My Generation's Search for Meaning

We're the middle children of history, man. No purpose or place. We have no Great War, no Great Depression. Our Great War is a spiritual war. Our Great Depression is our lives...and we are very, very pissed off.

- Brad Pitt as Tyler Durden in Fight Club

A great line from a clever movie, and one that really hit home when I watched it in 1999 (one of these days I'll read the book). This line still resonates, but I wonder if it would make it into a movie post 9-11-01.

Those of us in our 30s grew up in relative affluence and peace. Other than an occasional economic hiccup or a bomb being lobbed at Libya, those of my generation grew up not having to worry about the world at large. It was the "end of history" and we went out into the world to make a buck and figure out the meaning of life. In the movie, the angst-ridden protagonist was unable to find any meaning other than being a consumer, and he couldn't accept it:

You're not your job. You're not how much money you have in the bank. You're not the car you drive. You're not the contents of your wallet. You're not your fucking khakis. You're the all-singing, all-dancing crap of the world.

In today's world, five years later, I think our protagonist could find meaning, either as standard barer in the War on Terror, or perhaps as a member of the opposition. Either way you lean politically, 9-11 and the subsequent activity that followed it woke the country up from the inward-looking, angst-ridden search for meaning into a full-scale war against terrorism as well as ourselves.

This is why the political dialog has gotten so nasty. This is why students are getting more involved politically. This is why the number of blogs is exploding. It's our new meaning. It's our Great War.

posted by Director_Mitch @ 3:10 PM (Permalink)
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Not Surprised, But Still Pissed Off
I typically try not to blog on the exact same things as the "majors" since I rarely have anything to add that hasn't already been said. However, I will say this about the Johnson beheading: after Berg, I am not in the least bit surprised, but it still pisses me off. I would like to think that this will strengthen America's resolve, but nearly three years into the War on Terror, I am afraid I know better. I expect calls from the opposition within the next 24 hours blaming Bush and advocating everything from appeasement to withdraw.

As usual, one of the major bloggers said it better than I did. Outrageous, if unsurprising.

posted by Director_Mitch @ 1:40 PM (Permalink)
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Truth in (Self) Advertising
A friend of mine - who is one of the most talented marcomm people I have ever met - is looking for a new job and wants to create a resume that is absolutely truthful:

Objective - Get paid a lot to hang around with interesting and intelligent people all day, travel to great locations, and only do the type of projects that I want to do.

Works for me, but she may want to wait until the next bubble to try this.

posted by Director_Mitch @ 8:59 PM (Permalink)
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New Project: Home Expansion
I couldn't afford my home if I were buying it today. From the time I bought it in 1999 to today, it's value has skyrocketed, putting the modest 2,000 sq. ft house with a very large back yard within striking distance of $1 million. Yes, it's less than two miles from the ocean, convenient to shopping and services, and in an okay neighborhood, but coming from Houston where a 6,000 sq. ft. mansion was only $250K, I find it ridiculous.

In the past, when Americans grew out of their homes and had savings and incomes that had grown, they would "buy up" to a new home. The problem is that I want a new home and can't afford the next size up. My next size house in a comparable neighborhood would cost me at least $1.2 million, probably more like $1.4. Even if I sold my house for more than $900K, "moving on up" would require a substantial increase in my mortgage, property tax and home insurance, and I don't see that as a good use of my money.

One solution is to move out of California, which I have looked at, but the one place where my company would allow me to move is definitely a step down from SoCal. Another option is to move inland from where I am now, but I would get only marginal improvements in home prices and both my wife and I - who are less than three miles from our offices - would have to commute. Besides, I enjoy drinking my coffee on the beach every morning. The best solution, I have decided, is to take advantage of my huge back yard and the run-up in the home's value and expand my house. I can easily add 700 sq. ft. - growing the house by nearly a third - and still have a decent sized yard.

The downside to this proposal is the time involved. With the decision being made this week, I don't expect to post pictures of my new expanded house for at least a year. The first step - getting an architect - is going to take at least 6-8 weeks since they are so backed up (everyone else is also taking advantage of high home values and low interest rates to expand their homes so architects are in high demand). Then there are the contractors, who are backed up even more than the architects. The few I have talked to told me not to even call them back until I had my architect, then they would see how many months away they could schedule me.

After multiple phone calls I managed to get a hold of two architects, both of whom could take the project in the late July timeframe (both were recommended). I hope to meet with both of them next week, pick one, and get in the queue. Then I'll wait.

Will update the very slow progress as it happens.

posted by Director_Mitch @ 1:21 PM (Permalink)
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Kerry's Running for School Superintendent?
Polyblog read my mind when he commented on this:

Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry said Wednesday he would create a federal program that would pay to keep schools open until early evening to help working parents.

