Elegant Distractions

My political prediction for 2004: a Democrat will become the first suicide bomber in the USA. Not a Hamas or Hezbollah or Al Queda follower, but a Democrat trying to alter the inevitable outcome of the elections. It will not have the desired outcome.

This is one I hope to be wrong about.

UPDATE: Monday evening, and so far I'm still wrong! Woohoo!

Actually, the more I think about it (don't worry, it ain't that much) the more evident it becomes that Dems are far too narcisistic to blow themselves up. More likely to hire it out. No need to get their own hands dirty, after all. It would be unseemly. Better to let someone with less to live for handle that stuff, what?

Posted by director at 07:59 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0) | Categories: Imported Entries

I think this election comes down to this: are we interested in doing the hard things now or do we think we can put them off for at least four years?

Fighting a war is not about killing the enemy. It is about destroying the enemy's will to fight. It doesn't have to happen on the battlefield. By all accounts, we were winning the war in Viet Nam but we surrendered our will to fight and then it was lost in spite of battlefield victories.

Winning is hard. More correctly, winning a competition is difficult. The level of effort in preparation and execution between mediocre teams/athletes and champions is significant. Winners work harder, study their game more often and in more detail. They understand that winning the game starts with beating the opposition in their minds first, breaking their will to win. Champions beat the competition mentally first, then on the field of play. They do the hard things when the other guy goes home or stays out late at the party.

Today we have people in this country who have already lost that will (if they ever had it) because beating the enemy is hard. Forty years of avoiding hard things is a tough habit to break. Thankfully, we have people who train for these hard things and are willing to do them. All they ask is the chance.

The enemy cannot defeat us but we can allow ourselves to be defeated. The election is between those who will fight and those who will surrender because winning is hard and inconvenient and sometimes ugly. Which team are you on?

Posted by director at 09:04 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0) | Categories: Imported Entries

Had plenty of reason lately to consider this topic. Second-hand observations at close range lead me to a new appreciation of why (generally) marriage is easier in certain respects when entered into while young.

The older one gets the harder it becomes to adapt to the presence of another person. We grow ossified in our patterns and preferences, and defensive about changes to them. When young we are still determining who we are so it is far simpler to adapt ourselves to the person we are with, and visa versa.

Once we cross the crotchety threshold adaptation is increasingly harder and less likely. Finding a partner at this point means locating someone with a compatible set of sharp edges that will fit ours. Not so much molding and melding goes on so we better find the right fit from the begging or those nasty corners on our personalities could cause some harm.

Posted by director at 08:34 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0) | Categories: Imported Entries

Still playing catch-up after changing lodgings. Got my in-box mostly current and am burning down my sprint backlog hours and tasks.

Want to be more productive than ever in your life? Combine Getting Things Done with Scrum. Even in your personal life.

Scrum is a software project management methodology that can easily be adapted for non-software projects. I'm currently using it for a video editing project, two screenplays and preparing for a mountain climb next summer.

When GTD and Scrum collide, great things can happen.

Posted by director at 08:51 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0) | Categories: Imported Entries