Aaron Karo
I've had a more relaxed day at work for once. It's allowed me to do a little freelance reading, and one site that I've found to be fun reading is www.aaronkaro.com. A couple years ago, I remember reading this guy's "ruminations" on college life. Before everyone had their own blogs, he was writing purely entertaining, quality material in a monthly newsletter, posted on the internet or distributed through email lists.
I forgot about him until now, and it turns out that since then, he's graduated college, worked on Wall Street, quit, compiled his writings into a book, and spent time touring the country doing stand-up comedy. Through it all, he's continued to write consistently hilarious ruminations, a lot of which I can relate to, but most of which I lack the wit and charm to transfer to my own blog. After reading all his stuff, I feel shamed to continue posting in my blog, which is devastatingly mediocre in comparison. But anyways, I highly recommend that everyone check out that site and read through his columns.
Here are a few of my favorites:
"I think maybe I’m starting to figure women out though. One thing I have noticed is that girls are always cold and they are always complaining that they’re feet hurt. (Who the hell told you to wear seven-inch heels anyway?) So, I think what I’m gonna do is carry around a pair of sneakers and a sweater. That’ll really make me a hit with the ladies! Man, the things we do for love."
It's funny, cause I've known this for a long time but never did anything about it until recently. This guy thinks like me. Except instead of a sweater, I keep a fleece in the backseat of my car. And these days when Olivia asks me which shoes she should wear, I always tell her "I really like your white and blue sneakers". Even if we're going to a fancy place.
"Did I miss the poof revolution? Since when did it become mandatory for all girls to use one of those poofy things in the shower? I was crashing at a girl friend’s place and all she had was a poof and liquid soap. Guys were just not meant to use a poof in the shower. It’s too rough in places it should be gentle and too gentle when it should be rough. I feel uncomfortable just writing about it."
I can't help but respectfully disagree here. The gentleness/roughness issue is easily remedied by careful usage, most should be able to easily vary the amount of pressure applied in using the "poof" depending on the sensitivity of the area to be washed. It's not just for girls. But like him, I never knew what the real name was for the longest time, and I always called it the "poofy thing". Now, I've been enlightened to know that it's called a loofa.
"I am fascinated by bathroom attendants. To me, this is a sign that the economy is so bad we’ve been reduced to just making up jobs. Let’s just say, for argument’s sake, that I really do need baby powder, condoms, six varieties of mints and twenty different kinds of cologne every time I use the bathroom. I certainly don’t need all that stuff handed to me. And I definitely don’t want to tip this guy every time I take a piss. It’s like a urinal tollbooth in there."
I kind of like those guys actually. But it definitely does get annoying that I gotta feel pressured to drop a buck in his tray, just cause he handed me a paper towel after I washed my hands. I can get my own damn paper towel. They're at least part of the reason I tend to break $10 and $20 bills more, instead of using my singles to buy stuff. Stupid, I know, but hey... pays off when you really gotta pee at Barleycorn.
"My college buddies are obsessed with fantasy sports to the point that I’m actually worried about them. Here’s an example. My friend Jeremy is at this club and bumps into Kurt Thomas of the Knicks. Now if I met Kurt Thomas, I’d be getting his autograph, taking pictures with him, etc., but not Jeremy. Here is their conversation. Jeremy: Hey, you’re Kurt Thomas! Thomas: Yeah. Jeremy: It’s great to meet you. Thomas: Thanks dog. Jeremy: You know, I have you on my fantasy basketball team. Thomas: Word? Jeremy: Yeah, listen, I was wondering if I could ask you a favor. Thomas: What? Jeremy: I’m in second place, and I could really use some more blocks from you. Thomas: More blocks? No doubt, I’ll see what I can do. Jeremy: Thanks man, have a good night. That’s a true story. A few days later, Thomas had the most in blocks in one game of his career. He must have done it all for Jeremy."
Substitute in that story "Joe" for "Jeremy", "Mike Mussina" for "Kurt Thomas", and "Strikeouts" for "Blocks, and you've got a perfect description of my dream encounter with my favorite fantasy player.
