Big Thoughts – Page 82 – Wilder, Wealthy, and Wise

Franklin, Planners, The Terminator, My Unlikely But Real Link With President Eisenhower, Star Wars, and Kanban

“No matter who you are, no matter where you came from, you too can become financially independent in just a matter of months. All you need is strategy.” – Wolf of Wall Street

Amazing how he keeps showing up, right?

For me, it started with lists. Simple lists. In high school, when the number of things I had to do was greater than seven or so, I’d put a list together. It wasn’t really a plan, it was a way that I kept track of stuff I was supposed to do. On at least one occasion I made a date with a girl and then forgot about it completely. Poor girl, look at what she missed! (Amazingly, that girl chased me around like a puppy for years after I stood her up . . . but that’s another post.)

In college I had to get strategic, really for the sake of survival. My first semester, college work wasn’t at all hard. I studied a few hours, and got fairly decent grades. My next semester was not as friendly – Physics I, Calculus II and Chemistry II all had tests on the same week – all semester long. As a mechanism of sanity I bought one of those huge paper desk calendars and put it on my desk – I took the class and test schedules and laid out the entire semester at the start of the semester. It helped – now I knew when I would have to spend hours of studying – and it wouldn’t hit me by surprise. It was also helpful for taking notes. And for writing down Alice Cooper® lyrics when I was bored.

I can’t get a girl
‘Cause I ain’t got a car
I can’t get a car
‘Cause I ain’t got a job
I can’t get a job
‘Cause I ain’t got a car
So I’m looking for a girl with a job and a car
–Lost in America, Alice Cooper

Where the lists I used to make were just that, lists, the desk calendar was the basis of an entire strategy. I could plan my day (and night) and beer consumption appropriately. I could plan in advance, and when I got two weeks out, I could plan pretty accurately what I needed to do and study in order to pass. It worked.

After graduating from college, the first place I worked handed out . . . a pad of lists. This was just a simple list that you could fill out each morning to remember the things you had to do each day. Hey! I was back to high school. The lists were handy. I was shocked, shocked I say, to find out that my employer wanted me to work on lots of different things each day. The lists were handy. But I decided that I hadn’t had enough beer and decided to go back to grad school, and got back to my desk calendar.

After grad school I got another job. On the first day I found on my desk a box of business cards, assorted pens, pencils and offices supplies, a new computer, and a Franklin® Planner, complete with a metal nametag with my name on it.

Talk about an awesome first day!

I opened the planner, and looked at the cool pages – it was as if my old lists had mated with my desk calendar and created a system to manage . . . everything. I was in love.

There were two pages for each month – so I could do the strategic planning that had gotten me through college. And a page for each day, so I could create a prioritized list of the work that I needed to get done. Turns out that these were called Franklin© Planners because they were modeled off of Benjamin Franklin’s daily planner. He’d write down what he had to do, do it, and then write down what he’d done during the day.

Not a bad plan – especially since he did all this without electricity. Oh, wait . . . he discovered it! And bifocals. And treaties with France. And was a billionaire businessman. Sigh. I got to work without injuring myself. Does that count?

I took very well to the Franklin© Planner. It was awesome! Give me enough pages and I’d have planned my own funeral. Here’s an example of how you use it:

In the immortal words of Ben Franklin (on a sober day) “If someone asks if you wouldst be Sarah Connor sayeth, nay, I thinkith she livith in another county, or maybe Canada.”

The Franklin© Planner allows you to plan and prioritize your day. I’ve moved away from the A, B, C system. I now rank things based on what quadrant they are in, rated by importance. I think I stole the following concept from Stephen Covey (he wrote the 7 Habits of Highly Effective People), but the idea is this – put your effort where it matters. (True story: Covey stole this from Dwight D. Eisenhower. My grandmother was his grade school teacher. Did my grandmother teach Ike about importance and urgency?)

See how cool this is! I took a $500 computer and made a drawing that looks like a 7 year old did it! Bonus – who doesn’t like Comic Sans as a font?

This breaks most things that you do down into four different categories based upon if they are urgent (have to be done NOW!) and if they are important (HAVE to be done). Obviously some things are (sort of) in the middle, but on a daily basis, you can put most things in one of the four boxes.

Not Urgent, Not Important.

The first quadrant is the bottom left quadrant – it’s not important, and it’s not urgent.

Why would you ever do it? It’s like mowing the grass growing in the forest next to my house – sure I could let those hostages I have in the basement mow it, but then they’d just want more food, and I never go into the forest, anyway. Because no one ever mows there.

Urgent, Not Important.

The next quadrant is stuff that’s urgent but not important. You have to do this now. But the world will go on if it doesn’t happen. My suggestion is to ignore as much of this stuff as you can. Sure, paying your taxes might not seem important, but don’t do it for a few years and see how excited the IRS gets. So that’s probably important. But good examples of urgent but not important? Most phone calls you get at work. I now screen 90% of my calls at work, and 100% of those whose number I don’t know. Why interrupt my train of thought or work that’s important for a phone call?

Another great example of this would be emails. Most of them don’t require an immediate response. Save them up and hit them as a batch when you have time to focus on them.

Urgent, Important.

Ever have a boss who was a nervous wreck, who spasmed like an electrocuted spider monkey on meth when upper management said anything to him? Yeah. That’s what life is like when you spend your time in this quadrant. By definition, the stuff is important. By definition, you have to do it now.

Your life is a never ending crisis if all of your tasks are urgent and important. Urgent and Important things WILL show up in your life. If you can deal with them in a cool and collected manner when they do show up, well, you’re probably prepared because you’ve spent your life in the last quadrant:

Important, Not Urgent.

This is where you should spend your time – not in crisis-level activities, but in the planning and work that gets prepares you for success later. You exercise to be strong for the wrestling match that will take place in two months – it’s not urgent but it’s important. You save money now so you can buy a car with cash and not have to pay for interest. Important . . . not urgent.

It’s not entirely possible to live a life free of drama (you will occasionally hit a deer, you will get sick, they will run out of raspberry PEZ® before the feast of St. Thanos) but you can reduce it if you plan ahead.

One other system I’ve used (with meh-level results) is Kanban. Kanban was developed by an engineer at Toyota to allow collaborative work to take place in manufacturing. Several consultants and bloggers online are absolutely effusive about it. I’ve found (personally) it’s only good in motivating me when I’m not feeling enthused about what I’m doing at work.

It’s pretty simple – find a space, separate it into things you have to do, things you’re doing, and things you’ve gotten done. Then fill in sticky notes with the tasks you have to perform. Sort of like this:

Something tells me he’ll be disappointed after finding out his DNA test results . . . .

Again, your results may vary, but it’s cheap to try.

I’ve personally also tried several electronic planners, and each time I’ve gone back to pen and paper. For me, there’s something pretty useful about the book – it serves the purpose of planning my life, and I don’t take phone calls on it. And I don’t write blog posts on it (though it does hold my blog topic schedule and notes for future topics). It serves as a planning tool, and only as a planning tool. The Mrs. refers to it as my “brain.”

There’s something about the crisp feel of a new page each day. The smooth lines as the graphite of the pencil write down the activities that are planned. The accomplishment of a check mark to show work well done. Looking back on notes that you wrote a decade ago.

Dang. I wonder if anyone let the dog out? Or if anyone told Sarah that her Austrian friend was looking for her?

Robespierre, Stalin, Mao, Mangos and A Future That Must Not Be

“Soviet Union suffers worst wheat harvest in 55 years… Labor and food riots in Poland. Soviet troops invade… Cuba and Nicaragua reach troop strength goals of 500,000. El Salvador and Honduras fall… Greens Party gains control of West German Parliament. Demands withdrawal of nuclear weapons from European soil… Mexico plunged into revolution… “ – Red Dawn (1984)

Maximillian Robespierre, the guy who started it all . . .