Is this a Presidential issue? Aren't schools run locally? And Kerry must not talk to parents in California since the biggest issue facing working parents I know isn't a couple more hours in the afternoon, the issue is that California schools are closed all the time on work days. Take a look at a schedule: President's Day, MLK Day, Staff Development Days (multiple), End of a Quarter (multiple), Veterans Day, Spring Recess. There are dozens of days the schools are closed throughout the school year, and this doesn't include early dismissal, which for some secondary schools is as often as every other week.

But this isn't the case in the thousands of school districts across the U.S., which brings up the point: is this a national issue? Best case, it's a local issue and worst case it's a state-wide issue, but it certainly isn't something I expect the Leader of the Free World to spend time worrying about.

posted by Director_Mitch @ 9:37 AM (Permalink)
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Anxiously Waiting for the Day Kennedy Joins His Brothers
He's a drunk. He's committed manslaughter. He's an embarrassment to the senate. But the morons in Massachusetts keep electing him because of his last name: Kennedy Meets VIPs Who Want Bush Impeached

posted by Director_Mitch @ 7:43 AM (Permalink)
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WSJ: Don't List Your Blog on Your Resume
Under the "information we don't need" department (no direct link available):

Big Companies like Dell, Abbott and Sprint say that resumes increasingly are turning up that contain links to the applicants' personal Web sites, which include everything from baby pictures to political rants to sample cuts from personal bands.

The article then recommends candidates avoid listing or even mentioning their blogs, and interviews a few employers who sited examples where they got turned off from reading a candidate's personal web site.

In most cases I have to agree with the article. First, remember that you are dealing the morons in the HR department. Second, even though I am an active blogger, in my role as a hiring manager I don't want to see a candidate's blog on their resume. Blogging can be anything from a hobby to a political activity, and unless the blog is somehow related to the job at hand (a political analyst, for example) it really shouldn't come into consideration for employment.

Even if I were interviewing for a position and found that the hiring manager was a kindred spirit with my personal and political beliefs, he might wonder how I manage to enter so many blog entries during business hours...

posted by Director_Mitch @ 11:33 AM (Permalink)
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Guilty Pleasure : The Scott Peterson Case
I'm ashamed to admit it, but I am one of those people following the Scott Peterson case. Unlike the OJ trial, which I avoided as much as I could, this case for some reason intrigues me.

The OJ case didn't interest me since wasn't a huge surprise that a wife beater became unhinged and ended up murdering his wife (along with some poor guy who was at the wrong place at the wrong time). Motive wasn't an issue. And the whole race thing with OJ also just turned me off from the trial - I knew he was going to get off - so I just avoided it.

With Peterson, the whole question of motive is debatable (was it planned, or did he snap during an argument?) and the whole way he has handled himself after the fact - everything from his alibi(s) to his interviews - is like watching a bad soap opera, except this is real life. I also think the verdict isn't a slam dunk, although I am putting odds on a conviction.

I am into this thing enough that I actually watched the USA Network movie on the ordeal, The Perfect Husband (yes, it was trash, but it was good trash).

SoCal Law Blog is following the case if you're interested.

posted by Director_Mitch @ 7:03 PM (Permalink)
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The Power of Capitalism Even Extends to Free Services
You've probably seen this since nearly everyone I know has at least one Yahoo email account:

Dear Yahoo! Mail User,

Thanks for using Yahoo! Mail. It's our goal to offer you an email experience that makes it easy and enjoyable to stay in touch. Periodically, we make service changes to enhance that experience for our users. As of June 15, 2004, you'll enjoy the following benefits:

Increased storage capacity – from your current level to 100MB (still a big difference from the free 1G on Google, but a big improvement)

Increase in total message size to 10MB (I think the old one was 2MB)

A streamlined interface that's even easier to use

As noted before, this is in direct response to Gmail, showing that the power of capitalism extends even to free services (if you call seeing ads while you read your email "free").

Update: I should note again that this is for the free level of service only. As Techdirt points out, there is even more storage - 2 Gigs! - for the paid level.

posted by Director_Mitch @ 7:35 AM (Permalink)
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As If You Needed More Reasons to Hate HR
Guest blogger Dr. Bob wrote here before about HR being the anti-marketing group of a company. Just Procrastinating has more examples of petty, power-tripping morons who populate this profession.

posted by Director_Mitch @ 8:53 AM (Permalink)
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If You Thought People Talking on Cellphones While Driving Was Bad...
...wait until they can watch TV on their cellphone (link requires registration).

Samsung Develops TV-Over-Cellphone Chip - Samsung Electronics Co. Ltd. has developed an integrated circuit that provides terrestrial digital multimedia broadcasting (DMB) services within mobile telephones, according to reports out of South Korea...DMB is a South Korean digital video standard similar to the Digital Video Broadcast (DVB) suite of standards in use in Europe for cable, satellite (DVB-S) and terrestrial broadcast (DVB-T).

Cellphones will soon do everything from taking pictures to transmitting TV. I just hope one of the phones of the future allows me to talk on the road between my home and my office without dropping the signal.

posted by Director_Mitch @ 8:42 AM (Permalink)
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