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Category: General

What’s Up? – August 2020

So, we’ve posted a fair number of items in the past month or so, but things cooled off a bit. I could point to a number of causes, but the main one is a general desire to do something a bit different.

Writing about cooking was a nice reminder that I can string a few words together into something, even if I’m my own main audience for it. What I’m looking to do now is to write about some other topics that might be more widely helpful or less self-indulgent. The main one being management.

Currently I’m in the planning stages for a series of posts regarding people management, and more specifically call-center management, which is the career I somewhat surprisingly managed to carve out for myself.

Upcoming topics include:

  • Empathy
  • Setting goal, not goals
  • Flipping the org chart
  • Building trust
  • Managing remote teams

And other topics as they coalesce into solid points or themes.

I won’t be speaking about my employer specifically, as I don’t want to A) give the impression that I’m speaking for them or in any way give an impression that my views are necessarily their views and B) to hopefully show that, regardless who I work for, the lessons are broadly applicable and generally helpful. If you know me, you know who I work for. If not, it shouldn’t really matter, as long as the content applies to the work you’re doing.

With that said, keep an eye on this space for the first essay in the series to come soon. Likely on Empathy, which is the main attribute that drives all of the other work of the successful manager.

Thanks for continuing to indulge me.

WordBinge Book One: Angelmaker

I’ve actually had Angelmaker around for a while now, and had started reading it at least twice, only to set it down. It took me a few runs at it to really get into it, and I’m very glad I did. It’s strange, to be honest, because, if memory serves, I devoured Harkaway’s previous, The Gone-Away World, in one sitting, two at most.

Angelmaker is a similar book in some ways. There are themes of duality here (though not as blatant as the previous), in the use of the protagonist’s double name, Joshua Joseph Spork. It’s interesting how, in scenes of the character early in the book, it’s always Joe or Joseph, but in flashing back, the dual name is used, or even the shortened Josh. The chosen name acts as a marker for the aspect of Spork which developed. As the book progresses, we see more of the Joshua that could have been, until Spork becomes his own balanced combination of the two, his Crazy Joe persona.

There’s also a sense of constructivism at work, an unease with the machined and the mass-produced. Very much what Marx was railing against in noting the theft of the soul of the worker, the distancing of the hands and the heart from the end product. It rings especially loudly in that England was the place Marx most felt the dehumanization of mass production and most felt his Communism could take root.

That same dehumanization is taken literally in the path of the Ruskinites, whose adherence to the hand and the soul in their work is evidenced early on, yet is perverted in their search for meaning and existence in a mechanized world. They turn into that which they railed against, mass-produced, mechanized simulacra of their creator.

There is a sense that there are references I miss, as one who is Angliphilic, but who is not a full fledged Anglophile, let alone an Angle. I’m sure there are jokes and jabs and plays on words one would get were they immersed in English culture, but I never found myself at a stunning loss.

Finally, Angelmaker is a prime example of one of my favorite types of stories, those about fathers and sons. I find a depth to stories about the expectations of and for children and the ways these expectations emerge, both overtly and covertly.

Harkaway has a way with words that seeps into you, alters your thought patterns. A highly recommended experience.

Vocabulary:
(As I read through my book list, I’m going to pay special attention to new words I’m learning. Harkaway has some choice ones I particularly enjoyed. Partially because they’re chiefly used in British English, but also because they, in the manner of Twain, are the right words.)

lissom – adjective
(of a person or their body) thin, supple, and graceful.

barbican – noun
the outer defense of a castle or walled city, especially a double tower above a gate or drawbridge.

houri – noun
a beautiful young woman, especially one of the virgin companions of the faithful in the Muslim Paradise.

actinic – adjective [ attrib. ]
(of light or lighting) able to cause photochemical reactions, as in photography, through having a significant short wavelength or ultraviolet component.

amanuensis – noun (pl. amanuenses |-ˌsēz| )
a literary or artistic assistant, in particular one who takes dictation or copies manuscripts.

seraglio – noun (pl. seraglios) historical
the women’s apartments (harem) in an Ottoman palace.

doughty – adjective (doughtier, doughtiest) archaic, humorous
brave and persistent

Graeae
In Greek mythology the Graeae, also called the Grey Sisters, were three sisters in Greek mythology who shared one eye and one tooth among them. Their names were Deino, Enyo, and Pemphredo.

Tricoteuses – noun (pl. same)
a woman who sits and knits (used especially in reference to a number of women who did this, during the French Revolution, while attending public executions).

And finally, some favorite passages, among so damned many:

“There’s a pause while the chairman considers the possibility that he may have revealed rather more of himself than he had intended.”

“He thinks everything that happens anywhere on Earth is in some way his fault,” she replies. “My brother says it’s some sort of inverted egotism.”

“This is a wicked world. There are islands of joy, but they are small and the tide is rising, and even on dry land there are those who would embrace the tide.”

“His grandfather was scathing about ‘speculative faith’, which is the kind you get from worrying about the possibility that God exists and may be cross with you. Daniel Spork observed that God, if there is one, is well aware of the interior dialogue, and most likely unimpressed by it. Much better, he said, to get on with being the man you are, and hope like buggery that God thinks you did as well as could be expected.”

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My “What the fuck?” Moments Of The Day

Two items jumped out at me today while sifting my RSS feeds (though a more apt descriptor should really be applied, in that it is an addictive behavior) (injecting? scarfing? smoking?) today.

Item the first: From the NY Times blog Freakonomics (in turn from the writers (and others) of the wildly successful book of the same name), this article, with the soul stomping headline: “The Burden of Incarceration: 1 in 28 Kids Have a Parent Behind Bars“.  You don’t even need to click before it hurts.  One in twenty-eight?

Imagine your high-school English class.  Pick one of those cherubic faces from the crowd.  The frail blond boy in the back, scribbling on the cover of his Mead notebook, adding shadows and depth to his daydream doodling.  Or the pretty girl sat up perky in the front row, her tight knot of auburn hair held firm under a plastic claw, or pinned in place with a pair of chopsticks, eyes darting from her notes to the board to the teacher, trying so desperately to take it all in.  Imagine them waking up every morning, coming home every afternoon, going to bed every night, aware of and aching over a mom or dad-sized absence in their lives.  One less pair of arms to hold them in their sorrow, to smooth away the pain, to embrace them in their triumphs.  One in twenty-eight.

Item the second: From the Christian Science Monitor, this gem: “‘Feds Radiating Americans’? Mobile X-ray vans hit US streets“.  Now, aside from the admittedly fearmongery headline, I’d like to know just who decided that this passed the Fourth Amendment sniff test and went ahead with the roll out of these vehicles.  Which bureatchnick thought this was OK?  And does anyone know where one buys feathers or tar in quantity?

I’m sorry for ruining your day.  When the spouse asks who got you all riled up, you can tell ’em it was Josh’s fault.  And then send them on over to see for themselves.