Life

It’s paying off

/ hsoi

So I’ve only been doing it for a couple of weeks, but paying myself first sure feels good.

I’m getting things accomplished, and the day job isn’t suffering either. I feel a bit more balanced, and more things are getting cleaned off my plate. Heck, my email inbox doesn’t require scrolling any more to see the complete contents! 🙂

Yes it requires a higher level of discipline. I can’t keep doing “my work” all morning lest “their work” suffer, so I have to watch the clock and cut myself off. Or I may have to portion and schedule tasks because that task will take two hours to do so it’ll have to wait for tomorrow. I also have found that I’m spending less time on less important things, like keeping up with Facebook. Heck, I’ve given up almost every game on there… well, to be fair I only played Mafia Wars (yeah yeah I know) and Poker, but MW isn’t fun any more and was just a huge time sink. I haven’t touched it in a while now. And poker is poker… no big deal there, I’ll keep that one indulgence (along with Angry Birds on my iPhone). But that I’m doing less of the less-productive stuff is also good. Oh sure, I still make time to play with Wife, Kiddos, and dog (went out and had a nice cigar yesterday evening in the backyard with Wife and Puppy; finished reading book 2 of the “How to Train your Dragon” series to Daughter). All work and no play is closer to how my Dad operates, not me. 🙂

But I’m happy with how this is going. The real test will be if I’ll still be in this mode 3-6 months from now. I’m going to try.

And because of this mode well… I’m going to do something fun later this morning. I’ll report back later.

Breaking into a garage, and how to prevent it

/ hsoi / 1 Comment

A while ago, someone sent me this video on how to break into a garage with a coat hanger and a few seconds:

It relies upon a few things:

  • A garage door with an automatic opener
  • The automatic opener has the pull to release the door from the opener’s track
  • The door has windows, so the person can see what they’re doing. Someone with enough practice and experience could probably do it without a window, but certainly being able to see what you’re doing makes it a lot easier.
  • The door is likely a daily opener, thus there’s no cross bars or other physical devices that prevent the door from opening.

They straighten out the hanger but for a little hook at the end. Wedge the top of the door just enough to fit the hanger in. Hook the hanger on the door release, and pull. Ta da.

There are some things you can do to make life more difficult, like not having windows. If you have windows, covering them or making them harder to see through is better than nothing. If the door is not a daily opener, like for a shop, consider using cross bolts or other hard and fast means of securing the door.

But there’s also something else you can do: zip ties

Wonderful idea… if you have a second hole to put the zip tie through.

I have Genie garage door openers and there’s no second hole. But thankfully, the big black plastic housing has some airspace in the front, in the area just above the release lever. A few seconds with a drill, a hole through the housing, and viola.

She loves texting

/ hsoi / 4 Comments

Daughter loves texting.

Wife and I have been conservative in our mobile phone use, which parlays into our choice of service plans. Once Wife got her own iPhone (instead of the old crappy phone we once had), then her friends learned about it, Wife started to receive and thus send lots of text messages. The same happened to me, I blame Jay. 🙂  Originally we did AT&T’s minimum 200 msg/month plan, but I quickly realized that as each month passed we got closer and closer to our limit.

I caved and went for the Unlimited plan. It was only $5/month more, so why not.

I’m glad I did.

Daughter LOVES texting.

My father-in-law had a triple bypass surgery a couple of weeks ago. Wife and Kiddos have travelled up to be there, help out, etc.. I would go, but there’s work and well… Sasha is still a high-maintenance dog (we’re working on this, another topic for another time). So since they are gone and I am home, Daughter misses her Daddy.

She makes up for it by texting.

She uses Wife’s iPhone and folks… I’ll tell you this girl can type. I think texting is improving her spelling, her typing speed, everything. Plus, I think it’s great that she finds it a fun way to be close to Dad even when she can’t be close to Dad.

At this point what I want is an iPhone service plan that doesn’t cost me an arm and a leg. 😉

Pain as a (positive) motivator

/ hsoi

And another from John Farnham, on Pain.

This hit me for two reasons.

First, I’ve hit a point in my life where I need some serious change. The pain of staying where I am is now outweighing the pain of changing. It may flux, the level of pain may change, I may revert back. Who knows, but I hope not. I hope my motivation to move forward will continue.

The only way any of us ever move forward and improve our lives, is when the pain associated with our current lot exceeds the pain of moving on. It’s a universal formula, and it applies to all of us. Life is motion. Stagnation is always associated with wretchedness and mental illness. For the sake of our own mental health, we have to move on, no matter how painful it is!

John’s writing just hit home with me on that personal level. It is what’s going on for me: the pain to stay is greater than the pain to go.

