The last week of the year is always a good time for me to catch up on the things that I've let slide over the past few weeks as we've headed towards the Christmas holiday. My e-mail in-box is down to just twenty messages, I've got my team's year-end reviews all done, and I've had a chance to catch up on all the latest gossip about Chan Gailey's future as head football coach of the Buffalo Bills (it looks like we're in for yet another change in leadership after a 13th consecutive year of missing the playoffs).
I've also had plenty of time to watch the morning news programs and read the headlines at CNN, Google News, and the Wall Street Journal. That means I am fully up-to-speed on the great political train wreck known as the fiscal cliff. If only I could make myself look away.
No matter what I read or hear about the fiscal cliff, I always come back to the same thing -- we don't seem to have any leaders in Washington.
As I mentioned earlier, I've had more time than usual on my hands these past few days. So much time, in fact, that I've even gone back and read a little of John Kotter and Peter Drucker, two of the management gurus who were big names when I was in business school. I wanted to see what they had to say about leadership. Here are some highlights:
- Kotter talks quite a bit about the difference between management and leadership. For him, management is about coping with complexity in your environment while leadership is about coping with change. Leaders take a group forward towards a common or shared goal.
- Drucker emphasizes the importance of setting goals, accepting responsibility, and earning trust. He basically calls these three things nothing more than good, old-fashioned hard work.
I decided to keep reading about leadership and came across these nuggets from Shelley Kirkpatrick and Edwin Locke in a book they wrote in 1991 about leadership traits -- leaders admit their mistakes, are quite willing to listen to another's position on an issue, and are willing to change. When I read that, I felt like I'd struck gold. Kirkpatrick and Locke had pretty much defined exactly what isn't happening in Washington.
So, here we sit, waiting to see what grand solution our friends in Washington will deliver to us. The whole thing reminds me of another great cliff "dilemma." That would be the one that faced Thelma & Louise at the end of that very enjoyable movie back in the early 1990's. If you remember, after their series of (mis)adventures, they joined hands and drove off the cliff into the Grand Canyon. For some viewers, driving off the cliff signified that the two women had given up and taking the easy way out. For others, Thelma & Louise's choice to drive over the cliff was one that signified liberation and freedom. I just remember feeling sad.
It's Christmas Eve (well, it's 1:30PM) and I'm happy to report that it's snowing outside. It's actually coming down hard enough that it's beginning to cover the mulch. I know that it's supposed to switch over to rain pretty quickly but it sure is nice for right now.
When it first started to snow twenty minutes ago, Kim was the first to notice. "It's snowing," she called out. Of course, the kids are all up in their bedrooms doing who knows what so I don't think anyone heard. Five minutes later, though, Jay popped out of his room and yelled "Hey, it's snowing." I just smiled. Now, here I sit, turning my head around to look out the window every two minutes to see if it's still coming down.
While I know it wasn't the case, my memory tells me that we always had a white Christmas when I was growing up in upstate New York. I just took it for granted then. In fact, when I'd hear Bing Crosby singing that he was dreaming of a white Christmas, I never really understood why. "Doesn't everyone already have a white Christmas," I'd ask myself? It took a long while for me to realize that wasn't the case.
Now that I'm an "old man" living south of the Mason-Dixon line, I don't even like snow. I've forgotten how to drive in it. I hate to shovel it. My back is too old to sled on it. But, I think I finally understand why Bing was singing that tune. He wanted to be taken back to a simpler, quieter, more carefree time. Me, too.
When the new season of "X Factor" started, I made it a priority to watch. The primary reason for that was I wanted to see how Britney Spears would do. I only made it through the first 2 episodes. It was too boring. I'd expected Britney to be a train wreck. Instead, she seemed almost too controlled. She had very little to say and, aside from a few amusing facial expressions, she didn't hold my attention. So, I tuned out and stopped watching.
As the season progressed, there were a couple times when I stumbled across the show while channel surfing. Each time, I'd stick with it for a few minutes to see if I was missing anything. I wasn't (other than the sheer hilarity of watching Khloe Kardashian read from a teleprompter like a sixth-grader).
Then, all of a sudden, I found myself watching the entire show last week. It was final four week. By the end of the show, I'd made a complete 180-degree turn. I'd gone from not even thinking about "X Factor" to having incredibly strong opinions about who should win.
- I hated the guys in Emblem 3. They were much too full of themselves and really needed to just go back to the skate park.
- Carly Rose Sonenclar drove me crazy. I think it was her bug-eyed stage mother that did it for me. The last thing this world needed was for Carly Rose to win. Her mom would just be way too happy.
- Tate Stevens could actually sing. On top of that, he seemed like a pretty nice guy who really just couldn't believe that he was geting this chance.
- Finally, there were the girls from 5th Harmony. How incredibly annoying, with all their posing and hair flipping! But, I have to confess that they had me singing right along with "Anything Can Happen."