On December 3, 1792, Maximillian Robespierre, a lawyer and French revolutionary, gave a speech about the fate of the King, Louis XVI. Robespierre complained that he was totally against the death penalty in all cases, except this one. He ended his speech: “With regret I pronounce this fatal truth: Louis must die so that the nation may live.”

Eventually, it came to a vote on January 18, 1793 – Louis was convicted to die. Two days later, Louis XVI, King of France, was executed. But the precedent was huge. A monarch could be arrested by his people and could be executed based on a public vote.

Who, then, was safe?

Robespierre and the leftist (this is where the name “leftist” comes from – the revolutionaries sat on the left side of the assembly before the revolution) government had a strong bent that advocated communes, and nothing less than the complete and total repudiation and remaking of all of French society. Religion was abolished and replaced by “rationality” – the statues of Saints were actually guillotined. Common measurements were replaced by the metric system (you see why I’m suspicious of it). You could no longer refer to a man as “monsieur,” or a woman as “madame” – they were now simply, “citizen.” Even the names of the months weren’t sufficiently revolutionary – they had to be replaced with new names, and each month would consist of three 10 day weeks.

The idea that replacement of all social norms would be difficult led to a simple solution: kill anyone who opposes you. Robespierre said:

If the basis of popular government in peacetime is virtue, the basis of popular government during a revolution is both virtue and terror; virtue, without which terror is baneful; terror, without which virtue is powerless. Terror is nothing more than speedy, severe and inflexible justice; it is thus an emanation of virtue; it is less a principle in itself, than a consequence of the general principle of democracy, applied to the most pressing needs of the fatherland.

So, we’re killing you because it’s virtuous. And boy, were the French virtuous! The definition of a good revolutionary kept changing as the social norms of France kept changing. Between June of 1793 and a year later (they were calling July “Thermidor” by then) nearly 17,000 had been executed because they were insufficiently committed to the revolution and the shifting definitions of a good revolutionary.

The last victim? Robespierre himself. He was executed on July 28, 1794, along with his 21 closest buddies. When Napoleon Bonaparte took over a few years later – everyone was pretty happy when he called himself Emperor – it seemed far better than the tyranny of the leftists.

Robespierre’s execution. Looks festive!

But the French were amateurs when it comes terror. For real downward death spirals, you have to get to the Russians and the Chinese . . .

This might look familiar . . .

I blame Marx. Marx was born some 200 years ago (as of this writing) and has been, in my opinion, the worst thing to happen to the world since they invented Spandex®. Thankfully, Marx and Stalin never wore Spandex®, though rumor has it Mao wore it when he pretended to be Aquaman®.

After the Soviets finally took over Russia, for twenty years Stalin waged a purge against his own people in his attempt to create a perfect Marxist society. People who had “a little more” – Kulaks, were killed, starved on purpose. This was called the Holodomor, and killed between 4 million and 10 million of his own citizens. Stalin’s totals? During his lifetime it is likely that he was responsible for deaths (often brutal) of 15 million (low end) to 25 million (upper end). And it came about from the same sort of internal purification that the French demanded – Stalin even compared himself to Robespierre on more than one occasion. One story, popular during the day, was of a young Soviet boy, Pavlik Morozov, who supposedly denounced his father to authorities. It was said that Pavlik was then killed by his family, who were then . . . executed. Statues of Pavlik were erected everywhere. His school was a shrine that students from across the Soviet Union would visit to see such a heroic boy. Stalin himself was reported to have said, “What a little swine, denouncing his own father.”

The heroic little swine.

For a great taste of what Soviet life must have been like during Stalin – have a read of an excerpt from a novel here (LINK). It’s what leftism turns into over time, and the deaths are only a part of it – it’s the ultimate ripping apart of social and family structures that allow any sort of resistance to complete government control. Stalin was excellent.

But if the French invented it and Stalin made use of it, Mao made a life of it.

Mao, at a meeting to learn from the master . . . .

Mao was responsible for 40 to 80 million deaths during his lifetime.

And in Mao’s China, families were ripped apart, and the structure was ripped apart. His “Hundred Flowers” campaign appeared to ask for other ways to govern China. In reality, it was looking for anyone who disagreed with Mao, so they could be killed. Mao’s cult reached its height of absurdity with Mao’s Mangoes. Yes, you read that right – Mao’s Mangos.

Pictured: One of Mao’s Mangos. Really.

In 1968, the minister from Pakistan gave Mao some mangoes. Why? We don’t know. But Mao didn’t like mangos, so he split them up and sent them to various places (colleges, factories, government offices) and they exploded like a cultural grenade. People wrote songs. They formed up in lines to praise the mangos. They made perfect replications of the mangos when the mangos began to rot.

How bad was it? A dentist was executed when he said that the mango he saw “looked like a sweet potato.”

Executed. And not for being a bad dentist.

Because he made a crack about a Pakistani fruit.

Posts occur to me sometimes because I had a thought that struck me as funny. Or a memory I though it might be helpful to share. Or an observation that might change a life.

In the last few weeks I’ve seen several editorials in several newspapers and magazines lionizing Marx and communism – some saying that his ideas are the ideas that will save the planet. And I hear politicians and television announcers saying nearly the same words as Stalin or Lenin or Mao. And I read that we need to give Marx another look. I find particular horror in this failure to learn anything from history – as communism is a slow death – a death first of morals, and then of truth, and then of millions of citizens.

The verdict of history, by the numbers shows that no ideology ever, ever, has proven to provide more death to the people it governs than Marxism. By any mechanism of objective judgement, it is by far the most reprehensible system of government ever created. Nothing else is even close.

But we keep coming back to this idea – that others should take responsibility for us, and that we should create a society based on envy. Thankfully the Marxist paradise of Venezuela, gifted with nearly limitless oil wealth shows that Marxism can work. Oh, grinding poverty? Malnutrition? Immense corruption? Guess the right people aren’t in charge. It isn’t real communism.

Well, maybe someday if the Marxists kill enough people it will end up working . . . I bet they get it right in California – they’ll be there soon . . .

So you’ve hit bottom? Great news!

“Hitting bottom isn’t a weekend retreat. It’s not a damn seminar. Stop trying to control everything.” – Fight Club

One of the oldest digital pictures on my computer. I think these folks are from my mother’s side of the family . . . she said they were farmers.

There was a moment in time when it was almost . . . just too much. My moment was at 10pm one night in March in the (now) distant past. I had been up since 6am, and at 10pm was the first minute I had that was for me that day.

The day started early – I had to get my daughters up and ready for school – and then drop them off at the day care right as it opened at 7am (I’d made their lunches the night before). Then, off to work. Work lasted until 5:45pm, which was the last time I could leave and not miss the day care closing time, which was 6pm. I was a manager, so work meant long hours.

I’d take my daughters shopping for groceries once a week. The three of us ate for (generally) about $25 a week – which involved no eating out and quite a lot of Kraft Macaroni and Cheese® or Hamburger Helper™. Lunches for the girls were peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. Pretty much daily.

After shopping? Back to home to cook dinner, do dishes, and work on homework with the girls. Then make sure they bathed and toss ‘em into bed while I did a load of laundry.

Then it was 10pm. Me time. On Saturdays I’d get up with the girls and make breakfast (either cereal or pancakes) and then fall asleep, exhausted, while they watched cartoons.

