James Pearl Thinks Blogging is Dead

kdebello

Well-Known Member
build stuff or make slime. Or ride bikes. I try to really put down my own phone when hanging out with them, modeling good behavior.

The slime. I thought this fad would be over by now, but over a year later and my kids are still making slime. Our dining room table is a slime factory. It's a mess, but they are making something, they've gone and found where to get the best prices on glue and all the other stuff they put in it. Plus, my oldest was selling it and making some pretty good $

Build stuff. I made a rocker plate for the trainer. My oldest came into the garage and helped out. Not sure if she actually wanted to or if she was trying to get out of something her mom asked her to do. Either way, I'll take it. She even hopped on the trainer and rode 45 minutes. Hope it starts something since she's barely been on the bike and the first race is coming up quick.
 

MadisonDan

Well-Known Member
Team MTBNJ Halter's
Build stuff. I made a rocker plate for the trainer. My oldest came into the garage and helped out. Not sure if she actually wanted to or if she was trying to get out of something her mom asked her to do. Either way, I'll take it. She even hopped on the trainer and rode 45 minutes. Hope it starts something since she's barely been on the bike and the first race is coming up quick.
Just inside one month to go! I'm gonna guess (hope) there's more kids in her class this year!! Whatever gets her moving!
 

kdebello

Well-Known Member
How do you do this? Do people buy "used slime"?

She was taking orders from people that wanted different things in the slime. Had a little black market slime business. She'd take orders for what they wanted, beads, floam, stickier slime, colors, scented. Pack it up in little containers and meet somewhere for the deal. She put together a business plan, incoming/outgoing expenses, labor.

Hopefully this is the start to a successful future entrepreneur and not jail time.
 

jmanic

JORBA Board Member/Chapter Leader
Staff member
JORBA.ORG
Team MTBNJ Halter's
Okay, all you parents with the slime maker kids-
Hit up @mattybfat for his homemade stans recipe.
You've got a captive market here.
 

mattybfat

The Opinion Police
Team MTBNJ Halter's
Funny because everyone seems to be in that before the 14 year old or after 20 kids. Ask me how my kids are doing or what we are doing. And I will give you that blank stare and a IDK.

Oh my god how you forget, yes I did this before but that was before social media. 14-20 age group kids have one thing in common, your money. More the better. Oh and as Judge Judy says if a teenager has its mouth open then it's lying, lol. Also more importantly they want to stay as far away from doing anything with us as possible.

How quickly it switches to where we did everything as a family, then to our family and their friends, to we don't want to go with you we want to hang with our friends. I have already been through this once and see how my 30 somethings have evolved and see how loving and in tune they are now with family is a blessing.

Also funny is to hear people use noise or labor to relax. With both being my money maker sitting on a couch like right now with TV on mute typing this and browsing for the last hour is just what the Dr. Ordered.
 

Patrick

Overthinking the draft from the basement already
Staff member
i didn't respond to #2 - but i did read everyone's response.
And since I overthink everything, and conceptualize relaxing as the normal state, and everything else disturbing
that, I really had no answer. There was a time when I had to 'power down' - but it is long gone.

To @clarkenstein's reading, Zen and the Art.. A long time ago, I learned that things are what they are. Until "we" label
them good or bad, they just are.....they just are part of the journey. I highly recommend The Tao of Pooh for kids (and adults) that are
starting to have overly emotional responses to everything - there is a short series for books using the same framework to teach
different lessons. I still have a lot of Owl going on, but I know it. Kindof like that feller in A Beautiful Mind. Except my big problem is
what will i make for dinner.

Active release of emotions/tension is called catharsis. I guess the result is a relaxed feeling. Like taking a back-road home, instead of the highway.
it replaces an unwanted feeling with a sense of control and accomplishment. Sure ya feel better, but did you relax?

Reflecting on the hard problems of the day, just thinking about them - getting a handle(?) - defining scope - not solving. Or thinking about
accomplishments - not what didn't get done, can help the wind-it-down. Day is over, can't get it back. Did someone quote Annie back there? or
was that the weather thread?

So is the pedal-broom cathartic? allowing for reflection? feeding that goal-oriented inner compass ? it even has a social aspect....
Seems the perfect recipe for addiction to the right personality?

I just realized, to relax, I have a beer, and make shit up on the internet.....:D did that ruin it?
 

MadisonDan

Well-Known Member
Team MTBNJ Halter's
i didn't respond to #2 - but i did read everyone's response.
And since I overthink everything, and conceptualize relaxing as the normal state, and everything else disturbing
that, I really had no answer. There was a time when I had to 'power down' - but it is long gone.

