). This might be feasible in a small neighborhood but in larger communities or disconnected environments it quickly becomes more difficult, then impossible.
I suspect that what happened recently is that a few people saw some patterns, made some associations, and came to fear an upcoming coin shortage. They didn't get the assurances they needed from others - perhaps due to the generally increasing isolation many of us are experiencing thanks to everything associated with COVID - so they decided to look out for themselves and collect some extra coins 'just in case'. And now we have a situation vaguely similar to what we had earlier in the year with toilet paper - plenty in circulation for everyone yet a complicated situation if you ran out.
I think the real story of the coin shortage isn't the same old list of explanations I see in the news coverage. It isn't about offering to accept Venmo from the tooth fairies. It's about trust, or the lack of it; it's about a trust shortage. And in many ways, the trust shortage is causing or exacerbating many of 2020's problems, including the shortages in both coins and toilet paper. As I noted above, there are factors of the economic system at play here - the idea most relevant to this examination is individuality, and it exists in the roots of the system. Individuality means that despite the constant threat of scarcity, people looking out for themselves, driven entirely by self-interest, can weave an intricate tapestry of economic activity through their transactions that ultimately leads to efficient markets and a rising tide for all of us. But in this system - or at least in the models of it that I studied as an undergraduate - there is very little room for trust. If I remember correctly, the only time trust came up was when we studied lemon problems, which implied that trusting others in the market ensured a lifetime of being sold defective goods by shady salesmen.
I hinted at a solution to the coin shortage in small pieces throughout this post. The Four Quarters of the hypothetical laundromat is one way while the exercise of confirming you could rely on all your neighbors is another. Both methods are agreements to share a scarce resource and in this they resemble the theory suggested in the prior paragraph; the difference is that these methods rely on coordination, not market interactions, which means these methods are almost entirely reliant on trust. Another way to think of this is that if my responsibility was to ensure everyone had enough quarters for the laundry just as my neighbors were responsible for ensuring there were enough quarters for me, I'm almost certain there would be no concerns about the coin shortage.
I think when people talk about alternatives to a capitalist system, this is basically what they are talking about - a world where individuals think collectively because they trust the collective will reciprocate and take care of them. A thoughtful analysis of the coin shortage - or the toilet paper rush, or even the challenge of getting everyone to wear a mask - would think more about the role of trust in the problem. Unfortunately, I worry we are too far away from a world of trust to connect these dots, and the trends of 2020 don't offer much hope for an immediate change. But I think developing this mentality of taking care of others because they will take care of you is a crucial long-term goal for humanity. In a community built on trust - which can be as large as a country, or even the world - people will naturally make sacrifices for the greater good because they believe others will do the same. We're not quite there yet; we're not really close. When I think of how much time, money, and energy is wasted each day because of our trust shortage - the result of increasing isolation, polarization, and resentment - I realize we have a lot of work to do before we can repair an economic value system that has no place for trust.
Of course, you don't need me to tell you that although four quarters is a theoretical minimum, this is a very precarious environment for our laundromat; imagine going out of business because you can't reach a quarter that rolled behind a machine. Plus, it requires some additional cost burdens, such as needing to have an employee on the premises at all times to unload The Four Quarters anytime someone started a machine. Technically, the minimum number of quarters you need to run any coin laundromat is the cost of the most expensive machine, but that's like saying the minimum number of socks you need to get through the week is two. In practice, the laundromat will keep some quarters in reserve, with the exact number reflecting their tolerance for the risk of running out.
The problem with having an onsite quarter reserve is that idle cash has no intrinsic value; in fact, idle cash is costly. The laundromat pays an endless list of hidden costs to hold the extra quarters - it forgoes potential income from savings or investments, buys depreciating equipment for storing the quarters, devotes space in the laundromat solely for storage, and so on. To avoid paying these storage-related costs, a clever owner might pass the burden on to the customer and refuse quarter exchanges, essentially implementing a 'bring your own quarters' policy. Initially, this might be a good idea as each customer ensures a healthy quarter reserve, but since the laundromat's entire revenue now comes exclusively in quarters, it means a lot more work to handle the money compared to collecting revenue in dollar bills. It's going to take more time for the boss to use those quarters to make purchases, pay employees, or even just bring the money to the bank. And if the bank doesn't want to accept a burlap sack full of coins, the owner must budget additional time for rolling quarters (or pay the commission rate imposed by coin sorting machines). 'Bring your own quarters' solves the issue of having reserve quarters in the back room but the eventual cost increase is enormous, measured mostly in longer processing time.
Given the inefficiency of the two extremes, I think it's pretty clear that we'll end up with something in the middle, which was life in February - laundromats have extra coins for exchanges but customers still bring in a few of their own; both parties save time. The system leans on the excesses of our mints and printing presses - there is around $1.5 trillion in circulation, or just over $4,000 per American, which seems like a lot given that I almost never have more than $100 in cash at any one moment. This informal measurement suggests that there might be as much as 40x more cash in circulation than necessary (40x is highly unlikely to be the true factor, but illustrates the larger idea that we have more supply than necessary to complete daily cash transactions). And yet, as we are learning this summer, when it comes to cash we always have plenty of excess capacity... until we don't. But is there a better solution for this current situation than releasing additional cash into circulation?
This cycle is fueled by an underlying problem with our economic system while also serving as a microcosm of it - there is no incentive to produce (or purchase) anything 'just in case'; output (and spending) must have measurable present value. In theory, we buy umbrellas for a rainy day; in practice, we get soaked, then buy two umbrellas for next time. It doesn't seem like a huge deal when we are talking about the way people pay for laundry. But each shortage for something like toilet paper or laundry quarters is further evidence that any sector in our economy which operates with similar free market principles will someday face this issue.
A more serious consideration is ICU capacity. It's too early to say how many people will suffer in this pandemic because their local hospital ran out of treatment capacity; it's certainly unlikely that we won't learn from our errors. But what can we expect based on the history of similar errors? Let's just say I assume whatever happens in the hospitals will stay in the hospitals. Titanic didn't gross $2 billion for its commentary on why no one felt 'just in case' was good enough reason to stock sufficient lifeboats; I suppose we felt the lesson was applied once all ocean liners met modern safety standards. Our laser focus within domains ensures we don't hit the same rock bottom twice; the strict application of lessons within narrow confines suggests every domain will hit rock bottom once. I'm confident there will soon be a push to expand hospital capacity to prepare for future pandemics, but will the lessons extend beyond the healthcare realm? I'm not even sure these lessons will ensure sufficient stockpiles of PPE.
There are very few true surprises; most risks are simply ignored. And yet, we are constantly surprised when things go wrong. So what is going on here? We've seen so far that in a truly efficient setup, the minimum resource requirement can be very low (four coins for the laundromat) yet intuitively we know it's foolish to do anything at the bare minimum (two socks example). We've noted that the balance between survival and excess is controlled mostly by cost considerations (idle cash produces nothing) yet we leave ourselves exposed to risk by prioritizing present cost reductions until the risk harms us; we eventually eliminate the risk with an excessive overreaction (umbrella example). Finally, although we understand all of this in a broad sense, it seems like we don't apply lessons across all domains (the Titanic ensured sufficient excess capacity for lifeboats, but not all other concerns). To put it all into one sentence, we can get by on very little, but we build in some slack just in case, which lulls us into a false sense of security despite history being filled with endless examples demonstrating why this is the first step toward disaster.
This essentially helps us put the coin shortage into proper perspective as part of an ongoing cycle of creating slack, eating it up, and creating more slack, but there is a missing piece in the puzzle - why do we bother using up the slack at all? I think the coin laundromat offers a hint. The system strains from the moment people fear there will not be enough coins to conduct laundry transactions, which means laundry customers might start hoarding quarters in anticipation of a future shortage. But why would people believe in the possibility of a coin shortage? I worked this out by inverting the question - how would someone refute reports of an upcoming coin shortage? The solution is labor-intensive, but I think it's the only way - you would need to talk to enough people until you were convinced that in an absolute pinch you could rely on someone else for quarters (and everyone else could rely on you). This might be feasible in a small neighborhood but in larger communities or disconnected environments it quickly becomes more difficult, then impossible.
I suspect that what happened recently is that a few people saw some patterns, made some associations, and came to fear an upcoming coin shortage. They didn't get the assurances they needed from others - perhaps due to the generally increasing isolation many of us are experiencing thanks to everything associated with COVID - so they decided to look out for themselves and collect some extra coins 'just in case'. And now we have a situation vaguely similar to what we had earlier in the year with toilet paper - plenty in circulation for everyone yet a complicated situation if you ran out.
I think the real story of the coin shortage isn't the same old list of explanations I see in the news coverage. It isn't about offering to accept Venmo from the tooth fairies. It's about trust, or the lack of it; it's about a trust shortage. And in many ways, the trust shortage is causing or exacerbating many of 2020's problems, including the shortages in both coins and toilet paper. As I noted above, there are factors of the economic system at play here - the idea most relevant to this examination is individuality, and it exists in the roots of the system. Individuality means that despite the constant threat of scarcity, people looking out for themselves, driven entirely by self-interest, can weave an intricate tapestry of economic activity through their transactions that ultimately leads to efficient markets and a rising tide for all of us. But in this system - or at least in the models of it that I studied as an undergraduate - there is very little room for trust. If I remember correctly, the only time trust came up was when we studied lemon problems, which implied that trusting others in the market ensured a lifetime of being sold defective goods by shady salesmen.
