The Ideas, Opinions and Musings of Steven T Will.
My most frequent topics are movies, games and learning. Oh, and I like to share photos. But since I try to post most weekdays when I'm not on vacation, I delve into other things too: religion, words, news items, quotes.
And then, on occasion, I post snippets and wisps.
Welcome, and enjoy!
OK, so I have been listening to Christmas music, off and on, since September. ANYWAY!
Even though I hear Christmas music more often than the average person, I had not heard any playing in public before I left for Asia on October 31. So I wondered when I would. After all, it looked like I would not be home until just a couple days before Thanksgiving.
So imagine my surprise when I heard Christmas music in public for the first time on November 9. Where? On an airplane from Hefei, China to Beijing, China!
Yep, I got on the plane deep in Eastern China, in a town which had almost no English anywhere. (Seriously. It's disconcerting.) Yet the entire time the plane was being boarded, the music being piped in was a series of Christmas carols.
Here's a map to help you get your bearings. The big A is Hefei (pronounced something like "HUH fay.") It is south of Beijing, which has served as my home base on this trip. Oh, and you can see Nanjing just to the east of Hefei, which is where I will be when this blog entry gets posted. I cannot get to facebook, twitter or blogger while in China, so I am having to write this in Japan and get it ready for later publishing.
For the record, the first song was an instrumental version of "Jingle Bells." It was pretty trite, so I was not going to search hard for a version of it to include here. Instead, I will embed a pretty good version from the Royal Navy of England.
Two photos today, of the impressive Tokyo Tower. Sure, a clear blue sky would have afforded us the chance to see the top of it, but honestly, the flog/low clouds made for a very interesting view, too.
That's right, I am writing this 15 hours in your future.
And tomorrow -- oh it's just so cool -- my plane will take off from Tokyo at 3:00 PM on Friday, November 9, and I will land in Minneapolis/St. Paul at 11:00 AM Friday November 9, a full four hours before I took off.
Yes, that's right. You got it. Tomorrow, I will travel back in time!
But don't ask me who won the World Series. It wouldn't be ethical for me to tell you.
.
.
.
Oh, what the heck -- it was the Giants. The Giants won the Series.
And President Obama won the election.
Nope. No spoiler warnings. That's what being in the future does to you, folks. Makes you an unrepentant spoiler.
So, I am in Tokyo. My colleague and friend, Alison, is here as well. We went out to dinner tonight, and ended up at a restaurant in which the staff seemed to speak very, very little English.
Never fear! Technology to the rescue. The tables had touchscreen menus. Once we figured out we were actually supposed to order using the screens, we were on our way. Dinner would certainly be easy! Look through the items, and select what you want. Here's the front screen. As you can see, many options exist, and there are English words in addition to Japanese descriptions. We placed our order.
Well, you'd think that would make the experience go smoothly. Not quite. At first, we apparently ordered "very small" versions of what we wanted. The waitress was pretty sure we did something wrong, so she came over and told us "very small." We told her we wanted "larger" -- she pointed at the menu and said "medium" near a bowl of what looked to be the same thing we had ordered.
She assured us she would cancel our first order (and she did.) OK, so now, we go to the menu, to re-order. We clearly found a larger (medium?) size of one of the items we had ordered. And we think we found the larger size of the other. The dishes were each a type of rice bowl with pork.
When our first bowl arrived, all was good. It was pork, on rice. But it was only one bowl, so we shared it. After quite some time, another bowl was delivered. With raw fish on top of rice. Definitely NOT pork.
We began to understand what had happened. When the waitress showed us the "medium" bowls, she was showing us a special they had for three different rice bowls - pork, raw fish, and more raw fish and fish eggs. So, we had been served the pork first, and now we were going to get served the other two. But we didn't want the second dish. So we just sat there talking, and they never came by with the third bowl.
Eventually, we just asked for the check, and we paid and left.
What we had eaten was very, very good. Sadly, we wasted a nice bowl of rice with raw fish on it. But hey, at least they hadn't brought us that third bowl, too.
Already this year, I have traveled to Chicago and Wisconsin for work. Next week, I travel to Prague (I hear good things -- I hope I get to see some of it) and shortly after that, I travel to Orlando, then Minneapolis (I know, not much of a trip, but I don't even get to go home between the two), then a couple weeks and I'm off to Milan. And just a couple of weeks after I return from that, we head to California.
