Writing is Hard

It took me a long time to realize that I am (at least on some level) a perfectionist. If I can’t do it right, I don’t usually want to do it.  If I get started with something new, I don’t want to do it the easy or beginner’s way. I want to do it like a pro. I read up on the subject at hand, review my circumstances and abilities and pursue help from people I feel are experts. This has caused me to fail spectacularly in certain areas of my life and to succeed in unprecedented fashion in others. However, I am still far from anal about these things. I am not terribly organized. I just have incredibly high expectations for myself and hate being mediocre at anything I want to do. It’s a personality quirk that I am learning to deal with and maximize to create success.

Over the last few years of my life, I have made a living as a communicator. I did writing, broadcasting and now I create visions for product development and communicate that through documentation and meetings with the people that are responsible for doing the work. My obsession with excellence in the area of communication has served me well. I take care of my wife, own a house and I get to do a job other people only dream about. This is an area in which this personality quirk has been beneficial.

Unfortunately, this personality quirk also cripples me in certain areas of my life as well. This blog is an excellent example. I don’t have time to write the perfect essay about how I feel about life, faith, games, friendships and all the other topics on my mind. I could just write my thoughts down and hit the publish button, but then I probably wouldn’t get the same intellectual and emotional response from my audience that I expect from the things that I write. So I’ve got about four unfinished blog entries that are just waiting for me to find the time and inspiration to finally complete them.

Casey and I will be taking a few days off next week to go to Nags Head with my family. My goal is to finish at least one of those blog entries and get them posted and then try to be a little less obsessed with the process of writing for my blog. I have plenty of design documents and meetings to obsess over. I’d like for this blog to be a stress reliever and not another point of stress that needs to be carefully massaged. In fact, I think I’ll get started by saving myself a little time and NOT proof-reading this entry. It’s a baby step, but it’s progress.

Raised by Wolves?

A few years ago Quizno’s ran an advertisement that was probably one of the worst ads I had ever seen. You should be able to see it below.

Now, call me crazy, but why would you want to show a creepy pedophile-looking man sucking the teet of a she-wolf as part of an advertisement for food? That doesn’t make any sense to me. Not only did the commercial not give me any desire to go to Quizno’s, I was so offended by their stupidity that I refused to eat there. As punishment for terrible advertising, they wouldn’t get any of my money.

Today I figured out I needed to stay late and work on a project at the office, but I was starving by 5:30, so I ran out to get some food. Casey didn’t want me eating Burger King or some other crappy fast-food, so I pulled into a little shopping center to grab some food quickly and get back to the office before the doors to the building were locked for the night. I went into this local pizza & pasta place that’s pretty good, only to discover a long line that probably would have made me late. The only other food in this shopping center was a McDonald’s inside of a Walmart or Quiznos. So today, after five years of boycotting Quiznos, I went in and got a sub.

The sub was mediocre and the creepy guy behind the counter was probably hairier than the wolves in that commercial. Sorry Quizno’s. I gave you a chance but you’re going back on the banned list.

Not So Funny Story

This blog is doing double duty. It will serve as a funny story and as a public service announcement about food handling safety. Please pay close attention.

As I reported in my last post, I made taco salad for Sunday dinner. Now, spicey food isn’t my favorite, but I picked up some jalepenos at the grocery store the other day and I decided to slice some up to add to my plate. I diced the peppers up so I could add them to the ground turkey I was using and then moved on to work on another part of the meal. A few moments later I thoughtlessly scratched the end of my nose and suddenly the outer edges of my nostrils felt like they were on fire. I had transferred the oils of the pepper onto the sensitive skin of my nose.

I went to the sink and a little amused with myself, told Casey the story. I know to wash my hands after handling jalepenos, but I was moving too fast and forgot. My fault. My nose hurts and it looked like it was going to be a funny story. At the sink, I rinsed my hands and then started splashing cold water onto my face to soothe the burning. In the process I accidentally touched my left eye with my fingers and discovered that rinsing my hands hadn’t cleaned all the oils from the peppers.