I hinted at a solution to the coin shortage in small pieces throughout this post. The Four Quarters of the hypothetical laundromat is one way while the exercise of confirming you could rely on all your neighbors is another. Both methods are agreements to share a scarce resource and in this they resemble the theory suggested in the prior paragraph; the difference is that these methods rely on coordination, not market interactions, which means these methods are almost entirely reliant on trust. Another way to think of this is that if my responsibility was to ensure everyone had enough quarters for the laundry just as my neighbors were responsible for ensuring there were enough quarters for me, I'm almost certain there would be no concerns about the coin shortage.
I think when people talk about alternatives to a capitalist system, this is basically what they are talking about - a world where individuals think collectively because they trust the collective will reciprocate and take care of them. A thoughtful analysis of the coin shortage - or the toilet paper rush, or even the challenge of getting everyone to wear a mask - would think more about the role of trust in the problem. Unfortunately, I worry we are too far away from a world of trust to connect these dots, and the trends of 2020 don't offer much hope for an immediate change. But I think developing this mentality of taking care of others because they will take care of you is a crucial long-term goal for humanity. In a community built on trust - which can be as large as a country, or even the world - people will naturally make sacrifices for the greater good because they believe others will do the same. We're not quite there yet; we're not really close. When I think of how much time, money, and energy is wasted each day because of our trust shortage - the result of increasing isolation, polarization, and resentment - I realize we have a lot of work to do before we can repair an economic value system that has no place for trust.
Saturday, August 22, 2020
the aliens are already here
I've always been amused by fears of an alien invasion because it's based on the assumption of a united extraterrestrial species. I don't know why people make this assumption. As I recall first reading in the Animorphs series, there is only one known species that could organize an invasion of another planet - humans - and we spend our time waging war among ourselves.
We happily label each other aliens based on facts of birthplace or administrative processes. So why do we expect differently of Yoda or E.T.? Species unity seems a bigger advance than ray guns or space travel at light speed. I imagine our neighbors on Pluto look at us with the same repulsed fascination we reserve for militaristic ant colonies, and apply the same intervention strategy - watching these little idiots from afar will do just fine, thanks.
We happily label each other aliens based on facts of birthplace or administrative processes. So why do we expect differently of Yoda or E.T.? Species unity seems a bigger advance than ray guns or space travel at light speed. I imagine our neighbors on Pluto look at us with the same repulsed fascination we reserve for militaristic ant colonies, and apply the same intervention strategy - watching these little idiots from afar will do just fine, thanks.
Friday, August 21, 2020
toa rewind - two pods and a lie (october 2017)
I'm considering using Fridays to share recommendations to podcasts, videos, and articles. While I continue deliberating, here's an old post that describes three strong podcast episodes (and here's the follow-up where I belatedly provided those links, and offer a sarcastic editorial comment about global warming).
These three ideas have stuck with me. The cash flow concept is particularly relevant today due to the way COVID-19 induced lockdowns have instantly shortened the time frames for many businesses. Most ventures are viable in the long-term but the rent is due tomorrow; any fool can calculate 'profitable' (hint, revenue minus cost, hint) so why do so many businesses fail? My gut suggests that if I could only use one quality to assess a person's ability to run a business, I would pick the person's understanding of cash flow.
These three ideas have stuck with me. The cash flow concept is particularly relevant today due to the way COVID-19 induced lockdowns have instantly shortened the time frames for many businesses. Most ventures are viable in the long-term but the rent is due tomorrow; any fool can calculate 'profitable' (hint, revenue minus cost, hint) so why do so many businesses fail? My gut suggests that if I could only use one quality to assess a person's ability to run a business, I would pick the person's understanding of cash flow.
Thursday, August 20, 2020
close enough to write
Careful readers will recall that while in the process of writing the August newsletter I learned that bandanna was spelled with double n's. But of course, this isn't really true, since it's spelled bandana.
Right?
I decided to see if Google could help me, but all I got was 180 million answers, the number of results returned for bandana; the bandanna search variant returns a measly 183 million links, so I suppose it remains the 'correct' spelling by a narrow margin. Of course, like any good American I know that a simple majority tally means nothing. So, I spent the better part of the last five minutes doing some research to see if I could find the equivalent of an electoral college for this Spelling Decision 2020. My research suggests the official spelling is indeed bandanna, so if you are preparing for any spelling bees (spelling b's?) I advise a double-n on that second 'n'. But I also found plenty of voices insisting that bandana is becoming more common (and not just because people are forgetting how to spell); you can safely type in bandana when browsing websites like Amazon, which returns over 100 thousand results regardless of the spelling.
I am in favor of such trends. Language is merely a representation of how we communicate with each other; as our communication changes, so must its representation. I still remember the day I learned "before" was equally comprehensible when written as "b4". This spelling had nothing to do with merely combining a letter and a number, both of which had always existed; the catalyst was how the internet chat medium prized speed and brevity above all other concerns. The trend continued unchecked as texting became commonplace; emojis smirk in the faces of those who criticize logographic languages. The rapid acceptance of smiley faces and their endless variants as suitable forms of communication suggests a golden rule for writing - the right way is whatever gets the message across.
It's telling that Amazon and Google, two of the world's most valuable companies, have no problem accepting bandana; in a sense, their businesses rely on customers getting the message across. They know that most ideas can be communicated in multiple ways and they know that most ideas are valuable; if bandana works for them, it should work for me. People are not making typing errors when they type bandana; a word taking a new spelling is an olde story. But unlike in the past - when each person who questioned bandanna's gluttonous hoarding of n's was marked down on the report card and told to get back in line - we are now equipped with the internet, which counts among its many capabilities the power to unite spelling rebels in its endless war against inefficiency. It's possible that in a couple hundred years languages everywhere will have become transformed by an unprecedented number of new spellings, driven largely by the internet and its power to collect and share new ideas.
Broadly speaking, I recommend that everyone learn the grammar rules and try to use correct spellings. But I wouldn't gofarther than further than beyond that, particularly with spelling. It's not just that I have personal views on the matter, which I may cover later this summer - it's that I suspect we are at the start of a major transformation in the way confusing words are spelled (and these would be the only ones worth memorizing). The idea of learning the 'correct' spelling for so many words seems to me like a waste of time when the internet is dramatically tilting the playing field to favor speed over precision; in this new world, the correct spelling includes any variant that can be attributed to one intention. They say close only counts in horse races and hand grenades, or something like that; I'll have to Google it, because I know it counts there, too.
Right?
I decided to see if Google could help me, but all I got was 180 million answers, the number of results returned for bandana; the bandanna search variant returns a measly 183 million links, so I suppose it remains the 'correct' spelling by a narrow margin. Of course, like any good American I know that a simple majority tally means nothing. So, I spent the better part of the last five minutes doing some research to see if I could find the equivalent of an electoral college for this Spelling Decision 2020. My research suggests the official spelling is indeed bandanna, so if you are preparing for any spelling bees (spelling b's?) I advise a double-n on that second 'n'. But I also found plenty of voices insisting that bandana is becoming more common (and not just because people are forgetting how to spell); you can safely type in bandana when browsing websites like Amazon, which returns over 100 thousand results regardless of the spelling.
I am in favor of such trends. Language is merely a representation of how we communicate with each other; as our communication changes, so must its representation. I still remember the day I learned "before" was equally comprehensible when written as "b4". This spelling had nothing to do with merely combining a letter and a number, both of which had always existed; the catalyst was how the internet chat medium prized speed and brevity above all other concerns. The trend continued unchecked as texting became commonplace; emojis smirk in the faces of those who criticize logographic languages. The rapid acceptance of smiley faces and their endless variants as suitable forms of communication suggests a golden rule for writing - the right way is whatever gets the message across.
It's telling that Amazon and Google, two of the world's most valuable companies, have no problem accepting bandana; in a sense, their businesses rely on customers getting the message across. They know that most ideas can be communicated in multiple ways and they know that most ideas are valuable; if bandana works for them, it should work for me. People are not making typing errors when they type bandana; a word taking a new spelling is an olde story. But unlike in the past - when each person who questioned bandanna's gluttonous hoarding of n's was marked down on the report card and told to get back in line - we are now equipped with the internet, which counts among its many capabilities the power to unite spelling rebels in its endless war against inefficiency. It's possible that in a couple hundred years languages everywhere will have become transformed by an unprecedented number of new spellings, driven largely by the internet and its power to collect and share new ideas.
Broadly speaking, I recommend that everyone learn the grammar rules and try to use correct spellings. But I wouldn't go
Wednesday, August 19, 2020
proper corona admin, vol 78 - the quitter
A (former) colleague quit her job last week. We didn't work closely but we had collaborated on a couple of projects. She had a video 'going away drinks' on her last day where she remarked to the group that, for her, quitting a job during the pandemic just meant that on Monday she would log into a different video chat. It was, in my mind, perhaps the strangest observation I've heard - so far - on the new reality of this pandemic
Tuesday, August 18, 2020
proper lab-min, august 2020
I have a few irons in the proverbial fire at the moment but nothing ready to go today, so for now let's have a peek behind the curtain and see what's simmering on the TOA back-burners.
The best advice of the pandemic
I read on a training page about a marathon runner who always walks through the water stations. I think this is critical advice for many runners - especially those like me who are prone to overdoing it from time to time - but the underlying wisdom in the idea is that we all generally struggle to stop, and maybe learning how to stop would make a world of difference.
Lately, I notice this lesson playing out in the little daily interactions of pandemic life. Most people walking toward each other seem perfectly happy to veer far out of the way to avoid a close pass; sometimes one person steps into the street. But this solution allows for continuous movement, which I suspect is relevant. My suspicion is that we much prefer to go the long way around when the alternative is stopping and letting someone go first. In fact, I often see people brush past each other on the sidewalk, well within the danger zone of corona transmission, when if one or the other had simply stopped - sometimes just for two seconds - safe passage for all could have been assured.
