Tuesday, March 14, 2006
The French Are Revolting!
At least 17 of France's 84 universities are on strike to protest a new work contract designed to encourage employers to hire the young, but allowing the new hires to be fired at any moment in the first two years. The situation has become ugly in Paris where police have used tear gas to disperse students in the Latin Quarter. Nine police have been injured. One was hit in the face with a paving stone.
This is serious business, but it reminds me of one of the idiosyncracies I observed when I lived in Paris. When you think of the French, what characteristics or stereotypes come to mind? Well, one of them should be "love to go on strike." Forget soccer, cooking, cheating on your wife - going on strike is the French national pastime.
There was a lot of labor action in Paris when I lived there. In fact, I kept a list. From March 8 until May 27 (less than three months), the following strikes occurred in and around Paris:
This is serious business, but it reminds me of one of the idiosyncracies I observed when I lived in Paris. When you think of the French, what characteristics or stereotypes come to mind? Well, one of them should be "love to go on strike." Forget soccer, cooking, cheating on your wife - going on strike is the French national pastime.
There was a lot of labor action in Paris when I lived there. In fact, I kept a list. From March 8 until May 27 (less than three months), the following strikes occurred in and around Paris:
- Guards at the Louvre (closed it for four days)
- Right after the guards returned, the cashiers went on strike. While they were out, the Louvre was open for free.
- Truckers (blocked major roadways)
- Bank tellers (on strike over plans to open banks on Saturdays - sacre bleu!)
- Air traffic controllers at Orly (on strike because ATCs at CDG were paid more)
- Air France pilots
- Ground and operations crews at Air France Europe, TAT and Air Liberte
- Workers who send coded messages to French embassies and consulates (on strike over plans to computerize some of their work)
- Hospital interns (on strike over government plans to cut their reimbursements)
One week at lunch the Metallurgists Union (who represent the French IBM workers) were passing out leaflets urging workers to rebel against a management that regularly breaks the law by demanding excessive overtime. By law, management could not ask for more than 9 1/2 hours per week of overtime (on a 38 1/2 hour work week). Mon dieu, what monstrous task masters those IBM managers must have been! The union also advocated a 32 hour work week including commute time.
How does anyone ever get anything done in France?
Sunday, March 12, 2006
Rave - Nike's Latest MJ Commercial
I never owned a pair of Air Jordans. After my experience with PF Flyers as a kid taught me not to believe the marketing hype ("run faster and jump higher!"), I did not see the need to invest a day's pay in a pair of shoes, especially when my competitive hoops career ended when I was cut from the 9th grade team. That led to me becoming the manager and managers don't need fancy, slick looking basketball shoes to keep stats, film games or sweep the floors.
However, I always loved Nike's Air Jordan ads. My favorites had Spike Lee as Mars Blackmon ("gotta be the shoes"). It was always a pleasure to see how much fun both Michael and Nike could have with his image as it developed.
The new ad from Nike only shows Michael for about two seconds but it still is a terrific spot. It builds like a little drama over 60 seconds as young basketball players from around the world mimic Michael's most famous idiosyncracies and moves. Michael shows up at the end watching a street game and nodding as if he is an elder stateman who is approving the performance of the next generation. I understand that it was made with almost no enhanced effects. The players actually executed the moves you see. I expect that we'll see a lot of this spot on ESPN and CBS as March Madness heats up. Check it out yourself at
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-7356763155472762246
Make sure you have the sound on so that you can listen to the music as well. It is an important part of the dramatic arc of the ad.
However, I always loved Nike's Air Jordan ads. My favorites had Spike Lee as Mars Blackmon ("gotta be the shoes"). It was always a pleasure to see how much fun both Michael and Nike could have with his image as it developed.
The new ad from Nike only shows Michael for about two seconds but it still is a terrific spot. It builds like a little drama over 60 seconds as young basketball players from around the world mimic Michael's most famous idiosyncracies and moves. Michael shows up at the end watching a street game and nodding as if he is an elder stateman who is approving the performance of the next generation. I understand that it was made with almost no enhanced effects. The players actually executed the moves you see. I expect that we'll see a lot of this spot on ESPN and CBS as March Madness heats up. Check it out yourself at
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-7356763155472762246
Make sure you have the sound on so that you can listen to the music as well. It is an important part of the dramatic arc of the ad.