Financially, I was in debt – the most of my life. I had a home payment, a car payment, a student loan payment, and a lot of credit card debt. A lot. Divorces are expensive. Why are they expensive? They’re worth it. I mentioned the $100 food budget, but every dollar was spoken for. I wanted to play rugby for the local team, but couldn’t. There wasn’t enough money for both rugby club dues ($45?) and eating. So, eating took priority.

I remember distinctly being flat on my back in bed – arms outstretched, staring at the ceiling fan.

I was at the bottom. No money. No time for anything. And an endless stretch of days just to start digging myself out of the mess.

Again – I was at the bottom. And I gave up. How stupid was I to get in this situation. I prayed. “I can’t do this. I need help.”

The next day, a check for exactly the amount required arrived in the mailbox – it was a rebate from AT&T – I was in some sort of long distance plan that gave me a rebate after so long. And here it was. I could play rugby.

But who would watch the girls? Good friends (who I still owe!) would.

Every day after I hit bottom got better. Every day. It seems that when you’re at the bottom, every step, in any direction, is a way up and out. Eventually I got enough money so we weren’t living close to the edge.

I got promoted at work.

I got raises.

I got in shape.

I met The Mrs. – at the exact time and place where I was a better guy, and the world was headed my way.

Eventually, I clawed my way out of debt. And the lessons I learned walking out of the bottom of the pit, however slowly, are with me today.

When you’re at the bottom – the only way is up. What can you pick up down there and bring back up with you?

Machiavelli, Business Advice, and You

“Among other evils that being unarmed brings you, it causes you to be despised. That’s Niccolò Machiavelli. Now get! I need to use your bathroom.” – The Return of the Texas Chainsaw Massacre

LOOK AT THE SIZE OF THAT NOSE! You could park a jet airliner under that thing!

Niccolò di Bernardo dei Machiavelli, better known to us today as simply Machiavelli, died in 1527. I know, I know, these posts seem to be stuck in the 1500’s recently – but what better place to study the economic effects of an empire built on plundered gold (LINK), genetics of the amazingly inbred Hapsburgs (LINK) and now . . . political philosophy and business.

Machiavelli, besides having his name turned into a word for amoral behaviors used to get power (Machiavellian) was also a great-great-great-great-grandfather of Madonna, Cher, and Meatloaf which is why they use only one name.

I kid.

Machiavelli’s best known work is The Prince. Reportedly, he wrote this political philosophy book for Lorenzo de’ Medici. Niccolò had recently been fired from his job as a diplomat when he wrote The Prince, and back in 1516, being fired didn’t mean “here’s your crap and two weeks’ wages,” it meant, “we just might torture you and imprison you – just because.” And Machiavelli was tortured by the Medici family – merely because they thought he might have once known a group of people who might have been plotting against Medici rule.

So what does Machiavelli do? He writes an entire book and dedicates it to one member of the family that tortured him. Yeah – I guess he missed that job he got fired from.

Note: All quotes in this post are directly from The Prince.

The Prince has been written about a zillion times. Heck, I had to write a paper on it when I was in college. So what’s my take with this post?

Machiavelli wrote the book with an eye to a ruler in 16^th Century Italy. Does it have applicability in today’s business world? Let’s see. Yes.

“Everyone sees what you appear to be, few experience what you really are.”

I’ll mostly skip chapters 1-5. Although there is some applicability, I’ll leave you with these notes:

Machiavelli writes about differing kinds of states – including conquered states. His advice? Kill off all of the old rulers after you take over a place. I’ve seen this in business – one factory I knew about was bought by a new company. Step one? Fire all of the leadership. Not some. All. Every department head except one was immediately fired and replaced.

To quote Niccolo:

“If an injury has to be done to a man it should be so severe that his vengeance need not be feared.”

So, if you think you’re not replaceable? We replace our President every four or eight years. A business can do without you. And if you’re bought out? Getting rid of the leadership is a great way to immediately change the culture of a company. No mixed loyalties.

If a company or department was ruled by a tyrant, a new leader will find it pretty easy to start out in the department/division/company. If the previous leader allowed or encouraged a large amount of autonomy and freedom? You’re going to have problems. This type of business might be a tough one to lead after you take it over.

“He who wishes to be obeyed must know how to command.”

Chapter 6: Conquest by Virtue

When looking at rising to the top, Machiavelli strongly favored doing it based on your own skill and cunning. This type of power, he felt, was quite durable. This is the company you built from the ground up – the company you bought with cash, the department manager role you won through years of hard work and dedication.

“The lion cannot protect himself from traps, and the fox cannot defend himself from wolves. One must therefore be a fox to recognize traps, and a lion to frighten wolves.”

The major danger of this type of power was the idea that you could reform the system after conquering it. It is difficult to do so: the people who liked the old systems will fight hard to keep them – those that might benefit from the new system often won’t fight, since the benefits are in the future, and vague. Machiavelli favored the use of force to make change happen. And by force, Machiavelli meant swords and such. Since running down the hallway cutting down poorly performing employees with swords might be a bad idea, you might want to consider firing them instead.

Chapter 7: Conquest by Fortune

This is the power that you get when you’re appointed – you have powerful backers that want you to have the job/company. Whereas when you take a business over due to virtue (above), here you have to make the people that put you into power happy, as well as deal with the people in the company or department. If you’re lucky, and very, very good, you can keep the job after your father-in-law retires. But it’s not likely.

“A prudent man should always follow in the path trodden by great men and imitate those who are most excellent, so that if he does not attain to their greatness, at any rate he will get some tinge of it.”

Chapter 8: Conquest by Criminal Virtue

If you’re going to take over a place via immoral means, Machiavelli says to do all of the evil up front. If done completely enough, then you can (over time) make people forget your cruel and wicked actions over time. The worst of all possible immoral takeovers is one where the cruelty and evil continue over time.

I don’t really recommend this, but we see it all of the time, and the people who do it are amazingly rich.

Hmmm, maybe I should consider evil?

“The promise given was a necessity of the past: the word broken is a necessity of the present.”

Chapter 15: Reputation of A Prince

Machiavelli didn’t think much of the common man:

“How we live is so different from how we ought to live that he who studies what ought to be done rather than what is done will learn the way to his downfall rather than to his preservation.”

But that’s plain enough. As a manager, what do you think your reputation should be? Here, Niccolo cuts to the quick:

“And here comes in the question whether it is better to be loved rather than feared, or feared rather than loved. It might perhaps be answered that we should wish to be both; but since love and fear can hardly exist together, if we must choose between them, it is far safer to be feared than loved.”

Ouch!

But he’s right. If people love you, they can discount that feeling, especially at times when they feel joy. But if they fear you? They will be vigilant every minute of every day. Fear is a much more potent motivator than love – just ask Maslow (LINK).

How does this apply at work? Sadly, as a manager you have to remove yourself from the after work drinks. You have to remove yourself from the “work parties.” You have to be above and beyond that. If you are just another person in the group? Your authority means nothing. And you have to use your authority – quickly and suddenly, but with complete justification every so often. Why? Because theory would say you should know more than your employees – at least occasionally. Unless you use it – it won’t exist.

Chapter 16: Generosity vs. Parsimony

It’s a sad state of affairs – if you’re generous, people don’t appreciate it – they simply want more.

“Of mankind we may say in general they are fickle, hypocritical, and greedy of gain.”

And if you’re generous with your employees? Oddly, it makes them respect you less. Yes. Less. If you have to pick a reputation, being cheap is better than generosity. People understand cheap. Your employees understand cheap. They have to make choices everyday with their money. Being generous just means you’ve got so much money that your generosity means nothing . . . .

Chapter 17: Cruelty vs. Mercy

“Men worry less about doing an injury to one who makes himself loved than to one who makes himself feared.”

Machiavelli is pretty simple in this chapter. Create fear if it helps you – the idea is that fear should help your business. But if it’s excessive? Eventually people will leave you.