Teaching Van Persie syndrome
I wrote a few years ago about Robin Van Persie, a forward for Arsenal who made a controversial transfer to Manchester United at the tail end of his prime. Many wondered why he would switch from a very good team to a slightly better team; a couple of years later, Kevin Durant make a similar decision in the NBA.
My main point was that Van Persie left because he realized that at Arsenal he would stagnate as the best player whereas at Manchester United he would improve, spurred on by the slightly higher quality of teammate in his new squad. I think many of us have heard a version of this thinking - if you are the smartest person in a room, go find another room. I fear this is a pretty standard way of thinking, and explains why certain institutions are eroding. This might be particularly true in teaching because this is a terrible attitude for teachers, whose response should be to stay in the room until everyone else is just as smart.
UFOs
For some reason, when people talk about UFOs they don't talk about possibilities like aliens arriving with a cure for cancer or Yoda planting a giant tree that converts greenhouse gases to clean air. No, it's always an invasion with ray guns and laser missiles. Why? Is it just because conspiracy theorists overcompensate for a lack of imagination with pattern recognition skills?
Advice for Dave Chappelle
The '8:46' special was one of the most remarkable performances of the pandemic, but I have some feedback regarding his use of certain slurs. In short, show (by telling) don't tell (by using labels).
The race to Racist Joe
The Washington Football Team announced its new name on July 13 in a short statement. I don't think anyone was surprised by this announcement, demonstrating that when it comes to change it's almost always a matter of when, not if. I think Trader Joe's has reached this point. An online petition demanding the grocery store chain remove racist branding from its stores received thousands of signatures and forced the supermarket to consider the possibility; it eventually announced that it would not make any changes to its brand names, disputing the claim of racism.
The only thing that is certain to me is that these brands will eventually change because thousands of people never accidentally agree that a corporate brand is racist. The crowd is small today but its ranks will swell in the coming years. For now, these labels join other 'when not if' candidates such as Christopher Columbus Park in the North End and sports teams that have yet to follow Washington's example. In the meantime, I'm working out my own thinking about Trader Joe's, particularly because I've long referred to it, jokingly, as "Racist Joe's" without ever understanding why those words came to mind in the first place.
Reading reviws
These are piling up again thanks to the reopening of local libraries. I may try to write a full post for each book, but I'm considering a return to old ways for some books, writing about them in groups of three or four when I don't have too much to say about my reading experience.
Can we trust TOA?
Longtime readers may recall that I did a similar exercise back in April with mixed follow through - I wrote about some things but I never got around to the others. Who knows? No promises with today's list, but I assure you I am working on all of the above.
Until then, masks on, and maybe stop here and there when the situation calls for it.
Thanks for reading.
The best advice of the pandemic
I read on a training page about a marathon runner who always walks through the water stations. I think this is critical advice for many runners - especially those like me who are prone to overdoing it from time to time - but the underlying wisdom in the idea is that we all generally struggle to stop, and maybe learning how to stop would make a world of difference.
Lately, I notice this lesson playing out in the little daily interactions of pandemic life. Most people walking toward each other seem perfectly happy to veer far out of the way to avoid a close pass; sometimes one person steps into the street. But this solution allows for continuous movement, which I suspect is relevant. My suspicion is that we much prefer to go the long way around when the alternative is stopping and letting someone go first. In fact, I often see people brush past each other on the sidewalk, well within the danger zone of corona transmission, when if one or the other had simply stopped - sometimes just for two seconds - safe passage for all could have been assured.
Teaching Van Persie syndrome
I wrote a few years ago about Robin Van Persie, a forward for Arsenal who made a controversial transfer to Manchester United at the tail end of his prime. Many wondered why he would switch from a very good team to a slightly better team; a couple of years later, Kevin Durant make a similar decision in the NBA.
My main point was that Van Persie left because he realized that at Arsenal he would stagnate as the best player whereas at Manchester United he would improve, spurred on by the slightly higher quality of teammate in his new squad. I think many of us have heard a version of this thinking - if you are the smartest person in a room, go find another room. I fear this is a pretty standard way of thinking, and explains why certain institutions are eroding. This might be particularly true in teaching because this is a terrible attitude for teachers, whose response should be to stay in the room until everyone else is just as smart.
UFOs
For some reason, when people talk about UFOs they don't talk about possibilities like aliens arriving with a cure for cancer or Yoda planting a giant tree that converts greenhouse gases to clean air. No, it's always an invasion with ray guns and laser missiles. Why? Is it just because conspiracy theorists overcompensate for a lack of imagination with pattern recognition skills?
Advice for Dave Chappelle
The '8:46' special was one of the most remarkable performances of the pandemic, but I have some feedback regarding his use of certain slurs. In short, show (by telling) don't tell (by using labels).
The race to Racist Joe
The Washington Football Team announced its new name on July 13 in a short statement. I don't think anyone was surprised by this announcement, demonstrating that when it comes to change it's almost always a matter of when, not if. I think Trader Joe's has reached this point. An online petition demanding the grocery store chain remove racist branding from its stores received thousands of signatures and forced the supermarket to consider the possibility; it eventually announced that it would not make any changes to its brand names, disputing the claim of racism.
The only thing that is certain to me is that these brands will eventually change because thousands of people never accidentally agree that a corporate brand is racist. The crowd is small today but its ranks will swell in the coming years. For now, these labels join other 'when not if' candidates such as Christopher Columbus Park in the North End and sports teams that have yet to follow Washington's example. In the meantime, I'm working out my own thinking about Trader Joe's, particularly because I've long referred to it, jokingly, as "Racist Joe's" without ever understanding why those words came to mind in the first place.
Reading reviws
These are piling up again thanks to the reopening of local libraries. I may try to write a full post for each book, but I'm considering a return to old ways for some books, writing about them in groups of three or four when I don't have too much to say about my reading experience.
Can we trust TOA?
Longtime readers may recall that I did a similar exercise back in April with mixed follow through - I wrote about some things but I never got around to the others. Who knows? No promises with today's list, but I assure you I am working on all of the above.
Until then, masks on, and maybe stop here and there when the situation calls for it.
Thanks for reading.
Monday, August 17, 2020
toa rewind - the crow's nest (july 2017)
This wasn't my most polished bit of writing but the overall message feels very relevant to me in this current moment. If you know best, you'll tell others, and expect them to follow your expert guidance, wisdom, and advice; you forget how people learn, change, and grow.
Sunday, August 16, 2020
sixes and sevens, part three - my last two cents
The scope of 'Sixes and Sevens' was originally far more ambitious than a few hundred words about major felonies like honking at pedestrians while blocking a bike lane, but when I tried to get everything into one post it didn't quite work. I tried again a month later to capture some of those remaining ideas, but I unfortunately succumbed to the temptation of rolling out my Annual Rant Against Car Culture. Maybe today, the third time will be the charm.
The starting point was indeed a moment of confusion on the bridge. I was all sixes and sevens, as they say elsewhere, while I watched car after car zipping by a radar sign as it announced speeding verdicts - often fifteen or twenty miles per hour over the limit - for almost every passing vehicle. A few minutes later, a turning bus nearly pancaked me as I walked across Beacon Street, raising my temper as it lowered my confusion; speeding through an intersection doesn't mean speeding, but speeding surely normalizes the act of breaking other motor vehicle laws.
The thing that hit me much later - weeks after that first post where I so casually mentioned a ghost bike - was that I might actually have been leveled by that bus had the exact same moment happened ten years ago. Back then, the intersection was like most others in that the design didn't protect the cars, bikes, and pedestrians from each other; lives were ruined, inevitably and needlessly, as some died. The intersection has changed visibly to incorporate safety features and encourage Boston-bound drivers to slow down; these alterations surely made the difference, and allowed me to walk home, alive and unharmed.
So, who is to blame for my survival? I think it's a result of a cultural collision, Car Culture meeting Cycling Culture, which prevented my collision with a bus. On one side, we have decades of drivers accepting national road fatalities in excess of thirty thousand per year; the bikers on the other side unreasonably demand zero deaths. In Boston, it seems that each collision results in a small change that makes a road slightly safer - examples include plastic partitions that separate cyclists from bridge traffic, lights that signal 'early release' for bikes across busy intersections, and fresh coats of paint that reinforce existing bike lanes. It's the crux of any cultural clash, or maybe a natural consequence of collisions - with no possibility of maintaining order, the law rewrites itself.
These changes are so incremental it's hard to point to one tangible result, but as I noted above I feel that something added up in a critical way for me. It takes a long time before anyone can notice the effect of steady progress. It often comes after many years of raising lone voices until they can be collectively heard, and counted. I guess there is nothing impressive about any one person's two cents, but suppose everyone in America sent a couple of pennies to one bank account tomorrow - the impact for that recipient would be staggering. Of course, the reality is that most of us step over many pennies a day, literally in the sense of coins left underfoot, figuratively each time we keep silent about a problem; as long as there remains no understanding of just how little change is required to transform someone's world, I fear our world will remain shortchanged for us all.
The starting point was indeed a moment of confusion on the bridge. I was all sixes and sevens, as they say elsewhere, while I watched car after car zipping by a radar sign as it announced speeding verdicts - often fifteen or twenty miles per hour over the limit - for almost every passing vehicle. A few minutes later, a turning bus nearly pancaked me as I walked across Beacon Street, raising my temper as it lowered my confusion; speeding through an intersection doesn't mean speeding, but speeding surely normalizes the act of breaking other motor vehicle laws.
