Passion, Drive and Management

I've read a couple of books lately that really spoke to me. It isn't so much that they educated me or really made me see things in a new way, but they better articulated things I'd been thinking about and hadn't necessarily put words to yet.

The first was Michael Lopp's Managing Humans: Biting and Humorous Tales of a Software Engineering Manager. This work took form from Lopp's Rands in Repose blog and his career. In this book he tells fabricated tales based on his experiences in the software industry. The experiences don't fall too far from my experiences, but the value of this book lies in creating terminology, and providing some tips, tricks and suggestions for given situations. For anyone who works with or in a high-functioning team, this book will provide insight into the people and systems involved.

The second is Randy Komisar's The Monk and the Riddle : The Education of a Silicon Valley Entrepreneur. In this book Komisar warns against the deferred life plan (if I only do this now, I can do that other thing later), and unfalteringly recommends what to some might describe as work-life balance. What he's really describing is pursuing your career and your life, and making what you are passionate about your life's work. This has certainly been the key recipe for my motivation in the past.

This is a timely message for me as I've just stepped out of my job. It gives me insight and again provides voice to some of the thoughts I had as I made my decision to leave and at the same time gives me courage to be selective of my new role and only go for things that I'm passionate about.

NAFTA Road Trip 2008

Philosophers have said that the path is the destination.

The path is unknown, the destination is unknown, what we do know is this:

Sometime in the next few months, we will embark on a road trip of monumental proportions. Two adults, a kid and a dog will go on a road-trip. We'll be camping. Our path, or our destination, is to travel the West coast from Canada to Mexico.

No specific route, no plans other than a few destinations we want to visit and whatever strikes our fancy along the way.

If you have a suggested stop, We'd love to hear it -- comment or contact me.

SuperSync: favorite software of the week

Apple clearly got it right when they built the iPod.  Unfortunately, iTunes has some pretty serious flaws in situations where people want to legally share their music collection.  iTunes is simply a menace on a Windows system using fast user switching.  If one person leaves it running in one session, no one else on the computer can run it.  Sometimes your iPod will connect to someone else's iTunes.

SuperSync fills part of that hole by providing synchronization of libraries between iTunes installations, across whatever network connection you have, including the Internet.  Providing a remote player, and two-way synchronization is a band-aid on the iTunes problem.  It is a good utility at a low price and it gets the job done -- my iTunes library is now seamlessly replicated to my laptop.

But, is that what you really want?  I mean, my wife now wants to sync her iPod from her laptop, and she doesn't quite have the storage for the entire library.  Now what?  New hard drive?  And my son... It hardly seems efficient to have a local copy of the library for everyone.

On the other hand, we've gone the server route and that doesn't work either.  The wireless access is simply too slow to run iTunes using storage on a server.  What's the answer?  I'm not exactly sure, but it is pretty clear that for the basic use case iTunes is sufficient, but for situations other than the one person/one library/one computer model, there is some definite room for improvement.

 

Irony, TSA-Style

Air travel never ceases to amaze me.  In San Diego this afternoon, I'm getting ready to get on a plane going through all of the usual preflight rituals.  As I'm participating in this, the one thing that seems to consistently work in the air travel world, there are two things that get my mind cranking.

The lady checking our IDs and boarding passes has a name tag that says Sarin.  I'm sure that's her name, but I've got to confess it is a bit unnerving to look at the name tag of someone who is supposed to be protecting your security and read "Sarin."

Again, and I can't make this kind of thing up, there's a song playing somewhat loudly from the PA. It's about 1PM, and I'm pretty sure Muzak is running the "wake me up from my giant lunch" playlist, so we've got something peppy.  Hmm... 80s.   Funk/Disco.  Gap Band, yeah, definitely Gap Band.  I start tracking the lyrics... "you dropped a bomb on me...baby...you dropped a bomb on me." The only thing dropping in that TSA line was my jaw.

I truly hope this was someone's well-planned joke.  It was funny -- right in line with my sense of humor.  I needed the laugh this time as my bag was disassembled and given a good swabbing by a congenial TSA agent, whose name might have been Steve.

Guerilla marketers take note: you may want to pay TSA agents to pump your technology as they take apart peoples bags.  "Hey, how do you like the new iPod Nano?  I had one, really liked it, but got super-sick of iTunes.  I love my new Zune...check it out!  Next time you come through, I'll share a tune with you wirelessly.  Looks good, you can put your stuff back now."

Cruising

The ship arrived this morning before any of us awoke. Breakfast, final packing, cleaning up and getting out of the cabin was followed by an uneventful disembarkment.

Cruising is truly a state of mind.  Personally, I am an explorer.  I perfer to arrive somewhere, spend my time learning about and visiting places in that area.   Cruising doesn't lend itself to that.

First, you get your shore time in about 8-hour bursts.  There's a big push to go on an organized trip and without pre-planning (I didn't) it's pretty difficult to get much done, other than go on a tour or walk around the closest local area you can find.

Choose your poison -- organized tour or plan ahead.  In Cabo, we probably did it right.  A snorkeling tour (the water was about 65 degrees...I wear a wetsuit surfing in 62 degree water) which also ended up being a tour of Land's End, Lover's Beach and 15 minutes watching a humpback mother and calf.  Dos Equis, margaritas and nachos with cheese from a can that must have been labeled "7-11 surplus" made this a truly Mexican experience.  It was fun, and in the moment, I was able to fit in with that style of tourist just fine.

So, am I a cruising person?  Probably in the same sense that sometimes I'm a sit my butt on a beach chair at a resort person.  In the end, its just another type of vacation activity.  If you get your head in the right place, a Margarita in your right hand and a book in your left, you and the cruise will get along just fine. 

What else is in a name...

Say your name. Say it quick. Say it slow. Say it over and over. Pronounce things you might not think to pronounce.

Spotted Friday night: A brand new van owned by the framing company A-N-S Brothers. Is that A 'n' S like Guns 'n' Roses? Maybe it rhymes with 'fans.' Maybe its just me.

Day 0

Well, yesterday I was finally allowed to tell more people about my plans to leave Expedia.

I have the opportunity to take a break, study, learn new technology and ultimately perhaps develop a business idea and work on it.  If nothing else, a mid-career break and recharge can't be a bad thing. I'd better drop the "mid-career" thing now, or I'll be spending my break buying a Porsche.

A colleague of mine followed his dreams a couple of years ago. He wanted to make films. I admired him for taking a risk to do what he wanted to do. Since many dream of having a similar opportunity, I need to make the most of my time and opportunity.