Arizona Christmas

Since the family seems to be migrating to Phoenix, we decided to have Christmas there, and of course were greeted with exceptionally low temperatures. And naturally, it snowed like crazy back here, making for some epic days on the mountain for the everyone but me. Still, it was a pleasure being with family for Christmas, sharing too much food, gifts, board games, touch football and DVD's. Also watched the Arizona Cardinals beat the Falcons in overtime.

On Friday and Saturday Merritt, Sam and I ventured into a few canyons near Phoenix, in the Superstition Mountains. (Even though I was coming down with the flu and knew this would be a bad idea.) Ladder Canyon is not very technical (one rappel) but drops into Fish Creek and is an enjoyable jaunt. At the bottom we spotted a pack of 8-10 furry critters--thought they were ringtail cats at first but after a little web-work Merritt determined they were coatis, a racoon-like animal that travels in small bands. They saw us and scampered up the canyon wall. Ladder Canyon was named after a ladder that had been left there for years and become not only an eyesore, but a potential danger to anyone using it. So following the suggestion in Todd Martin's new book Arizona: Technical Canyoneering, we did our service project by hauling it up the canyon and out to the road, but now everyone will be left to wonder how Ladder Canyon got its name, and that will become a matter of lore, in which we will be anonymous participants.

After a frost-covered night in tents we headed up Tango Canyon, with no trail and challenging route-finding. Arizona canyons are unlike its Utah cousins--they are filled with cactus and century plants and all manner of nasty, noxious thistles. (Arizona state motto: Home of pretty rocks and sharp pointy things.) We started with a very tough early-morning climb, followed by a sweet down-canyon strip and then a long 2-3 mile bushwhack up Fish Creek back to camp. Along the way I got pricked or stuck at least a thousand times, sprained an ankle and slogged through freezing cold water. It was enough to make me glad I didn't take more people on this trip. But neither Sam nor Merritt complained, and at the end of the day we all marked it as a success.

By Sunday morning and out trip home I was a coughing, sneezing, shivering, hobbling wreck feeling every year of my age. And I don't regret a minute of it. Merry Christmas!

The Lost Carols

By the time I was ten years old I had memorized the words to a dozen or more Christmas carols--Silent Night, O Little Town of Bethlehem, Hark the Herald, Joy to the World and many others. We heard them in malls and stores, and on TV and in the movies, and we sang them in schools. From Thanksgiving to New Years each year provided a tutorial on the birth of Christ in song and spoken word.

In this age where we nervously check our speech at each public portal for any outward signs of religious belief, those days have passed. Of course Christmas carols in schools are long gone--except perhaps those innocuous tales of Frosty, Rudolf and Jingle Bells. But the traditional religious carols have also disappeared from any public place, from most radio and television, and from all the nooks and crannies of our secular lives, with the exception of churches and religious stations.

As a result, young people don't know Christmas carols any more. I'm guessing you would find more children know the words to satirical versions of "Rudolf the Red-Nosed Reindeer" than to "Joy to the World." So families and carolers and other like-minded groups cannot spontaneously sing carols any more. And we have lost not only one of the great social bonds of a sacred holiday, but also a subtle but effective link of the Christmas season to its heritage as the celebration of the birth of Christ, the spirit of sacrifice, and the wonders of selfless love.

With every generation, as we ring out the old, the passing generation mourns the loss of traditional culture and the degeneration of societal values. And I suppose I am no different, and would rather rage against the dying of the light than go gently into that good night.

The Last Town on Earth

Finished a fascinating novel today--The Last Town on Earth. It takes place in Washington State in 1918--quite an extraordinary time. World War I was dragging on, fueling many activist protestors. The Women's Movement extended voting rights from state to state, while women began to work at traditional male jobs because of the war-driven labor shortages. The Industrial Revolution was in full swing. Labor unions were on the rise, sparking fierce conflicts from coast to coast. The Bolsheviks stormed St. Petersburg, while socialist groups and communities popped up across the U.S. And yet the most extraordinary, cataclysmic event of the year was unquestionably the outbreak of the Spanish Flu, which started in the U.S. and spread quickly throughout the world, killing somewhere between 30-100 million people, rivaling the Black Death plague of the 14th century as the worst medical tragedy in the world's history. (And on a personal note, my father was born on the seventh day of the year.)

