Rolodex Roulette

Image of Jonathan Novich

I found myself alone in the front of the minivan at 9pm with the rest of the team sleeping in back on the last leg of our family vacation.

Since I hadn’t put the word out to schedule late-night conference calls, (see “how to use Twitter and Facebook” to network”), I invented Rolodex Roulette.

The idea?

Commit to calling one person in my phonebook for each letter of the alphabet by last name and allow the randomness of the touch screen scrolling interface to determine whom I would call.

You never know, right?

Well, I ended up making 23 calls (I only know one person whose last name starts with X and he lives in Japan, so that wasn’t going to happen) and we got home before I could get to Y and Z.

The result?

8 GREAT conversations and connecting with people I hadn’t chatted with in a LONG time.

Plus, when you talk to “random” people, you have the opportunity to hear things that are outside of your normal discourse, which broadens your worldview.

Here’s the list (* means that I actually spoke with them)

1. Ytzik Aranov
2. Justin Bacon*
3. Elle Can
4. Justin Damelin
5. Jack Elmore
6. Stephanie Fisch
7. Martha Galley
8. Chris Hagner*
9. Shai Ingber*
10. Drew Jenkins
11. Moshe Kinderlehrer
12. Curtis Lee
13. Valerie Moore
14. Jonathan Novich*
15. Zakia Ovington
16. Abe Pachikara
17. Matt Richards*
18. Q-ok, skipped this too, since I only know two people. One lives in Australia…the other, Linda Quarles…I am seeing on Wed. anyway
19. Troy Sabin*
20. Brig Tison*
21. Helen Underwood
22. Clark Valberg*
23. Adam Weinstein
24. Bingwu Xie (the only X…in Japan, and I didn’t call him)

A 33% hit rate. Not bad.

Clark (#22) suggested that the idea could be an iPhone app and linked into social networks such as a Facebook status update (tweet) that says “I am playing Rolodex Roulette and speaking with Clark Valberg now” (with the appropriate links.)

Anyway, I had a great time and highly recommend the game.

No Blood For Oil? How about Water?

First it was phosphorus, now it is water.

A fascinating article about what current trends in consumption mean for us and future generations.

Thoughts?

Will ingenuity solve this or are we headed to catastrophe?

Flexibility vs. Security

On 2nd thought, I am not sure this is the best title for this post.

Perhaps you can help me re-title it after it.

Three times within the course of three days people remarked/commented on my ability “as a dad” to participate in an activity of my kids during the traditional work day.

Tonka and Paco took a class this summer at the local franchise of the Little Gym and the last session of the semester, the parents are invited in to participate in the activity (and you can bet I did that with enough gusto that they probably are re-thinking the practice.)

I also took them at 2pm to their dental appointments.

The teachers at the Little Gym and the dentist, in particular, were truly amazed (I was the only father in the gym class) that I was there.

Since I make my own schedule, I can do that.

They saw the flexibility portion of my job.

What they don’t see, however, is the fact that I have traded the relative security of a known ribi-weekly paycheck.

But, in thinking further about it, I realized that, particularly these days, many people don’t take that for granted either.

So, wondering…what do you think is the appropriate “flip-side” to the flexibility that I currently have?

Layar, worlds first mobile Augmented Reality browser

a nice glimpse of the future of how virtual and real come together...

The Wedding Process

Image via Wikipedia

We were in Albany last weekend for the wedding of one of the NFO's sisters. A glorious affair indeed.

Over the weekend, as we offered our blessings and thoughts for the couple, I had a chance to have some side conversations with people about marriage.

What was interesting is how many people said how naive they were about what marriage really entails at the time of their weddings.

Not in the sense of "oh, it's terrible and I thought it would be 'happily ever after,'" but really more in the sense of how much effort, patience and time it takes to really morph into a couple...in the true sense of the world.

A few weeks back, I was talking to some friends of ours and they were sharing a conversation they'd had about what they would expect the other spouse to do in the event of an untimely/early death of one spouse.