To @clarkenstein's reading, Zen and the Art.. A long time ago, I learned that things are what they are. Until "we" label
them good or bad, they just are.....they just are part of the journey. I highly recommend The Tao of Pooh for kids (and adults) that are
starting to have overly emotional responses to everything - there is a short series for books using the same framework to teach
different lessons. I still have a lot of Owl going on, but I know it. Kindof like that feller in A Beautiful Mind. Except my big problem is
what will i make for dinner.

Active release of emotions/tension is called catharsis. I guess the result is a relaxed feeling. Like taking a back-road home, instead of the highway.
it replaces an unwanted feeling with a sense of control and accomplishment. Sure ya feel better, but did you relax?

Reflecting on the hard problems of the day, just thinking about them - getting a handle(?) - defining scope - not solving. Or thinking about
accomplishments - not what didn't get done, can help the wind-it-down. Day is over, can't get it back. Did someone quote Annie back there? or
was that the weather thread?

So is the pedal-broom cathartic? allowing for reflection? feeding that goal-oriented inner compass ? it even has a social aspect....
Seems the perfect recipe for addiction to the right personality?

I just realized, to relax, I have a beer, and make shit up on the internet.....:D did that ruin it?
All I saw was beer
 

Norm

Mayor McCheese
Team MTBNJ Halter's
Before I get into the day I just want to say that I really enjoy the comments that keep rolling. They're really great.

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It is 8:28 where I sit now. But I realize that a) I am dog tired and b) it's way late for this. I just finished up Thai dinner and I'm sitting on D's brother's (& husband's) couch. It's is peacefully quiet right now. It feels nice & relaxing to the point that I am going to fall asleep shortly, because I woke up in a timezone where it is now Bed O'clock. Adri is in the office. Oli took a nap. I am going to bed in 30 minutes and here he is taking a nap.

Today was one of those days where you look back and cannot believe it was all the same day. I think sitting on a plane going across the country will do that. You feel like you go through almost an entire week when you fly 5+ hours.

At 6:30 I woke up after a mediocre night of sleep. By 7:00 I was on Watopia Island and in there I took a break to bid D's parents farewell as they set sail for NC on the way to FL. I got back on the trainer and finished up my hour, which was just a single climb to the tower before having to jump off and start the day. Sat with D and had tea while she ate breakfast then she was off to work and I went to shower up.

Woke the boys up at 9:00 and got them fed and off to school. After 5 days off they really didn't have any license to complain and with a 2 hour delay this morning they were fairly well-rested. By the time I dropped them off I had gotten 2 phone calls. I returned the coworker one on the way to get my haircut and we discussed the workshop for a half hour or so. Got my haircut around 10:00 and then called @seanrunnette back as I drove home and finished packing. I had decided on the ride today that I was probably going to leave the bike gear at home but in the end, I threw it in the suitcase while we were on the phone.

10:45 I am in an Uber, 11:30 on the other side of the TSA, then by 12:00 I had eaten my chicken caesar salad and was starting my airport work routine. At 2:00 I was in my seat and we were off the ground about 30 minutes later.

The flight was totally uneventful which is the way I like it. I prepped all the docs I need for the next 2 days which will make my life a lot easier than trying to wing it. I also did some reading and am almost done with book 6 of the Harry Potter series. Almost got through S-Town episode 3 but I found that just sitting there listening to that was not engaging enough when trapped in a plane seat so I ended up having to do other things to keep my sanity.

I ended up getting to Adri & Oli's at 5:43, which was 9 minutes after I was supposed to land so I was way early. I sat around with Oli talking while Adri made his way home. We ordered Thai food and devoured an awesome meal so fast so I wasn't able to get a picture of it. I am also not going to tell you which actor in this play is D's brother and which is his husband. You'll just have to guess.

Zoe seemed happy to see me.

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Patrick

Overthinking the draft from the basement already
Staff member
Are a light and helmet supplied with the swiffer? I've seen evening rides.
 

Norm

Mayor McCheese
Team MTBNJ Halter's
I woke up today at 5:00 am, Snooze Coast Time. I'd gone to bed at 10:00pm last night so that was a solid 7 hours of sleep but I still woke up in a total stupor. It's crazy how much the daylight actually messes with your sense of when you should be awake or asleep. Of course, this isn't entirely true because nobody goes to bed when the sun goes down. I took my time waking up, because I had nothing to rush towards. I just don't want to adopt a PST schedule and then have a tragically hard time waking up Thursday morning when I fly out at 6am.