Something about traveling causes stress long before I actually hit the road. And when the number of planned trips increases, the preparatory stress increases exponentially. I think it's because each trip generates a long mental list in my head (things to do before I go, reservations which must be made, things to take, etc.) and having multiple lists generates a meta-list -- check the "Prague list," then check the "Orlando list," then ... oh wait, the "Orlando list" needs to have some of the "Minneapolis list" on it!
I am sorely tempted to try my new "vacation blog" plan. What's that, you ask?
The charter for Snippets & Wisps contains the phrase "I post every weekday when I'm not on vacation" but I have noticed that readership drops when I go on vacation (makes sense) but doesn't pick up again for a while after (also makes sense, but it wasn't obvious to me when I made the charter. Live and learn.)
Some of my favorite blogs (or "columns" to use the old print term, for those blogs which really started out as on-line versions of print media) don't go silent when the authors are on vacation. Instead, they "re-print" entries from the past.
"Hey," I thought recently, "I could do the same thing. After all, I have several years worth of blog material, but many people have only been reading me since I started publishing to Facebook. Maybe some old posts would be worth re-printing ... errrr ... re-posting."
So, I had begun poking around my old stuff to see what I might re-run. On vacation. And now....
Instead of vacation, I am thinking about using it to fill in when I will be traveling. Why? Traveling takes so much time! Connection to the internet can be so unpredictable while on the road. And, very importantly, I sometimes have absolutely nothing in my travel days except work, and since I don't blog about work (here) there is often nothing to say.
This is all a preface to this final warning, dear readers. You might feel a bit of deja vu soon. If you visit Snippets & Wisps and you think you've read something before, you just might be right.
When you travel very rarely, a trip on an airplane can be fun. I remember some of my first flights. I was excited. I wanted to sit near the window, and I spent much of the flight looking out the window at the sights. Back then, it was cool. [And shouldn't it still be? A blogger can't let this topic go without linking to Louis CK's "Everything's Amazing and Nobody's Happy" can he?]
Well, I don't want to be part of the trend Louis CK spoke about. I merely want to comment on the situation some semi-frequent travelers find ourselves in.
If you travel for business, you know that after flying enough miles [one might even say too many miles] you reach a special level in a frequent flier program where you become eligible for special treatment by the airlines. I've never been at one of these levels, but I've traveled with a few colleagues who are, and the perks are very nice. Not only are there quiet, comfortable lounges to spend time [with little snacks and coffee and nice restrooms] but these privileged fliers also can be upgraded, or even change flights, without extra fees.
I have absolutely no problem with this. Frequent business travelers put up with frequent inconvenience. Even with this special treatment, airports are like cattle yards, airplane seats are designed for people the size of a typical 10 year old, and only the ultra-privileged who travel first/business class have seats that don't cause appendages to fall asleep. [Oops. I'm complaining. It's Amazing. Really. {Sorry, Louis.}] They deserve their perks.
My situation, though, is that I have been flying pretty frequently this year; far more than I ever have before. But I am not at one of these special levels yet. I am caught in the middle. It's a strange situation. Part of me wants to fly a bit more, so I can finally get some of the sweet treats I've seen. But the more rational side of me realizes that, on the whole, that would still put me in airports and airplanes far more than it would put me in nice lounges. It's like I have these two little spirits, one on each shoulder, arguing about what I should want, and I'm stuck in the middle.
That's why, when I flew home last week from Vegas, it did not surprise me when I had to pay an extra $50 to change flights. Oh, it might seem illogical. You see, I had been asked to move off of my scheduled flight (1:30), to a later one, because my scheduled flight was overbooked. For this trouble, the airline would pay for my ticket and give me a voucher for future travel. Apparently it was worth it for the airline to give me hundreds of dollars of value to inconvenience me. But when I discovered I could get on an earlier flight (10:30), increasing my convenience while also freeing up space on their overbooked flight, not only did I not get compensation for helping them, I paid for the courtesy. Had I been at one of those special frequent flier levels, it would have cost me nothing. Had I been a less experienced traveler, of course, I would not have known to ask. I was stuck in the middle.
And so, when I got on that earlier flight, giving myself a chance to spend 3 fewer hours in the Las Vegas airport, you can imagine where my seat was on the plane.
Yep.
Stuck in the middle.