The wife said, "I've spent 20 years breaking this one in, I don't have patience for another one."

It was said in jest...sort of...but I think the larger point, which she realized, is that it just takes a LOT OF TIME for two people to really come together and learn to live with each other in true harmony.

I don't want this to come off as saying there's discontent and dischord all along the way, there's certainly not. There are plenty of amazing moments as well, but recognizing that growing (or should I say wedding?) two people into one doesn't happen on the wedding day, it just starts there.

Maybe we should start talking about 'wedding' as a verb, not a noun. The noun, then, is just the first looping together in a process that takes a while.

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Two Things I Will ALWAYS Invest In….

Marketing and Technology.

Legendary management professor Peter Drucker said it best:

“The business enterprise has two—and only two—basic functions: marketing and innovation.”  (The Essential Drucker)

And I view Technology as a fundamental driver of innovation.

That’s why I spent the bulk of 2 days last week TOTALLY overhauling and upgrading my infrastructure.

I was away from my core business (fortunately it is August and things were a bit slow), but this is the kind of upfront investment that technology requires…”all in” and which pays off SIGNIFICANTLY over time.

Here’s what we did (it’s going to get a bit geeky, so hang on)

1. bought a new x64 PC w/4 GB RAM and dual core. Installed Windows 7 on it, added a 2nd video card and now have 4 monitors attached to it. Office 2010 tech preview is coming
2. Took my previous machine and made it a true “media center” PC where TV, Video, Pics, Music can all be accessed from multiple locations throughout the house and, (most importantly for the NFO and me) while exercising
3. Migrated my business email/calendar/contacts to a hosted Exchange solution
4. set up real-time synchronization between 3 computers and my mobile phone
5. got a new mobile phone (HTC touch) and brought it online
6. reconfigured my Magic Jack phone to make it easier to access
7. added cameras to two other computers so we can Skype with family/friends around the world (and no one has to come into the “man cave”)
8. used Windows Live Sync to keep all files up to date across multiple devices

There’s more and it took some work. One night, I had parts of 3 different computers strewn about the basement floor.

But, we got it done and now, we’re ready to rumble.

Shift in the Parental Paradigm…

There are a few slides at the pool where we go.

At the beginning of the summer, I asked Tonka to go down the medium sized one at least once before the end of July.

Paco has been going down these slides since before he was 3, so I know someone of her age can handle it.

She said she would.

Somehow, July came and went and I never called her on it.

Until last week.

It’s not so much that I want her to go down the slide per se, it’s that I want her to learn the lesson that we need to stand up to our fears and confront them. Obviously, if safety is an issue, your fear is right, but you have to have the judgment that a slide at a public pool with hundreds of kids going down it each day without incident is indeed safe.

I know I’m more risk-tolerant than many, but I also know that total risk-aversion is something that I want my daughter to avoid.

So, at first, I pushed…pretty hard. I threatened. I punished.

Not because she wouldn’t go down the slide, but because she had broken her promise to me.

She was in tears.

I was angry and upset.

Two days later, we were back at the pool.

I tried a different approach.

Admittedly, I should have tried it before, but hey, I’m doing this for the first time, so cut me some slack.

Told her it was ok to be afraid. Offered assistance in a number of ways, as did Paco.

Failure.

Now, I wasn’t angry, I was saddened.

Call me melodramatic, but I envisioned a teenager, or college student, or a middle aged woman who was paralyzed by fear and unable to overcome it to take that next step of growth and worried that that woman was my daughter…and it was a result of my failure to help her understand why she needed to do this.

We were both upset by the situation (she didn’t go down the slide) and she was acting out a bit in the car ride home.

It was at that moment that I knew the paradigm for her had shifted.

I couldn’t just tell her what to do and have her listen to me simply because I am her father. That era, for her, at least, had passed.