The Last Town on Earth tells the story of a small, idealistic wood mill town in Washington that attempts to quarantine itself to protect against the disease. As the drama progresses, author Tom Mullen gently presents a range of moral dilemmas and social and psychological insights. Many won't find it very satisfying, as the practical and well-intentioned efforts of the town unravel like a Greek tragedy, leaving a trail of broken lives and ethical ambiguity. Yet it certainly provokes thought, reminiscent in my mind of Albert Camus' The Plague. I thought it was a compelling read.

After-dinner mint: In the final pages of the book, after the end of the novel, is the following addendum: "This book was set in Garamond, a typeface originally designed by the Parisian typecutter Claude Garamond (1480-1561) ... Garamond's distinguished romans and italics first appeared in Opera Ciceronis in 1543-44. The Garamond types are clear, open and elegant." I do enjoy this kind of unexpected learning. And I wonder if Garamond ever dreamed that he would be immortalized by his type face.

Dead African Master Means Big Money for Me

Received this email yesterday which successfully got through my spam filters and which I found so audaciously, ridiculously, pathetically interesting and funny that I wanted to share it. Italics are mine, and I've edited it for length. I'm so excited about this opportunity. How thoughtful of tina_gambo0@latinmail.com to contact me.

WITH DUE RESPACT DEAR FRIEND,

PLEASE I NEEDED YOUR PERSONAL HELP IN THIS MATTER, THIS ALHAJI DAHIRU J MUSA, IS A CITIZEN OF ABIDJAN COTE'D'IVOIRE WHO DIED ON THE RECENT CRISES IN THAT COUNTRY, THE REBELS IN THE CITY OF BOAKERY BOMBED ALHAJI MUSA'RECIDENCE DURING ONE OF THEIR RAIDS, HE AND ALL THE MEMBERS OF HIS FAMILY WERE KILLED IN THAT BOMB INCIDENT, ALHAJI MUSA IS AN INTERNATIONAL BUSSINESS MAN AND A MAJOR SUPPLIER OF YAMAHA MACHINE PARTS IN THIS COUNTRY,

MR.DAHIRU J, MUSA, IN QUESTION, IS A CITIZEN OF ABIDJAN COTE'D'IVOIRE REPUBLIC OF IVORY COAST, WHY I MYSELF IS A REPUBLIC OF BURKINA FASO, WORKING WITH OUR CENTRAL BANK RESERVOIR ACCOUNT DEPOSITED PAYMENT SLIP SECURITY OFFICE, WHY MR.DAHIRU J MUSA, WAS CUSTOMER TO THIS OUR BANK WERE I AM WORKING, HE HAS BEING BANKING WITH THIS OUR BANK, BEFORE HE DIED IN THAT THERE COUNTRY RECENT CRISES BOMBED ATTACK,

SO BASED ON THIS, THE PERSONAL DRIVER TO THE DISEASED PERSON IN QUESTION, LATE MR.DAHIRU J, MUSA, WHOM HAS BEEN COMING TO OUR BANK HERE TO WITHDRAWAL MONEY AND DEPOSITED MONEY WITH HIS MASTER, DURING HIS MASTER LIFE TIME IN THIS WORLD, WHICH HE TOLD ME TO GO AHEAD FOR THE TRANSFERRING PROJECT, BECAUSE AS SOON AS THIS MONEY BEEN TRANSFER INTO YOUR POSITION BANK ACCOUNT, HE HAS HIS OWN PERCENTAGE WHICH WE AGREED UPON, AS SOME ONE WHOM GIVE ME THE INFORMATION’S ON SAID PROJECT, SO THAT EVERY ONE WHOM IS INVOLVE IN THIS TRANSFER PROJECT WILL BE HAPPY,