The thing that hit me much later - weeks after that first post where I so casually mentioned a ghost bike - was that I might actually have been leveled by that bus had the exact same moment happened ten years ago. Back then, the intersection was like most others in that the design didn't protect the cars, bikes, and pedestrians from each other; lives were ruined, inevitably and needlessly, as some died. The intersection has changed visibly to incorporate safety features and encourage Boston-bound drivers to slow down; these alterations surely made the difference, and allowed me to walk home, alive and unharmed.
So, who is to blame for my survival? I think it's a result of a cultural collision, Car Culture meeting Cycling Culture, which prevented my collision with a bus. On one side, we have decades of drivers accepting national road fatalities in excess of thirty thousand per year; the bikers on the other side unreasonably demand zero deaths. In Boston, it seems that each collision results in a small change that makes a road slightly safer - examples include plastic partitions that separate cyclists from bridge traffic, lights that signal 'early release' for bikes across busy intersections, and fresh coats of paint that reinforce existing bike lanes. It's the crux of any cultural clash, or maybe a natural consequence of collisions - with no possibility of maintaining order, the law rewrites itself.
These changes are so incremental it's hard to point to one tangible result, but as I noted above I feel that something added up in a critical way for me. It takes a long time before anyone can notice the effect of steady progress. It often comes after many years of raising lone voices until they can be collectively heard, and counted. I guess there is nothing impressive about any one person's two cents, but suppose everyone in America sent a couple of pennies to one bank account tomorrow - the impact for that recipient would be staggering. Of course, the reality is that most of us step over many pennies a day, literally in the sense of coins left underfoot, figuratively each time we keep silent about a problem; as long as there remains no understanding of just how little change is required to transform someone's world, I fear our world will remain shortchanged for us all.
Saturday, August 15, 2020
leftovers - reading review, the game
I've linked this article in the past - a piece Dryden wrote for Grantland that still resonates with me today. I especially like the following quote:
The best part is in the final portion - 'to fight expectation and disappointment'. In any discussion of toughness, perseverance, and grit, I feel these elements are commonly overlooked or excluded; I've always appreciated Dryden's acknowledgment of these most relevant obstacles, and his suggestion that they remain very real even if most of us pretend we are above such emotion.
"The toughest players aren’t those who hit but those who are willing to be hit, to fight their way into open ice, to fight their way to the net, to fight expectation and disappointment to score the game-changing goal."
The best part is in the final portion - 'to fight expectation and disappointment'. In any discussion of toughness, perseverance, and grit, I feel these elements are commonly overlooked or excluded; I've always appreciated Dryden's acknowledgment of these most relevant obstacles, and his suggestion that they remain very real even if most of us pretend we are above such emotion.
Friday, August 14, 2020
a nation of immigrants
I've heard throughout my life that America is a nation of immigrants. This is based on the experiences of many millions of people who came to these shores to carve out their own piece of the American dream. I am a certain kind of immigrant myself, at least if you splice the definition along reasonable yet specific lines, so it's understand why in the past this 'nation of immigrants' idea held a certain appeal to me.
These days, though, I'm not so sure that this is a correct idea. Many people are here with no ancestral connection to immigration. In some cases, their ancestors arrived in chains; for others, their ancestors were already here, before being forced out. A nation of immigrants? I think it's best to retire the expression from my vocabulary.
These days, though, I'm not so sure that this is a correct idea. Many people are here with no ancestral connection to immigration. In some cases, their ancestors arrived in chains; for others, their ancestors were already here, before being forced out. A nation of immigrants? I think it's best to retire the expression from my vocabulary.
Thursday, August 13, 2020
pointless
The odd thing about using my free time to write essays is that I always hated writing assignments. I remember being awake at 3AM during my junior year of high school, trying to finish an anthology project. I finally wrote a silly poem about the ticking clock, writer's block, and agony; I was never happier to finish my homework. This continued in college, when I signed up for courses in short fiction and freelance writing. I liked both classes, but these were cases of making the most of my electives; I don't remember enjoying the writing.
There is a similar opening act to my running story - young me, he never liked running. If a coach needed a punishment, extra running was 100% effective; I basically quit helmet football because of the vindictive, pointless sprints. But I know when the tide turned with running. I returned to Japan during the summer after my sophomore year and ran without a clear objective for the first time in my life. I simply ran, guided by a vague notion to get in better shape while exploring the foreign cities, towns, and countrysides of home. Running finally made sense. When I returned to basketball practice that fall, I found myself entirely unaffected by the once-dreaded conditioning tests, or by punishment sprints; it was just running, and since I knew how to do it, I liked it.
I guess it's no surprise that a similar thing has become true of writing. At some point in the past few years, I found myself writing without prompting, and it finally made sense. There were some vague notions of killing time between jobs, organizing my thinking, or becoming famous enough to be canceled, but for the most part I was just writing. I agree with the many who have noted that unstructured, unorganized time is critical to developing creative skills; I'd like to know what the experts anticipate when the only exposure to an activity is via structured, organized time.
There is a similar opening act to my running story - young me, he never liked running. If a coach needed a punishment, extra running was 100% effective; I basically quit helmet football because of the vindictive, pointless sprints. But I know when the tide turned with running. I returned to Japan during the summer after my sophomore year and ran without a clear objective for the first time in my life. I simply ran, guided by a vague notion to get in better shape while exploring the foreign cities, towns, and countrysides of home. Running finally made sense. When I returned to basketball practice that fall, I found myself entirely unaffected by the once-dreaded conditioning tests, or by punishment sprints; it was just running, and since I knew how to do it, I liked it.
I guess it's no surprise that a similar thing has become true of writing. At some point in the past few years, I found myself writing without prompting, and it finally made sense. There were some vague notions of killing time between jobs, organizing my thinking, or becoming famous enough to be canceled, but for the most part I was just writing. I agree with the many who have noted that unstructured, unorganized time is critical to developing creative skills; I'd like to know what the experts anticipate when the only exposure to an activity is via structured, organized time.
Wednesday, August 12, 2020
proper corona admin, vol 77 - this solution stinks
I've been amused at various times during the pandemic when my observations intersect with national or even global news items. For example, I've recently noticed more nickels and dimes in my loose change after shopping at Haymarket, which aligns with stories about a national 'coin shortage'. There are also those stories about deodorant sales being down, a report that passes (by failing) my sniff test.
But suggestions that venturing into public without deodorant as a social distancing 'tactic' has the aroma of being too clever for its own good. Isn't losing the sense of smell one of the COVID-19 symptoms? It seems like this strategy would work around healthy folks but fail to prevent the infected from wandering into your vicinity; I'm open to other strategies, but in the meantime let's stick with the masks, reduced gathering sizes, and running blindly into the street to get around any unmasked idiot.
But suggestions that venturing into public without deodorant as a social distancing 'tactic' has the aroma of being too clever for its own good. Isn't losing the sense of smell one of the COVID-19 symptoms? It seems like this strategy would work around healthy folks but fail to prevent the infected from wandering into your vicinity; I'm open to other strategies, but in the meantime let's stick with the masks, reduced gathering sizes, and running blindly into the street to get around any unmasked idiot.
Tuesday, August 11, 2020
reading review - the game
Ken Dryden's 1983 classic weaves a memoir of his hockey career around the narrative frame of one week late in his farewell season. He glides easily from commentary to recollection, each story illuminating another aspect of his thinking about leadership, teamwork, and life. I first read it in 2011 and thought it was great; I returned to it in 2014 and was moved enough to include it TOA's 'Life Changing Books' series. A year later, I mentioned it in my shortlist of "best books I've ever read".
Despite my prior rave reviews, improbably it seems that the third time is the charm in a certain sense - when I finished reading The Game in May, I gave serious consideration to buying books. It would be a fitting tribute for this book - the first that I started (rather than continued) reading during lockdown - because it lifted me out of a hugely problematic reading rut; I realized in the process that there is immense value in having my favorite books always within touching distance.
The Game by Ken Dryden (May 2020)
Dryden sets the tone early, noting that the distance of time or space often allows observers to see the clearest picture. He uses the vantage point afforded by his impending retirement to look around and understand his career, which had nearly hurtled past him during a dizzying, decorated decade. The most significant theme in the book is the idea that success can quickly become an enemy of future success. He points out that accomplished people are susceptible to losing patience for repeating the same grueling work that once took them to the summit; he observes how teams will explain away a slipping standard by appropriating excuses for poor performances, perhaps to cushion a fall only they can see coming. His most intriguing comment about this topic was that at the top of a profession qualities often become symptoms of each other (the generalized example being the Business Bro truism that an overused strength will eventually become a weakness).
Of course, even the most diligent, dedicated competitor will eventually come down from his or her perch. In sports, the realities of age are the great equalizer. Athletes inevitably reach a career stage where they are no longer able to continue improving, instead devoting their energies to maintaining a playing level; a few seasons later, merely breaking even becomes impossible. Dryden's exploration of this reality is the treasure chest of The Game, and suggests that the label of 'sports book' sets the wrong expectations. The inevitability of mourning the slow and steady accumulation of losses is the not merely a game, but the game of life; as a professional athlete he experienced the shuddering fact many decades earlier than the average person, and as a writer he brings us face-to-face with the reckoning.
The aspect of this book I've always found particularly relevant given my own interests is Dryden's wisdom about building strong teams. The observation that a great team must ultimately police itself is incredibly powerful, perhaps so much so that it will scare those who prefer discipline via rules, regulations, and policies. But a team is first and foremost about a shared feeling, one Dryden notes as being something those outside the group could not understand, and therefore nothing is better positioned to protect the team ethos than the equilibrium established by the team members. The most important consideration is one he expresses in this book using the language of laissez-faire economics - nonintervention is itself a form of intervention, and often brings about its own set of consequences.