So now my left eye is in pain and its not funny anymore. This isn’t just an uncomfortable burning sensation. This is a stinging pain in my eyeballs. I close my eyes and put my hands back under the water for a few seconds but I can’t find the soap blind. My eye starts hurting even worse and as a pain reflex I start splashing more water onto to my face and opening my eyes in an attempt to rinse out the oils. Instead, the water transfers more of the oils into my right eye and suddenly my entire face is burning. It took a good five minutes before I was able to get my hands and face clean enough for the pain to subside. It felt like one of those ridiculous movie scenarios where everything that could possibly go wrong goes wrong and the theater is cracking up while the protagonist writhes in agony. The only thing that was missing was the dog eating the food off the counter while I was blinded and a laugh track.

So be careful when handling peppers. After handling anything spicey, make sure to thoroughly clean your hands with soap and water before you touch anything else. Also remember that anything hotter than jalepenos should be handled with gloves, or else you may experience that same intense burning sensation on your hands or transfer the oils to another surface to inflict pain on some unsuspecting victim. Treat peppers like fire or they might just treat you to a little fire of their own.

A Manly Weekend

It’s after 11 on Sunday night and as I type this message the muscles in my forearms are aching. In fact, a lot of muscles I’m not using right now are aching. You see, I had a very manly weekend and as a result I am pretty sore. How manly you ask?

During the winter we had a wicked storm blow through here. Pay close attention to the “blow” part cause its important. There was very little rain in this storm. It was mostly wind. This wind did a number on my backyard fence. See, my dad and I built the fence ourselves and based on some (bad) advice, I only dropped concrete into every other post. The other posts were just packed back into place with soil. Well, when the wind was blowing with near-hurricane force, the posts that were concreted barely moved but the posts packed into the dirt wobbled back and forth with the fencing acting like a sail. I know most of you have probably forgotten your high school physics lessons, but when certain sections of a rigid structure are moving and others are stationary, they call the stationary part a “fulcrum” and the moving section “broken.”

So I promised the wife that the first warm weekend we were at home, I would get out and repair the fence. The night of the storm I had put a band-aid on the problem by hammering some of the boards back into place, but I still had a broken panel, a cracked crossbeam and several posts that were leaning. It looked like a ship listing in the water after a nasty storm. Since the sun was finally out this weekend, I decided that I would get my fence repaired and standing up straight. 

First, Casey and I had to mow the backyard, which was pretty ridiculous because we hadn’t mowed since last fall. Our grass doesn’t grow at all during the winter, so I had been able to neglect it for months with no consequences. Three weeks ago I got out and did the front yard when the grass started growing again, but I had yet to find the time or the motivation to complete the back. No one can see the backyard and its not like my dog is complaining. Well, I waited a little too long and by the time we got back there on Saturday morning, it was at least two feet tall in some places. So at 9am on Saturday, just 15 minutes after I woke up, I went through with my weed-whacker and chopped the tall grass down while Casey came behind me with a mower and finished the job. It was only after that was done that I could begin to think about the fence.

After a trip to Walmart and Lowes for house and yard supplies, I headed out back and started digging. I had to dig out around each post that was weakened and down to about 2 feet or so to get them standing straight again. Then I would have Casey hold the post level while I poured concrete from 80 lbs bags and repacked soil on top. I did five or six posts and then moved on to repairing broken fencing. I dropped a new crossbeam, replaced the broken panel and missed the nails more times that I should probably admit while swinging the hammer. Apparently working in video game development doesn’t develop the skills you need to swing a hammer properly.

By 7pm we had the fence fixed and called it night.  However, my manly Saturday was not over. We hadn’t had dinner yet and we were getting hungry, so we ran to the grocery story and when we got back I set out to make a hearty meal. I made low-fat turkey burgers and probably the healthiest cheese fries known to man with boiled & baked fries, 2% reduced-fat cheese, turkey bacon and fat-free sour cream. Despite all the fat/hyphen combinations in the recipe, I turned out a very tasty and satisfying meal. 