I finished the 6th Potter book before I left for the day, then took an Uber to a coffee shop and grabbed a coffee and caught up on some reading before the workshop began. I still managed to get there 40 minutes early and was the 3rd person there after the 2 PMs who were both there at 8:00. They didn't have any coffee for us to drink which is crazy. It's not like we're in the coffee capital of the world or anything

We are using a partner for this implementation and they are seemingly determined to make things as difficult as possible so I more or less walked into the workshop blind. When the account rep walked in, he came to me and said, "So how do you want to do this?" I am happy to see that these guys have their shit together. All in all the day went fine, though they did not allow me to prepare for this properly because they did not share the RFP with me nor did they let me have any pre-workshop calls. So it was more of a "What You Bought" workshop than anything. I can talk shop with these guys off the cuff, so I enjoy the discussions. But in the end, these 2 days are going to be less productive than they could be.

As an aside I really do not know where my future lies with this company right now. I should mention that we were bought out last week, Friday to be exact. This is why I was supposed to go to Chicago last week, and which was moved to next week I found out today. The new date us next Tuesday, and it is now a dinner date so it looks like I will be flying out to Chicago maybe Monday. I don't know the details just yet. D says I am living quite the jetset lifestyle. I told her it's more like a donkey saddle lifestyle. Anyway, I have no idea what this all means. I guess speculating is pointless.

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We got done at 2:30 so I walked over to Caffe Vita to have an espresso and hang out. I walked there from the meeting and rapidly the neighborhood turned from downtown Seattle (nondescript big buildings) to coffee shop row, then quickly to rainbow town. I soon realize that this is the same neighborhood we went to get sushi when we were here in the summer. The reason I know this specific coffee shop is because Adri & Oli had gotten me a bag of coffee from here when they came out for Thanksgiving. I have since ordered 2 pounds from them online and I wanted to stop in for an espresso and 2 pounds of coffee. One for me and one for The Tall Man. File that under Coming up with Reasons to Get Together.

Through the day I finished up S-Town episodes 3 & 4, and started 5. I also started the 7th Potter book.

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Dinner was also in the rainbow neighborhood, which was pretty convenient since it's been raining all day. As an aside, sorry for the flipping verb tenses - I am writing this both during and after work and I am tired, so I can't be bothered to line them all up. Oli had asked me what I wanted to eat for dinner and I said Ramen. So he found a Ramen place in addition to a dessert place. I figure I earned dessert since I did not ride today, and I had a monster cookie at lunch. The evils of business travel. Anyway, dinner was amazingly good and I am stoked on how many Ramen places are popping up in this world. Dessert was good because ice cream is good.

As an aside to the above food orgy - I was able to button my old size 34 work pants this morning...just barely, but I was able to. I also used 1 notch smaller on my belt this morning compared to the last time I wore the belt. So ok, the food consumption was high today but I think that's ok given the overall direction of things recently.

Ok it's late. Checking out now and hopefully 5am doesn't hit me like a brick shithouse again tomorrow morning.

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map111158

Well-Known Member
Don't know if you will have time but there's a place called Kedai Makan in capitol hill area where I had one of the best meals of my life. Think the food would be right up your alley.
 

Norm

Mayor McCheese
Team MTBNJ Halter's
I woke up at 4:15, no alarm. I'm not sure if it was because I had to use the bathroom or because I was well-rested, but I woke up and never went back to bed. I picked up the Potter book and read some more before I left for the day. I will give Rowling credit in this series. People actually die. It's fairly rare that good guys actually die in books, but in this one, some of them actually do. I suppose in Fantasy novels it's somewhat normal for main(ish) characters to get knocked off. But mainstream books typically do not go that route. Admirable that it's the case here. On the flip side, Harry Potter does not mature 1 ounce this whole series.

Left that house at 6:15 and went to Rainbow Town to try out yet another coffee place. I looked up "Coffee Capital of the World" last night and Seattle was in the top 7, and they had recommended a place I had not been yet. So I went this morning and it was so incredibly good. I would say of all the places, this was the best of the bunch. I got an espresso and a pourover coffee while I sat in the shop and did nothing. Sitting there, I felt somewhat aimless. But I am trying to relax as much as I can this trip, trying not to fall into the trap of working both before & after work.

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Boeing just rolled the 10,000th 737 off the production line, says the Seattle Times. I would link it but it is behind a paywall.

Finished up episodes 5, 6, and 7 of S-Town today. I don't know what to think of this. And I am ok not knowing what to think of this. Sometimes you have a strong opinion of something and that's to be expected. But other times you don't really know what to think and I think that's ok too. I don't believe you have to have a firm opinion on everything. In this day and age, it seems you are expected to always react strongly one way or another. On this podcast, I don't know what I think. The curve ball about mercury halfway through the 7th episode kind of irritated me in a way because that is really a very unexplored reality in this. But then the last episode just sort of ended. I had been led to believe by something else I read that there was some payoff in the last minutes of the last episode. I didn't find that to be the case. So I will turn to the Internet and see what conventional wisdom says. I feel a little short changed in a sense. But I think that is my innately human desire for a crescendo.

