Lessons Learned

There's a big difference between intelligence and knowledge.

As regular readers know, I have a very high opinion of my son's intelligence. He's an impressively bright lad -- in addition to his undeniable musical gifts, he does seem to be able to handle other advanced thought processes with ease. Oh, I'll admit that he does struggle with a few concepts that I was able to master by his age (like how to wear a belt to keep your pants from falling down, and how to get a job, etc), but he seems perfectly capable of grasping subtle nuances of science, language, math, and zoroastrianism, etc. So, as long as hanging out with the music industry's social misfits (ie, drummers) doesn't cause a permanent decline in IQ, I think he'll eventually be able to gain the wisdom needed to function as an adult.

But it is still a work in progress. No matter how smart you are, you still need time to gain true understanding of the way the world works. In Tanner's case, the most obvious path to enlightenment would be to simply listen to and accept everything that his father tells him. Unfortunately, this simple technique seems to be contrary to the way the teenage brain works...so the other option is to learn by experience.

Don't get me wrong; I'm not saying that he hasn't acquired some very important knowledge already -- he definitely knows not to get involved in a land war in Asia, and not to go against a Sicilian when death is on the line. He also knows that no matter how badly you screw up your business, the government will pay off your debts...and that Diet Coke + Mentos = Fun!

But sometimes, you just have to go through the process.

As you may remember, Tanner got a fancy new keyboard for his birthday back in November. In addition to the regular band instruments it can emulate, it also has the ability to produce the kinds of weird and uncanny sound effects that he needs to supplement the "outer-space themed" music that DomeCube wants to put on their upcoming album. He was pretty excited about having all this capability, and immediately set about banging away at the keys.

I don't know whether it was a manufacturing deficiency, or the result of overenthusiastic fingers, but one of the keysprings apparently broke. It wouldn't be so bad if it was one of the keys way over to the side of the keyboard, but it happened to be the Middle C. Despite the fact that Tanner enjoys playing in oddball key signatures and uses sharps and flats a lot, there's really no way you're going to be able to avoid Middle C forever. The keyboard's got to go into the shop.

Fortunately (we thought), there were a few days left on the manufacturer's warranty, so I dug up the receipt and helped him figure out who to call for the repairs. He took the keyboard in to the shop and left it there. When he got home, I asked a few questions.

"Well, will it be covered under the warranty?"

"I dunno."

"Did they say when they'll call you with an estimate if it's not?"

"No."

"When do they expect the repairs to be completed?"

"I dunno."

"Well, then, I think you should call them tomorrow and get the answers to these questions. It would be a shame if it's an expensive repair job and not covered by the warranty."

"Why you always hasslin' me, man? You're a Nazi, man, just like all the Nazis in your uptight, belt-wearin' generation! When will you ever learn to be mellow and just let us kids just live in peace, which is all we're tryin' to do. Chill out, dude; just dial down your stress-o-meter and re-friggin-lax. I'll handle it without you having to go all Gestapo on me. Geez!"

Well, it went something like that, anyway. The point is that neither of us had obtained any kind of commitment from the repair folks, and they had the keyboard. Tanner didn't seem to mind too much, since he had other keyboards he could use. But he would definitely need the Korg back when it came time to begin the recording.

So here it is, a month later, and the recording deadlines loom. I'm on a business trip in Alabama, and haven't been thinking about keyboard repairs at all. Then yesterday when I was heading out to grab some lunch, my cell phone rang.

"Hey Dad," (Hmm, I'm not a Nazi now. Something's up.) "What's the best way to go about getting $6 to me?"

"Um, get a job?"

"No, I mean, like, right now. I'm here to pick up my keyboard, but they won't give it to me unless I can find $6."

"The repair cost $6?"

"No, the repair was $96. But I have $90."

"Ninety six?! Why didn't you tell me you'd authorized them to do that?"

"Um, well. I didn't. They just did it. But they won't give me the keyboard until I cough up 96 clams, and I need it back so I can make the funky space noises we need for our album. Just dump another Jackson in my checking account and it'll be covered and life is good."

Now, this is interesting on a couple of different levels. One is the obvious level, concerning how I'll use my Parental Authority to ensure that the greenhorn lad learns a valuable life lesson from this experience. But another is the fact that today's youth just assume that any financial transaction can be handled from anywhere, merely by placing a phone call. He's in a music store in Lakewood, CO, talking with his dad in a restaurant in Alabama, discussing how to instantly transfer money from the pocket of the guy who has a job directly into the pocket of the freeloading slacker 2000 miles away. [Insert appropriate congressional bailout analogy here.]

What a country!

It doesn't take a Ward Cleaver to know that the only correct thing to do here is to tell the boy to apologize to the nice music store clerk who's been patiently waiting through the phone call, and then explain that he'll be back to pick up the keyboard after he finds a job, deposits his pay into an interest-bearing savings account, and then waits long enough for there to be $96 left over (after taxes, 401k contributions, and charitable deductions.)