I missed the elimination show last week (so sorry to hear the news, Emblem 3) but, this past Wednesday, there I was, glued to the TV for the finale. I was completely into it, critiquing each performance, making predictions, applauding 5th Harmony for bringing out "Anything Can Happen" one more time, cringing at Carly Rose's duet with LeAnn Rimes, laughing at the sight of Simon Cowell with his shirt unbuttoned all the way down to his navel, and praying to God that Carly Rose wouldn't win. Why did I all of a sudden care about this ridiculous show? Who knows? And, who cares?
Last night, it was time to reveal the winner. I dutifully tuned in at 8PM, all ready for a 2-hour extravaganza. By 8:15PM, I was gone. It was another complete 180-degree turn. The show was ridiculous. In fifteen minutes, we got fake paparazzi lining a fake red carpet, an embarassing technical difficulty that really threw cute little Mario Lopez for a loop, lip syncing finalists, and just one too many "amazings" from poor Ms. Kardashian. I couldn't take it. I gave up control of the remote, leafed through the latest issue of Entertainment Weekly, and was in bed by 8:45PM. What a night.
Of course, the first thing I did this morning was hop on-line to see who won. That's right -- they got me. I know I'll be back next year to give it another try.
It's been a busy week, capped off by a long 10-hour work day on Saturday. I'm hoping I can stay motivated enough today to send out my Christmas cards. We'll see about that. In any event, I haven't had any time to create a post.
That doesn't mean I haven't been coming up with ideas. In fact, earlier in the week, I was having a difficult time deciding what to write about in my next post. I couldn't decide between my ear wax "incident" (trust me, the thing I pulled out of my right ear was so amazing you need to hear about it) or those completely awful WBAL-TV editorials that run several times each week (how they come up with so many completely non-controversial topics is beyond me).
Then the shooting in Connecticut happened. I was at home on Friday morning, getting ready for a meeting in DC that afternoon. It was an exceptionally busy morning, one where I wasn't able to make my periodic stops at www.cnn.com to see what was going on in the world. So, when I came upstairs to head out the door, I was shocked to hear Kim tell me what had happened. Now that two days have gone by, I've had some time to try and process things. The question I keep coming back to is why any private citizen needs to own an assault rifle?
First things first. I'm a waterfowl hunter. I got introduced to hunting when I met Kim's family. I really enjoy it. In fact, if I could, I'd do it every day during the season. I've tried to get my kids interested but have had no luck. That's been a disappointment for me since I think that there's a lot to learn about nature, yourself, and others when you spend time in a blind.
Because I hunt, I own a shotgun. I appreciate the fact that I live in a country where I'm allowed to own a shotgun. But, it's always amazed me that, when I first got one, I just walked into a store, paid my money, and walked out with it. There were no questions asked and no requirement that I take any sort of safety course. It's kind of odd -- to get a hunting license, you do need to take a safety course. But, to own the gun, none is required.
So, it was pretty darn easy for me to purchase a shotgun. Perhaps that makes sense since a shotgun can't be concealed (unlike a handgun) and only holds three shells (unlike an assault rifle, with their high-capacity magazines). Perhaps.
I've thought for the past 48 hours about why anyone really needs an assault rifle and I can't think of a single good reason. If you can, I'd be happy to hear it. And, please don't say "To defend myself against someone else who's armed with one." That won't work for me.
I saw this morning that Diane Feinstein plans to introduce legislation on the first day of the next Congressional session that would limit the "sale, transfer, and possession" of assault weapons. I can't wait to see who tries to suppress the bill or, if it comes to a vote, votes against it. In a common sense world, that bill would pass in a heartbeat. Unfortunately, I don't think we live in a common sense world.
When we lived in our first two houses, I spent a ton of time at the hardware store. There were two reasons for this.
- First, both of those houses always seemed to have something that needed to be repaired. Invariably, we didn't have the parts or tools that were needed to do the job. That meant it was pretty much impossible to get a job done without a trip to the hardware store.
- Second, I was born without the handyman gene. That meant that I usually misdiagnosed the problem at least once and had to make multiple trips to the hardware store to complete the job.
When we moved to a new house twelve years ago, my trips to the hardware store started to dwindle. There were fewer new projects to complete and fewer repair jobs to tackle. Plus, I'd acquired a (very) modest level of competence around the house and, when a job needed to be done, the need for multiple trips to the hardware store to get a single job done almost disappeared.
So, when I started my little paint repair job yesterday afternoon, I had hardly given it any thought. During Hurricane Sandy, we'd had a little water damage on our kitchen ceiling. Considering the damage that the storm did to others on the East Coast, the impact on us was pretty darn small. The water stain was about two feet long and varied in width from about one-half inch to about two inches. I stared at it each day for the past few weeks and, finally, with college football season over, I had a free Saturday afternoon. I figured the job would take all of 10 minutes. That was a bit of an underestimation.