Day 2 of the workshop was more of the same. The SOW for my time stated that I was supposed to "facilitate" in the taking of requirements but the shitty implementation team did zero to help in this regard. Apparently, to "facilitate" in this context means "do it for us because we suck". Essentially 2 days into this project and the team that is being paid a *lot* of money to run this is trying to get out of doing as much as they can. So again today I drove the entire day and the account manager, in between trying to get the PM from the client to go to the gym with him after the workshop, spouted nonsense in between being totally distracted by his phone. Real professional dipshits we have here. As an aside, that PM announced at the end that she had to leave because there was a sudden death in her world. I don't know if this was a very unfortunate event or that the account manager freaked her out so much she had to make a run for it.

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After work I walked to Pike's Place Market then walked the 3 miles back to the house, taking a detour to pick up ice cream for dessert. Oli is cooking dinner tonight so I figured it would be nice to add something. Plus it ended up being a great day to walk, so I enjoyed the weather and listened to a mix of podcasts & music while I enjoyed the afternoon. While it may barely cover the cookie I had at lunch today, it was nice to get a little activity in to top off the day.

Tonight is just packing my bags to head home. The trip was well & good but I am ready to go. I don't feel like this was a super productive trip but I did enjoy some of the workshop conversations and I did get some good food through my stay here. I didn't end up going to the place that @map111158 (welcome back from the abyss) suggested but I added it to my travel map and asked Oli about it when I got back today. He agreed it is amazing but also said you need to plan in advance because it's impossible to get in there on short notice. Next time I come out (which could be in the summer) I'll make sure I go.

I fly out at 6am tomorrow morning, and I have a middle seat.

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Norm

Mayor McCheese
Team MTBNJ Halter's
And the Seattle trip ends.

I woke up at 3:00am today, Sure it was on the Snooze Coast and I never stayed up past 10:00 (9:15 last night) but it was still 3:00am. I was ready to go so waking up was easy. I will not belabor the flight home other than a few points. First, Zoe was all like, "Hey ok take care BUT PLAY WITH MY BELLY FIRST PLEASE"

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To @pooriggy - no, no bike. Up to the day I left, I had ridden 2+ hours a day on average for 10 straight days. Did I really need to go out of my way to ride? I don't think so. If I'd been on my own it would be 1 thing but I was staying with D's brother, I felt it somewhat important to actually spend some time with them when I was there. I got out of work at 3:00 yesterday then walked for 2 hours and got back at 5:00. Oli was there cooking us dinner when I got back. So I feel it would have been a bit of a dickish move to take off and try to find a bike at that point.

There are 2 points though:

1. I later found out after the fact yesterday that I walked right by the cemetery where Bruce & Brandon Lee are buried. This is less than a mile from there they live
2. By chance I happened to wear some bike clothes home on the plane anyway

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In the end this is a 76 hour journey which includes anything you want it to. You burn a lot of time on the plane but you can make it worthwhile, or you can let it eat you. On the way out, I did work because I needed to (note: it ended up being throwaway work). On the way back I read a lot, and watched the first half of The Darkest Hour before it stopped streaming. I liked what I saw but I was ok letting it go.

On this 76 hour journey I managed to...

1. Finish the 6th Potter book and start the 7th
2. Finish up the S-Town podcast
3. Spend some quality time with D's brother
4. Eat 3 really good dinners
5. Try 3 different new coffee shops in Seattle
6. Walk around town a lot
7. Read the NYT Magazine & book review from last week
8. Relax a bit more than usual
9. Get to meet some good people from Seattle Children's Research Institute

Despite all of that, I am happy to be home. By the end of yesterday I was spent, and was looking forward to being done. I was not thrilled by the 3:00 start time of today but once I woke up it was fine, and surprisingly getting an Uber at 3:20 am was incredibly easy. The worst part of the trip was the approach to Newark, where the turbulence was probably as bad as I have ever had it. It was more like the bottom-dropping-out effect, which happened non-stop for almost 30 minutes coming in. By the end of it I felt seasick, and almost ready to throw up. I tried to read through it but that may have made it worse. This generally doesn't bother me but after such a long time, it got to me.

I got home, inhaled food & advil, then went to pick up the kids. In between getting Julia & Zac, my boss called and we talked for a half hour about the various things that we need to somehow try to band-aid and more importantly, how poorly prepared and responsible this implementation partner is. I am not letting this one slide. We are raising the red alarm on day 3 of this project. I have seen things go south fast when you let it slide and "hope it works out."

After I helped the kids with homework I jumped into Zwift-London and the hills for an hour. After dinner, D jumped on and tried it for the first time as well. When I hit submit on this post, I will go book my trip for Chicago, next Monday through Wednesday.

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