I’m sad to say that being cruel is a much better way to create loyalty than being nice – it seems that’s just how humanity works. A strong man who is justifiably cruel gets our respect over someone who loves us. Every time.

Chapter 18: Keeping A Prince’s Word

“He should appear to be compassionate, faithful to his word, guileless, and devout. And indeed he should be so. But his disposition should be such that, if he needs to be the opposite, he knows how.”

A Prince should be virtuous. A Prince should look virtuous. A Prince knows when not to be virtuous. Your team, your group, your company will look the other way when you decide the company is more important than your compassion. Oddly? They will love you for it.

Chapter 22: Nobles and Staff

Get good people to work for you. Make them loyal to you. Value competence over cool tee-shirts.

“Because there are three classes of intellects: one which comprehends by itself; another which appreciates what others comprehend; and a third which neither comprehends by itself nor by the showing of others; the first is the most excellent, the second is good, the third is useless.”

Don’t have idiots on your staff. And understand the differences between intellects.

Chapter 23: Avoid Flatterers

This might be the most powerful quote by Machiavelli, well, ever:

“There is no other way to guard yourself against flattery than by making men understand that telling you the truth will not offend you.”

If you hide yourself from the actual truth, and punish those that would tell the truth to you? Well, the game is over.

“Men are so happily absorbed in their own affairs and indulge in such self-deception that it is difficult for them not to fall victim to this plague; and some efforts to protect oneself from flatterers involve the risk of becoming despised.”

If you’re a leader? Being despised is the end.

Chapter 25: Fortune

Here Machiavelli starts looking at risk. Here’s a rough passage, if you’re a feminist:

“It is better to be impetuous than cautious, because fortune is a woman; and it is necessary, if one wants to hold her down, to beat her and strike her down.”

Well.

Anyhow – Machiavelli makes a great point: risk is not an enemy. Risk is risk. And when you’re in a risky situation at work, why not take it up a notch?

Actual story: I knew that my boss had interviewed (don’t ask me how) someone for my position. At the next available opportunity, I asked him about it.

I’ve never enjoyed a work situation more. “How did you know?”

My response: “If I told you, would you ever trust me with a secret?”

The look on his face was priceless.

When you have nothing to lose? Doubling down is for sissies. Go all in.

Remember this:

“If an injury has to be done to a man it should be so severe that his vengeance need not be feared.”

‘nuff said.

Doritos, Obesity, Addiction, and Nic Cage

â€œGood evening, sir. My name is Steve.Â I come from a rough area.Â I used to be addicted to crack but now I’m off and trying to stay clean.Â That is why I’m selling magazine subscriptions.â€ â€“ Office Space

Now Iâ€™m gonna hum that song all day long.

What if . . . your food is actually an addiction, like heroin, tobacco, the metric system, or Lady Gaga songs?

I heard just a little bit of a radio talk show where the guest made that comment.Â Well, kinda made that comment.Â I embellished just a bit.

How on Earth could your food be addictive?

Humans have been eating food for as long as there have been humans.Â Before that, they ate rocks.Â Small ones, better for the digestion.Â But humans were stupid, so our ancestorâ€™s brains encoded subtle signals that made them think that sweet things were amazingly good.Â That meat tasted wonderful.Â That eating enough fat should make you feel full.

These signals directly from the food, sometimes.Â Cheese contains casein.Â I know that â€œcaseinâ€ sounds like what you do to a bank before robbing it, but in this case itâ€™s a protein found in milk.Â And casein is found in dairy products, like cheese.Â Â When you eat it, your body begins the process of digesting it.Â And in digesting it, it turns it into opiates called casomorphins.Â Yes.Â Your body turns cheese into drugs that make you want to eat cheese.

When I eat sugar, I can feel it.Â Thereâ€™s a reason that parents think that kids are hyperactive, and thatâ€™s because they are.Â Sugar hits the bloodstream very quickly, and stimulates an insulin response that plays hell with the endocrine (â€œEndoâ€ is from the Latin for â€œStupid name that George Lucas would use to name an EwokÂ® or somethingâ€ and â€œcrineâ€ comes from being sad, as in â€œitâ€™s a crine shameâ€) system.Â We certainly didnâ€™t have sugar in quantities 5,000 years ago, so our bodies developed a strong, positive response to this extremely energy-dense and reactive group of molecules.

Itâ€™s my guess that weâ€™ve changed (via breeding) the nutrition that we get from our plants.Â The corn (maize) of today doesnâ€™t look much at all like the grass-looking plant that humans started breeding thousands of years ago to turn into the massive ears of corn.Â Itâ€™s certain that the protein balance and other aspects of vitamins, minerals, and carbohydrate content have changed as we made corn what it is today.

So far, weâ€™ve only touched on foods that were at least related to stuff we ate 5,000 years ago.Â A native American from 1500 B.C. would recognize corn, kinda.Â Heâ€™d recognize meat.Â But heâ€™d have no clue about what to think about a Ding DongÂ®, Twinkieâ„¢, or Nachos BellGrandeÂ®.

Bold John Wilder Assertion:Â Modern foods have led us to a place far enough and fast enough that our digestive systems, brains, and hormonal system canâ€™t even remotely begin to cope.

What evidence is there for this assertion?

DoritosÂ® have more than 40 ingredients.

Wonder Breadâ„¢ has over 14.

The bread the Amish make has five.Â Remove sugar, and youâ€™ve got four.Â And that makes yummy French bread.

Letâ€™s think of the processed food that we buy in the supermarket (or convenience store) differently.Â These foods arenâ€™t the same as they were forty years ago.Â Theyâ€™ve been faced with the ultimate evolutionary system that the modern world has to offer:Â the free market.

Markets are amoral.Â They provide the product that people purchase, not the product that people need.Â Markets are ruthless.Â If no one buys a product, the product will cease to exist, quickly.

And what do we buy?Â We buy things that we like.Â Things that taste good.Â Things that we crave.Â What could be a better seller than food that has been taste and market tested to be something that is . . . addictive?

If you look at the data, you can see plainly that obesity had accelerated greatly in the United States.Â If you were planning on hurting the place, you couldnâ€™t have done a better job.Â Sadly, there are too many changes that have happened during the time period to be absolutely certain about what happened.Â The Internet hit.Â Smart phones were invented.Â High fructose corn syrup replaced sugar in lots of things (and it is different than sugar in how it is metabolized).Â Air conditioning became more common.Â Nicolas Cage started doing movies.

This isnâ€™t good.

It isnâ€™t getting any better.

Itâ€™s entirely possible that our changing food consumption has nothing to do at all with our changing obesity rates.Â Itâ€™s probably all due to Nic Cage.

Maybe the food sticks to your ribs?

As Iâ€™ve pointed out before, there are many, many mysteries about being human.Â It doesnâ€™t make it easier to track down whatâ€™s going on in this experiment when the world is changing so very fast.Â My take?Â Our parents were skinny (mostly).Â Why?Â They ate food with mostly few ingredients.Â Steak.Â Eggs.Â Broccoli.Â Potatoes.Â Lettuce.Â Butter.Â Milk they just got from a cow.Â And they also expended more calories without washing machines or dishwashing machines.Â And they were colder in winter and hotter in summer.

So, of the things that have changed, Iâ€™d bet that food is at least a part of it.Â Heck, they had CokeÂ®, but they served it in 8 ounce glass bottles, not 2 liter plastic jugs.Â Mass quantities, like maybe an addict might want.

Or maybe (ounces to liters?) . . . itâ€™s the metric system thatâ€™s making us fat?

Karma May Not Be Real . . . But, Seriously, Why Would You Want To Mess With It?