I CONTACTED YOU IN ORDER FOR US TO JOIN HAND AND MAKE SURE WE MOVE THIS MONEY IN OUR POSITION, JUST BEAR IN MINE THAT YOU ARE DEALING WITH A RELIABLE MAN WITH FAMILY, I AM GIVING YOU EVERY ASSURANCE IN THIS TRANSACTION, MY DEAR, WE WILL NOT ALLOWED THE BANK AUTHORITIES TO INHERIT THIS MONEY LIKE THAT, AS FAR AS THE PERSONAL DRIVER IS AWARE ABOUT THIS DEPOSITED MONEY BY HIS LATE MASTER,

THERE WILL BE NO PROBLEM MY DEAR, I AM WITH YOU UNTIL YOU HAVE THIS MONEY IN YOUR POSITION FOR OUR OWN GOOD OK.

PLEASE CONTACT ME THROUGH THIS MY ALTERNATIVE EMAIL ACCOUNT, (tina_gambo0@latinmail.com)

THANKS YOURS FAITHFULLY.
FROM MADAM KABOURE T. GAMBO.

The Cathedral and the Bazaar

I read a pretty interesting article the other day entitled The Cathedral and the Bazaar. (I’m a sucker for creative titles, especially when they're intrinsic to the article, like this one.) Written in 2000 by legendary hacker, computer programmer and open source evangelist Eric Steven Raymond, The Cathedral and the Bazaar is a rather famous treatise on Raymond’s epiphanies about collaborative software development, ala Linus Torvaald’s Linux.

I am by no means literate in software theory. But in the article, Raymond enumerates a new set of development principles that, it seems to me, transcend the world of software. (I take no credit for this insight, as Keith McFarland made a similar point in an article he wrote using The Cathedral and the Bazaar to compare software development to strategic planning.) I won’t waste the kilobytes or your time by providing much detail or commentary, but consider the expansive truths behind some of Raymond's principles:

1. “Every good work of software starts by scratching a developer’s personal itch.” Yep, and every great work of art and every good business and …

2. “Good programmers know what to write. Great ones know what to rewrite.” Like any genealogy, the roots of greatness always go deeper.

3. “If you have the right attitude, interesting problems will find you.” Seneca said: “Luck is when preparation meets opportunity.”

4. “Release early. Release often. And listen to your customers.” This is the bazaar approach vs. the traditional construction of cathedrals.

5. “Given enough eyeballs, all bugs are shallow.” He calls this “Linus’s Law,” and it is actually a paraphrase of a more formal principle. This is the idea behind James Surowiecki’s interesting book, The Wisdom of Crowds.

6. “If you treat your beta-testers as if they’re your most valuable resource, they will respond by becoming your most valuable resource.” Pretty good leadership principle, methinks.

7. “The next best thing to having good ideas is recognizing good ideas from your users. Sometimes the latter is better.” More on leadership.

8. “Often, the most striking and innovative solutions come from realizing that your concept of the problem was wrong.” This sounds almost Einsteinian in its simple and humble profundity.

9. “Any tool should be useful in the expected way, but a truly great tool lends itself to uses you never expected.” I’m guessing chimpanzees discovered this long ago.

10. “To solve an interesting problem, start by finding a problem that is interesting to you.” We’ll all capable of doing remarkable things, but only when we’re really energized by our work.

Availability Bias

The other day I read about "Availability Bias," a concept that won a few psychologists a Nobel Prize in 2002. The idea here is that people tend to attach too much importance, validity, relevance or likelihood to factors that they are more aware of. For instance, you might read about lottery winners, which makes you believe that your chances of winning are greater than they are, and incite you with false expectations to play the lottery. Or you see the sensational media accounts of a few airplane crashes and develop an irrational fear of flying, when statistically your risk of dying is greater in an automobile.