Well, either that or I could give the clerk my credit card number over the phone now, let the boy have the keyboard immediately, and then later force him to endure several months of ongoing parental lectures on the evils of not getting commitments from the vendor up front before you hand him your device. Hey—After all, the band has an album to put out.

I won't bore you with details of the actual resolution. But I will say that I sincerely hope that both the boy and his father learned something from these discussions and transactions. I hope.

The only thing I can promise, though, is that I'll post links to the new songs once they're recorded. It's gonna be wild and entertaining stuff, I'm sure -- I'm definitely looking forward to it. Until then, we'll be watching closely to see if anyone has gained any wisdom at all. Should be interesting, right?

Enjoy the ride, and have a great day!

Where's Waldo?

OK, are you ready for another one of my "Why can't I win Lotto so I'll have more time to write blogs?" rants?

[Actually, if I won Lotto, the truth is that I'd probably be flying my Learjet to Nova Scotia (yadda yadda yadda) -- and you'd never hear from me again. But I like to think that my passion for this forum of frivolous wordplay would be great enough to keep me pounding the keyboard in a tireless effort to clog the Internet, even if I were part of the "Jeeves, tell Parker to fetch the mauve Rolls for an outing to the Club" set.]

As you've probably guessed, my recent absence from the Web can be attributed to the same factors as usual: being busy at work, having lots to do in my personal life, and having a brain the size of a peanut. The "busy at work" part is the major factor right now, since I recently had to prepare for a trip to Alabama...which is where I am now. I expect to remain pretty darn busy for the duration of this trip, so I don't expect to be posting much new info until I arrive back in Denver at the end of the month.

Thank you for your patience.

The good news is that the trip has been lovely so far. Huntsville is a pleasant enough place, the people are friendly, and the weather has been superb. I found an excellent place to swim (more about that in a future blog), and can eat anything I want at company expense.

The bad news is that the eating has outpaced the swimming, and by a wide margin. Oops. I feel like I'm channeling the ghost of Orson Welles. (Or for the Nero Wolfe fans, William Conrad.)

Anyway, I'll try my best to share some of the local flavor with you. There's an excellent Space Flight Museum here, some attractive forest-covered hills, and a Waffle House restaurant on every street corner. The local speech rythyms are hypnotically melodic, the radio stations have LOTS of country music and religious programming, and the streets are filled with all the people and cars who were featured in "The Ballad of Ricky Bobby". I'm having fun.

So please accept my apologies for the lightness of the blog for the next week or so. I do have some good stories to share concerning air travel, hotel accomodations, and living on the corporate credit card. So please keep checking back. As always, thank you for your continued patronage.

Have a great day!

MP3 Player

For some reason I can't explain, I've wanted to learn to speak Japanese for quite some time now. I just think the language sounds cool, especially when Samurai movie dudes are threatening each other as they waggle their swords around.

Or maybe it's because I never could figure out what Eric Bloom was grunting in the middle of Blue Öyster Cult's "Godzilla" (2:42 of the linked clip). Or maybe it was Mr. Roboto. I'm not sure.

In any case, I finally checked out some "Intro to Japanese" CDs at the library, and started listening to them in my car. Progress has been slow...but there has been progress. The problem is that I also like to listen to the news when I'm driving, so I got to thinking that it would be nice to have another venue for trying to absorb my language lessons. My first thought was to listen at the office, but my employer seems to expect me to occasionally accomplish something related to my English language duties, so that probably wouldn't work. But then I went for my long run on the weekend...and realized that during some of those runs, I had two hours of isolated, quiet time. A perfect opportunity.

But I can't very well carry my car's CD player up the canyon, now, can I? No, of course not. But I have seen other runners who seem to be listening to some sort of portable devices, with tiny little headphones embedded into their ears. Perhaps, I thought, one of those devices could provide a solution to my dilemma. Hmmm.

After some investigation, I discovered that these portable audio sources (usually attached to the biceps with velcro straps) were called "Empee3 Players", or "Eye-pods". Odd names, but they seem to be very popular. I decided to look into purchasing one.

Yikes. It turns out that they're fairly expensive, especially if you get more than one Gigabyte of capacity. I couldn't find anything in local stores for less than about $50. Maybe I should check on eBay.

And there you go. 8Gb players for about $15. Oh, don't worry -- I know the old saying about how if something looks too good to be true, it probably is...so I did a little research. And sure enough, the buzz on the review sites seems to confirm that the suspiciously inexpensive MP3 players I was looking at are cheap Chinese knockoffs that don't have nearly the usable capacity that they claim to have.

Still...if I could get one for ten or twelve bucks, and it could hold my Japanese lessons -- well, perhaps false advertising and lower-than-expected quality are fair tradeoffs for ultra-cheap capacity. I put down a bid, just to see what happened.

And presto, I'm out $13, and some guy in Longduckdong province has agreed to send me an 8Gb (wink wink nudge nudge) MP3 player, shipping it across the Pacific at no extra charge. Cool.