Attack of the Killer Rabbits
Among my many addresses over the years, I have lived on Flea Street (Avenida de las Pulgas) and on a street that used to be a rabbit field (Rue de Grenelle). I now live near Pico which leads me to think of pico de gallo which translates to "tip of the rooster" or rooster's beak. I occasionally imagine what life on each street would be like if the name was literal. Given my love for Monty Python (see the name of this blog, for example), I pictured killer rabbits along the streets of Paris in the 7th arrondissement attacking fashionable shoppers ("he's got a mean streak a mile wide!"). Flea Street actually was not that inaccurate a description for my place there given the hairy rodent that roommate Jeff once killed with my nine iron.
However, I never took this line of thought to a logical conclusion - all-out war between Animals and Humans. Nor was I as clever as Jeff Lewis who recently mused on just that. Some of his piece is strikingly logical while other parts are laugh-out-loud funny. I hope that the Wallace and Gromit/Chicken Run guys are paying attention because they could really do justice to Jeff's story idea. Either them or the tongue-in-cheek humor of the guys who made Shaun of the Dead.
http://www.babblog.com/Feb_06/021906_JL_Babble.htm
http://www.babblog.com/Mar_06/031806_JL_Babble.htm
However, I never took this line of thought to a logical conclusion - all-out war between Animals and Humans. Nor was I as clever as Jeff Lewis who recently mused on just that. Some of his piece is strikingly logical while other parts are laugh-out-loud funny. I hope that the Wallace and Gromit/Chicken Run guys are paying attention because they could really do justice to Jeff's story idea. Either them or the tongue-in-cheek humor of the guys who made Shaun of the Dead.
http://www.babblog.com/Feb_06/021906_JL_Babble.htm
http://www.babblog.com/Mar_06/031806_JL_Babble.htm
Humorous Church Signs
Do you read the inspirational words on church signs? Ever want to change them around to make something funnier, more irreverent? This site is the creative outlet you have been seeking:
http://www.churchsigngenerator.com/
Just click on a design, enter up to four lines of text then click on the button to generate the sign. You can have the church offering congratulations in Yiddish to new parents as I did above. Or you can be more sacriligious, like having the church advertise a weekly study group and lap dancing . . .
How To Be A Mensch
Guy Kawasaki is a serial entrepreneur and venture capitalist in the Bay Area with a Stanford undergrad degree and an MBA from UCLA (that is not the sole reason I am citing him today). He is an articulate spokesperson about business matters who usually can break down ideas to easy-to-grasp concepts. On his blog he takes the time to apply the same principle to matters that may be only peripherally related to business.
In this entry he describes how to be a mensch - http://blog.guykawasaki.com/2006/02/how_to_be_a_men.html
It led me to think about the people I know who fit the criteria. My mom, dad and brothers. Cousins, aunts and uncles. R2K people. Trivia people. My internet pen pals. In fact, I realized that a lot of the people I choose to hang out with are just good folk, i.e., mensches. That means that you, dear reader, probably are one yourself.
However, you should also be aware of Kawasaki's definition of a blogger and his audience, " Someone with nothing to say writing for someone with nothing to do."
In this entry he describes how to be a mensch - http://blog.guykawasaki.com/2006/02/how_to_be_a_men.html
It led me to think about the people I know who fit the criteria. My mom, dad and brothers. Cousins, aunts and uncles. R2K people. Trivia people. My internet pen pals. In fact, I realized that a lot of the people I choose to hang out with are just good folk, i.e., mensches. That means that you, dear reader, probably are one yourself.
However, you should also be aware of Kawasaki's definition of a blogger and his audience, " Someone with nothing to say writing for someone with nothing to do."
Bad Business Judgement
The advertisement here is from Boeing/Bell Helicopters for its Osprey helicopter. The tag line appears beside a picture of soldiers storming a mosque - "It descends from the heavens. Ironically it unleashes hell ... Consider it a gift from above." The ad was placed in the National Journal and the Armed Forces Review before it was identified as incredibly offensive and pulled.
The question I have yet to see answered is why an attack helicopter needs to be marketed like laundry detergent in the first place. Maybe the ad creator should have tried a cents off coupon instead.
My favorite Dilbert moment at work
I once received an email at work from the owners of some commonly-accessed databases. The email was announcing that the databases would be unavailable over the weekend while the servers on which they resided were moved to a new facility. The note concluded, "We apologize for any incontinence that this causes you."
I was so upset that I peed in my pants.