Despite everything you hear about the human brain being the most powerful computer ever made, it is quite clear to me that most of us are not ruled by our brains, and generally don't act rationally. Availability Bias is just one example. Daniel Gilbert's recent book Stumbling On Happiness also illustrated this principle very nicely--we are terrible at predicting what will make us happy, or at least we aren't very good at acting upon what we might truly know in the deepest recesses of our rational minds.

I think we also tend to do a very poor job of generating the facts to make a decision. The truth is, most of us don't want to be bothered with the potential for a major shift in our perspective. So the Right tunes in to Fox News for decision-making data, and the Left to Jon Stewart. (Yep, that's true!) Most people fear the other side, both those on it, but even more, the possibility that they might be holding a smidgeon of truth.

A corollary to this is the filters we employ to automatically sort and interpret all data based on what we already have chosen to believe. This is historically true in science, enough to fuel an unhealthy skepticism for all those with enough temerity to challenge the prevailing thought. But it's equally true in religion, politics and sports. We all look way too hard for corroborating data, and our fervor leads us to find honor and shame split neatly along party lines, and the image of the Virgin Mary grown onto the side of a cow.

Now I don't think it's a terrible thing to follow your heart, for the mind is certainly prone to error. But it seems to me that we ought to be smart enough to know who is leading the dance at any given time, and to recognize the difference between heart and head. The brain is indeed a computer with a lot of RAM. Unfortunately, like many people with their PC's, it never gets used for anything more challenging than MySpace.

Pay it Forward

When starting this consulting career, I figured it might help to have a little credibility for prospective clients who don't know me personally. I belong to a business network called LinkedIn.com. It tends to show up prominently in Google searches, so I asked a few friends on my network if they would be kind enough to write a recommendation for me and post it on LinkedIn. They did so. And as you might expect (given that I hand-picked them!) they were very kind. I recognized that I'm not really deserving of such praise, but nevertheless the nice words were very gratifying to me.

This got me to thinking about my potential to brighten up someone's day. I thought about all the many people I have come in contact with, through business, church or community, who have impressed me and made a positive impact on my life. And I decided to try to spend some time every day letting someone know, either face to face, on the phone, by email, letter or the web. I put it on my task list every day to remind me. It's been fun.

Several times I have used LinkedIn, which has a tool for recommendations. It's been funny--almost every time I've written one, I've gotten one back in return. (I'm going to start changing my practice so this doesn't happen!) I guess people feel an obligation. But in any event, it's been a nice experience, doesn't take long and maybe makes both sides feel a little better about life.

I guess it's the same principle behind the old-fashioned thank you note. Still feels good to get those. And equally good to give them.

Interesting Quotes: Part 2

"When the eagles are silent, the parrots begin to jabber."
--Churchill

"Lots of folks confuse bad management with destiny."
--Ken Hubbard

"Our doubts are traitors and make us oft lose the good we oft might win by fearing to attempt."
--Shakespeare

"I know God will not give me anything I can't handle. I just wish that He didn't trust me so much."
--Mother Teresa

"Do or not do. There is no try."
--Yoda

"Whatever a man does, he must do first in his mind."
--Albert Szent-Gyorgyi

"Results! Why man, I have got a lot of results. I know several thousand things that will not work."
--Edison

"Necessity never made a good bargain."
--Benjamin Franklin

"Cats are intended to teach us that not everything in nature has a function."
--Garrison Keillor

"I owe my success to having listened respectfully to the very best advice, and then going away and doing the exact opposite."
--G. K. Chesterton

"I don't want to achieve immortality through my work. I want to achieve it through not dying."
--Woody Allen

"Only two things are infinite, the universe and human stupidity, and I'm not sure about the former."
--Albert Einstein

"Education is what survives when what has been learned has been forgotten."
-- BF Skinner