Fifteen days later, the device arrived, complete with earphones, a USB connector, and a user's manual that said things like "Good most use to hearing musical," and "Ears attach long supply for on." Despite such helpful instructions ("Underwater not to be recommend player"), I was eventually able to figure out how to get it to play music. It also includes an FM radio, a voice recorder, and the capability to play videos. Pretty sweet for a tad more than a sawbuck.

The next challenge came in figuring out how to load the language lesson tracks onto the device. I decided to stick with the low-end basics, and set up a playlist using Windows Media Player. And eight hours and significant gnashing of teeth later, I had that bad boy loaded with everything I'd need to learn Japanese while working out, lounging around, or driving to the office. (Well, as long as I was willing to spend that time with earbuds jammed into my head, at least.)

But before I began to implement this grand educational strategy, I happened to talk with my brother. We had chatted on many occasions about inspiring each other to pursue the study of Japanese...but he said he was struggling with the task, and thus far had been unable to find properly helpful study materials. And then he reminded me that his birthday was coming up. Hmmm.

I decided that the fully-loaded MP3 player might be just the gift that would jumpstart his desired bilingual edification. So I put the components in a box for him, went back on eBay and ordered another one of the low-rent devices for myself. I didn't get quite as good a deal on this one, but again, if it works at all, I'll be satisfied. I figure that if my brother works on the lessons, too, we'll be able to hold each other accountable for making progress in our studies...and before the end of summer we'll know how to do all the things they include in recorded language lessons -- like ask where the bathroom is, how much a train ticket costs, and whether we're expected to bring the popcorn for this weekend's Godzilla movie marathon.

I'll keep you posted on how it goes. In the meantime, have a great day!

Excellent Weekend

One of the nice perks of my job is we have a pretty decent company wellness program. There's a gym on the property, and the plant is located in a beautiful spot near some great places to run and ride bikes. In addition to that, the company reimburses employees for fees they pay to join a health club.

I'm not sure how many employees take advantage of this offer; if you were to fling a cat into just about any workgroup out here, you'd have a pretty good chance of hitting someone who's only a couple of croissants away from a coronary. Of course, there are some studly athletes here, too...but I'd guess that the majority of the workforce has bigger numbers in their cholesterol count than they do in their 401k.

But my problem is that since I work for Foothills, my athletic club and swim team memberships are free -- so I can't ask the company for reimbursement. But I truly hate to think that there's a pot of free money that I could be using just sitting there gathering dust. (Hmmm. Have you ever seen money that actually did have dust on it? I'm not sure I have.) What am I to do?

I decided to go ahead and join 24-Hour Fitness. After all, there have been a few times when I wanted to work out when Foothills wasn't open, so I could justify it with self-promises to go lift weights on those mornings when I wake up at 3am with nothing else to do. Right?

Anyway, I got signed up and went over there for an early-morning workout on Saturday. From there I headed to the pool to swim, and then went out to meet my friend Kristen to run at Waterton. I figured that with all that warmup, my legs should be loose, flexible, and ready to pour on the miles.

Well, kinda. I ended up telling Kristen to run several miles of the canyon by herself while I did some stretching and self-massage to try to work the tightness out of my hamstring. During this interval, I had the opporuntity for some "Gee, isn't this pretty" reflections on how lucky I am to live in this state...but didn't have my camera along, so I can't share those images with you. You may, if you wish, take a few moments at this point to close your eyes and visualize a majestic canyon, a crisp blue sky, and the deep, surreal sounds of the river's ice chunks adjusting themselves as the sun peeked over the ridges to warm them.

Pretty sweet, isn't it? (I'll try to remember to get some pictures next time.)

I did end up running the last 3 miles with Kristen, but never really felt like I could stride out to the extent I should've. She had an excellent workout, but I only managed about 7 miles, total. Still, even though my leg still isn't completely cooperative, I'd have to say that I felt like I got some good exercise. Later, I had lunch with Tanner, and actually got him to tell me a little bit about how college is going for him. It was a good day all around.

Sunday was the day for my "Swim Clinic for Runners". About 15 people showed up to get some stroke feedback and to talk about efficiency and open-water racing hints. It was a great group, and they came up with some excellent questions for me. We ended up working past our scheduled two hours, and I was very pleased at the progress that we made. I'm hoping that at least a few of them will join a Masters swim team to continue with the progress they made. And I hope that a few of them will return next month when we have another such clinic. I will never get tired of promoting this great sport!

See? This is why I buy Lottery tickets. If I could win, then every day would be like a weekend, wouldn't it? It's something to dream about, I guess. In the meantime, I'll keep working for a living, adding to my retirement fund, and taking whatever reimbursements and benefits they so kindly offer me. Even without a jackpot in my future, I'd have to say that I have a pretty sweet life. Thank you for letting me share these parts of it with you. Have a great day, my friends!