Getty Villa Report
On February 20th, I visited the new, improved Getty Villa. It is a re-creation of a Roman villa that is now home solely to the Getty Trust's antiquities collection - Roman, Etruscan, Greek, etc. The setting is spectacular - in Pacific Palisades between Santa Monica and Malibu, wedged into a canyon overlooking the Pacific. Surrounded by native foliage, you feel as though you really are on the Mediterranean. The villa used to be one of my favorite places to visit and take out of town guests. I have really missed it over the last eight years since it closed for renovation shortly before the Getty Center in Brentwood opened. When the Getty Trust announced that the Villa would be re-opening on January 28th, I quickly made a reservation for the first date that fit my work schedule - President's Day, February 20th.
I could not have chosen a more beautiful day to visit. The winter rains from this weekend cleaned out the air. The weather was cloudless and vivid blue - I whispered a small "wow" to myself when I passed through the McClure Tunnel and began the drive up PCH from Santa Monica. That is always a wow moment, one of those vistas that makes LA special. But today was even more so as the azure sky, the deep blue ocean, the tan-white sand and the green of the palisades and the coastal hills beyond mixed perfectly. Looking over my shoulder, I could see the PV Peninsula and even Catalina clearly.
I am not going to write a tour guide travelogue of the Getty Villa. Many others have already done so. The LA Times write up was my guide (http://www.calendarlive.com/galleriesandmuseums/cl-wk-cover26jan26,0,6102019.story). So I am just going to document a few impressions.
As usual, the Getty has done a fabulous job. Yes, it is true that the Getty Trust has billions to spend, but when it comes to facilities, they spend it on quality. (Side note: May family lore tells us that J Paul Getty and his dad rented a room from my family in Bartlesville when Getty was a young boy. His father had invested $500 in Bartlesville for a 1,100-acre lease. He drilled 43 wells and all but one were producers. Young Getty made money around town selling the Saturday Evening Post before he became an oil man too. You can see that history in person today because the building and the May Brothers store are still there in Bartlesville at the corner of Frank Phillips Blvd and Johnstone. Now back to our regularly scheduled program.)
Anyway, it is not quite accurate to call the eight years of work a restoration. The villa was re-imagined to be a more complete and accurate representation of the ancient villa at Herculaneum on which it was based. Because of the narrow canyon, the villa is aligned perpendicular to the coastline. But this was not true of villas in ancient Rome - they were parallel to the coast. So before the renovation when visitors entered along the reflecting pool, they were really coming in the side of the house. The renovation has corrected this by bringing visitors from the new parking area to the proper front of the villa which is how guests at the real villa in Herculaneum would have experienced it. Why is this important? It demonstrates the renovators' scrupulous attention to detail. They don't want you to have a replica experience. They want it to feel like the real thing.
That was the key impression from my visit - the architecture and grounds are more interesting than the collection itself. It was a pleasure to marvel at the exquisite marble in one room, the intricate mosaic in the floor of another. See the lizard on the tromp l 'oleil fresco? Looks real doesn't it? See the perpindicular tiles along the edge of the roof? They were there in ancient times to keep birds from nesting under the tiles. Reportedly, all the main building materials used in the structure are those that would have been available in the first century AD. When Getty first built the villa, he paid to open up long-closed marble quarries to ensure that he was using authentic materials. As I said, the Getty Trust spent its money on quality.
Because I was looking at the detail of the building, I tended to especially notice the fine work on the art pieces. The gold jewelry for example was incredible. How did the artisans create such small ornamentations and tiny, intricate gold chains? Very clever, imaginative and impressive. On the other hand, you really can only see so many water jugs and drinking cups before they become boring.
Three final notes. The open air theater was supposed to be located on the hillside so that the attendees could look down the canyon to the sea behind the performance area. This plan was nixed by the local residents. Too bad. Second, why were there so many employees walking around? It seemed at times like they outnumbered the vistors. Finally, the only negative. The limited space in the canyon means that the new parking structure is located below the villa and mars the view of the sea from the patio at the end of the reflecting pool. It is one of the few reminders that you are in the land of the car culture and not somewhere on the Mediterranean.
I could not have chosen a more beautiful day to visit. The winter rains from this weekend cleaned out the air. The weather was cloudless and vivid blue - I whispered a small "wow" to myself when I passed through the McClure Tunnel and began the drive up PCH from Santa Monica. That is always a wow moment, one of those vistas that makes LA special. But today was even more so as the azure sky, the deep blue ocean, the tan-white sand and the green of the palisades and the coastal hills beyond mixed perfectly. Looking over my shoulder, I could see the PV Peninsula and even Catalina clearly.
