New Year's Resolution

I don't usually make resolutions for the new year. I figure that if you need to make a resolution, you can make it anytime, so no need to wait for January 1. Also, I have not been good about keeping the resolutions I have made in the past. But this year, on December 26, we went to a memorial for Kelly, the guy pictured here, and his daughter spoke. She encouraged us all to make New Year's resolutions, because Kelly liked to make them, and he was always very excited about them, so that's a good enough reason for me. This year I will make one.

Kelly, by the way, was only 50 years old and was killed in a skiing accident, fell head first into deep snow and suffocated on the Saturday before Christmas, so the circumstances were really terrible. Kelly was a Boy Scout leader who had a lot of influence on my sons. He and I were not really close, but we were always friendly. He was very lighthearted, always laughing about something, and he once said that at his memorial he thought there should be strawberry-rhubarb pie. The church that hosted his memorial was overflowing, as was the parking lot, and there was one of the largest collections of strawberry-rhubarb pies that has ever been assembled.

So now I have to come up with a resolution. I started the brainstorming by eliminating a few possibilities. Losing weight is out. Exercising is out. Everybody makes that sort of resolution, and those are just the type of resolutions I have not kept in the past. I expanded on those ideas to exclude anything health-related, like eating more broccoli. Also, I decided that something like beating all 30 levels of Starcraft (which might have been a better resolution 10 years ago) or reading every single Christopher Moore book (which I might do anyway) would be too frivolous.

Then I started thinking about writing all this in a blog post, and it was not too much of a stretch to decide that I could have a resolution related to writing. Not  really health-related, and not completely frivolous, and something I should work on more. My last blog post was in May, related to Game of Thrones. I should get going again.

So I am resolving to write at least two blog posts per month in 2016. This one doesn't count toward January, because I am going to post it today, December 31. I really would like to write a post every week, but we'll call that an aspiration as opposed to a resolution, so a little more relaxed level of commitment. Two posts a month is probably doable; once a week, I have my doubts.

I have plans for my first 2016 post -- it involves Republicans and Machiavelli -- so that should be coming to this very site soon.

GoT - Worst Episode Ever

The most interesting thing we learned this week is that Tyrion has at least one normal-sized part, other than his head. Or so he claims.

I feel compelled to write about Game of Thrones, again, because it has gone from being the best thing on TV to disheartening in less than one season. Those of us who have sat through the first six episodes deserve something good for our struggles, and it had better involve dragons, all three of them, and lots of fire.

As has become the norm, there weren't any really dramatic scenes this week, or maybe I am just getting jaded. One thing we have learned about Game of Thrones by now is that, even when something dramatic happens, it doesn't necessarily change the main narrative, because there is no main narrative, and one story just gets replaced by another and another, and Daenerys still isn't going anywhere with those dragons. Watch a daytime soap opera for a few months; after a while, nothing seems like that big of a deal anymore. So yeah, maybe I'm jaded.

Let's see if I can recap this week. I didn't take notes, so I may get some things wrong. I don't think anyone cares.

Arya sees dead people. Not imaginary or ghostly ones -- actual bodies. She seems like she wants to retain her identity rather than become no one. I think it's because some people on her list are still alive.

Tyrion and Jorah Mormont get a lift from some slavers, and we learn that dwarf penis is a delicacy, or a cool trophy, or something. I don't remember that from the books -- it seems to me that dwarfs everywhere would get the Theon treatment pretty quick if that were the case. It's silly, but if it gets our men to Daenerys faster, I'm all for it.

Jamie and Bronn want to go grab Princess Myrcella, so they just...wander into the garden where she is spending time with her fiance. And at just the same time, right at just the exact same time, the Sand Snakes show up, also to take Myrcella, or maybe kill her, I'm not sure. There is a choreographed-looking fight, where I think no one is killed or severely wounded, at which point the palace guards show up and stop the fighting. They do this by shouting at them to stop, and since they greatly outnumber Jamie and Bronn and the Sand Snakes, everyone stops and is arrested. The head of the Dornish guards shows how scary he is by making a nice little pirouette with his axe, after everyone is already standing still, which is funny in a way that serious drama is not supposed to be funny. It's a terrible scene.