Call it fate, but later that night, while giving Gianni a bath, I was reading Harold Kushner’s book When All You Ever Wanted Isn’t Enough and the

chapter talked about the difference between “power” and “love.”

I won’t go into all of it, but suffice it to say, it gave me some ideas.

And it also helped me recognize that this was a pivotal moment for her as well as for me.

We needed to focus on the nature of our relationship.

So, I took her to the couch and we hugged each other. We chatted about what happened and we tried to reach an understanding.

I don’t know if we achieved the specific objective, but I do think she got the meta-message…that I love her.

I suppose that is the most important thing here and, if she knows that, perhaps it will make it easier to take those leaps of faith that childhood require.

 

Technorati Tags: parenting,child rearing,daughters

Don’t Mess With the Zohan

Cover via Amazon

It’s not always so popular to stereotype people, but if you’ve spent a lot of time in Israel or with Israelis (and can handle a little bit of raunch/off-color), then You Don't Mess with the Zohan is worth it.

Yes, I know it’s 2 or 3 years old or whatever, but what do you want, I have 3 kids?!!

Anyway, I found myself laughing out loud and crying (full disclosure: I think Adam Sandler is really funny) as he (and others in the film) hammed up the Israeli cultural foibles.

Very accurate.

A good, light laugh, even if the ending is rather naive.

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America on the decline?

My friend Josh, a graduate of St. John's College and a guy who knows a thing or two about a classical liberal arts education, submits the following. Thoughts?

I would submit that the American experiment is in the “complacency to dependency” stage as is evidenced by the over-reliance on government bailouts and total lack of consequences and free markets in today’s environment.

The average age of the world’s greatest civilizations has been 200 years. Those nations always progress through the following sequence:

• From bondage to spiritual faith,
• from spiritual faith to great courage,
• from great courage to liberty,
• from liberty to abundance,
• from abundance to selfishness,
• from selfishness to complacency,
• from complacency to dependency,
• from dependency back into bondage."

–Alexander Fraser Tytler Lord Woodhouselee (1748-1813), "The Decline and Fall of the Athenian Republic", Scottish historian at Edinburgh University

Justifying Tech Toys to Stay Young

The other day I wrote that one of the ways to “stay young” is to befriend a 14 year old.
Another way…one that works for me and one that, in hindsight, worked for my Poppy, is to buy advanced technologies that you don’t fully understand.
Then, play around with it.
I obtained a new phone with some advanced features and I could feel my mind working (as if I was playing Sudoku) as I sought to discover the inner workings of the device.
Yes, I enjoyed it, but I now can justify my purchases :-)
Experts tell you that exercising your brain with new challenges helps prevent diseases like Alzheimers.

Hi-Ho...a new standard in High/Low

Our Sabbath Meal Invite Strategy and preparation document are the subject of a great deal of "roasting" within our community.

And, over the years, we've had plenty of people rise to the occasion with extremely creative, exciting, and memorable "gifts" to make the moment even more special.

Whether it is a trash can, a fire extinguisher, gifts that are symbolic of our children, folding chairs, WD-40, electric extension cords, Drano, carpet cleaner or whatever (and I'm just naming a few not saying the others aren't great), each of these items like a piece in a museum that says "donated by the XX family foundation" holds a place in our memory long after the meal is done.

However, this past week, we reached a new plateau.

One of the things we ask our guests is to share "a high point and a low point" of the past week.

We've had great highs and very sad lows, but until now, as far as I can recall, no one had ever come with a prepared statement in the form of a song.

Bobby Medow, father of our friend, Panina Licht, on the plane from St. Louis penned the following to the tune for "Hi-Ho" from Snow White and 7 Dwarves.

We pause and recognize the grandeur of this moment.

What the 3rd child doesn't know...

is that you've been there before.

Gianni has recently started throwing some tantrums.

She's also got a look in her eye that says "I am testing you and testing boundaries."

What she doesn't realized is: we're not fazed.

We've "been there, done that."

She'll lie down in the middle of the kitchen floor, cry, kick her legs, etc.