This morning Casey and I made it to church on time for the 9:00 service. Our small group all gave us high-fives because (sadly) we’re usually at least 5 minutes late. After church we headed home and after some flirtations with napping or spending the day chilling on the couch, I headed back out to the store and picked up some gardening supplies and lumber. When I got home, I built two raised beds from the lumber and Casey and I set up our first garden together in the backyard. We planted tomatoes, cucumber, zucchini, hot peppers and a variety of spices. I then used the dug-out soil from the boxes to re-grade the uneven sections of our yard that don’t line up very well with the fence. We managed to finish all of this by about 6:00. 

When we came inside, I cooked another meal. Did you know you could make a healthy taco salad? I use ground-turkey and lots of vegetables and then throw on some fat-free sour cream. My wife works in the health and fitness industry, so I’ve learned how to cook lots of healthy meals that don’t taste like cardboard. It’s not always easy, but I’ve found or developed light recipes for almost every meal we enjoy. Although, if the turkeys of the world ever take this place over, I will probably be the first one shipped off to Gitmo, so we’ll see if ends up being worth the efforts.

After dinner, I transferred my homebrewed beer to the secondary fermentation container and dropped in some more hops to “dry hop” it, which should add some really amazing aroma to the finished product. It’s an Extra Pale Ale and if you ask nice, I might just let you have a bottle when its finished. I brewed a 5 gallon batch last week and let it ferment in a plastic bucket that has handles. I transferred it into a glass container without any handles, so of course I ended my weekend hefting the jug back into the closet, muscles twitching and joints strained. 

So I ache. It’s a good ache. It’s the kind of ache that you earn and you’re happy about, even if it hurts for a few days into the week. The aches go away, but my fence will last for years now that I’ve secured those posts. The plants that we put in the ground will yield fruit for months to come and after a three or four more weeks I’ll be able to enjoy an extra pale ale that’s better than anything you can buy in stores. I’m sure I could turn all of that into a great spiritual lesson, but I’m too tired. You connect the dots. I’m going to bed. 

The Bachelor is Scripted

There. I said it. Millions of American women would hate me for saying it if they had any idea who I was and bothered to read my blog. But its true. While I’m sure that the women on the show have little idea of what is going on behind the scenes, the Bachelor and the Producers of the show probably meet on a consistent basis to discuss not just how he feels about the women, but also about what moves to make next to keep ratings high.

My wife has been watching The Bachelor: London Calling on Monday nights the last few weeks. While she has never really followed previous seasons very closely, Casey found out that the ex-girlfriend of a friend of ours here in North Carolina was going to be on the show, so she wanted to watch and see the girl’s progress. I still wasn’t interested in the show, but I have a stack of good books I’ve been working on since Christmas, so sitting on the couch with Casey on Monday’s is a good way for me to spend a little time with her and still enjoy my own separate hobby. So each week I grab a book (I’m currently reading “Brewing Up a Business: Adventures in Entrepeneurship”) and join Casey for TV and reading. I get a lot of reading done, but I am also able to follow along with what is going on in the show.

Last week I was in the middle of a page about branding for small business when I realized the television show we were watching wasn’t “reality” television at all. We were watching a scripted story. I know because I write for a living and have done so for quite a few years now. I know that whether a writer is working on a piece of sports journalism, writing a novel or scripting a video game, the ultimate goal is to tell a story. This is certainly true for television shows as well and I knew that we were watching a story unfold before us. I put my book down, watched for a few more minutes and then told Casey exactly who was going home 10 minutes before the rose ceremony. I was dead on.

This week I decided that I wanted to experiment with my theory that the show was heavily scripted. I decided to actually watch the entire show and only read during commercial breaks. I watched the tennis & tea date and picked Chelsea out as the girl to get the “first impression” rose. Correct on call #1. Amanda getting a rose during the one-on-one date was a no-brainer so I don’t even consider that a call that needed to be made.