“But not this time, this is our time. This time you gonna hand them a business card that says I’m a CEO, bitch. That’s what I want from you.” – The Social Network

Your Dogma caught my Karma . . .

My first month on the job (when I graduated from college with a Masters) I travelled around to several of the company’s remote offices. They had offices across the country, and at that time I think they had some sort of operation in 35 of the 50 states (57 if you count Texas as many times as they think they should be counted). One of my first trips was to Central Midwestia – the rustbelt. And our facility was right in the middle of the rust belt. Across the street there was a stamping plant that continually (and very audibly) stamped auto parts out of glowing steel. To the north there was a sausage plant. To the west was a manufacturer of household cleansers. Many of the factory buildings looked to have been built prior to World War I, and some of them looked like they had been through World War II or even the Great Sitcom wars of the early 2000’s. Still bits of Futurama® on some of the walls.

The facility there was . . . everything packed into the size of a postage stamp. There were areas of the facility that if you had a sandwich for lunch you couldn’t gotten through because your belly would have been too big. And the electrical system? It looked like it had been thrown together on a Hollywood set so you could channel lightning into a monster to have it live . . . again.

What an experience!

The next month, I had the opposite experience at another one of “our” (I don’t work there anymore) facilities. Even though the facility had been open (in one form or another) since the Civil War, this facility, though old, was spacious, with plenty of room for moving around. The primary purpose of my visit was to work on a problem that the facility manager was having, so, after talking about the issue and looking over the beautiful Atlantic bay that was right next to the facility, we decided to go to lunch. The Salesguy, sensing a free lunch (I think they have radar) tagged along.

During lunch we talked about lots of different things, like how lobster stew there was cheaper than a hamburger. Also, as a new guy to the company they each had really interesting stories to tell the new guy (me). The conversation drifted to the places I’d visited with the company so far.

Wee John Wilder: “Well, I did see our facility in Central Midwestia.”

Salesguy: “What did you think of that?”

Wee John Wilder: (Pause) “I think that whoever set up that facility had one of the biggest challenges of a career. I have no idea how they fit all of that stuff into that space. My hat is off to them.”

Sure, I could have called the place a mess, but it really wasn’t – I’m not sure anyone could have done better putting all the parts into place.

The next morning when I got to the facility, Salesguy wasn’t there, but he had left me two boxes of golf balls (good ones) with the company logo on them, along with other swag he normally gave to customers.

“Wow! This was nice of him!”

The facility manager then explained that Salesguy had been the person who had put that facility in Central Midwestia together – and he’d spent months of his life making it work, but most people had called it a mess. Karma . . . doesn’t always mean that bad things happen.

Fast forward to last year:

I was on the phone talking to a friend that works at another company about a year ago. The CEO (at my friend’s company) had just announced his “retirement”. He hadn’t been talking about retirement, so the corporate world knows that “going to spend time with family” also means . . . “got fired”.

There had been some other recent changes as well at that company – the Chief Sales Guy (I don’t remember his actual title) had recently quit. That was fairly surprising, since Chief Sales Guy had been at the company since it was founded. The Chief Sales Guy was friends with the owner of the company, and had even suggested a possible replacement for his position as Chief Sales Guy to the owner.

Since The Mrs. had met the now fired CEO at a party some years ago, when I got home I mentioned the news to her. Her response was immediate: “Oh, the Secretary got him fired.”

The Mrs. is a writer of novels, so I asked her to explain this particular plot.

“Well, you remember that you told me about secretary, right?”

And then I remembered. The Chief Sales Guy had an executive Secretary that been with him for over a decade. After he left, that Secretary was blended into the pool of lesser secretaries on the floor. One Thursday afternoon, she had tickets unexpectedly fall into her lap for a literally “once in a lifetime” adventure (it was Elton John© performing the “Best of” Metallica™ with backing vocals by Katie Perry® and the Mormon Tabernacle Choir©). The Secretary was supposed to work until 5pm, but would have preferred to leave about 15 minutes early to get ready. This would have been fine with her old boss, so she found another lesser secretary who could cover for her.

But the person who could cover for her went to the “Jabba The Hutt®” of secretaries (her new boss), who didn’t like this impertinence. So, even before the Secretary could go and ask Jabba© for permission, Jabba™ had gone to complain to the CEO. The CEO fired the Secretary on the spot.

Fired. On the spot. For wanting to leave 15 minutes early. Yeah, true story.

The Mrs. reasoned that the Secretary had mentioned her woes to the former Chief Sales Guy.

The Chief Sales Guy went to the owner and told him the story. The owner, in the narrative favored by The Mrs., fired the CEO a week later, after he’d found a replacement.

I have no idea if this is true or not, but it really makes sense.

Everybody answers to someone, even the CEO. Oh, sure the CEO retired with $100 million or so, but I bet the Secretary enjoyed the afternoon she found out that karma had scored just a little revenge for her. Me? I’d have smoked a cigar and had a nice scotch. Bet she had a Margarita on her deck with copious middle fingers for the CEO.

Your career will likely be a long one – 40 to 50 years for most people. You will meet people on the way up, and you will meet people on the way down. You alone control how you act and how you treat people. Being nice is a choice. Being a jerk is a choice. Why would you ever choose being a jerk? Why would you, as CEO, choose to fire a secretary for wanting to leave 15 minutes early on a Friday?

I’ll note that being a jerk isn’t the same as being honest. Don’t lie. Why does The Mrs. never ask me “does this outfit make my butt look big?” Because if honesty counts against my karma scores . . . oh my.

But Texas will be fine when it comes to karma. They have no idea that when hurricanes hit them it might be karma. Texans? They just want to put a saddle on the hurricane and ride it on up into Iowa so they can take that over, too.

Pizarro, The Economic Failure of Spain, and Why Bad News May Be Good News

“You don’t acquire the kind of wealth your uncle commanded by being like the rest of us.” – John Carter On Mars

I love the idea of people carrying me around everywhere I go. Now how do I become emperor again?

In 1532, Francisco Pizarro, accompanied by a force of less than 200 Spaniards, took on a portion of the main army of the Inca. Why? To defeat the entire Inca nation. The plan was at least partially desperation. To retreat would show weakness. As Cortez had burned his ships years earlier to give his men incentive to defeat the Aztec empire, Pizarro was all in.

Pizarro invited the Incan Emperor, Atahualpa, into a down called Cajamarca. Believing this to be safe since there were only 200 Spaniards, Atahualpa was accompanied “only” by 6,000 of his warriors and generals who were admittedly armed only with small battle axes. The Spaniards had waited, concealed and terrified in Cajamarca, for hours.

As Atahualpa was carried into the central square of the town, his honor guard parted to allow Atahualpa down from his litter. History records that he became angry when a single Friar approached him and asked him pledge fealty to the Spanish king, Charles, and become a Catholic. At the point where Atahualpa enraged, the Spanish sprang from their concealment, attacking the Incans with cannon, gunfire, and sword. The cavalry managed to abduct Atahualpa, and Pizarro himself blocked a sword strike at Atahualpa, catching at least part of the sword on his own hand.

Pizarro wanted Atahualpa as a hostage – a living Atahualpa could be used to give orders. A living Atahualpa could be used to prevent the 55,000 battle-hardened troops outside from rushing the Spaniards. A living Atahualpa could be ransomed.

Fake news, 1532 style: a picture of Pizarro meeting Atahualpa looking like everything is nice and rosy. Not pictured: The battle where Atahualpa lost his entire empire.

Also: Do you have a few minutes to listen to a story about Jesus?