Know what we do?

Lift her up and just move her to another room, put her face down there and let her scream.

Matter of fact. All business. Ok, have your tantrum and we'll move on, but no need to disturb the peace in here.

We've seen this and we're unmoved, so good luck.

As a father, I want to teach her to innovate any way, it's a critical Darwinian skill, right? (need to adapt to your environment), so I'm sure this behavior will morph into something uniquely her own, but for now, she hasn't yet figured out that the strategies she's employing have been met before.

In effect, she's fighting the last war. ;-)

The Supreme Commander in My House...

The other day Paco says to me:

"Dad, can I have a popsicle?"

"I don't know. Ask the Supreme Commander."

Without missing a beat or hesitating for even a second, he turns to the NFO and says:

"Mom, can I have a popsicle please?"

Nice.

I told this story to my brother-in-law. He loved it. He said, "I call my wife 'Zeus,' since she is all-powerful."

The value of sharing...

Image by erjkprunczyk via Flickr

People often ask me why I am willing to share so much information and to share some seemingly random things with you.

Well, I guess it is because that, more often than not, it is, simply put, worth it.

Here's a trivial example.

The other day, in my post where I suggested that Maryland may be the most uniquely shaped state, I mentioned a book that I wanted to read called How the States Got Their Shapes.

Well, wouldn't you know it, but one of the people coming over for lunch the next day had it, brought it over, and lent it to me?

So, while I didn't read ALL the states, I did skim a majority of the book and I'm going to say that, when you combine the shape with some of the historical information around it, that Maryland and West Virginia would be my top two nominees.

In a previous era, there's NO way that I would have been able to share that information and then have it turn into something so useful, so quickly.

Internet Porn and Parenting in a Networked World

Remember back after September 11th when we learned that nature of war had changed?

We learned that Al-Qaeda was a “network” and that our military wasn’t set up to defeat a networked enemy.

For some reason, I get Details magazine (I think it is left over from a US Air miles redemption offer, but I digress). It's not super-intellectual, but it does have some entertaining, light (bathroom, if I must be honest) reading.

The other night, I was reading an article called HOW INTERNET PORN IS CHANGING TEEN SEX (warning: the content is EXTREMELY graphic. Mom-please do not read this.)

[Note: when you put in “warning: graphic content,” I bet that makes MORE people read it, not less. Hmmmm…)

Ok, so the rest of this post is a lot of graphic content also.

I know you clicked over. I told you it was GRAPHIC.

And that is part of the point.

One of the things that really came out in the article was how teens can basically access anything they want, any time, from anywhere.

When most of us were growing up, there was one line into the house (the phone) and parents could control it.

Now, there are billions of lines in.

You can’t control it.

You can try, but I think you’ll (and I) lose.

It’s a totally new paradigm, so it requires a new way of thinking.

My good friend, Rabbi Shu Eliovson, runs a phenomenal organization called In-Reach (please consider donating here)

It’s specifically focused on Jewish youth, but the problems/challenges are universal.

How do you help parents prepare their kids for dealing with a world where every possible imaginable thing (and we mean everything-stuff that some of you can’t even picture, nor do you want to) is at their fingertips (or iPods or phones).

It’s a new war (survival of your kids) in a networked world.

If you are a parent, you can’t fight “the last war.”

Trust me, I don’t have the answer on this one, but I do have a bit of time (probably less than I think though) to figure it out.

That’s why we are kicking this conversation off today.

Updated: thanks to those of you who have already donated (just put jer979 in the notes field)

On Sustainability…

For those of you who are concerned about sustainability (and that should be all of you), two articles worth checking out.

Both from Scientific American

The first is about Todd Brady, who is Corp Environmental Manager at Intel, and has designed Intel’s first green building to be opened this year in Haifa, Israel.

The other article, far more technical, raised my awareness (from zero) on the looming crisis of a Phosphorus Famine.

I had NO idea about this at all or how critical it is.