Then came the epic two-on-one date that pitted Holly against Marshana, the only black woman on the show this season. The show built tension surrounding the date, with all the girls and probably most of the audience assuming this was an easy win for Holly. They even showed Marshana saying “I might as well pack my bags.” From a storytelling perspective, this told me that Holly was going home. Why? Because Americans love an underdog, because “shocking moments” are what propel a reality show’s ratings and (I hate to admit that people think this way) because she’s black. Over the course of the season, Matt has shown kindness towards Marshana, but very little romantic interest. I think its good for the ratings to keep her around and even better to pit her against a woman that some people automatically assumed was a favorite to win. Matt would look racist if he kicked her off the show too early, which would hurt his image and the image of the show. So by setting her up as a sympathetic character in this episode and giving her the big win despite all signs pointing to her going home, they’ve renewed in the minds of viewers that The Bachelor is really looking for true love and any of the girls left could be the winner. It was a great storytelling device to keep interest high and make millions of women second-guess the favorites they have already picked out in their minds.

For the record, I also picked Kelly and Ashlee as the two to go home at the rose ceremony. Why? Kelly has been shown on the edge of drunkenness more than once on the show. This was done for a reason. The show wants to glamorize and moralize The Bachelor, even though its really about a man who makes out with multiple women and strings them all along in his “quest for true love.” Without being crass and blatantly calling her out for drunkenness, they showed how it hurt her chances at finding a “classy” man when she made a fool of herself by showing off her breasts to Matt right before the ceremony. Then, just in case anyone was feeling sorry for her, they made sure to air her quasi-drunken tirade about how awesome she was before the show was over. Moralizing complete. White women aged 18-45 all over America feel justified in wanting Kelly to go home.

Ashlee was just a victim of flat character development and the process of elimination. Shayne is hot, young and exciting while Robin gets to play the eager love-struck girl in conflict with the other women. Those are important characters that appeal to different audience demographics. That left Noelle and Ashlee. Noelle has been portrayed as the wall-flower that is scared of getting overlooked. Her storyline isn’t complete yet because Matt hasn’t given her a chance to shine on her own. That leaves Ashlee, who never really developed beyond being the girl with a pretty voice. She didn’t have a story to tell and she wasn’t going to capture as large a “fanbase” as Noelle would. That meant it was her time to go home.

Of course, I know that post-production is a beautiful thing. Writers and producers are able to insert story and conflict where there is little that exists naturally. I understand that in an effort to tell stories, they can manipulate the footage they’ve collected and create story. That was clearly demonstrated with Marshana last night. They showed footage of the other girls talking about how Holly was definitely coming home. They showed footage of Matt reassuring Holly when she said how scary the experience is. I have to admit that it was good post-production work. So I guess that needs to be taken into account when I call the show “scripted.”

I don’t think that in real life, these stories play out quite so perfectly to make good television. Here’s what I think happened. Matt picked a few favorites after the first night he met them. In fact, he may have been given information about them beforehand to help narrow the field. Women like the drunk girl who stuck her panties into his pocket on the first night are selected specifically to make a fool of themselves and go home on the first night. The other women are all “cast” to fit particular roles and the producers meet with Matt to orchestrate the direction of each date and rose ceremony. Does anyone think it was a coincidence that Holly and Marshana were put on a date together? Me neither. Of course, Matt has a say in who sticks around, but I highly doubt the women go home in the order he would have picked. He probably has a few girls in mind and the rest are just casualties of reality television.

If anyone needs more convincing that the show is scripted and mostly fictional, go look up the show on Wikipedia. Out of 11 completed seasons, only one bachelor, the pro bass fisherman, is still involved with the woman he picked at the end of the show. The rest of them broke up almost immediately after the show aired. The relationships and experiences on this show are fabricated through storytelling to capture an audience and drive ratings. The Bachelor doesn’t have anything more to do with finding true love than Pro Wrestling has to do with finding the best fighter. It’s just entertainment.