And ransomed he was – for a room, 22’ by 8’ by 7’. Not just any room. But a room that big, filled with gold. And two the same size filled with silver. It’s certain that the gold wouldn’t have been solid, but would have been jewelry and other items. Let’s assume that it was 2/3 filled with air. That still means the gold would have been worth (in today’s dollars) at least $20 billion. The silver wouldn’t even be worth a billion.

Atahualpa was executed, anyway. The King of Spain was reportedly not pleased, but was pretty good with the over $4 billion that was his (minimum) cut of Atahualpa’s treasure. In November of 1533, Pizarro entered Cuzco, the capital of the Mayans as its conqueror. He would serve as governor of what is now Peru. Pizarro was killed in 1541 by the son of an assassinated rival.

Pizarro, with a fine, feathered hat. Makes me want to kill some tropical bird so I can have a cool feather. What, I don’t have to kill one for a feather? Spoilsport. Oh, and Pizarro had two kids with Atahualpa’s wife. She must have been attracted to that fine beard.

But the impact on Spain was enormous. The Conquistadors kept coming, and kept taking gold from the New World for over a century more. All of the treasure went back to Spain, and, initially, paid off the debts of the Spanish government. But it did other things, as well.

Seville, the Spanish city had over 16,000 shops making textiles out of silk in the year 1500, before the gold started to come in from the Americas. The population of Spain stood at (around) 10,000,000 at this time. 200 years after 1500, in 1700? The population of Spain had dropped to around 6,000,000.

What happened?

All of the gold. Such good fortune, right?

Where it would have been pretty rough for a foreign power to have taken over Spain (it was in pretty good shape, militarily) the gold from the New World did the job wonderfully. How?

All of the gold led to a change in the culture and value of Spain. Whereas before, Spain had been an industrious nation, after gold, things changed. Why do it, when you could have someone else do it? There were people in the Netherlands that would gladly build it for you and ship it to Spain. There were people in the Netherlands that would gladly come to Spain to do work that Spaniards wouldn’t do. Begging (among Spaniards) and living off of charity became to be seen as more virtuous than resorting to common work, at least that was the message the common man received from watching the nobility. Spain had traditionally been more than self-sufficient in providing agriculture. In 1578, one observer noted that the lack of production “was not the fault of the land, but was the fault of the people.”

Spain’s military and colonial establishment, however, continued to provide the currency that the country needed even as the country sank into indolence and despair.

And what brought about the despair?

Success.

Success took away the hard lessons in life. The Spanish military took the ambitious young men of Spain and allowed them to seek glory. The rest of Spain? Lived off of the glory. Eventually, the rot of success allowed the United States to completely remove the remaining Spanish colonies from Spain. When our new, steel warships fought against the Spanish? They often fought cannon that were 100 years old, and 70 years out of date.

Success allowed Spain to become an economic shambles. Success teaches no lessons.

In my life, everything that ever made me better was . . . awful. Losing a wrestling match. Being deeply in debt. Getting a divorce.

Losing a wrestling match (2-1, in overtime in 8^th grade) made me want to win. And I worked harder. Next time I wrestled that guy? I pinned him in 20 seconds.

Being in debt. That one mad me reexamine my entire life, or at least the spending associated with it. Each spending decision became a moral choice, since I was living in a constant state of (nearly) not having enough money to make it. There’s nothing immoral about being either rich or poor – it’s what you learn.

Getting a divorce, to me, allowed me to really understand how I’d contributed to the failure of the marriage, realize what I was really looking for in a partner, and allow me to both pick a more suitable wife as well as to become a more suitable husband.

If I had won the lottery or become a rock star at 20, what would I have learned? Well, besides learning what a car upholstered entirely in endangered species would drive like, probably not much. I’ve often said that if I’d been immensely wealthy when I was young, I probably wouldn’t have made it to 30. For whatever reason, I find that adversity and challenge are my friends. Success is nice, but only if it holds a challenge.

Holy cow – maybe the ultimate challenge is beating success?

Oh, Seneca figured that out 2000 years ago:

“Let us too overcome all things, with our reward consisting not in any wreath or garland, not in trumpet-calls for silence for the ceremonial proclamation of our name, but in moral worth, in strength of spirit, in a peace that is won forever once in any contest fortune has been utterly defeated.” – Seneca, Letters

So the next time you feel that you’ve just had a spot of bad luck? It might just be your best luck. Or, if you believe Seneca – no luck at all is required.

Taxes, Charity, Morality, and the Immortality of Keanu Reeves

“You can feel it when you go to work, when you go to church, when you pay your taxes. It is the world that has been pulled over your eyes, to blind you from the truth.” – The Matrix

I’ve always wondered what clothes cost in The Matrix. These three could have told me, but I forgot to ask them before I moved away from Alaska.

I’ve just finished stapling my tax return together for the year 2017. Why did the tax return cross the road? John Wilder stapled it to the chicken.

I can’t (generally) do my taxes before the first week in April because, like Ben Franklin said, the only two certain things are death and taxes. And I’m certain I like to wait, because:

I’m lazy and
I don’t get all the information for one investment until mid-March.

I really hate doing taxes, but, thankfully, an entire tax software industry exists only to allow us to do them ourselves on a Sunday afternoon. Yes. I started on Sunday afternoon after I’d taken one of the cars in to get fixed. As in today. I’m not only lazy, I do everything I can to put off taxes to the last possible minute.

Generally, as the envelopes with “IMPORTANT: TAX INFORMATION” show up I clip them all together and pretend they don’t exist for 70 or so days, so I’ve been preparing for doing the taxes for a while. My information isn’t all that complicated, so I’ve managed to do it myself for, well, ever.

fluxcapacitor

Taxes are more complicated than time travel or Doc Brown’s hairstyle.

How does doing taxes change my mood? The Mrs. says that I have three personalities, and generally, she’s right:

Juan Délegator – Juan is general me around the house. My general motto is: if someone else (like my kids) can do it, they should do it. Why? To make them capable. No, I won’t make them run 480 volt 3-phase power to my flux capacitor, but I will make them do dishes. And I will make them do things that they are capable of and uncomfortable with. Why? So, like Conan, “they will be strong when the wolves come.” Juan is pretty easy-going. And why not? The work is getting done.
The General – The General is like Juan, but The General comes out when time is of the essence – like our house is going to catch on fire due to my poor wiring of the flux capacitor. The General is commanding, and expects immediate obedience and compliance, due to the consequences of not taking that immediate action. The General doesn’t care how you feel, but wants to end the emergency as quickly and as efficiently as possible. Movie reference: The Wolf from Pulp Fiction®.
The Nazi – The Nazi is like The General. But isn’t having fun. And The Nazi kind of wants you to suffer. Only one thing (really) brings out The Nazi (anymore).

wolf

Me when I’m enjoying myself the most . . . fixing bad things in a hurry. Pretty please.

This year (I have to say) wasn’t that bad. Most of the time I get worried that, since I’m doing the taxes on the last possible day prior to them being due, that I’ll find myself without some key piece of information.

Not this year. I have it all, or I did after I looked in a stack of papers on the bedroom. Whew.

So, I entered the information required by the program.

And this year TurboTax® downloaded my work information directly from my employer. Also nice. Not that I’m a huge fan of TurboTax© – they are, at best, a necessary evil. Doing a meaningless task well is still meaningless. Without taxation, fully 20% (my guess) of the economy could be used for more productive things . . . overnight. TurboTax© programmers could program video games. Or something. The IRS™ could do what they would naturally aspire to do, form covens and attempt to steal souls actually produce something in the economy.

And the process of doing taxes today are (largely) meaningless for the average taxpayer. For the average payer, the IRS already has all of the information necessary to send the taxpayer a bill. They already know my income. My interest payments (to and from me, which are getting closer to equal!) and they know how much I made (or lost) off of my stocks. They know if I bought or sold a house.