"I wish med school kids wouldn’t show off so much. The other day a bunch of my friends were hanging out and someone farted. We all laughed but then the med student of the bunch said, “Guys, that was just a natural mixture of carbon dioxide, formed from chemical reactions between stomach acid and intestinal fluid, as well as hydrogen and methane.” Well that kind of took the fun out of it."
Yeah, I'm pretty immature like that, but most of the time Olivia laughs it off. But maybe I should try to be a little more professional around her med-school friends. They probably don't appreciate my brand of crass humor as much. So in the future I'll have to resist the temptation to call Magglio Ordonez "Fagglio" or Bobby Jackson "Booby Jackson" when I'm at one of those dinner parties or whatever. Only when I'm with my own less sophisticated group of friends could I say stuff like "I worked out at the Bally's in Queerfield (Deerfield)" or "Let's go eat at Taco Smell".
*****
Also, the call for any interested softball players continues. It sounds like there's enough interest for me to go ahead an plan details, so that's good. Tentatively, it seems early Sunday afternoon would be an ideal time, although I am still leaving the door open for a Saturday date too. Talk to me within the next couple days if possible.
Thursday, August 07, 2003
Wednesday, August 06, 2003
Tuesday, August 05, 2003
Serve This
Recently, especially in light of the rollercoaster that has been my last couple weeks of work, I've come to the realization that my job makes me more or less a servant. It's not technically a "service" position, like answering phones and dealing with customers' problems, but that just means that instead of being a servant to customers, I'm a servant to my bosses. This was a difficult thing for me to fully grasp because now that I think of it, I've never been in the position to serve other people. I'm used to being served.
Most of us (myself included) went through years of school and looked at it as though it were some burden placed on our shoulders. By the final semester of my senior year at college, I couldn't wait to take my last exam, grab my diploma and go. Too busy being pissed at professors who talked down to me, and too worried about getting the best grades possible, I failed to recognize the fact that school was there for my benefit, and not the other way around. All these professors, TA's, and department administrators that I viewed as the enemy, were actually people that were being paid to make sure I got my edumacation. Maybe it didn't always work out that way, with lazy and self-absorbed professors all over the place, but that was the intention.
Well, now that I'm more than a year removed from graduation and been working for a while, it's becoming more apparent that the days of me being served by everyone around me are over. Though my managers and most of the people I work with are eager to help me and answer my questions, the bottom line is that I work for them and that's the only reason they pay me each week.
Ever since I started working this job, I've wondered why I get home each night feeling so tired and drained, and I still haven't come up with a good answer. I mean, it's not like I'm lifting rocks all day, I'm sitting at a desk for the majority of 8 or 9 hours. All I know is, at the end of each day, I feel like I desperately need some time to recuperate. Exactly what it is I'm recuperating from, I don't know.
I think a big part of it is that I'm just not used to being in the position of serving other people. Yes, I'm getting paid for what I do, but other than that, my work is solely for the benefit of someone else. On the surface, when my boss gives me a list of Action Items from a meeting to take care of, it's a lot like a professor assigning a chapter to study or a problem set to do. But in reality, studying that chapter or doing that problem set is for my own good. If I don't do it, nobody really loses out but me. On the other hand, those Action Items have very little direct effect on my life. I might gain some technical experience from getting them accomplished, but that's merely a side benefit. So while it's probably just as tough, if not tougher, to work on an MP for 8 hours as it is to be at this job all day, the situation is very different.
Doing something for the sake of money and doing it for the sake of personal gain are two different things to me. Money is great, but it's honestly not that important to me. Maybe it's because I've never had to worry much about not having enough of it, so I don't fully appreciate its value. But really, the paycheck I get each Friday is not enough, in and of itself, to motivate me to work my butt off at my job. I do work hard, partly because it's the way I've been brought up, but also because I have some faith that in the end, my effort will pay off in some way when all is said and done. I'm getting off my original topic though.
I guess in the bigger picture of my overall life, there's a significant shift in paradigm that has to come with the adjustment of starting a career. For 22 years, the focus has always been on improving myself, and working hard for my own future gain. Well, that future is now, and with its arrival, the questions arise - who am I working hard for, and for what purpose?
Because my primary role is no longer to serve myself and my own interests, there must be some deeper motivation and personal justification for something that takes up the majority of my waking hours and demands so much of my soul. Right now, I lack a clear sense of what this motivation is, or where it's supposed to come from, and maybe that's why I end up feeling so debilitated at the end of each day.