 Cersei conspires with the High Sparrow by telling him about gay Loras Tyrell. The High Sparrow then holds a cartoonishly simple "inquest" which features precisely one accusing witness, and both Loras and Queen Margery are imprisoned (she for lying about her brother), just like Cersei planned. It's a departure from the book, and a bad one that we can only hope will be corrected. One constant in Game of Thrones is that Cersei is a super-villainess, simply because everyone in the books is apparently pre-programmed to go along with every evil plot she hatches, no matter how unlikely. That the mother of three of her brother's children and murderer of her husband the king dares to accuse someone else of depravity, this we can understand, because it's Cersei, and she always gets away with shit.

In the books though, Cersei's interaction with the High Sparrow is actually one time when things don't go quite as planned for her. It's an interesting twist to Cersei's story when we finally find someone who has the sense to check up on her BS, and then calls her on it. But in the show, we get the same old super-villainess plot line that started back in episode two or so when she decided to have  a direwolf killed for no reason. Another lousy scene.

And finally, in the show's climactic scene, so to speak, Sansa gets married and finally loses her virginity. But since her husband is Ramsay the Unfailingly Cruel, there has to be some cruelty. Only Ramsay seems to have gotten confused about what cruelty is, so he makes Theon watch while he takes his husbandly due whether Sansa wants it or not. It feels more creepy than really cruel, and we're left a bit disgusted. The whole story line is not in the books, so you can't blame George RR Martin for this one.

We're left to hope that maybe next week Sansa and Theon will step up, gut Ramsay like a fish, watch him bleed to death, and then take over Winterfell. Except that would actually resolve a story line. That's not likely.

It's always nice to find someone who agrees with me: http://www.theatlantic.com/entertainment/archive/2015/05/game-of-thrones-roundtable-season-5-episode-six-unbowed-unbent-unbroken/393503/

The Game of Thrones Doldrums

Those of you who have watched the first three episodes of Game of Thrones, Season 5, tell me: What is the most dramatic single moment so far this season? Anything to compare with Ned Stark's beheading, the birth of dragons, Joffrey's wedding? Should we set our sights lower? Anything as good as Bran being pushed from a window, Jamie losing his hand? Tyrion's trial, the fight between Oberyn and the Mountain, Lysa Arryn's death?

I think not.

Mance Rayder died -- was that this season? Tyrion was kidnapped. Jon Snow was elected Lord Commander. Daenerys had rocks thrown at her. Brienne followed Sansa. Arya threw her clothes in the ocean...

I have read more than once that this is the best season of Game of Thrones, and maybe it will be, but I don't see it so far. I have my doubts going forward too, because the show writers are dealing with a problem handed to them by George RR Martin: the books are getting less interesting as they go along.

I was introduced to Games of Thrones through the TV show, but then I read all five Song of Fire and Ice books, and I can tell you that they were a bit of a slog at times. Martin's habit of killing off several of his main characters, like Ned Stark, Catelyn Stark, and Robb Stark, or his other habit of sending them off to the edges of the world to follow their own stories, like Sansa Stark, Arya Stark, and Brandon Stark, forces him to keep introducing new characters and new story lines, and the whole thing seems to lose focus.

Without giving away any details, let me just list some major characters: Brienne, Ayra, Sansa, Jamie, Cersei, Stannis, Jon, Sam, Tyrion, Daenerys. Of those ten characters, three have dramatic moments still to come, if the show follows the books (though already there are departures), before the end of book five. There is at least one moment coming that will make for a great TV scene; I would not be surprised if it ends the season (no, not the walk of shame.)

The other seven characters? They will do stuff, go toward somewhere but not get there, or stay where they are, doing stuff. Zzzz. The stories range from mildly engaging to frustrating (do something already!) to downright tedious. We will be left hoping that their stories get more interesting in the sixth book/season, and that they somehow have an important part to play in the main story, and that there actually is a main story, because we are beginning to doubt. And while Dorne may be a fun new place, don't get your hopes up about anything much happening there. But it's pretty. You can already see that major departures from the book early this season stem from the show's creators trying to find something interesting for some of their characters to do.

The show is so well done that it will always hold my interest. That said, I just don't see how it can live up to the high moments of previous seasons, not unless they find some really compelling stories that are not in the first five books.