I found an old can of paint in the basement labeled "master bathroom ceiling." I took a look at the master bathroom ceiling, glanced at the kitchen ceiling, and said "Those look the same to me." I opened the can, mixed the paint, poured a little into the rolling pan, and took out my smallest roller. I coated the roller with the paint, climbed up my step ladder, and began to roll. What a mistake! I now had a six-inch long stripe of bright white paint in the middle of my kitchen ceiling and the rest of that ceiling was definitely not bright white. This was a flashback to my home repair adventures from the 1990's.
Now, I had a real problem on my hands. As bad as the water stain looked, the water stain combined with six-inch white stripe looked even worse. It was at this point, of course, that Kim found some of our old paperwork from the builder that identified the ceiling paint by name. It was Duron Ceiling White. I put on my shoes and headed off to the Duron store to pick up a quart. Of course, when I got there, the crack staff at the counter promptly informed me that Duron doesn't make that color any more and the only way to get a match would be for me to bring them in a sample. "Does that mean I need to cut a little square out of the ceiling dryall," I asked? "That's right," I was told.
So, it was back in the car for the drive back home. Once I got there, I pulled out a razor, climbed up the step ladder again, and prepared to cut a hole in the ceiling. "Umm, don't you think it might be smarter to take a piece out of the ceiling somewhere a little less obvious than the middle of the room," Kim asked? Of course, she was right. So, I headed over to the coat closet and scratched away for a few minutes until I finally had a thumbnail-sized piece of the ceiling.
From there, it was back to the paint store to get my suggested match (it was "Antique White"), another drive home, and -- finally -- success. Now, when you look at the kitchen ceiling, instead of a water stain, you see some slightly mismatched paint. It's a classic repair job by Mike. That means it took longer than it should have and it's not perfect. I love it.
In case you're keeping track at home, pet peeve #1,206 on my list is people leaving their Halloween pumpkins out on their stoop after Thanksgiving. That just drives me crazy. Halloween is on October 31st. I guess it's OK for you to leave your pumpkins out on display through Thanksgiving but anything beyond that is just asking for trouble. Come December, it takes an amazing amount of self-restraint for me to not smash every one I see.
Thankfully, most of the pumpkins are now gone. That doesn't mean I have no more home decorating concerns. You see, now I'm focused on pet peeve #1,207. That would be my problem with people who don't decorate their front yards for Christmas.
When you were young, didn't it seem like every house was decorated for Christmas? That's the way I remember it. OK, I admit that my memory may be faulty and I could be looking back through rose-tinted glasses at a past that didn't really exist. But, there had to have been more homes decorated for Christmas back when I was young. That was the case even though we had to use those crazy Christmas bulbs that you had to screw into place. And, in upstate New York, we had to put lights up when there was already snow on the ground and it was 20 degrees outside.
I know some of my neighbors will read this and I'm probably going to get in trouble but, by my count this evening, less than one-third of the houses on the street are decorated. What's up with that? I'm not looking for a Clark Griswold display (although that would be nice). Candles in the windows will do just fine. Come on, people. You can do better.
I spent a good bit of time earlier this week "spending" my PowerBall winnings. I had serious internal debates about exactly how many houses I'd buy and where they'd be. I finally settled on an apartment in New York City (with a rooftop terrace, of course), a house on the Eastern Shore, a ski home out west, and a villa in southern Italy. I thought about how many cars we'd buy. I even decided to get a private plane to get us back and forth to all those homes.
Somehow, in all that daydreaming about the purchases I'd make to show off my new-found riches, I never stopped to consider the true indicator of personal wealth. It's not homes. It's not cars. It's not even planes. It's how many Christmas decorations you have.
We just finished a full afternoon of decorating the inside of the house. I think I made 20 trips up and down the basement stairs, lugging box after box of decorations to their rightful place in the house. We have one artificial tree for the upstairs landing and two for the front porch. We have yard after yard of greens to drape the front stairs and the back railing. There's a cranberry tree for the mantel, a pine cone tree for the study, and an apple tree for the living room. We have holly for the entertainment center, wreaths for the dining room and kitchen windows, and carolers for the piano. The list goes on and on. In fact, I think it would be simpler to list the Christmas decorations that we don't have.
We have so much stuff that we couldn't find the manger set amongst all the clutter. We searched high and low, wondering where it could have gone. For a moment, I thought that a certain someone who, several years ago, had kidnapped our baby Jesus and held him for ransom had decided to go all out this year and take Joseph, Mary, the shepherds, wise men, and cattle, too. Thankfully, after a brief period of panic, we found the entire set in with a box of Christmas knick-knacks. Crisis averted.
Tomorrow, it's out to the tree farm and then one last burst of decorating. I really can't wait -- it all looks great.