But am I complaining? No, of course not. It was Amazing! Really. [Really?] {Sorry, Louis.}
We get to have Thanksgiving this year with all of our kids, except one. Sarah & Troy will be at our house for Thanksgiving break. Lucas & Lee will be in town. And Adam & Marisa will join us and also see Marisa's family, so that's great.
But Leah will be in New York.
I will absolutely enjoy the kids I have around.
But it won't stop me from missing the one who is absent.
I checked Expedia.com early last week, and it would cost $700 to get her a ticket to Minneapolis and back, and even then, she'd have to leave Minnesota early Saturday morning, because all the flights east on Sunday are full. And the flight would have two connections (Cleveland and Chicago). And of course, she'd still have to pay for the taxi or shuttle to-and-from JFK. So, that's not going to happen.
Though we've been on our way to being empty-nesters for a while, this is the first time we've not had Leah for a holiday. It was hard to miss Sarah for Thanksgiving last year, and it will be just as hard to miss Leah this year.
But once Thanksgiving is past, Christmas is right around the corner. Then we get to have her around for almost a month!
So, Steve, just hang on. You can make it!
.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.
P.S. When I talked to her last, Leah knew exactly how many weeks, days and hours it would be until she arrives home for Christmas break. It made me smile [from the toes up.] And I do believe her anticipation is not solely because she'll be in the same state as her boyfriend. I think we parents & siblings have something to do with it.
So the trip to Japan and China reaffirmed my love for our new camera. I bought it in preparation for Sarah & Troy’s wedding, since our previous camera was having major trouble focusing when shooting indoors. If all goes well, when I post this to my blog, I will have some good examples of how well the photos turn out with this Sony DSC-H20. 10X optical zoom. A flash that reaches a long way.
And you know one other thing that is a real improvement? No matter how many photos I have stored on the memory card, the camera is ready to shoot as soon as it’s on. Our older camera had a silly implementation that seemed to have to read through each file on the card before it could find a spot to put the next image. So, when we were in Hawaii and I took over 1000 shots [OK, laugh, but first of all, you should see the best ones we got from that trip – I can’t get the best ones without having some chaff to throw away. And second of all, do you know how beautiful Hawaii is? I defy anyone with a camera in his hands to refrain from capturing some of that beauty.] I’d have to suffer through almost a minute each time I turned on the camera, near the end of the trip, because the camera had to find the end of the existing images. Not this Sony! It’s smart.
So, enjoy a photo or two (or however many I put here – it’s so easy for the first photo from Flickr to be added to a blog entry, and so hard for every one after that) from our nice camera.
The Great Wall of China - Uploaded by me to Flickr
Hong Kong Skyline - Uploaded by me to Flickr
Sun near setting, in the Forbidden City in Beijing - Uploaded by me to Flickr
.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.
This blog entry was supposed to be posted on November 3. An early version got out because I'm just not sure how to use Flickr's blogging ability to schedule a post, rather than just immediately posting it. Maybe it can't handle that, or maybe I'm not techie enough to know how. Anyway, if it feels like you already saw this in my blog, you're probably right!
I want to ride Japanese airlines all the time. I mean it. They load a plane faster, with more courtesy, than I have ever experienced from an American airline. And when you reach the baggage claim area, the luggage is already being circulated on the belt, and there are actually airline staff there to help.
Then, in my dealings with the business people at the conference I attended, they were unfailingly polite, and they had smiles on their faces 99% of the time. Honestly! And the bowing? Oh, my! You’ve never felt so respected in your life until you’ve been bowed to five times when you’re being thanked at the end of your presentation, with two sets of applause. [Sure it was courteous applause, but it was applause.]
And then. And then.
And then these same reserved, polite, efficient people go out to a large restaurant, take over a dining hall, and go crazy! Did you know they play “Rock, Paper, Scissors” as a party game? They do! Did you know it can also be a drinking game? It can! Did you know that 40-somethings and 50-somethings can cheer on other 30-40-50-somethings as they engage in beer-chugging contests? They can, and they do!
If you ask me what the best part of the trip to Japan was, I won’t talk about that party. But if you ask me what the most surprising thing was? Well, that’s pretty much it.