I am not going to write a tour guide travelogue of the Getty Villa. Many others have already done so. The LA Times write up was my guide (http://www.calendarlive.com/galleriesandmuseums/cl-wk-cover26jan26,0,6102019.story). So I am just going to document a few impressions.
As usual, the Getty has done a fabulous job. Yes, it is true that the Getty Trust has billions to spend, but when it comes to facilities, they spend it on quality. (Side note: May family lore tells us that J Paul Getty and his dad rented a room from my family in Bartlesville when Getty was a young boy. His father had invested $500 in Bartlesville for a 1,100-acre lease. He drilled 43 wells and all but one were producers. Young Getty made money around town selling the Saturday Evening Post before he became an oil man too. You can see that history in person today because the building and the May Brothers store are still there in Bartlesville at the corner of Frank Phillips Blvd and Johnstone. Now back to our regularly scheduled program.)
Anyway, it is not quite accurate to call the eight years of work a restoration. The villa was re-imagined to be a more complete and accurate representation of the ancient villa at Herculaneum on which it was based. Because of the narrow canyon, the villa is aligned perpendicular to the coastline. But this was not true of villas in ancient Rome - they were parallel to the coast. So before the renovation when visitors entered along the reflecting pool, they were really coming in the side of the house. The renovation has corrected this by bringing visitors from the new parking area to the proper front of the villa which is how guests at the real villa in Herculaneum would have experienced it. Why is this important? It demonstrates the renovators' scrupulous attention to detail. They don't want you to have a replica experience. They want it to feel like the real thing.
That was the key impression from my visit - the architecture and grounds are more interesting than the collection itself. It was a pleasure to marvel at the exquisite marble in one room, the intricate mosaic in the floor of another. See the lizard on the tromp l 'oleil fresco? Looks real doesn't it? See the perpindicular tiles along the edge of the roof? They were there in ancient times to keep birds from nesting under the tiles. Reportedly, all the main building materials used in the structure are those that would have been available in the first century AD. When Getty first built the villa, he paid to open up long-closed marble quarries to ensure that he was using authentic materials. As I said, the Getty Trust spent its money on quality.
Because I was looking at the detail of the building, I tended to especially notice the fine work on the art pieces. The gold jewelry for example was incredible. How did the artisans create such small ornamentations and tiny, intricate gold chains? Very clever, imaginative and impressive. On the other hand, you really can only see so many water jugs and drinking cups before they become boring.
Three final notes. The open air theater was supposed to be located on the hillside so that the attendees could look down the canyon to the sea behind the performance area. This plan was nixed by the local residents. Too bad. Second, why were there so many employees walking around? It seemed at times like they outnumbered the vistors. Finally, the only negative. The limited space in the canyon means that the new parking structure is located below the villa and mars the view of the sea from the patio at the end of the reflecting pool. It is one of the few reminders that you are in the land of the car culture and not somewhere on the Mediterranean.
Thoughts for the Day
I think I will make my first blog entry a list of thoughts for the day (of course I did not write these but I don't think they are copywritten so I don't think I have to offer attribution). Next time I will post something more original.
- Do not walk behind me, for I may not lead. Do not walk ahead of me, for I may not follow. Do not walk beside me either. Just leave me the hell alone.
- The journey of a thousand miles begins with a broken fan belt and a leaky tire.
- It's always darkest before dawn. So if you're going to steal your neighbor's newspaper, that's the time to do it.
- No one is listening until you fart.
- Always remember you're unique. Just like everyone else.
- Never test the depth of the water with both feet.
- Before you criticize someone, you should walk a mile in their shoes. That way, when you criticize them, you're a mile away and you have their shoes.
- If at first you don't succeed, skydiving is not for you.
- Give a man a fish and he will eat for a day. Teach him how to fish, and he will sit in a boat and drink beer all day.
- If you lend someone $20 and never see that person again, it was probably worth it.
- Some days you are the bug; some days you are the windshield.
- Good judgment comes from bad experience, and a lot of that comes from bad judgment.
- The quickest way to double your money is to fold it in half and put it back in your pocket.
- Duct tape is like the Force. It has a light side and a dark side, and it holds the universe together.
- There are two theories to arguing with women. Neither one works.
- Never miss a good chance to shut up.
- We are born naked, wet, and hungry, and get slapped on our butts. ... then things get worse.
- The most wasted day of all is one in which we have not laughed.