The Mariners

This year, the Mariners are supposed to be good, so interest in baseball around here is a little higher than usual. It's too early in the year to gather too much from how the team has played so far, which is good, because they are 3-6 after nine games. What you look for this early are indications, hints about how things might go, even if you can't really put much stock in them. For a team that is picked to win their division, all you really want is indications that they will perform as expected. So, what are the indicators so far?

Opponents

First thing to remember is that the Mariners have played the Angels, A's, and Dodgers -- their two biggest division rivals and one of the best teams in baseball. It's funny to see when a team plays a series of lousy opponents, and suddenly the manager, the players, announcers, radio hosts will start talking about how the bats are on track, the hits are falling in, the pitchers have found their groove, etc., when in fact they have just been beating lousy teams. The Mariners have played good teams; that may be all there is to the slow start.

Starting Pitching

Pitching is supposed to be the strength of this team, especially the starters. So far they have gotten five pretty lousy starts, three good ones, and one so-so. One thing you really want to watch is the two young phenoms, Paxton and Walker. Paxton has been OK, but Walker has been horrible in two starts. That's a bad sign.

Relief Pitching

Fernando Rodney, the Mariners closer, has given up 6 runs on 7 hits and four walks, in 3 and 1/3 innings. The rest of the bullpen has been fine, I guess.

Left-Handed Hitting

Neither Cano nor Seager has gotten on track yet, but Seth Smith started well, and Ackley has hit three home runs. They'll be fine.

Right-Handed Hitting

This is an important category, because the Mariners have not had much right-handed hitting for years, but this year they added Nelson Cruz, Justin Ruggiano, and Rickie Weeks. So far, the results have been decent on balance, because all of the right-handed hitters have been lousy except Cruz, who has hit six homers in the last 5 games, which makes up for a lot.

Overall

• Mariners fans are very used to high expectations followed by disappointing results, so we are well-positioned to deal with a poor start, unlike maybe Yankee or Red Sox fans.
• As the day started, the M's were 1.5 games back of the A's despite their lousy record, It could be a lot worse, like they could be Cleveland.
• The Mariners play bad teams for the next 15 games, so I expect they will suddenly start playing much better. If they don't, that would be a bad indication.
• Hisashi Iwakuma, Taijuan Walker, and Fernando Rodney need to pitch better. If they do, I think the M's will be OK.

Ten pounds

The journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step.

Lao Tzu

Well, if we stick with Lao Tzu's metaphor, I have walked the first 100 miles, because I have lost ten pounds in the last couple of months

Of course, the first 100 miles are probably the easiest; after that you start to get tired of all the walking. Also, I am still in familiar territory; it will take another ten pounds to get down below the range in which my weight has fluctuated for the last 15 years or so. I have a feeling this second 100 miles may be much harder.

I like the walking analogy, because losing weight is definitely not like driving 1,000 miles, or like hopping on a plane. It's a slow slog. With the amount of weight I want to lose, it's actually more like walking 10,000 miles. Did you know that you could walk to Argentina in a year and a half? I think you could. You would probably start getting discouraged somewhere in California though.

And while we are on walking, that is one thing I have added to the routine. I still don't usually walk on weekends, but I go almost every day at work. I work near the water in Seattle, so the walking is nice. I'm not very enthusiastic about most exercise, but I do like to walk.

The other main thing I have done is to start tracking what I eat. I am not very strict about it, but even keeping track of some of my meals has helped me focus on eating smaller dinners. I use an online program called MyFitnessPal that helps track calories and nutrition, plus my daily weight. When I started, I was probably averaging over 1,000 calories every night after I got home, maybe way over. Now, I keep it down to 700-800, which is OK for someone my size.

MyFitnessPal keeps track of fat calories, carbohydrates, protein, salt, and sugars. Invariably, almost literally invariably, I eat way more fat and salt than MyFitnessPal recommends -- usually something like twice the salt or more. I usually eat extra protein. And my carbs and sugar are way, way lower, than their goals, like maybe 1/4. Appropriate for a diabetic, I guess.

And about the diabetes: the biggest change I have seen so far is that my blood sugar levels have gone way down. I am taking less insulin, and I skip some days when my blood sugar is low, but my daily readings are much better than they were a few months ago. I even had one incident when my blood sugar dropped way too low -- all the way down to 42 (even my endocrinologist's eyes widened at that) -- but I made a couple of changes to keep that from happening again. Health-wise, keeping my diabetes under control is about the best thing I can do, so this has been great news.