But the process of taxes is, at least partially, immoral.

Yes. Immoral.

Let me tell a story . . .

paytaxes

I used to go to church when visiting Pop Wilder – it was the same church that I’d grown up going to coloring pictures of Jesus. True conversation, from when I was about five:

Sunday School Teacher: “Johnny, Jesus wasn’t purple.”

Little Johnny Wilder: “Isn’t Jesus God?”

Sunday School Teacher: “Yes, He is.”

Little Johnny Wilder: “Then he could be purple if he wanted to be.”

It was a small church in a small town. Pop would go every Sunday, and when I was around, I’d go with him. One morning, the Pastor gave a sermon that made my circuits pop.

He used the concept and example of Christian charity in his sermon. But in every verse I could find, that charity referred to voluntary giving. Here? The Pastor was wanting to have increased taxpayer spending going to the poor – and indicated that, somehow, this equated to charity.

I sat on the pew, seething, which, generally isn’t very appropriate for a church, but neither was his sermon, which violated the following principles:

Taxes are forced – there’s nothing moral about them.

Charity is given of free will – there’s no coercion other than moral coercion. You have to make a choice to give to charity.

And that’s what made me mad. Charity – the act of giving time or money to someone else, is important for the soul. Government services have nearly completely destroyed the idea of charity – why help the homeless? Government should be doing that. Why feed hungry children? Government should be helping them. Folks drowning in Canada due to all the hockey rinks melting? Government should fix the rinks, because Canadians can’t swim!!

Since government is already fixing the problem people don’t think that there’s the need for charity. Since I already give federal, state, and local governments over 45% of my income directly, and indirectly pay for the corporate income taxes on every item I buy and Social Security kicks on another 15%, I figure the government is already into me for 65%-75% or more of what I make.

That thought doesn’t leave me feeling charitable. And that’s the immoral part. Giving charity makes me a better person, inside, where it counts. Feeling uncharitable because my money has been forcibly taken from me and to (many people and groups) that I feel undeserving, well, that’s immoral. Charity is good. But Jesus certainly didn’t say, “Go forth, and haveth ye government arresteth ye brothers and ye sisters who give not 75% of yon incomes to others.”

And I didn’t feel charitable when the Pastor was asking the congregation to take more of my money. Honestly, it’s not greedy to want to keep some of your money. But I feel that there is truly nothing greedier than asking forcing others to pay for things that you want to do, but don’t have the money for. I mean, I’d love to have a great treehouse, complete with air conditioning and plumbing.

taxesswanson

Now there are legitimate reasons for taxation – common defense. Courts. Common infrastructure. But there isn’t enough money in the world to pay for everyone’s “needs” – and payment for everyone’s wants would bankrupt the planet.

Taxes were complicated this year. The parts that I have to file and send are about 40 pages, but I’ve learned printing off the federal and sending them to the state makes life easier. By the time that I’d printed the copies I’ll send plus the spare copies, I had printed out 160 pages. I’ll send 120 pages out, plus a pretty big check. I don’t mind sending 120 pages out, or even the check. Heck, all the dollar bills I have say they belong to the Federal Reserve® already, right?

refunds

No refund. But I won’t burn the place down. Or try to get my stapler back.

I’m just sad that they make us pay taxes in the Matrix. But, the clothes don’t cost all that much here . . . .

neoforever

And Neo lives forever. I guess the whole “Death and Taxes” must just be . . . taxes.

Russian Wrestlers, Pylometrics, and You’re Probably Not Trying All That Hard

“When the game is on the line, a winner wants the ball in his hands.” – The Replacements

A miniature version of The Boy prepares for a match . . . he now weighs 200 pounds.

The other day I was on Amazon. Yes, I know. The fact that I cannot walk into my living room because of all the little boxes shows I might spend too much time there. Anyway, I was looking for hair regrowth tonic that actually works and carbohydrate free sugar cookies options for fitness equipment for Pugsley and The Boy. One of the things that I saw was . . . a box. You can buy it here (LINK).

I don’t get any money if you buy a box. But you do get a box. One box.

The idea of the box is that you . . . jump on it. That’s it.

What led me to the box I was watching a video of Александр Александрович Карелин. Oh, sorry, you don’t speak Russian – that’s Aleksandr Aleksandrovich Karelin spelled out in the strange chickenscratch that Russians use as a secret code that Putin and Trump devised so we can’t decipher their messages. Karelin was an internationally ranked wrestler for a while. Like for five Olympics. In fact, his career record is 887 wins and two losses. His nickname is “The Experiment.” Because he could do 42 pullups. And he weighed 285 pounds. His signature move? Lifting 285 pound people off the mat and tossing them up into the air so they landed on their shoulders.

The Experiment.

Yeah.

A quote from Aleksandr: “They call me The Experiment because they cannot conceive that every day I train harder than they have ever trained in their lives.” He might be just a bit intense.

Aleksandr was being interviewed in the YouTube® video I saw, and they showed the obligatory clip of him working out. One of the exercises he was doing was repeatedly jumping on a box that was 24” or 30” high. I was impressed. 285 pound guy jumping that high? Wow.

Here’s a picture of Aleksandr. Yeah, that’s a 285 pound human he’s going to toss into the air like a ragdoll. Not sure why they need tanks if the Russians have more guys like this around. Oh, and he’s buddies with Putin and has both a doctorate and a law degree. Don’t you feel like an underachiever now?

It turns out that “jumping on boxes” is known by the $250 per hour consultant word, “pylometrics.” From the Latin root Pylo for “pile of” and the ancient Greek word “metron” which means “communist measurement system.” Pylometrics came to world attention when the Soviet track and field teams of the 1970’s were turning in absolutely amazing performances. One trainer thought, “hey, it must be all of the jumping on boxes stuff that they’re doing,” and completely disregarding the simpler theory of, “win Olympic medals or we’ll shoot your family.”

Regardless, as noted above, he renamed it pylometrics so he could charge $250 per hour to talk about it.

Well, if one of the best wrestlers ever to live thought that pylometrics should be a part of his routine, well, why not? (Previous post: Pugsley decided he wanted to be an NCAA champion in wrestling. (LINK)) If you’re going to try to be the best, you emulate everything you can about the very best people you can find. Everything. Pugsley even has a poster of Putin up on his wall now.

So, I was on Amazon, totally not looking for hair tonic when I found the boxes shown above. Did I say boxes? Yeah. I saw the picture and expected three. Turns out that a cube exists in three dimensions, so they delivered just one box with three heights – 16 inches, 20 inches, and 24 inches. It turns out if you rotate the box . . . well, you get the picture now.

The Boy put it together when it arrived, but then he had to leave, so that left Pugsley and I in the wrestling room with the cube. To be frank, I was concerned that Pugsley wouldn’t be able to jump up on the 16” side and we’d have to get something smaller. I was hoping that it wouldn’t hurt his confidence to have to jump on the “short box.”

He set it with the 16” side facing up. He jumped, and stuck the landing on top of the box like an Olympic® gymnast.

John Wilder: “That was awesome. Okay, try 20 inches!”

He tried once, twice, and was up on top on the third side.

John Wilder: “That was amazing!! Try 24 inches!

Pugsley: “No, I can’t do that.”

John Wilder: “Try.”

He jumped up. Not quite.

Again. A miss.

Third time? He stuck to the top of the box like there were magnets in his feet.

Also this month, friend was doing Crossfit®.

Things you never need to guess about a person: if they are vegan, if they drive a Prius®, or if they are in Crossfit©. Now if you find an actual human that does all three of these things, you might have found a smug singularity – beware or you might get sucked into the smug . . . . (my friend isn’t smug, just often sore after working out).