There were a couple of stray ideas that caught my eye despite falling outside the larger arcs of the book. Dryden identifies unstructured and unorganized time as vital for developing creative skills, a comment made in the context of hockey that remains relevant in the widest application of the creativity concept. He also notes that the past can do no more than offer clues for how to return to successful ways, but never guidance; life changes far too quickly for recycling blueprints. Finally, I thought it was an important reminder that old age means requiring more time for everything - movement, conversation, even thinking. The failure to adapt within the confines of this reality is the most common challenge I've noticed when I've had the opportunity to train new hospice volunteers - particularly those around my age.
TOA Power Rating: Three penalty boxes out of four.
Despite my prior rave reviews, improbably it seems that the third time is the charm in a certain sense - when I finished reading The Game in May, I gave serious consideration to buying books. It would be a fitting tribute for this book - the first that I started (rather than continued) reading during lockdown - because it lifted me out of a hugely problematic reading rut; I realized in the process that there is immense value in having my favorite books always within touching distance.
The Game by Ken Dryden (May 2020)
Dryden sets the tone early, noting that the distance of time or space often allows observers to see the clearest picture. He uses the vantage point afforded by his impending retirement to look around and understand his career, which had nearly hurtled past him during a dizzying, decorated decade. The most significant theme in the book is the idea that success can quickly become an enemy of future success. He points out that accomplished people are susceptible to losing patience for repeating the same grueling work that once took them to the summit; he observes how teams will explain away a slipping standard by appropriating excuses for poor performances, perhaps to cushion a fall only they can see coming. His most intriguing comment about this topic was that at the top of a profession qualities often become symptoms of each other (the generalized example being the Business Bro truism that an overused strength will eventually become a weakness).
Of course, even the most diligent, dedicated competitor will eventually come down from his or her perch. In sports, the realities of age are the great equalizer. Athletes inevitably reach a career stage where they are no longer able to continue improving, instead devoting their energies to maintaining a playing level; a few seasons later, merely breaking even becomes impossible. Dryden's exploration of this reality is the treasure chest of The Game, and suggests that the label of 'sports book' sets the wrong expectations. The inevitability of mourning the slow and steady accumulation of losses is the not merely a game, but the game of life; as a professional athlete he experienced the shuddering fact many decades earlier than the average person, and as a writer he brings us face-to-face with the reckoning.
The aspect of this book I've always found particularly relevant given my own interests is Dryden's wisdom about building strong teams. The observation that a great team must ultimately police itself is incredibly powerful, perhaps so much so that it will scare those who prefer discipline via rules, regulations, and policies. But a team is first and foremost about a shared feeling, one Dryden notes as being something those outside the group could not understand, and therefore nothing is better positioned to protect the team ethos than the equilibrium established by the team members. The most important consideration is one he expresses in this book using the language of laissez-faire economics - nonintervention is itself a form of intervention, and often brings about its own set of consequences.
There were a couple of stray ideas that caught my eye despite falling outside the larger arcs of the book. Dryden identifies unstructured and unorganized time as vital for developing creative skills, a comment made in the context of hockey that remains relevant in the widest application of the creativity concept. He also notes that the past can do no more than offer clues for how to return to successful ways, but never guidance; life changes far too quickly for recycling blueprints. Finally, I thought it was an important reminder that old age means requiring more time for everything - movement, conversation, even thinking. The failure to adapt within the confines of this reality is the most common challenge I've noticed when I've had the opportunity to train new hospice volunteers - particularly those around my age.
TOA Power Rating: Three penalty boxes out of four.
Monday, August 10, 2020
toa rewind - jerry jones, nigerian prince (december 2018)
Note, the friend who spawned this post did point to a specific person but it was not Jerry Jones; I actually don't remember how I picked my title. My hunch is that since it was December, I likely had just seen him on TV during a helmet football telecast. Looking back, maybe I could have found a better example, but it probably would have resulted in a worse title.
Anyway, here it is, a TOA classic, in the sense that I dig deep into the math until I can make up an answer to a pointless question. And if you really like to crunch those numbers/letters, the post spawned a leftover for the nerds. The lesson - if you don't bother to think about sample size, you are going to miss some pretty easy answers to otherwise confusing questions.
Anyway, here it is, a TOA classic, in the sense that I dig deep into the math until I can make up an answer to a pointless question. And if you really like to crunch those numbers/letters, the post spawned a leftover for the nerds. The lesson - if you don't bother to think about sample size, you are going to miss some pretty easy answers to otherwise confusing questions.
Sunday, August 9, 2020
the business bro is ready to spend
I was excited a few months ago to once again run a hiring round. It had been a few years since my last such project but I found that my enthusiasm and energy for the task remained in abundance. I zipped through the preliminary steps, posted the job on our career board, and sat back in anticipation of a flood of applications. I knew it was important to take a deep breath and get myself ready for the next step, which I knew from my past experience would be the most challenging aspect of the process. After a few different experiments, I had worked out a system where once I had fifty or so applications, I would shut myself in a conference room and pick a few interview candidates. This ensured, among other efficiency benefits, that I would assess candidates while in the same mental, emotional, and physical condition, a consideration that I hoped would reduce any external effects on my choices. I figured that although I was new in my role, my hiring process should loosely resemble what worked elsewhere, so I came back in the next day with the intent to get moving once we reached around fifty applications.
A week later, we had almost ten candidates - some flood - and I wasn't impressed with the quality of the applicant pool. At first, I couldn’t figure it out. Was it possible that I had written something into the job description that turned off strong candidates? Or, perhaps the economy had changed so much since my last hiring round that it was being reflected in the number of applicants - a strong economy by definition means fewer job seekers. Maybe (though surely not) candidates were much more excited about my former workplace than my current one? I couldn't think of a great explanation, so I dug a little deeper, but for the most part I remained confused about the situation.
I came to an odd realization after a couple of days - even if I could think of a way to expand the applicant pool, I probably wouldn't be allowed to support it with increased expenditures. This was because the type of spending dictated the approval process, and like most of my colleagues I wasn't allowed to spend so much as a nickel on a new standing desk without jumping through a series of hoops. This in itself isn't a huge deal - financial controls are crucial - but since I could basically hire whomever I pleased in my function as a hiring manager, I felt the big picture going out of focus. To put it another way, I could spend tens of thousands of salary dollars to fill my open role but I wasn't allowed to freely buy equipment at a fraction of the cost; it never struck me as weird because this is standard process at many a Good Company, but once I refreshed my thinking it was hard to shake the epiphany.
The underlying problem that fertilized the growth of this system is the way people forget that one dollar is one dollar. I think this is a symptom of how workplaces have a special capability of making simple things endlessly complex until otherwise capable adults overlook basic details. Why is my ability to spend money based on the expense sheet category? There is no good reason why $200 for equipment goes through layers of approvals while the six-figure hiring expenditures zoom past the red tape. And yes, I mean six figures - I’ve heard from HR that most new hires cost our organization around two and a half times the annual salary, so anyone paid above $40K per year hits the threshold. Most perplexing of all is that if categories are factored into spending decisions, shouldn't it be easier to spend small amounts on one-time full price purchases, given that new hires are usually more expensive up front and continue to incur costs so long as they remain on the payroll?
The situation I've described so far might be a hidden factor as to why firms so often struggle with hiring. My guess is that most organizations deliberating a new six-figure expense would hold multiple meetings, conduct extensive analyses, and gather input from a wide range of voices; I am confident that hiring decisions do not demand the same rigorous examination. I suspect that most organizations would do much better with hiring simply by applying the same decision process across price points; a $200K expense involves the same level of scrutiny regardless of whether it involves hiring or not. At the very least, I would think that this would involve more senior colleagues in each hiring decision and I imagine incorporating their experience would prove invaluable in the decision.
But it's also occurred to me that perhaps I have this backward. It might be that if an organization regularly involved junior members in big spending decisions, it would become better prepared to make spending decisions in the future. Most people my age are reaching a career stage where they could reasonably hold final say on a hiring decision, but unless they've learned to spend big money in other aspects of their work I don't know why they would be prepared to do so in a hiring manager capacity. (The closest non-work equivalent is probably buying a house, but from what I know these have been borrowing rather than spending decisions.) I like the approach of bringing in more junior people for big spending decisions, even if just as observers, and I like it for many reasons - perhaps the most important of these is the growth and development opportunity in the context of this unnatural skill.
All of these big insights are invaluable, but what did it mean for my hiring round? Regardless of my philosophies, TOA posts, and grand plans for organizational process changes, my immediate responsibility was to fill the open position. The reality is that I found this to be no difficulty at all; I deliberately framed my situation as 'a problem' at the outset of this post. The unintended benefit about my approach was that I had some kind of expectation about the candidate pool, which allowed me to realize I was mistaken about the job market. The 'flood' of resumes that trickled into my inbox suggested that we'd already hired the best candidate, so I took the hint and promoted someone from the team. It could sometimes be the case that a lukewarm response to a posting means a job's qualifications must be reevaluated, but for the most part I find the external response a great benchmark for internal evaluation. I still recommend always thinking about ways to expand the applicant pool but treating this as its own ends risks obscuring the main idea - ultimately, the only important consideration is having qualified and capable people in your organization. A hiring round is an opportunity to make such an assessment not just for new candidates but also for those who are already in the team.