Second, the real focus of John’s writing is about panhandlers. Personally I don’t have anything to do with them. Wife is more compassionate than I about this, and she is right: we don’t know their story, they could truly need help. But when I see the same guys on the same street corner day after week after month, I’m just not convinced they really care to change, that they really are down on their luck. You offer them a job, they don’t want it. Food they might take; money, or booze or pot they will take. Sorry. I bust my hump at multiple jobs to earn my money and you want me to just give it to you so you can flush it and your life down the toilet? I won’t have any part in that.

John makes a perfect point:

Yes, he claims to be miserable, hungry, homeless, et al. Yet, regardless of what you do, or don’t do, he’ll surely be back on that same street corner, with the same hand-scribbled sign, next week, and the week after, in perpetuity. As miserable as he claims to be, the pain of self-improvement perpetually exceeds the pain of staying where he is.

So, in giving him cash, or even food, you are “easing his pain,” and thus assuring that he will never change. There is only one thing he really lacks, and that’s ambition, and well-meaning enablers virtually insure that ambition never rears its ugly head!

Pain is firmly attached to all our lives, and pain is a relentless headmaster. Thus, in forestalling anyone from the full enjoyment of the logical consequences of their own carelessness, stupidity, vanity, sloth, naivety, and bad habits, we ultimately do them, and society, no good service. “Giving ” cash to someone who has done nothing to earn it, is ultimately destructive of their mental health. In fact, you’re doing little more than supporting a drug habit!

This Civilization already has far too many healthy, able-bodied, yet sleazy and willfully-unproductive cowards. Preventing them from ever growing up, from ever squarely confronting their own shortcomings and moving forward, is ultimately a crime against humanity!

Pay Yourself First

/ hsoi / 2 Comments

I first learned of the concept from the Motley Fool guys: Pay Yourself First. I try to do that as much as I can with finances, but I realized that I haven’t been doing it enough with the rest of my life.

For instance, I wake up and immediately the mindset starts into “going to work”. If I’m going to do anything for myself, it tends to be something done at night after work, and many times I’m too drained or tired to put effort into it. Consequently, my own projects suffer.

Well, I’m trying to “pay myself first” in other areas. Let’s see how it goes. Wake up, do my own thing for a few hours. Yes, I still have to portion things right to give proper time to the day job. But since there’s no way I’ll neglect that work well, hopefully this will now mean other things won’t get neglected or ignored from lack of time or energy. Hopefully this will pay off for me.

I really want it to pay off for me. I’ve got a bunch of irons in the fire and I want to ensure they get forged to completion. There are also some new things I want to do, and I can’t do them until I clear off my plate.

Killed by coyotes? What can we learn.

/ hsoi / 2 Comments

I was flipping through TV channels and came across a show on the National Geographic Channel called “Killed by Coyotes?”

 

A talented young folk singer, Taylor Mitchell, is killed by coyotes as she hikes alone in a Canadian national park. It’s the first fatal coyote attack on an adult human ever recorded, and it shocks not only the surrounding community but coyote experts as well. Highly intelligent and generally timid around people, coyotes have traditionally not been considered a threat to human communities. But are they becoming more habituated to us and are they losing their fear of us? In the wake of the attack, scientists, police and park rangers try to develop a clear picture of what happened – and why. And with coyote numbers increasing throughout North America, we explore how humans and coyotes co-exist.

 

 

I remember when this story hit the news. I only caught the last half of the show, but it was interesting. They came to the conclusion that Taylor was killed as a result of a predatory act, that is, they were hunting her… not defense, not a rabid animal acting out of character, but she was hunted. They said these yotes were “Eastern Coyotes”, a hybrid of coyote and wolves; consequently, they have a different behavior, one that’s not afraid of larger quarry. Furthermore they asserted that in a protected forest, there’s no fear of predatation by humans, and in fact there is likely chances for “friendly” interaction with humans thus critters become less afraid of humans. Consequently, any attempts to “scare them off” just wouldn’t work because they have no fear of humans; that you are bigger means nothing.

We’ll never know the truth of what happened to Taylor Mitchell, but it does go to show that the world can be a dangerous place. We are so insulated, so isolated from the reality of the world… most people don’t want to acknowledge or are ignorant of how the world really is (including human predators that surround us on a daily basis). And yes it’s true that Taylor’s case is a first in recorded history. But you know… it’s little comfort to know you’re a statistical anomaly while in the midst of being attacked.

I did take a few things from this.

First, they hypothesized based upon their findings that Taylor detected she was being followed and started to run, throwing her keys, her camera, all in an attempt to flee. It’s very natural to choose one reaction: fight or flight. They hypothesized that Taylor chose flight, and that triggered a stronger predatory response in the coyotes. What if she had chosen to fight? Granted the results may have been the same, but you can’t help but wonder if standing your ground and fighting could have yielded a better result. I also consider that one’s response to such a situation may be biological, but one thing we humans have is an ability to overcome our biological programming. If instead you train and condition yourself to fight, if your first reaction might be “OH SHIT!” but then your second reaction is “YOU’RE GOING DOWN!!”, what sort of difference could that make? There’s often discussion of the wussification of America, how we’re teaching kids to go fetal instead of fight… how could things be different if we raised fighters, not flighters?