Anyhow . . . when working up to a max in the deadlift (the king of all lifts) my friend tried to stop at 100 pounds. She thought that was enough. Too hard.

Her coach encouraged her – and she maxed out at 180 pounds.

Most days we have no idea of the things that we are capable of, if only we try. The thing that generally limits your life is . . . you. If you want to be the best, you have to start by working like the best. And believing in yourself.

You might not get there, but you’ll know that you didn’t hold back. You’ve put the game in your hands.

I know where you could go to buy a box . . .

College is Expensive and Your GPA is as Inflated as an Instagram Model

“But you can’t hold a whole fraternity responsible for the behavior of a few, sick twisted individuals. For if you do, then shouldn’t we blame the whole fraternity system? And if the whole fraternity system is guilty, then isn’t this an indictment of our educational institutions in general? I put it to you, Greg – isn’t this an indictment of our entire American society? Well, you can do whatever you want to us, but we’re not going to sit here and listen to you badmouth the United States of America. Gentlemen!” – Animal House

Pugsley climbing a climbing wall. Not pictured: college degree he earned.

Last week we reviewed how college may provide (does provide) a lot of poor choices for student degrees – essentially you can get a degree that’s not worth very much to any employer. But, thankfully, in an era where I can look up the most obscure facts online, I can count on college being cheaper now?

No. It’s more expensive than ever.

Huh? You have a service that more people are requesting, one that’s essentially unlimited since Wikipedia® is free, and the prices go up?

Yes. But Wikipedia™ does not have climbing walls.

At least colleges are paying more for instructors/professors, right?

No. Colleges are increasingly pushing instruction onto “adjunct” instructors. These adjunct instructors are generally paid in PEZ® and pity. If the college feels guilty, it leaves a little extra on the nightstand in the morning.

How much have prices gone up?

Prices have gone up everywhere, but let’s pick Harvard™. In 1970, Harvard cost about $4,000 a year for tuition. Not bad? Well, the median family income was about $10,000 back then, so, not so bad. If you hustled you could (with a small scholarship and working a pizza delivery job) make it.

Harvard now costs over $43,000 a year. Median family income is closer to $60,000 a year, so prices (in terms of a family income) are up over 180%. But Harvard® has literally billions of dollars in a cash horde that the administration rolls in when they can’t get enough sleep. Other colleges have gone up more. Much more. One state school has gone up (since 1980) from $6,000 tuition to $40,000. This is more than Harvard’s 180%, but I won’t do the math because I’m feeling like I don’t want to. Oh! The solution is left to the student! Yeah, that’s what the books said . . .

So why are prices going up?

One theory, and it’s a good one, is student loans. Student loans were created as a mechanism to trap young people into debt before they can legally buy whiskey means to allow anyone to go to school as long as they were willing to borrow enough money.

Student loan debt is the very worst kind of debt I know of that doesn’t involve a blood oath with the Mafia. It is the herpes of debt.

Just like herpes is incurable and makes you (when disclosed) a lot less attractive to the opposite sex (or same sex, or whatever combinations including androids that are possible in California) student loan debt makes you less attractive. And you can’t declare bankruptcy and get out of student loan debt. Again, like herpes, it’s forever. Unlike herpes, you can pay your debt down to zero.

But you should avoid both of them, if you can. Debt, especially student loan debt, will outlast your mortgage. I bought and sold four houses, three unicorns and one wife before I paid off my student loan.

I met him. Nice guy. But he never did a song about a unicorn or a Pegasus.

But why would student loans cause the cost of college to increase?

Simply put, there’s more money available? The colleges most exposed to student loans increased their tuition the most. Quite simply – tuition expands to consume as much money as you can feed it. There’s a pretty comprehensive study that proves it – you can find the info here (LINK). What, am I supposed to do all of your research?

So where is the money going?

PEZ® for the adjunct professors? No. Administrators. I’ve seen this before in other organizations that aren’t subject to market punishment (like, say, your friendly federal or state government or school district). One administrator has a job. It’s not a hard job, but it’s his (or hers). They are paid, at least partially, on the number of staff that they have. So, they get approved positions for “essential” work. Soon enough, a job that was barely important enough for one person is now down by a staff of thirty. (This tendency will be discussed again in a future post, and was discussed in “Government is a Jobs Program here (LINK).)

Professor Doom is a very good writer. His blog is “Confessions of a College Professor” and I strongly suggest that you read it, especially if you are certain that colleges are bastions of honor, learning, and goodness. Recently, the learned Professor had a post where he described that at Evergreen College in Washington State, that there is one administrator for every six students. I kid you not. Here’s the link (LINK).

But the education is better, right?

Again, I’ll have to defer to Professor Doom. He writes again and again how grade inflation has taken off (LINK). I tried to find his post about how, due to a computer error, bunches of students at a school he was at were signed up for a class AFTER they got their schedules.

When this error was discovered at the end of the semester, fully a third of students (who had never attended class) had an “A” in the class that they had never been to and weren’t aware of. Yeah, you read that right.

In at least a third of your classes, you never need attend and you’ll pull an “A”.

Wow. That’s not really education at all, except maybe in the “son or daughter of a President or Senator who gets on a corporate board of directors because they can fog a mirror” way.

Why?

On snowy day a long time ago I decided I wanted to teach. A new college had come to town – I had never heard of it, “University of Phoenix™.” They put an ad out looking for faculty, and I sent in my résumé. Or rësümë if you’re in a 1980’s hair metal band.

Well, in the 1980’s I had hair . . .

I got an immediate call back. Pretty soon I was in “New Faculty Training” – which included a batch of people with master’s degrees. Most of us had teaching experience at the undergraduate level – that was, back in the day, how you paid to go to grad school.

We sat in a circle and discussed how to teach at the University. We would get stock options if we did well. The curriculum was set, and it was explained to us that the students were often working. And had a tough time. So we shouldn’t treat them exactly as students.

Think of them as customers instead, we were told.

So, what if a student never came to class?

“Well, they’re paying for it, so, it’s not a problem.”

What if a student didn’t turn in an assignment?

“You should give them a chance to turn it in late – they might have had a sick kid.”

One of the prospective faculty got pretty blunt: “So, we shouldn’t flunk them?”

The leader of the orientation paused. “Well, not if you can help it.”

So, a course you didn’t have to show up for, you could turn in assignments late, and would almost never flunk? That sounds like the state of higher education today.

Was it a smart financial move? I just checked. I wouldn’t have been a billionaire if I would have stayed with them. So, whew.

What happened, John Wilder?

Prior to our current generation, college had been about the reputation of the institution and the graduates. If you were a Harvard® man or a Vanderbilt™ grad, that meant something. Not only was the curriculum difficult, but you only had a very small chance of even getting into the place.

The reputation of the school was that it was difficult – only the best should try to get in. Only the best will succeed. The often repeated story was of a Dean getting up before the freshman and saying, “look to your left . . . now look to your right. Only one of you will be here in four years.”

That was something they were proud of. If you didn’t dig in and study, well, you’re gone. That enhances the value of the school’s name.

This was important. The school would rather eat a kitten (an actual, living kitten without condiments like creamy horseradish sauce that go great with kitten) than put a graduate out that wasn’t up to their standards.

Now? Students are “customers” and the administration wants as many of them as possible so they can spawn a never ending series of administrator clones (college administrators reproduce asexually) to bring into the college administration. They don’t want to kick a student out, because that would mean that they would lose the precious, precious money that the student brings in. So they need things to attract more customers. Like elephant rides. Free panty hose. Margarita Tuesday.

Oh, did I mention that our college has climbing walls?