If I lose another ten pounds, I'll write another post about it, hopefully in a couple of months. Five pounds a month. That will be enough if I can keep doing it.

A Good Interview Question

"Everyone needs to drink the Kool-Aid."

This is an actual quote from an actual manager I used to work for, said many different times, and it meant that everyone needed to get behind the latest program. It is a metaphorical reference to the Jonestown massacre, in which over 900 people literally drank the Kool-Aid. The Kool-Aid had been poisoned, and everyone who drank it died.

"What is your favorite interview question?" I see that question, or something similar, in Linked-In articles every so often. Someone will ask a series of successful business people what they like to ask candidates, and they get different answers. Sometimes the answers are interesting, but more often they demonstrate that even successful people just ask whatever, because interviews are not a very good way to gauge a person's value. So I put my own talents to coming up with a good interview question, and I'll share that after I share a couple of the not-so-good answers I have seen.

One answer, meant to identify superstars: Tell them you don't think it's a good fit, and see how they react. Most people will basically figure the interview is over, but the best ones, the ones who know that they will be great for your company, will argue their case. That's the theory. The problem with this theory is that all interviewees know that sometimes interviewers like them for no particular reason, and sometimes they don't, also for no real reason. So if you tell them they are not a good fit, they will write you off, figuring that you do not know what you are talking about, but so it goes, and maybe the next interviewer will see it differently.

Here's one I really liked: What animal are you like? Why not just ask them what type of tree they want to be? But what I really liked about this one was the guy's example of a good answer. One woman answered that she was like a duck, because they look calm on the surface, but they are paddling like crazy under the water. He thought that was a brilliant answer, and he hired her, and she's doing well. The problem with this one is, I have been hearing that duck metaphor since I was a kid. This guy must be one of a very few people who grew to adulthood without hearing this cute little duck story, so he hired a woman based on an old cliche.

I can do better than that.

The Question: "Suppose our company was about to implement some big new initiative, but you disagreed with the whole concept, maybe even thought it would be counter-productive. What would you do?" Answers should depend on the level of the candidate being interviewed. You are not going to ask a CEO candidate this type of 30-minute interview question, so let's start with...

Vice-President
Good answer: (Careful...Whoever is asking this question, it is probably their idea you are talking about.) "I would try to influence the initiative to improve on what I saw as its shortcomings, but once the decision was made, I would put my full support behind it."
Bad answer: This is really a better question at lower levels of the organization. No VP candidate will trip over it. Let's move on.

Director
Good answer: "I would recruit my direct reports to take the lead in implementing the initiative within my group and would expect them to support the company direction."
Olé! This director candidate has just passed responsibility to his or her managers without even taking a stand on the original question. This is of course what the director will also do in real life, leaving him or her able to claim later that he or she either did or did not support the initiative, depending on how the wind blows.
Bad answer: Anything else. Directors are the ultimate bullshitters; it's how they get to be directors. Anyone who commits themselves to either supporting or opposing the idea, when they can easily just let someone else take all the risks, really doesn't understand what being a director is all about.




Manager
Good answer: "I would act the same way that I would act if I completely agreed with the initiative. I would volunteer to help rally the troops and to take an active part in the implementation."
Very good! To rephrase this answer, "My job as a manager is to get noticed by the management above me, so that somehow I stand out among the other managers who are also trying to get noticed. This sounds like an opportunity to get attention, and I will jostle with them to try to get noticed the most. What I think of the actual idea is not a factor." Definitely manager material.
Bad answer: "I would keep my opinion to myself, but I would try not to get involved in implementing the initiative any more than was required."
Uh oh. This person gave perhaps the most reasonable and rational answer, and it's a dead giveaway that says that they have not been fully assimilated. They are trying to maintain their dignity and sense of self rather than serve the corporate good first and foremost. End the interview. Escort them out of the building. Recommend them to your competitors.
Other bad answer: "I would try to work with management to let my concerns be known and possibly change the direction of the initiative."
Hah, foolish peasant! No one wants to hear your puny thoughts. Learn your place!

An Actual Worker
Good answer: " I would assume that the management of the company understands the issues better than I do, and I would support them and trust that they know what they are doing."
Excellent, brilliant answer, because this person has come to grips with a most vital concept: Their own little thoughts are unworthy, and they must put their faith in those who know better. This is a potentially fine employee, at least until they wise up.
Bad answer: "I would pretend to support the initiative, but privately I would tell everyone what I really thought of it."
This is of course what everyone from the Vice-President on down will do, but anyone who is this honest probably isn't a good fit...