A week later, we had almost ten candidates - some flood - and I wasn't impressed with the quality of the applicant pool. At first, I couldn’t figure it out. Was it possible that I had written something into the job description that turned off strong candidates? Or, perhaps the economy had changed so much since my last hiring round that it was being reflected in the number of applicants - a strong economy by definition means fewer job seekers. Maybe (though surely not) candidates were much more excited about my former workplace than my current one? I couldn't think of a great explanation, so I dug a little deeper, but for the most part I remained confused about the situation.
I came to an odd realization after a couple of days - even if I could think of a way to expand the applicant pool, I probably wouldn't be allowed to support it with increased expenditures. This was because the type of spending dictated the approval process, and like most of my colleagues I wasn't allowed to spend so much as a nickel on a new standing desk without jumping through a series of hoops. This in itself isn't a huge deal - financial controls are crucial - but since I could basically hire whomever I pleased in my function as a hiring manager, I felt the big picture going out of focus. To put it another way, I could spend tens of thousands of salary dollars to fill my open role but I wasn't allowed to freely buy equipment at a fraction of the cost; it never struck me as weird because this is standard process at many a Good Company, but once I refreshed my thinking it was hard to shake the epiphany.
The underlying problem that fertilized the growth of this system is the way people forget that one dollar is one dollar. I think this is a symptom of how workplaces have a special capability of making simple things endlessly complex until otherwise capable adults overlook basic details. Why is my ability to spend money based on the expense sheet category? There is no good reason why $200 for equipment goes through layers of approvals while the six-figure hiring expenditures zoom past the red tape. And yes, I mean six figures - I’ve heard from HR that most new hires cost our organization around two and a half times the annual salary, so anyone paid above $40K per year hits the threshold. Most perplexing of all is that if categories are factored into spending decisions, shouldn't it be easier to spend small amounts on one-time full price purchases, given that new hires are usually more expensive up front and continue to incur costs so long as they remain on the payroll?
The situation I've described so far might be a hidden factor as to why firms so often struggle with hiring. My guess is that most organizations deliberating a new six-figure expense would hold multiple meetings, conduct extensive analyses, and gather input from a wide range of voices; I am confident that hiring decisions do not demand the same rigorous examination. I suspect that most organizations would do much better with hiring simply by applying the same decision process across price points; a $200K expense involves the same level of scrutiny regardless of whether it involves hiring or not. At the very least, I would think that this would involve more senior colleagues in each hiring decision and I imagine incorporating their experience would prove invaluable in the decision.
But it's also occurred to me that perhaps I have this backward. It might be that if an organization regularly involved junior members in big spending decisions, it would become better prepared to make spending decisions in the future. Most people my age are reaching a career stage where they could reasonably hold final say on a hiring decision, but unless they've learned to spend big money in other aspects of their work I don't know why they would be prepared to do so in a hiring manager capacity. (The closest non-work equivalent is probably buying a house, but from what I know these have been borrowing rather than spending decisions.) I like the approach of bringing in more junior people for big spending decisions, even if just as observers, and I like it for many reasons - perhaps the most important of these is the growth and development opportunity in the context of this unnatural skill.
All of these big insights are invaluable, but what did it mean for my hiring round? Regardless of my philosophies, TOA posts, and grand plans for organizational process changes, my immediate responsibility was to fill the open position. The reality is that I found this to be no difficulty at all; I deliberately framed my situation as 'a problem' at the outset of this post. The unintended benefit about my approach was that I had some kind of expectation about the candidate pool, which allowed me to realize I was mistaken about the job market. The 'flood' of resumes that trickled into my inbox suggested that we'd already hired the best candidate, so I took the hint and promoted someone from the team. It could sometimes be the case that a lukewarm response to a posting means a job's qualifications must be reevaluated, but for the most part I find the external response a great benchmark for internal evaluation. I still recommend always thinking about ways to expand the applicant pool but treating this as its own ends risks obscuring the main idea - ultimately, the only important consideration is having qualified and capable people in your organization. A hiring round is an opportunity to make such an assessment not just for new candidates but also for those who are already in the team.
Saturday, August 8, 2020
reading review - seeking wisdom, riff offs (encore)
OK, back on the stage for one last riff - I hope this clears up the last thought I shared on Thursday:
11c) Let’s say someone ID’s one of two colors with 80% success. If the color exists in 10% of the population, the other color is misidentified in 18% of total IDs. So how sure can we be it's the minority based on an identification? Around 31%.
This asks something like - was the car you saw blue or green? - and sets a condition that there is a 20% chance of identification error (I say blue when it was green). Further, if green is seen in only 10% of the total of all cars added together, then we know 2% of green answers are incorrect; green is incorrectly called blue 18% of the time.
If you write it out, it looks like this:
So if you add up the percentages and take the proportion, you get the odds of each answer being correct:
In other words, if someone says they saw the less frequently seen car, it only takes a small identification error rate before the answer becomes more than 50% likely to be incorrect.
11c) Let’s say someone ID’s one of two colors with 80% success. If the color exists in 10% of the population, the other color is misidentified in 18% of total IDs. So how sure can we be it's the minority based on an identification? Around 31%.
This asks something like - was the car you saw blue or green? - and sets a condition that there is a 20% chance of identification error (I say blue when it was green). Further, if green is seen in only 10% of the total of all cars added together, then we know 2% of green answers are incorrect; green is incorrectly called blue 18% of the time.
If you write it out, it looks like this:
- Blue car is correct answer - 72%
- Blue car is incorrect answer - 2%
- Green car is correct answer - 8%
- Green car is incorrect answer - 18%
So if you add up the percentages and take the proportion, you get the odds of each answer being correct:
- Probability blue is correct: 72/74 = 97.3%
- Probability blue is incorrect: 2/74 = 2.7%
- Probability green is correct: 8/26 = 30.8%
- Probability green is incorrect: 18/26 = 69.2%
In other words, if someone says they saw the less frequently seen car, it only takes a small identification error rate before the answer becomes more than 50% likely to be incorrect.
Friday, August 7, 2020
proper corona admin, vol 76 - finally awake
My coffee maker broke in April after ten years of dedicated service (and thirty months after its first sign of trouble). I immediately plugged in a replacement - well, not really plugged in, it's a pour over drip filter, like in this article.
The transition was initially a disaster. One morning, my 'coffee' was a cup of floating grounds; the next day an overflow left my floor covered in lukewarm caffeine. But I got better. These days, I expertly follow the technique from the above article and I enjoy a noticeably superior cup of coffee.
How is this possible? Surely, the machines have had enough time to get better at this, but I should know that if there is variation a skilled person beats an automated process every time. It's right there in the article - nothing flashy here, just good solid technique, and a great start to the day.
The transition was initially a disaster. One morning, my 'coffee' was a cup of floating grounds; the next day an overflow left my floor covered in lukewarm caffeine. But I got better. These days, I expertly follow the technique from the above article and I enjoy a noticeably superior cup of coffee.
How is this possible? Surely, the machines have had enough time to get better at this, but I should know that if there is variation a skilled person beats an automated process every time. It's right there in the article - nothing flashy here, just good solid technique, and a great start to the day.
Thursday, August 6, 2020
reading review - seeking wisdom, riff-off (crunching numbers)
Howdy! Let's finish up with some more scattered observations from Peter Bevelin's Seeking Wisdom.
8) Just saying ‘four out of five’ says nothing. So from all, or just a sample of five?
We've gotten dangerously accustomed to talking about results from surveys or studies as if they automatically represent some kind of truth. It wouldn't be such an issue if these results never strayed from the trivial or mundane - four out of five Americans put on their left sock first! - but unfortunately the results are often about more important questions, forcing us in the audience to remain skeptical until we can confirm the validity of the methodology.
9) Roulette wheels have been shown to pull in a profit even without a house edge. Players tend to pull back bets during a bad run, or stick with a double down strategy long after the returns have slowed.
Comments like this reinforce my skepticism about amateur statistical analysis (or maybe I'm just annoyed at the low standards for 'thinking' about roulette wheels). I'm sure someone somewhere watched real gamblers at a real roulette board and observed this strange phenomenon ("have been shown"). The link to betting behavior rings true; the stock market is my star witness.
But here's the thing - every single bet made on a roulette board favors the house. No exceptions. This is the only relevant reason why roulette wheels profit in the sense that no matter what else happens at the wheel, the house retains the probability edge. Could the house win without this built-in advantage? Possibly. But I think bettors would wise up, and the house would respond. If you disagree, sit at a blackjack table and openly count cards.
10a) Just enrolling low-performing students into a remedial course can bias toward ‘good results’ via regression to the mean.
10b) The body is great at healing itself, so many treatments will look effective just by leveraging the high base rate of natural success.
These subtleties of statistical behavior likely wouldn't be met with a standing ovation from the education or medical fields. But let's say you take one hundred equally capable students, then grade their semester performance on the standard 'curve'. Just by pure chance - by which I mean, factors unrelated to underlying academic ability - you'd have five percent of those students earn a failing grade. If you put them in a remedial course, each student has at least a 95% chance of doing better. For some reason, people use these results to conclude that remedial coursework has value.
The medical field has a very strong grasp of this idea but seems resigned to an obvious counterpoint - what else can we do? Fluids and bed rest are almost always a great idea, but insurance won't cover it, which means doctors aren't reimbursed for good advice; I always appreciate the online resources that demarcate symptoms into 'continue monitoring' and 'go to the hospital' categories.
11a) In the context of certain events like a large earthquake, probabilities are a distraction. In geology such an event is inevitable, and a better strategy would be to encourage anyone in the area to be fully prepared.
11b) Forensic evidence alone will produce false positives. Let’s say a city has a 500K population, with false matches in 1/20000 tests. If there is 1 sick person, that means the infected party plus 25 test positive - so any match is a 1/26 chance of being sick.