Maybe I need to have a wife and kids to support, and having them depend on me and my paycheck will provide a driving force to move forward. Maybe I need to take up a satisfying hobby, to counter the draining effects of serving other people's interests at work all the time. Maybe I should drop everything and start my own company, have people work for me, and continue to be entirely focused on my personal gain and no one else's, for the rest of my life. All of the above? None of the above?
Anyways, if I had known that leaving school would effectively mark the end of my life as a "servee" and the beginning of my life as a "server", maybe I wouldn't have been in such a hurry to walk across that stage to get my fake diploma on that fateful day in May 2002. But hey, life goes on. And I'd like to believe that some day, everything I wonder about will all make sense to me.
"Welcome to the real world -- it sucks" - Monica from Friends
Recently, especially in light of the rollercoaster that has been my last couple weeks of work, I've come to the realization that my job makes me more or less a servant. It's not technically a "service" position, like answering phones and dealing with customers' problems, but that just means that instead of being a servant to customers, I'm a servant to my bosses. This was a difficult thing for me to fully grasp because now that I think of it, I've never been in the position to serve other people. I'm used to being served.
Most of us (myself included) went through years of school and looked at it as though it were some burden placed on our shoulders. By the final semester of my senior year at college, I couldn't wait to take my last exam, grab my diploma and go. Too busy being pissed at professors who talked down to me, and too worried about getting the best grades possible, I failed to recognize the fact that school was there for my benefit, and not the other way around. All these professors, TA's, and department administrators that I viewed as the enemy, were actually people that were being paid to make sure I got my edumacation. Maybe it didn't always work out that way, with lazy and self-absorbed professors all over the place, but that was the intention.
Well, now that I'm more than a year removed from graduation and been working for a while, it's becoming more apparent that the days of me being served by everyone around me are over. Though my managers and most of the people I work with are eager to help me and answer my questions, the bottom line is that I work for them and that's the only reason they pay me each week.
Ever since I started working this job, I've wondered why I get home each night feeling so tired and drained, and I still haven't come up with a good answer. I mean, it's not like I'm lifting rocks all day, I'm sitting at a desk for the majority of 8 or 9 hours. All I know is, at the end of each day, I feel like I desperately need some time to recuperate. Exactly what it is I'm recuperating from, I don't know.
I think a big part of it is that I'm just not used to being in the position of serving other people. Yes, I'm getting paid for what I do, but other than that, my work is solely for the benefit of someone else. On the surface, when my boss gives me a list of Action Items from a meeting to take care of, it's a lot like a professor assigning a chapter to study or a problem set to do. But in reality, studying that chapter or doing that problem set is for my own good. If I don't do it, nobody really loses out but me. On the other hand, those Action Items have very little direct effect on my life. I might gain some technical experience from getting them accomplished, but that's merely a side benefit. So while it's probably just as tough, if not tougher, to work on an MP for 8 hours as it is to be at this job all day, the situation is very different.
Doing something for the sake of money and doing it for the sake of personal gain are two different things to me. Money is great, but it's honestly not that important to me. Maybe it's because I've never had to worry much about not having enough of it, so I don't fully appreciate its value. But really, the paycheck I get each Friday is not enough, in and of itself, to motivate me to work my butt off at my job. I do work hard, partly because it's the way I've been brought up, but also because I have some faith that in the end, my effort will pay off in some way when all is said and done. I'm getting off my original topic though.
I guess in the bigger picture of my overall life, there's a significant shift in paradigm that has to come with the adjustment of starting a career. For 22 years, the focus has always been on improving myself, and working hard for my own future gain. Well, that future is now, and with its arrival, the questions arise - who am I working hard for, and for what purpose?
Because my primary role is no longer to serve myself and my own interests, there must be some deeper motivation and personal justification for something that takes up the majority of my waking hours and demands so much of my soul. Right now, I lack a clear sense of what this motivation is, or where it's supposed to come from, and maybe that's why I end up feeling so debilitated at the end of each day.
