Crosswalks to Nowhere

I got out on the bike this morning for a morning ride around town and wound up at the Jewel for some groceries and yes, flowers for my sweetie.

You'll notice the new look of this blog. I think it's nicer, cleaner, and a bit easier on the eyes overall. This came as a result of upgrading to the latest version of MovableType, which is the software I use to run this site. I won't go into the technical details here, but the stuff from the old blog is all here, so you should be able to find what you're looking for. I expect Google and the other search engines to catch up shortly.

A few updates: (1) got married in March to my soulmate; (2) bought a wonderful house in a great neighborhood (and went through the wringer at the 11th hour doing so); and (3) started another podcast, Discover Woodfield, as a companion to our award-winning Cheap Date Show. The cool thing about Discover Woodfield: it's sponsored.

Okay, that's it for now. The blogging now continues...

"I'm looking at a picture of a market in Marrakesh with plucked chickens hanging
with oregano around their necks. No, really, oregano."

[Spoken in full voice by the guy next to me on the train this evening, as he surfed the internet and talked to his wife on his cellphone. After this, he went into a 10 minute tirade about how their daughter ruined the serpentine belt on the tractor mower.]

Last Friday was one of those perfectly beautiful days in Chicago, and here are some photos that show it.

In order, we have The Sears Tower, the old Post Office, and one of the towers at Two North Riverside Plaza.

That's an awful lot of blue...

The other night, one of my daughter's friends asked me why I have an Apple sticker on my car.

I gave my usual response, which is "because I use Apple computers and they're cool," but for some reason I felt the need to temper that response because of the way Mac people are perceived these days.

I consider myself a "Mac Person," but more important than that, I've always believed in the philosophy of "the right technology for the job." There are things that mainframes can do that UNIX servers don't do very well, there are things that Linux servers do nicely that a Windows 2003 machine can't. For what I do, a Mac fits the bill better than a PC running XP or Vista.

The Mac is not flawless, by any means. I've had my share of problems with Macs-- but for the most part it's a solid platform that works.

And sometimes, the reactions you get from people who hear you're a Mac person are amazing.

Many people I meet are technology-agnostic, which means a computer is a computer and there's usually no compelling reason for them to care what operating system is running under the hood. When I mention to these people that I use a Mac, they're usually genuinely curious, and in some cases (let's take my real estate agent as an example) ask if the Mac would solve some of the problems they have on their PCs, or at least, how different the computing environments are from each other. It's my hope that most computer users will eventually fall into this camp.

Until then, we'll continue to have the factions of Windows-hating Mac Users and Apple-hating Windows Users.

Not too long ago, I was on a local discussion forum and someone made a comment about the expense and incompatibility of Vista on his computer. When I raised a concern about Windows Vista's new licensing structure, he immediately said "Well, that's what you'd expect to hear from a Mac User."

Unfortunately, this is typical in some corners of the computing world, and it seems no matter how even-handed you are about computer platforms, someone will label you. And it's not limited to that side of the argument (if we must pick sides).

There's also a segment of Mac users who view other Mac users as part of a huge brotherhood who must do everything they can to convert the masses to using the Mac. Often, these people are even worse than the combative PC users because they approach their world as evangelists, oblivious to other opinions or viewpoints. For these souls, Apple can do no wrong. This is the main reason I stopped visiting certain Mac forums on the internet-- reading most of those postings made me woozy. (Posted next to a Hello Kitty avatar: "Omigod, I just looooooove my little Macky the MacBook! It's so cuuuuuuuuute!" Gack.)

What I like about the Mac is the fact that, most of the time, if I want to do something it will simply work. By controlling most aspects of hardware and software, Apple has created a near-seamless model. Plug in your iPod, it works. Plug in a gigabit Ethernet connection, you're live. Viruses? None to speak of, really. These are the parts of the "Get a Mac" TV ads that speak the truth.

