Category: Generic

Leadership

Bloganuary writing prompt
What makes a good leader?
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I have no idea. If I knew, I would be a better leader than I am. Granted at work I am only a leader of four people and they are all excellent at their jobs so it makes my job easy. Still, having said that, if I could be better I would be better. 

If I can’t give you something that makes you a good leader, I can give you something that makes you a friggin’ pain in the ass leader. Simple: Don’t micromanage. Ugh, working for a micromanager is infuriating. Seriously. I mean, I don’t know if this is true at all, but it’s what I heard, Jimmy Carter is a great man but he was a shitty President though. Why? Rumor has it he was a bit of a micromanager. If that’s true, it’s got to be the reason why his presidency went down the one-term crapper. 

If you want to be a good leader, don’t be a micromanager. 

No Nukes

Bloganuary writing prompt
If you could un-invent something, what would it be?
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After the political events of the last 8-9 years I would like to say that if I could un-invent anything it would be social media, but if I did that I would never have met my wife (thanks, Myspace.com!) so I’m not going there.

Fascism could sure go for some un-inventing. If I could remove the very concept from history with a Thanos-like snap of my fingers I would, but that’s not where I’m going today.

If I could un-invent something it would be nuclear weapons. Yes that would have made the end of the second world war messier, and it would have changed the entire cold war, possibly for the worse, but there are two scientific breakthroughs from the 20th century that are probably the greatest achievements in human history. One was the moon landing. The other, unfortunately, was the bomb. I would remove the bomb. I would remove that horror from our world. 

I’m on the fence about nuclear power. If we could just figure out a safe way to dispose (or better yet, recycle) the waste I would be fully on board. Let the scientific advancements in nuclear energy go for humanity’s benefit instead of potential destruction, right?

No nukes. Simple.

(Non) Daily Haiku for You #130

I filled up my water bottle from the fountain at work and put some lemonade mix into it that I have been carrying in my backpack for months. 

G.R.O.S.S.

Let’s write a haiku about the experience.

Lemonade gone bad.
Was it the water or mix?
Do I want to know?

Love

Bloganuary writing prompt
Can you share a positive example of where you’ve felt loved?
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I am not going to share too much on this topic (shockingly) but I will give a short answer.

One year ago my mother was coming to the end of her life. It was awful. She was in hospice and fighting hard for each second. The pain of knowing we were losing her and the guilt at not being able to do anything more to help her combined to pretty much crush me.

My wife was there for me. My wife was my support. My wife was my rock. My wife was my heart and soul. I have never felt more loved.

My two step kids were in Vermont through the whole ordeal, but they were there for me too. Remotely at first, but then after my mother passed away they came home and were there for me in person as well. Again, I have never felt more loved. 

My wife and my step kids. My family. I would not have made it through that experience without them. I am so thankful for the love they give to me and I will never be able to show them how much they mean to me. I love them all so much I cannot put it into words. I need to do an infinitely better job showing them how much I love them and how much they mean to me. My heart aches at the thought of it.

Commute Fun

After a few inches of snow followed by a layer of ice last night, the commute this morning is going to be rough. Hopefully most of Massachusetts will just stay home and I’ll have routes 93 and 128 to myself.

Not likely.

I’m running a bit late this morning but I did manage to sneak in a picture for the photo a day thing. Granted it’s basically the same as the last two days. What’s a red head to do?

To Do List Recap

I posted a to do list for this evening earlier. How did I do?

  • Approximately 90 more minutes of work – DONE
  • Top off the cat’s food bowl – DONE
  • Cook dinner – DONE
  • Eat dinner while hanging out with my wife in front of the tube – DONE
  • Shovel the 4-5 inches of snow we got today off of the drive way so that I can drive to the office tomorrow – DONE
  • Bring the trash barrel out to the street once there is a path shoveled to get it there – DONE
  • Finish today’s exercise and close the last ring in the Apple Watch’s activity app – DONE
  • Pack up my work laptop along with a bunch of things to put onto my new desk, which officially becomes my desk tomorrow – DONE
  • Keel over from exhaustion and sleep – IN PROGRESS

Well what do you know? I had a pretty productive night. The only thing left to do is sleep. I need to finish an episode of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine first (season seven episode 22, I’m almost done with the full rewatch!) while I wait for my Apple Watch to charge and then it’s lights out, babie.

Nice work, Robert.