Maybe I need to have a wife and kids to support, and having them depend on me and my paycheck will provide a driving force to move forward. Maybe I need to take up a satisfying hobby, to counter the draining effects of serving other people's interests at work all the time. Maybe I should drop everything and start my own company, have people work for me, and continue to be entirely focused on my personal gain and no one else's, for the rest of my life. All of the above? None of the above?
Anyways, if I had known that leaving school would effectively mark the end of my life as a "servee" and the beginning of my life as a "server", maybe I wouldn't have been in such a hurry to walk across that stage to get my fake diploma on that fateful day in May 2002. But hey, life goes on. And I'd like to believe that some day, everything I wonder about will all make sense to me.
"Welcome to the real world -- it sucks" - Monica from Friends
Monday, August 04, 2003
Proof that there is justice in this world - Gigli earned only $3.8 million in its opening weekend, a movie that cost $54 million to make. It couldn't even beat Finding Nemo in its 10th week. Not saying Finding Nemo sucks (I haven't seen it), but hey, after all the hype and promotion surrounding Gigli, it's pretty sad that they couldn't do better in their opening weekend. I was starting to think movie producers could put out any piece of crap and make money, but it's kind of reassuring to know that they can't shove just anything they want down our throats and still turn a profit.
A question I have been pondering - would it be better to be mauled by a bear, or walk through a swarm of little tiny flies? Well, I've never been a victim of bear-maulage, but I did experience walking through a thick cloud of little flies this weekend and it was pretty bad. These guys were everywhere, it was disgusting. I felt like I was breathing them in by the hundreds, and they were flying in my mouth. Then I got in my car, and they all followed me in. I've never seen anything like that, is it me or is the insect population getting worse every year? Seriously though, a bear, you can shoot it. How do you kill millions of tiny bugs? You can spray them with insecticide, but there's so many of them that enough will survive, and they will inevitably reproduce faster than you can find new insecticides.
Note to Vic - if you happen to read this, please join Mcnown now. If you need the info, contact me or check your Yahoo email account.
Random Observation - The first 4 letters of the words "Analog" and "Analysis" are "Anal". I noticed this because I looked at my Windows taskbar and a lot of the minimized windows are titled "Anal..." tee-hee
A question I have been pondering - would it be better to be mauled by a bear, or walk through a swarm of little tiny flies? Well, I've never been a victim of bear-maulage, but I did experience walking through a thick cloud of little flies this weekend and it was pretty bad. These guys were everywhere, it was disgusting. I felt like I was breathing them in by the hundreds, and they were flying in my mouth. Then I got in my car, and they all followed me in. I've never seen anything like that, is it me or is the insect population getting worse every year? Seriously though, a bear, you can shoot it. How do you kill millions of tiny bugs? You can spray them with insecticide, but there's so many of them that enough will survive, and they will inevitably reproduce faster than you can find new insecticides.
Note to Vic - if you happen to read this, please join Mcnown now. If you need the info, contact me or check your Yahoo email account.
Random Observation - The first 4 letters of the words "Analog" and "Analysis" are "Anal". I noticed this because I looked at my Windows taskbar and a lot of the minimized windows are titled "Anal..." tee-hee
Friday, August 01, 2003
Baseball/Summer
It's August and football is just around the corner, but right now BASEBALL is where it's at. I can't believe how well the Sox are playing, even in the beginning of the year when everyone had high expectations, I wouldn't have thought it would be like this. Of course, we are still in 2nd place, but man, what a way to rebound from that awful series getting swept by the Tigers. But looking ahead on the schedule, the road gets tougher. Gotta play the Yankees twice, Boston, Seattle coming up right now, and in a few weeks, another series with those dreaded Tigers. It's too bad they didn't cash in on all the crappy teams in the first half, but oh well. It's time to step it up.
Another team that is hot and needs to step up more is my fantasy team. Most of my readers don't care about my fantasy team, so just skip this. Anyways, hot starting pitching as of late has kind of put me back in the running, 150 pts behind the beast out of Kansas. And tonight, two big head-to-head pitching matchups against the Whiteys. Greg Maddux takes the hill against Nideo Homo, and Mike Mussina faces Tim Hudson. Doesn't get much more huge than that...