What I don't like is the fact that when something goes wrong with a Mac, it's usually something really stupid. For example, I am about to have the keyboard on my MacBook replaced for the fourth time-- not because of abuse, but because of Apple's self-admitted problems with the manufacture of the part. Apple is cheerfully replacing the keyboard free of charge, but what if I didn't live no more than 10 minutes from an Apple Store?

Another example: last week, Apple released an update to their iTunes software that I dutifully loaded on my Mac. The result: about 40 songs that I purchased from the iTunes Music Store wouldn't copy to my iPod any more. (Not all the songs I purchased from iTunes, just these 40 completely random tracks.) The solution? I had to rebuild my entire iTunes library, a 20-minute process.

So I'm faced with a choice-- have a computing environment that works with the occasional stupid glitch, or run what 90% of the computing world uses (Windows) and deal with drivers, antivirus software, and a little more tweaking than I'd like.

I'll choose the former, but I won't be evangelical about it. And the truth is that PCs will be with us forever, and even though I use a Mac, I still run Windows XP (under Parallels) on my MacBook because there's no software for the Mac that's as good as Adobe Audition for mixing our podcasts.

The proper tool for the proper job: that's what it's about. And that sticker on my car? It's not so much a badge as it's a cool-looking sticker.

I mentioned in an earlier posting that I was at an event in Tokyo. The invitation I received from the sponsor said it was a "Business Casual Event." I asked one of my traveling companions (who works for the company sponsoring the event) to verify this for me. "Business casual, for certain," is what he was told.

I decided to follow the advice a clothing salesman gave me years ago: "You could dress business casual-- but why?" I packed two suits, a sport jacket with a couple turtleneck sweaters and coordinated pants, and-- just in case-- a pair of tan Dockers and a blue button-up shirt.

The first day of the meetings, held at the Park Hyatt Tokyo (where Lost in Translation was filmed, by the way) nearly every single one of the over 300 attendees was wearing a suit.

So much for "business casual, for certain." At least I bet right.

The truth is that "business casual" is a meaningless term that thousands of fashion writers and HR departments have tried to define but have had little success. At best, I can come up with the common threads of "collared shirts, clothing with finished seams, no logo wear, and no Spandex." (I remember seeing an Arthur Andersen memo in the mid-1980s which specified that female employees "must wear appropriate undergarments" but that's another topic.)

For several years in the late 1980s and early 1990s I worked for an investment firm known for its casual approach to the employee environment: free breakfast and lunch, free ice cream in the afternoon, free soda, water, and beer in all the refrigerators-- and a nonexistent dress code. The idea was that you were supposed to do your job and do it extremely well, and in return the company didn't bother you with checking your death-metal-band T-shirt underneath your flannel. I'd call the environment "proto-dot-com." (The funny part is that by the time the dot-com boom was in full force, the company had been swallowed up by a gigantic Swiss bank and the beer and nonexistent dress code were gone.)

While working at the firm, I rode the train regularly with one of its partners. Both of us were usually in jeans, and we'd get disdainful looks from everyone else on the train, each one spiffed up in suits and ties. I used to laugh, thinking that this guy could have bought and sold most of the people in the car, and they looked at him like he was a low-life.

I would never call that company's environment "business casual"-- it was clearly all the way on the other side of it-- but I believe that firms like mine had a huge influence on more traditional companies and encouraged the casual-dress policies of the 90s.

By the time "jeans Friday" started to take hold in the business world in the 1990s, I was already tired of it. Yes, it's zero-brain-power easy to put on jeans in the morning and match them up with a polo shirt and sneakers, but at some point-- say, after doing this for 10 years-- you don't feel like you're really going to work. And while that's not necessarily a bad thing, there is something to be said for more clearly defining the line between life at home and life at the office.

That's when I began my transformation into a beDockered middle manager, for better or worse.

So, while everyone else was getting ready to go ahead and uh, wear a Hawaiian shirt and jeans on Friday, I was already on the way back. And that was around the time I met the salesman mentioned at the top of this piece.

