On New Year’s Resolutions, Thinking about blogging, and the Weather in Kent

By all accounts we are 10.4% into 2011¹, a point where over half of New Year’s resolutions have already been broken. I had three resolutions this year and by my account I have been successful.

Resolution #1: Curse less and more at the same time

I habitually curse. I easily surpass my cursing quota every quarter. The majority of my cursing is usually ironic and for the sake of comedy. Work presents a problem as it is the place I am compelled to curse the most, but at the same time a well timed fuck this noise doesn’t always play well in the office. Problem.

Sometime between the hours of 2am and 3am eastern standard time during the penultimate week of 2010 I found my answer:

Shazbot

As you of course know shazbot is the curse word used by Mork².

By utilizing shazbot my cursing has taken a logarithmic path. It has tapered to an average of 7 shazbots per hour per work day. I think I can mark this as success thus far. I am about a log base 1,9.




Resolution #2: Utilize schematics more

It makes much more sense than utilizing napkins, I have an abundance of t-squares, and I’ll get more done³. I could store the schematics in the warehouse.

Resolution #3: Find ways to use the phrase “a day late and a dollar short”

No more than 11 days ago I was leaving work when my colleague⁸ was carrying his umbrella the day after it rained and he had been drenched. I pounced on the opportunity but I did not verify if he was in fact a dollar short.



footnotes:


¹ at that point I instinctually typed fiscal year 2011 but corrected myself.

² Of Mork and Mindy fame

³ Although I consider myself to be hyper-productive, my overall production output is hindered by the fact that I am interested in everything all the time and feel the need to constantly begin new projects. In addition to this I am fascinated by design and the environment in which you create in. Often times when I begin conceptualizing⁴ an endeavor I spend an inordinate amount of time conceptualizing the environment I want to create in. What would be the best type of typewriter, where do I get one of those six foot candles, how many warm grey Copic markers is too many, perhaps this would be better done at the park in front of that fountain on that one bench that I like but not the other ones. What this adds up too is by the time I have decided that I am ready I may have already moved onto the next project⁷ leaving the original ideas to live only on the pages of an archived moleskine notebook that no doubt won’t be discovered because I never followed through on that time capsule project.

⁴ The other day I was sitting around drinking a blood and sand⁵ cocktail and was thinking about blogging. I did not blog. I simply thought about the idea of thinking about blogging. I really like blogging but I like thinking about it more. Often I conceptualize the post in my head or a sketch and feel like “I got it” and then there is not point to put it down. I know editing defeats some of the nature of blogging as I am internally editing myself but I think as the co-writer of this blog I have a duty to my reader(s) to provide all the content that is fit to blog and nothing more. My blog post to ideas about blog posts is 1 : 3, my blog posts to times I think about thinking about blog post is 1: 7.

⁵ Blood and Sand is a classic scotch based cocktail. It’s great because it’s suitable for breakfast⁶, a pre dinner drink, or after 2am. Very versatile. This recipe is more on the bitter side than the classic recipe by substituting punt et mes for ross vermouth and using less luxardo maraschino liquor or cherry brandy. I also am using a peated scotch that gives it a smokey flavor and aroma that plays well with the orange juice and cherry.

1 oz Laphroaig
Freshly squeeze juice of one large Valencia orange (approximately 1 oz)
.75 oz of Punt et Mes
.75 oz of Cherry brandy or luxardo maraschino liquor
Dash of orange bitters

Stir with ice in a glass cocktail shaker and strain once or twice through a chinoise or a tea strainer commensurate on your proclivity for orange juice pulp. Pour into a chilled coupe glass or serve with one large ice cube in a rocks glass.


⁶ It has orange juice!


⁷ I have this business idea for a work related fantasy camp. Unlike those rock and roll fantasy camps the job choices would be everyday jobs that we want to do for a week but passed on in our lives for financial and other reasons. One week as a mailman, cop, crooked cop, bakery owner, proprietor of a bed and breakfast, high school math teacher who teaches kids that math is fun. So like that. To be detailed in a post to be named later


⁸This particular work colleague grew up in Kent and now resides in London. It’s predictable but we enjoy discussing the weather. The BBC has tremendously good weather forecast. All of their meteorologist discuss the intricacies of barometric pressure with a sense of ease knowing the connoisseurship of the audience. I brought that up with my co-worker who informed me everyone in England loves talking about the weather and is so well versed in it partially because of weather forecasting being part of the National Curriculum. He described that during your studies a significant amount of time is devoted to forecasting the weather as this fun and informative assignment. Combined with the detail being provided it seems to stick. The BBC news provides me less relevant weather advice but I’m always well prepared for the rain.