*****
Considering there's still a whole month left, it's a little early to do a "summer-in-review", but it really seems like the past couple months have just flown by. I guess when I think about it, a lot of stuff happened, but it feels like just yesterday when it was the end of May and we were at Dennis's graduation. Graduating seniors were giving me resumes to submit at Northrop, and everyone was talking about their plans for their break. Ray came back from Berkeley to take summer school at U of I, and I told him I'd visit him in Champaign for sure. Dan left for Honeywell, and I planned on maybe flying out there one weekend too. Olivia finished her finals, and made me promise to take her to Indiana Dunes sometime before the end of her vacation.
Meanwhile, for me at work, life during the summer months pretty much carries on the same as the rest of the year. The weather is nicer, of course, and the atmosphere is a little more relaxed, but other than that, the beat goes on. Fridays come and go, weeks and then months pass before I even know it. I find myself living from weekend to weekend, and having things planned weeks in advance, instead of calling people up an hour beforehand and expecting everyone to be ready to just pick up and go.
So now it's August, Dan is finishing up at Honeywell, Ray will be headed back to Cali soon, and I haven't managed to visit either of them. There's still a few weekends before Olivia starts her 2nd year of med school, but I don't know whether we'll end up making it to the Dunes or not. The past couple weeks especially have been a blur, working late and trying to stay sane amidst the madness of my surroundings. In a couple weeks, the US Navy is set to make a decision on who to award a large contract to, and if they choose us, it'll be even busier here for at least the next year or two. Which would be good for the company, and thus my job security, but not so good for the rest of my life as far as stress and free time and all that.
Well, for now I'd like to forget about all that stuff and list some of the good times so far this summer:
- Visiting Champaign for the weekend of Dennis's graduation. Softball, Legend's, the Quad, a fountain, Murphy's, and more...
- Rod's graduation party. Filipino Egg Rolls, Miller Lite, Mah-johng, Euchre, and No Limit Holdem
- Great America with the best friends. Waiting over an hour for the Whizzer, screaming on Viper, Superman, Iron Wolf, Raging Bull, and sharing funnel cake.
- A Sox game, a Cubs game, and a Sox-Cubs game. Seeing multiple drunk morons run on the field at US Hellular, one attacking the ump. Then Sammy Sosa getting busted for cork at Wrigley. Back to US Smellular, where we happened to catch the only game the Sox lost at home to the Cubs, while Cubs fans and Sox fans in our section kept getting kicked out for fighting each other.
- Lion's Head, Cherry Red, and Blu. Seems like the only times I see certain friends these days are at bars. I miss you guys, we should really hang out more outside.
- Good movies: Matrix Reloaded, X-men United, Seabiscuit, and some others I forget at the moment. Bad movies: Too many, among others, probably my least enjoyable was the Hulk
- 4th of July Barbeque at Cindy's in P-tine. 40's, brats, Pictionary. The only bad part was Billy Krotch blowing the Sox game in the 9th. Also worth mentioning was the recent Sushi night at Cindy's in Chicago. Much props for being a consistently excellent and generous host, Cindy.
- Thursday nights at Cubby Bear, $1 domestics. Turned into a Lambda thing after a while, so I stopped going. But it was good at the beginning of the summer, reminded me of the old crazy times with Andy and Will during freshman year of college. The best was them scaring the hell out of the racist white girl on the dance floor. Followed closely by the time me and Dave Chan whooped on them in Blitz arcade.
- Home run derby at DGS. A nice sunny Saturday afternoon, Anuj with a bucket of baseballs, the batting practice pitcher's screen, and just hitting away for a couple hours. More and more I cherish the opportunities to do these kinds of things and forget about everything else for a day.
Well, there's probably a few more that I missed, but just writing all those down puts me in a better mood. One more month left, time to step it up...
It's August and football is just around the corner, but right now BASEBALL is where it's at. I can't believe how well the Sox are playing, even in the beginning of the year when everyone had high expectations, I wouldn't have thought it would be like this. Of course, we are still in 2nd place, but man, what a way to rebound from that awful series getting swept by the Tigers. But looking ahead on the schedule, the road gets tougher. Gotta play the Yankees twice, Boston, Seattle coming up right now, and in a few weeks, another series with those dreaded Tigers. It's too bad they didn't cash in on all the crappy teams in the first half, but oh well. It's time to step it up.