The dress code at most of the places I've worked has been some sort of business casual. This included everything from khakis to polo shirts, down to jeans and even shorts in the summer (at one particular company). The common stipulation among all of them, though, was that when you met with the company's clients, you should dress in formal business attire.

Over the years, I defined "business casual" to mean "no jacket, no tie." There's room to move in that definition, but I usually try to err on the side of overdressing. I remember getting off a plane in Amsterdam and heading straight to a meeting in my company's offices, figuring my travel attire (khaki pants and a polo shirt) would be fine, as it was acceptable in most of the company's offices worldwide. When I entered the conference room, I felt like the guy who cleans the conference rooms after everyone leaves-- wait, even he was dressed better than I was.

Never again.

My current employer just opened up the dress code on summer Fridays to allow jeans. Many of my coworkers are excited about this.

As for me, it will be business as usual.

The Silent Film Society of Chicago just announced their Silent Summer 2007 Film Festival.

This is one of my favorite things to do on Friday nights in July and August. This year's schedule looks like this:

July 20 - Seven Chances (Buster Keaton)
July 27 - Wings (Clara Bow and Buddy Rogers, Jr. in the very first film to win an Academy Award for Best Picture)
Aug. 3 - Battleship Potemkin (with orchestra and organ)
Aug. 10 - Welcome Danger (Harold Lloyd)
Aug. 17 - Beggars of Life (Wallace Beery and Louise Brooks)

Details at the Society's web site.

We'll be there!

I recently discovered Wonderfalls, an intelligent, irreverent, and highly original TV show.

It's the story of Jaye Tyler (Caroline Dhavernas), a twentysomething with a Philosophy degree from Brown who works at a Niagara Falls gift shop. (Her adolescent and adenoidal boss is not-so-affectionately referred to as "Mouth-Breather.") The hook: the animal-shaped toys and tchochkes she encounters in her life speak to her. As in, they literally speak to her and tell her what to do. Jaye just wants to be left alone, interacting with the world begrudgingly and indifferently only when she has to, but the critters in the show get her involved in other peoples' lives and ultimately-- and in a very convoluted manner-- make them better off than they were.

Oh, and Wonderfalls is also a canceled TV show: dumped by Fox after only four episodes in early 2004.

The critics raved about this show when it was first aired. More than one referred to it as "the best thing on television." Not being one to fall for superlatives, I didn't bother with it until the complete 13-episode series was released on DVD and I read even more glowing reviews. Finally, I rented Disc One from Netflix and stuck it in my bag for my trip to Japan. I cursed my laptop battery when it died in the middle of an episode called "Karma Chameleon." It was that good. Within the next couple weeks, I'd finished watching the entire series, and felt better for the experience.

Okay, maybe that's exaggerating, but there's something to be said for watching a TV show or movie or whatever and having it wind up a satisfying experience.

I also came to the realization that Wonderfalls' cancellation was ultimately a good thing.

I remember when I was heavily into another, more successful TV comedy-drama, Northern Exposure: the first episode I ever saw (where Shelly gets addicted to satellite TV) blew me away and I was hooked for the next few seasons.

Then the show got really, REALLY stupid. Dr Fleishman became a mountain man. Lovable, simple-yet-wise Ed became an idiot. Ruth-Ann got really mean. And most egregious was the sudden center-staging of Chris the DJ as a pontificating, overblown, wordy dime-store-philosopher-wannabe who made me want to pull an Elvis and shoot out the TV screen.

There, I feel better.

My point is that the 13 episodes of Wonderfalls complete a very nice story arc, and by virtue of the show's not living past its first season it never got the chance to get stupid. And thanks to the hard work of the show's fans to get the show released on DVD, the show lives on in its absolute brilliance, never to be described as "the formerly-great Wonderfalls."

It's heartening to see something so wonderful live on in one medium despite its failure in another. It's very much in line with the overarching theme of Wonderfalls, that everything happens for a reason.