Losing Weight

"Then do it. Quit fucking around."

Cheech Marin as Romeo in Tin Cup.

<<<(Not me, but close enough.)

I am reluctant to blog about losing weight, because it's something I talk about and think about a lot and then never really do. But I really, really need to lose weight. Being fat (obese sounds too nice) is going to kill me, and I would really prefer not to let that happen. I would also like to spend at least some of the rest of my life not being a fat person..

I already have type 2 diabetes, a disease that is definitely made worse by being overweight. My doctor has told me to inspect my feet each day so that I don't end up getting them amputated. I lose some feeling in them already sometimes, because diabetes affects your circulation. Also, my right foot hurts when I first start to walk on it, then feels better once it warms up, and I have to think that carrying 300 pounds with every step is not good for it. I also have sleep apnea, which is another condition that can affect thinner people but is exacerbated by being heavy.

One big problem with losing weight is that everyone thinks you should do something, but everyone has a different idea of what that should be. My doctor suggested gastric bypass surgery and gave me a referral. Ugh. You should exercise, of course, only some people say that doesn't really help. You read that everyone should drink 8 glasses of water a day, except I have read more credible information that says that's bunk. Vegetarian, low fat, low carb, no prepared foods. Only weigh yourself once a week; weigh yourself every day. I once saw a website with 110 ideas to help lose weight. I'm pretty sure that at least 98 of them were worthless; I just don't know which 98.

I have seen pretty persuasive evidence that low carb actually works, but I already don't eat many carbs because of my diabetes. I think I have learned to compensate.

The one thing I am pretty sure of is that I need to eat less. I definitely eat more than I need to even when I am not hungry, but it's not so easy to stop doing that.

If you want wisdom and inspiration, it's hard to beat Cheech Marin playing a fictional character in a comedy. In any case, time to quit fucking around. Let's do this.

February

Seattle has two seasons: Rainy, and August, or so the local joke goes. Actually, I'm not sure if that is a local joke, but it should be. It doesn't actually rain here all the time, but it rains a lot of the time, and most of the year it can be overcast for days at at time, or months at a time, so it seems.

But I think the seasons that make more of a difference here are these: Light, and Dark. Sort of like the penguins in Antarctica, only not quite so stark a contrast.

Seattle is pretty far north. It is the northernmost city of its size in the 48 states (and I suppose all 50.) Our capitol, Olympia, is the most northerly capitol of the 48 states, and we are north of that.
Seattle is farther north than Fargo, North Dakota, farther north than Toronto, Canada. The 45th parallel, halfway from the equator to the north pole, runs through Northern Oregon, way south of here.

As a result of all this northness, we have noticeably longer summer days and shorter winter days than, say, California, where I grew up. Around June 21, it starts to get light by 4:30 AM (or so I have heard), and it isn't completely dark at 10:00 at night. However, near Christmas the days are about eight and a half hours long, and the sun never gets very high in the sky. Add in that it is usually overcast and often raining, and the truth is that it's dark almost all the time for several months, starting in November. You get up when it's dark, drive to work in the dark, come home in the dark, and a lot of times it's dark even in the middle of the day.

When the boys were very young, we lived on a cul-de-sac with several other families with small kids. During the summer, the boys would go out and play with the neighbor kids almost every day, and we would chat with their parents all the time. Then a point came each year when everything stopped, because it was dark when we got home, and it was cold and rainy, and we hardly saw each other for months. In the spring, we ventured outdoors again.

I don't think seasonal affective disorder (SAD) is much of a thing in California, but you hear about it here every year. The Internet says it is caused by changes in light rather than by cold weather, and I can believe that. I always find November to be depressing (not clinically depressing -- I'm fine, thanks), because it is like going into a long tunnel, knowing that you won't be seeing the light at the other end for a long time.

And that is why, sometime since I moved to Seattle, I learned to appreciate February. The weather is still crappy -- as I sit here typing, it is midday and grey outside, and raining, very typical -- and it is still dark most of the time, but by now it is getting lighter on the way to work and on the way home. I can see the light at the end of that tunnel, finally, and this is good.