Another team that is hot and needs to step up more is my fantasy team. Most of my readers don't care about my fantasy team, so just skip this. Anyways, hot starting pitching as of late has kind of put me back in the running, 150 pts behind the beast out of Kansas. And tonight, two big head-to-head pitching matchups against the Whiteys. Greg Maddux takes the hill against Nideo Homo, and Mike Mussina faces Tim Hudson. Doesn't get much more huge than that...
*****
Considering there's still a whole month left, it's a little early to do a "summer-in-review", but it really seems like the past couple months have just flown by. I guess when I think about it, a lot of stuff happened, but it feels like just yesterday when it was the end of May and we were at Dennis's graduation. Graduating seniors were giving me resumes to submit at Northrop, and everyone was talking about their plans for their break. Ray came back from Berkeley to take summer school at U of I, and I told him I'd visit him in Champaign for sure. Dan left for Honeywell, and I planned on maybe flying out there one weekend too. Olivia finished her finals, and made me promise to take her to Indiana Dunes sometime before the end of her vacation.
Meanwhile, for me at work, life during the summer months pretty much carries on the same as the rest of the year. The weather is nicer, of course, and the atmosphere is a little more relaxed, but other than that, the beat goes on. Fridays come and go, weeks and then months pass before I even know it. I find myself living from weekend to weekend, and having things planned weeks in advance, instead of calling people up an hour beforehand and expecting everyone to be ready to just pick up and go.
So now it's August, Dan is finishing up at Honeywell, Ray will be headed back to Cali soon, and I haven't managed to visit either of them. There's still a few weekends before Olivia starts her 2nd year of med school, but I don't know whether we'll end up making it to the Dunes or not. The past couple weeks especially have been a blur, working late and trying to stay sane amidst the madness of my surroundings. In a couple weeks, the US Navy is set to make a decision on who to award a large contract to, and if they choose us, it'll be even busier here for at least the next year or two. Which would be good for the company, and thus my job security, but not so good for the rest of my life as far as stress and free time and all that.
Well, for now I'd like to forget about all that stuff and list some of the good times so far this summer:
- Visiting Champaign for the weekend of Dennis's graduation. Softball, Legend's, the Quad, a fountain, Murphy's, and more...
- Rod's graduation party. Filipino Egg Rolls, Miller Lite, Mah-johng, Euchre, and No Limit Holdem
- Great America with the best friends. Waiting over an hour for the Whizzer, screaming on Viper, Superman, Iron Wolf, Raging Bull, and sharing funnel cake.
- A Sox game, a Cubs game, and a Sox-Cubs game. Seeing multiple drunk morons run on the field at US Hellular, one attacking the ump. Then Sammy Sosa getting busted for cork at Wrigley. Back to US Smellular, where we happened to catch the only game the Sox lost at home to the Cubs, while Cubs fans and Sox fans in our section kept getting kicked out for fighting each other.
- Lion's Head, Cherry Red, and Blu. Seems like the only times I see certain friends these days are at bars. I miss you guys, we should really hang out more outside.
- Good movies: Matrix Reloaded, X-men United, Seabiscuit, and some others I forget at the moment. Bad movies: Too many, among others, probably my least enjoyable was the Hulk
- 4th of July Barbeque at Cindy's in P-tine. 40's, brats, Pictionary. The only bad part was Billy Krotch blowing the Sox game in the 9th. Also worth mentioning was the recent Sushi night at Cindy's in Chicago. Much props for being a consistently excellent and generous host, Cindy.
- Thursday nights at Cubby Bear, $1 domestics. Turned into a Lambda thing after a while, so I stopped going. But it was good at the beginning of the summer, reminded me of the old crazy times with Andy and Will during freshman year of college. The best was them scaring the hell out of the racist white girl on the dance floor. Followed closely by the time me and Dave Chan whooped on them in Blitz arcade.
- Home run derby at DGS. A nice sunny Saturday afternoon, Anuj with a bucket of baseballs, the batting practice pitcher's screen, and just hitting away for a couple hours. More and more I cherish the opportunities to do these kinds of things and forget about everything else for a day.
Well, there's probably a few more that I missed, but just writing all those down puts me in a better mood. One more month left, time to step it up...
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