Some of you may know, I’ve been away. Now, normally, I try to blog every work day, but you’ll have to excuse me for missing a few. I was on a trip to Japan and China. The first couple of days, I missed blogging because of jet lag. Then I was in China, and as it turns out, China doesn’t allow Blogger these days(or Twitter, not that I would have tweeted much, but some.)
If you follow the links above, you’ll see why there’s no blogger in China. It’s kind of strange – I completely recognize the lack of freedom that implies, yet while in China, I didn’t feel any different vibe – freedom-wise – that I felt in Japan. You drive, you shop, you hope not to get hit by the cars, you eat good food, you decide against McDonald’s and KFC, because, hey, you’re in a different country, but, hey again, you could have that American fare if you wanted.
So, before I go again, I should probably figure out how to blog by sending e-mail to blogger or something and see if that would work.
As long as I don’t set off some Chinese Internet Alarms when I try it. Because, as much as I liked it, I don’t want to stay there forever. Y’know, like in a cell or something.
(I know, I don’t blog about work. And this comes dangerously close to crossing the line, [OK, so maybe, technically, it crosses the line.] but bear with me – it won’t sound like it’s work related.)
I spoke at a conference in Japan while I was there, and it was the first time I had ever experienced simultaneous translation [Or is it interpretation? I think it is. Marisa has explained it before.] There was a team of three interpreters sitting in a closed room at the back of the auditorium, trying very hard to keep up with me as I spoke on technical topics. Now, realize first that I got the opportunity to give the same presentation twice, and even the first time, I knew I was supposed to talk slowly. I tried. And I tried positioning myself quite a ways away from my laptop so when I moved from one chart to the next, I had to take a short break to walk back and advance the slide – this was to give the interpreters a chance to catch up.
Well, after the first session, two of my interpreters told me I should slowdown. I didn’t see the third – and I’m glad. I don’t know how I could have handled 3 for 3. Anyway, for the second session, I … slowed … down.
And when I finished, one of my Japanese hosts (not an interpreter) said to me “You seemed tired up there.”
Well, thanks a bunch!
It turns out, if you’ve ever heard me speak, that I talk pretty fast. And, in particular, when I’m excited, or trying to express passion, I talk fast. It’s sort of a Harold Hill thing. I can bring you along with me, following my lure as I draw you closer, if you understand what I am saying!
So, before I do this again, I have to work on a slower, intense, energetic delivery.
Isn’t it nice to know there’s always something you can improve?
[Nah. I’d rather be perfect. At everything. Can we arrange that?]
I've been off in what we used to call The Orient (and don't you think we still should? Far East just doesn't sound as flavorful.) In fact, I am sitting in a hotel in Hong Kong as I write this, so my orient-ing is not quite done.
Anyway (This blogger I read named Tia would say anyhoodle but that is way too young and feminine for me. [Not that there's anything wrong with that. It's just not me.])
I've written some blog entries while I've been away, and so I'm about to schedule them to appear over the next several days. Most of them have to do with observations from my travels. I don't think there is a single snippet, wisp, or movie review among them.
Enjoy. (Or skip this blog for a few days, if this sort of thing does not trip your proverbial trigger. [Honestly, where is the proverb that has a trigger in it?])
I had to fly in one plane, for twelve or thirteen hours to get here. I'm not quite sure how many because time just doesn't make sense. When I arrived, it was 5:30 AM according to my PC, but the local time in Tokyo was 7:30 PM. What time did my body think it was?
Who knows!
I was tired, but not quite as tired as I'd normally be after staying up until 5:30 AM (which I don't think I've done since, what, I was 19? Unless I did it once for a kid being born. [Adam? Don't think so. Lucas, absolutely not. Sarah - again, not possible. Leah - no.] Or for some other health-related family thing. [Lucas's surgery - possibly. Flying back from CA when Adam had his - possibly. The girls never had surgery like that, thank goodness.]
Anyway, the point is, I had gotten some fitful sleep sitting up in a crowded coach seat, so I wasn't quite as tired as I might have been. But then I went to bed at 10:30 PM local time, which would have been 8:30 AM in my normal time zone, and wonder of wonders, I actually fell asleep.
But I awoke at 3:00 AM.
And I've been up since then. Almost 15 hours now. And I need to make it another 3 or so.
And then tomorrow I have to be on a train at 7:00 AM, and then coherent enough to speak, and listen, to people a few hours later.
Time is weird enough. Add jet lag, and the weirdness multiplies.