I like these quips because understanding them is the best way to demonstrate mastery of applied probability. The earthquake example is an easy starting point, reminding us that certain events occur at magnitudes that make estimating frequencies an inappropriate mode of thinking. The next is more mathematically challenging but critical; a high school student who understood it would have no immediate need for additional probability coursework (probably).
12) I've exposed your lies, baby, the underneath no big surprise...
If there's one thing to keep in mind, it's that the deceit of statistical thinking is often only just out of sight. Lift every rock, but don't be surprised when you see that, hiding all along...
...OK, fine.
That's not from this book, that's from Muse's 'Plug In Baby'. But we need to end a riff-off somewhere, and I'm out of Courtney Barnett songs. So what better way than Muse?
Thanks for reading.
8) Just saying ‘four out of five’ says nothing. So from all, or just a sample of five?
We've gotten dangerously accustomed to talking about results from surveys or studies as if they automatically represent some kind of truth. It wouldn't be such an issue if these results never strayed from the trivial or mundane - four out of five Americans put on their left sock first! - but unfortunately the results are often about more important questions, forcing us in the audience to remain skeptical until we can confirm the validity of the methodology.
9) Roulette wheels have been shown to pull in a profit even without a house edge. Players tend to pull back bets during a bad run, or stick with a double down strategy long after the returns have slowed.
Comments like this reinforce my skepticism about amateur statistical analysis (or maybe I'm just annoyed at the low standards for 'thinking' about roulette wheels). I'm sure someone somewhere watched real gamblers at a real roulette board and observed this strange phenomenon ("have been shown"). The link to betting behavior rings true; the stock market is my star witness.
But here's the thing - every single bet made on a roulette board favors the house. No exceptions. This is the only relevant reason why roulette wheels profit in the sense that no matter what else happens at the wheel, the house retains the probability edge. Could the house win without this built-in advantage? Possibly. But I think bettors would wise up, and the house would respond. If you disagree, sit at a blackjack table and openly count cards.
10a) Just enrolling low-performing students into a remedial course can bias toward ‘good results’ via regression to the mean.
10b) The body is great at healing itself, so many treatments will look effective just by leveraging the high base rate of natural success.
These subtleties of statistical behavior likely wouldn't be met with a standing ovation from the education or medical fields. But let's say you take one hundred equally capable students, then grade their semester performance on the standard 'curve'. Just by pure chance - by which I mean, factors unrelated to underlying academic ability - you'd have five percent of those students earn a failing grade. If you put them in a remedial course, each student has at least a 95% chance of doing better. For some reason, people use these results to conclude that remedial coursework has value.
The medical field has a very strong grasp of this idea but seems resigned to an obvious counterpoint - what else can we do? Fluids and bed rest are almost always a great idea, but insurance won't cover it, which means doctors aren't reimbursed for good advice; I always appreciate the online resources that demarcate symptoms into 'continue monitoring' and 'go to the hospital' categories.
11a) In the context of certain events like a large earthquake, probabilities are a distraction. In geology such an event is inevitable, and a better strategy would be to encourage anyone in the area to be fully prepared.
11b) Forensic evidence alone will produce false positives. Let’s say a city has a 500K population, with false matches in 1/20000 tests. If there is 1 sick person, that means the infected party plus 25 test positive - so any match is a 1/26 chance of being sick.
I like these quips because understanding them is the best way to demonstrate mastery of applied probability. The earthquake example is an easy starting point, reminding us that certain events occur at magnitudes that make estimating frequencies an inappropriate mode of thinking. The next is more mathematically challenging but critical; a high school student who understood it would have no immediate need for additional probability coursework (probably).
12) I've exposed your lies, baby, the underneath no big surprise...
If there's one thing to keep in mind, it's that the deceit of statistical thinking is often only just out of sight. Lift every rock, but don't be surprised when you see that, hiding all along...
...OK, fine.
That's not from this book, that's from Muse's 'Plug In Baby'. But we need to end a riff-off somewhere, and I'm out of Courtney Barnett songs. So what better way than Muse?
Thanks for reading.
Wednesday, August 5, 2020
proper corona admin, vol 75 - always leave a note
My working hypothesis during June and July was that Massachusetts was a lot like a cool room in a warm house - do nothing, and eventually the surroundings would bring the mercury up to the domestic average. I'm not going to run off with this analogy and accuse us of doing nothing, but... well, the case counts are climbing again, so something's cooking.
The local chatter seems focused on blaming certain decisions and activities - we reopened indoor dining too soon, people are stupidly throwing large parties, everyone is sitting bumper to bumper at the beach. I agree that not a single one of those things helped keep the numbers down, but I also know the truth I'm reminded of every day in my apartment - if I leave the door open with my air conditioner running, I might as well not have the thing turned on at all.
The local chatter seems focused on blaming certain decisions and activities - we reopened indoor dining too soon, people are stupidly throwing large parties, everyone is sitting bumper to bumper at the beach. I agree that not a single one of those things helped keep the numbers down, but I also know the truth I'm reminded of every day in my apartment - if I leave the door open with my air conditioner running, I might as well not have the thing turned on at all.
Tuesday, August 4, 2020
uncollected
A friend once recollected that I played Pokemon Red incorrectly; I couldn't argue the point. The object of the game was in the motto - gotta catch 'em all - but I insisted on catching only those that would make my predetermined final battle lineup: Venusaur, Dugtrio, Gengar, Alakazam, Gyarados, Arcanine; I ignored the rest. I optimized my play to ensure the strongest possible version of that team; I learned nothing about collecting.
Building teams, emphasizing strengths, planning on top of plans - the Gameboy was a practice field for my current collection of skills; the most important of all was ignoring the official purpose to find my own motivation. I've been reading James Baldwin's The Cross of Redemption: Uncollected Writings, essays that promise lessons on race, democracy, and identity; I've learned mostly about prose, specifically the way Baldwin connects the reader from point to point, clause to clause; the semicolon is the unsung guide. Writer meets semicolon, semicolon meets writer; the future bleeds from the present. I'm better equipped now to connect ideas as they wander by; I've never been this interested in catching them all.
Building teams, emphasizing strengths, planning on top of plans - the Gameboy was a practice field for my current collection of skills; the most important of all was ignoring the official purpose to find my own motivation. I've been reading James Baldwin's The Cross of Redemption: Uncollected Writings, essays that promise lessons on race, democracy, and identity; I've learned mostly about prose, specifically the way Baldwin connects the reader from point to point, clause to clause; the semicolon is the unsung guide. Writer meets semicolon, semicolon meets writer; the future bleeds from the present. I'm better equipped now to connect ideas as they wander by; I've never been this interested in catching them all.
Monday, August 3, 2020
toa rewind - recycling day blues (april 2018)
Monday and Friday are the trash and recycling pickups days over on my little corner of Beacon Hill. And since it is Monday, and since we are recycling old posts, and since I am back in a moment when I don't really go anywhere - why not roll back the clock to this forgotten gem?
April 2018: 'Recycling Day Blues'
As an added fun fact, I credit the feel of the post to Courtney Barnett's 'Canned Tomatoes (Whole)', and in particular to this specific recording.
April 2018: 'Recycling Day Blues'
As an added fun fact, I credit the feel of the post to Courtney Barnett's 'Canned Tomatoes (Whole)', and in particular to this specific recording.
Sunday, August 2, 2020
growing up with social media
I've noticed something interesting about my friends, or at least those right around the narrow thirty-one to thirty-three range that brackets my age - we don't seem very active on social media. This flies in the face of what I'm led to believe about our generation, a sorry, self-absorbed lot wasting all our time staring into our screens and praying for approval. So what's going on here?
I've been thinking about this and I think I'm onto something. I've noticed an interesting feature about us - we were all in the sweet spot when Facebook took off, and I recall all of us using it more or less in the same way. The logic back then seems really simple now - if you became friendly with someone, a Facebook request would be exchanged within a few days. I remember being very active on Facebook as high school ended, and using it to keep up with friends old and new throughout my freshman year of college. But for whatever reason we dropped off, and with few exceptions it seems that we've all stayed off.
My working theory is that Facebook left us jaded about social media. We tried it, and it either didn't really work or we didn't really need it, so we moved on. Part of it I attribute to something I'll call first-mover disadvantage: we discovered mostly bad features and decided we'd rather live without them than wait for improvement. We posted statuses before there was Twitter, we shared pictures before there was Instagram, and we scribbled on walls before there was Snapchat; each social media derivative seems linked to some tired Facebook feature. Looking back, I thought all those features were fine, but I was never interested in trying those separated platforms, either.
It's possible that my friends, being my selections to a certain degree, are likely to share some basic characteristics, with an aversion to social media being one possibility. But I've recently befriended some slightly younger people through work, and I notice two things about them - they are much more comfortable with social media and they hardly recall any 'good old days' of using Facebook. I'm almost jealous because it seems they've been spared whatever ruined my experience. It's like instead of getting all the channels in one cable package like I did, they just picked the ones they would watch and ended up having a far more favorable view of television. The reverse is true for a much older age group - they are perfectly happy with Facebook (and also seem content with the traditional cable TV package).
I acknowledge that suggesting Facebook was collectively 'scarring' might be a bit of an overstatement; I suppose I can just stick to saying it left us jaded about social media. Also, it's always dubious to apply such blanket statements over anything, particularly since I did very little research on this one; I just talked to a couple of my friends, who broadly agreed with me. But I feel something definitely happened, and in hindsight it seemed to happen in an instant; one day I was just done with Facebook. The best evidence I have is that my Facebook friend list cuts off with pretty much everyone I knew through the end of my freshman year. I know part of that is because I stopped sending requests to new people, but it takes two to tango; my new friends stopped sending requests to me, too. I remember one specific friend, a class year behind me, who used to joke that one of us would crack and send the request; by the time I graduated, I'd probably forgotten my login password.