The visual that brought the phosphorus issue (and more…ever since An Incovnenient Truth, I feel like my outlook has dramatically changed), was the author’s description of the Earth as a spaceship.

He writes:

Green Revelation
My interest in phosphorus dates back to the mid-1990s, when I became involved in a NASA program aiming to learn how to grow food in space. The design of such a system requires a careful analysis of the cycles of all elements that go into food and that would need to be recycled within the closed environment of a spaceship. Such know-how may be necessary for a future trip to Mars, which would last almost three years.

Our planet is also a spaceship: it has an essentially fixed total amount of each element.

Worth the read.

Most Unique State Shape...

Image via Wikipedia

There is no question that I'm biased on this one, but was looking at a cut-out of the state of Maryland the other day and I wondered...what state has the most unique shape?

I'm ready to argue for Maryland. So many nooks and crannies, a very narrow part in the northwest, a huge cut thanks to the Chesapeake Bay.

There's a book I added to my Amazon Wish List, but haven't read yet called How the States Got Their Shapes which I will have to check out.

Which state do you think and why?

My job is to leave…

Dropped Tonka off at a new camp on Monday and she was a bit clingy. Even teary.

Eventually, I had to go, of course, and I thought that part of my job is to have her confront her fears, face the unknown. Those are life skills.

My job, to put it bluntly, is to leave her in this scenario.

IT’s the only path to growth.

What Dancing Teaches Us About Perception...

Image by ~طفــس بس محتــرم~ 08.08.08 ~ via Flickr

The NFO and I are big fans of the Fox show "So You Think You Can Dance."

The summer season ended last week where Jeanine edged out Brandon for the championship.

It was widely recognized the Jeanine had "peaked at the right time" and had made dramatic improvements in her dancing skills over the course of the season.

While we don't know for sure, I suspect that many people saw this transformation and loved her "4th quarter push," thus giving her the crown.

The thing is....it was also widely recognized from the VERY beginning of the season that Brandon was one of the top, if not THE top dancer, on the show.

His audition was memorable. He gave, what the lead judge called, "one of the greatest solo performances the show has ever seen" and he was consistently excellent in his execution.

So, what caused his defeat?

I think it was expectations.

From the very beginning, Brandon was a superstar. Expectations were ridiculously high. A small hiccup that was super minor for another dance became the one thing that the judges could find fault with in his otherwise phenomenal and consistent performances.

So, we expected excellence from him and if he delivered 99.9%, it didn't meet our expectations.

Jeanine, on the other hand, made improvement that relatively speaking seemed far more significant than Brandon's, so in our eyes, she appeared to be the better dancer.

It wasn't about consistency it was about the delta, the change.

We don't notice consistency. We notice change.

And we notice big change more than little change.

One less page of classified ads in our local paper, we don't notice.

The paper going out of business, we notice.

I wonder if there's a lesson here for a lot of things.  It's good to start strong, but if you have to choose, it's probably better to finish strong.

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Selling Kidneys...Conservatives/Liberals United!

Image by Getty Images via Daylife

You may have heard about the recent scandal in New Jersey where a number of Orthodox rabbis were arrested for a variety of things including money laundering.

One of them, however, was involved (allegedly) in a kidney selling scheme where he would pay poor people $10k and then re-sell the organ for $160k to rich people in need of a transplant.

It seems, however, that on the issue of selling organs, we may have a point of agreement between free market libertarians and liberals.

The free marketers would, of course, say "hey, a kidney is an asset you possess...like your time, your skills, and your education. You should be able to sell that on the free market the same way you would any of those other assets."

And the liberals would say "just like in a case of abortion where it is 'my body, my choice,' a person who wants to sell his kidney can say 'hey, it's my body, my choice.'"

People take all kinds of risks every single day and they live with those decisions. If a poor person in need of cash in India or wherever can make $10k (or more) by selling a kidney to someone who has money and can afford it, isn't everyone better off?

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