Second… I can’t help but think about all those people who freak out over the whole “concealed carry in national parks” issue. For me, it’s not about wild animals, but still about predators. It’s quite common for drug manufacturers to grow marijuana on public lands in national parks. Of course, they don’t want to be found, so if you stumble upon them, it’s unlikely the rest of your day will go well. But I think back to a camping trip with my family at a Texas State Park. We’re just walking down the road in the park and suddenly a coyote runs across the road in the middle of the day. Odd behavior, but it happened. Thankfully nothing came of it, but what if the yote thought otherwise? Do you have a plan to deal with that situation? Do you have a means to handle it?

.44 Magnum does a good job of addressing the situation. Imagine of Taylor was armed. Imagine if she had such an equalizer. Might she be alive today?

 

Unicorn City

/ hsoi / 2 Comments

I’m not into LARPing, but I did play D&D as a kid, played MUD’s in undergrad… so I jive with all of this.

Co-worker just showed me this trailer for a movie called Unicorn City

Looks like that could be enjoyable to watch.

Failure or success in education depends upon the parents

/ hsoi / 10 Comments

Adam Carolla rants about why the public school system has failed. (h/t The Packing Rat) Some NSFW audio.

He’s right. Success or failure in school directly corresponds upon the level of involvement of the parent. My little sister spent 2 years as a grade school teacher in inner city Washington D.C.. It was most evident from the family culture there that it was the prime contributor to the student’s level of success or failure (mostly failure). I can speak from my own public school experience that parental involvement is the #1 factor in the success or failing of the student (which then corresponds to the success or failing of the school, the school system, etc.).

Trouble is, it’s not politically correct to talk about it (and Adam’s rant isn’t politically correct). Furthermore, the people who whine and care so much about public education, the Liberals and Democrats, have a huge voter base that pulls directly from those very groups that have the culture problem. Do you think they’re going to address the truly tough issues in a head-on and brutally honest fashion and risk alienating their voter base? Nope, because votes matter more than actually addressing and fixing real problems.

Furthermore, you can’t fix problems of culture by throwing more money at it. It’s harder to fix culture problems. Look at Chris Rock’s own rant about how you get more respect within the Black community coming home from prison than you do coming home from college.

So what sort of culture do you surround yourself with? What sort of culture do you surround and permit to surround your children? It’s not strictly a racial thing, but it does tend to fall along ethnic lines. Believe me, I know some Asians that are worthless and some Mexicans with more degrees on their wall than you. It’s the culture that you (and your children) are surrounded by. And don’t think it’s out of your control. Sure some parts may be, but that means you as the parent have to become even more involved. Yes it might mean you have to be strict, deny your child, say “no”, and be tough in how you raise them. It’s your job to be their parent, not their friend, not to “be cool” or any such notion.

Wonder why homeschooled kids do so well? Maybe it has something to do with that high level of parental involvement in their lives and education. Think about it.

Language as a Window into Social Relations

/ hsoi / 2 Comments

My time in higher education was spent studying “human/speech communication” — I studied how people communicate. So I find things like the following video to be interesting.

Note, the audio/video may be NSFW… there’s nothing overt like cussing or nudity, but it does talk about sex.

Necessary tool support

/ hsoi / 2 Comments

Yes, you need tools. Good tools. Things break, you have to fix them. Screwdrivers, wrenches, pliers, hammers… and the many variants that exist of these things.

But sometimes we need things to support the tools. Tools alone don’t cut it.

WD-40.

Duct tape.

3-in-One oil.

Goo Gone.

Electricians tape. Masking tape. Teflon tape.

Liquid Wrench.

That last one is a favorite. I think my little vial of it is geez… maybe a couple of decades old. You only need a little bit, and you don’t need it all that often. But when you need it, nothing else works like it does. When the guy came this morning to install the new washing machine, of course he had to turn off the hot and cold water supplies. When he turned the hot supply back on, it started to leak from the valve stem. We could tighten it and get it to stop, but it didn’t really stop. Went to Lowes to get a replacement spigot. Trying to remove the old spigot? Oh my. I guess 25+ years of lime and calcium build-up, and the spigot would not budge. Liquid Wrench to the rescue. Soak it, tap on the spigot threads, crank and cuss… wipe off what was loosened, repeat numerous times cussing louder each time. I didn’t have a solid combination wrench large enough so I had to use adjustable combination wrenches (Craftsman), and I swear I was close to breaking them, it was that stubborn. Eventually, with more soaking and cranking, she gave. Thank you, Liquid Wrench.