But what about Facebook specifically made us so jaded? This is a tough one to figure out. My best guess is that we were all at that age, where for a few years we were seventeen going on twenty-three, and at that time having something like Facebook just wasn't a healthy idea. It's a really hard time because most kids are starting to figure themselves out, and having Facebook around to put every little fact on public display probably felt a little over the speed limit. On the surface, Facebook seemed a good way to look at photos, read status updates, and maybe do a little research for mutual connections; this meant most people lived in constant fear of others laughing at their worst pictures, mocking their lame comments, or scoffing at their short friend lists. They say social media puts your mistakes out there for everyone to see, but for me the problem was a constant sense of feeling mistaken. Over time most of us become OK with having ourselves out in the world, and all the simple facts that go along with who we are, but that's called growing up; for many of us, the first step was unfriending Facebook.
I've been thinking about this and I think I'm onto something. I've noticed an interesting feature about us - we were all in the sweet spot when Facebook took off, and I recall all of us using it more or less in the same way. The logic back then seems really simple now - if you became friendly with someone, a Facebook request would be exchanged within a few days. I remember being very active on Facebook as high school ended, and using it to keep up with friends old and new throughout my freshman year of college. But for whatever reason we dropped off, and with few exceptions it seems that we've all stayed off.
My working theory is that Facebook left us jaded about social media. We tried it, and it either didn't really work or we didn't really need it, so we moved on. Part of it I attribute to something I'll call first-mover disadvantage: we discovered mostly bad features and decided we'd rather live without them than wait for improvement. We posted statuses before there was Twitter, we shared pictures before there was Instagram, and we scribbled on walls before there was Snapchat; each social media derivative seems linked to some tired Facebook feature. Looking back, I thought all those features were fine, but I was never interested in trying those separated platforms, either.
It's possible that my friends, being my selections to a certain degree, are likely to share some basic characteristics, with an aversion to social media being one possibility. But I've recently befriended some slightly younger people through work, and I notice two things about them - they are much more comfortable with social media and they hardly recall any 'good old days' of using Facebook. I'm almost jealous because it seems they've been spared whatever ruined my experience. It's like instead of getting all the channels in one cable package like I did, they just picked the ones they would watch and ended up having a far more favorable view of television. The reverse is true for a much older age group - they are perfectly happy with Facebook (and also seem content with the traditional cable TV package).
I acknowledge that suggesting Facebook was collectively 'scarring' might be a bit of an overstatement; I suppose I can just stick to saying it left us jaded about social media. Also, it's always dubious to apply such blanket statements over anything, particularly since I did very little research on this one; I just talked to a couple of my friends, who broadly agreed with me. But I feel something definitely happened, and in hindsight it seemed to happen in an instant; one day I was just done with Facebook. The best evidence I have is that my Facebook friend list cuts off with pretty much everyone I knew through the end of my freshman year. I know part of that is because I stopped sending requests to new people, but it takes two to tango; my new friends stopped sending requests to me, too. I remember one specific friend, a class year behind me, who used to joke that one of us would crack and send the request; by the time I graduated, I'd probably forgotten my login password.
But what about Facebook specifically made us so jaded? This is a tough one to figure out. My best guess is that we were all at that age, where for a few years we were seventeen going on twenty-three, and at that time having something like Facebook just wasn't a healthy idea. It's a really hard time because most kids are starting to figure themselves out, and having Facebook around to put every little fact on public display probably felt a little over the speed limit. On the surface, Facebook seemed a good way to look at photos, read status updates, and maybe do a little research for mutual connections; this meant most people lived in constant fear of others laughing at their worst pictures, mocking their lame comments, or scoffing at their short friend lists. They say social media puts your mistakes out there for everyone to see, but for me the problem was a constant sense of feeling mistaken. Over time most of us become OK with having ourselves out in the world, and all the simple facts that go along with who we are, but that's called growing up; for many of us, the first step was unfriending Facebook.
Saturday, August 1, 2020
the toa newsletter - august 2020
Hi readers,
No big thoughts or ideas this month - I think we all know the long haul when we see it - so let's roll through the newsletter in classic proper admin style.
Fall foliage?
If you stomp along the southbound side of Binney Street in Cambridge, you'll encounter the future. No, not some biotech producing a vaccine - I'm talking about FALL FOLIAGE, one crunchy pile of leaves at a time.
What gives? Perhaps the trees have COVID-19, or maybe even COVID-20? Is an early fall (ha ha!) a counter-intuitive feature of climate change? Given the recent popularity of heat waves, maybe these trees just need a drink; I sure do.
Mask update
I'm not very impressed with the common Corona Mask, so I opted to buy a stack of bandannas instead. Fifteen bandannas, twenty bucks total, the world is Haymarket prices. As an added bonus, I can also rotate them as headbands, so everyone wins.
Side note
Side note - just learned 'bandanna' is spelled with the consecutive n's??? I'm going to think about this.
Mouse update
No, not that kind - I'm talking about the computer (but my apartment is rodent free, thank you for asking). My work from home opener is threatening to become the main act and this made me realize that I haven't used a computer mouse in almost five months (or a printer, or my indoor voice, or a desk, or a desk chair...); if you want to learn keyboard shortcuts, just give me a call.
Keyboard update
No, not that kind - I'm talking about the music, man. Anyway, my spare keys are home following a long loan spell and I'm back to unlocking the songs within.
Well, maybe.
Anyway, in March 2015 I was making good progress on 'Ghosts' by The Head and The Heart, following along on this tutorial (and also this one for the solo). This time I'm starting with a couple of Muse tracks because I think these will translate my 'computer keyboard' skills a little better to the musical variant. 'The 2nd Law: Isolated System' has my right hand in mind (and boasts a very easy tutorial layout) while 'Hysteria' will do the same for the left hand (you'll need to watch at 0.25x speed to catch the movements). My hunch was that moving my fingers on the keyboard wouldn't be an issue after a decade of shunning the computer mouse, but I would need some practice with hitting the right notes; the verdict is so far, so good, with my song selection deserving early credit.
What I'm realizing is that although musical instruments are very easy to play, the feedback process is designed to ruin the confidence of any budding The Edge; there is no worse sound than B-flat during 'Under The Sea'. And yet, by consistently drowning myself in the choppy sound for fifteen minutes a day, I'm seeing significant progress; I'm quickly becoming capable of producing ever-impressive errors. My goal is to become good enough such that I can put the 10,000 hours rule to rest once and for all, perhaps by writing my own Malcolm Gladwell style book about how 'true mastery' is achieved fifteen minutes at a time; reader, make like a piano and stay tuned.
In the next month of... True On Average:
1. Feedback for Dave Chapelle?
2. Another eureka moment!
3. I was right about Trader Joe's.
No big thoughts or ideas this month - I think we all know the long haul when we see it - so let's roll through the newsletter in classic proper admin style.
Fall foliage?
If you stomp along the southbound side of Binney Street in Cambridge, you'll encounter the future. No, not some biotech producing a vaccine - I'm talking about FALL FOLIAGE, one crunchy pile of leaves at a time.
What gives? Perhaps the trees have COVID-19, or maybe even COVID-20? Is an early fall (ha ha!) a counter-intuitive feature of climate change? Given the recent popularity of heat waves, maybe these trees just need a drink; I sure do.
Mask update
I'm not very impressed with the common Corona Mask, so I opted to buy a stack of bandannas instead. Fifteen bandannas, twenty bucks total, the world is Haymarket prices. As an added bonus, I can also rotate them as headbands, so everyone wins.
Side note
Side note - just learned 'bandanna' is spelled with the consecutive n's??? I'm going to think about this.
Mouse update
No, not that kind - I'm talking about the computer (but my apartment is rodent free, thank you for asking). My work from home opener is threatening to become the main act and this made me realize that I haven't used a computer mouse in almost five months (or a printer, or my indoor voice, or a desk, or a desk chair...); if you want to learn keyboard shortcuts, just give me a call.
Keyboard update
No, not that kind - I'm talking about the music, man. Anyway, my spare keys are home following a long loan spell and I'm back to unlocking the songs within.
Well, maybe.
Anyway, in March 2015 I was making good progress on 'Ghosts' by The Head and The Heart, following along on this tutorial (and also this one for the solo). This time I'm starting with a couple of Muse tracks because I think these will translate my 'computer keyboard' skills a little better to the musical variant. 'The 2nd Law: Isolated System' has my right hand in mind (and boasts a very easy tutorial layout) while 'Hysteria' will do the same for the left hand (you'll need to watch at 0.25x speed to catch the movements). My hunch was that moving my fingers on the keyboard wouldn't be an issue after a decade of shunning the computer mouse, but I would need some practice with hitting the right notes; the verdict is so far, so good, with my song selection deserving early credit.
What I'm realizing is that although musical instruments are very easy to play, the feedback process is designed to ruin the confidence of any budding The Edge; there is no worse sound than B-flat during 'Under The Sea'. And yet, by consistently drowning myself in the choppy sound for fifteen minutes a day, I'm seeing significant progress; I'm quickly becoming capable of producing ever-impressive errors. My goal is to become good enough such that I can put the 10,000 hours rule to rest once and for all, perhaps by writing my own Malcolm Gladwell style book about how 'true mastery' is achieved fifteen minutes at a time; reader, make like a piano and stay tuned.
In the next month of... True On Average:
1. Feedback for Dave Chapelle?
2. Another eureka moment!
3. I was right about Trader Joe's.
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