Jim Goings

For some reason my car wouldn’t start after work today. The battery was good and the car would turn “on”, but the engine wouldn’t even try to turn over. I suppose a bad starter could be the culprit, but wouldn’t it at least make a noise or something? I suspect that there is an electrical problem. Luckily Beck and I have AAA and they came out in about 20 minutes and towed me all the way back home from downtown P-town. Pretty sweet deal!

My good mood will surely be fouled by the mechanics fee tomorrow.

Girl’s Room

We finally got around to remodeling the girls room. Steve, Kelly, and Dad came up to help out too! We decided on the Disney Cinderella theme. We put down a new 12′ x 9′ rug, painted the walls with four colors (pink. 2 shades of blue, and white trim), installed new sliding closet doors, painted the dresser, and put up some Disney princess wall border on two walls. It came out awesome. Rebecca even made the curtains from fabric we picked up at Joanne’s. We also moved Monie into this room so all the girls are now sharing the princess room. Needless to say the girls love it.

I’m working on a major project for work that is suitably named “Project Jaywalk”. I don’t like discussing details about work on my blog, but let’s just say that if I didn’t shave my head, I’d be bald anyway. This project affects a lot of people and you learn a lot about how the most trivial things become mountains to move. It’s frustrating, but nonetheless good experience. I’ve learned enough so far to handle things way, way differently the next time I’m doing something similar.

Lesson Learned #1 - Involved *less* people. Inaction by committee is a regular occurance and in the end, it just costs money to do nothing. I understand the general desire to solicit input and be communicative, but when everyone wants their own way and decisions don’t get made it leads to a whole lot of nothing.

Lesson Learned #2 - Discover your decision makers and stake holders clearly up front. *Demand* their input and don’t accept “I’m busy with other things” as an excuse for them to not pay attention. Otherwise, you’re setup to fail.

Lesson Learned #3 - Understand and document deliverables clearly up front. Make sure that your stakeholders and business owners sign off on a written list of deliverables. If you don’t have time to develop a complete list of deliverables, delay the project. Don’t start on the wrong path from day one.

Lesson Learned #4 - Don’t forget that keeping the lights on is critical too. Never underestimate the amount of resources you have and make sure your butt isn’t hanging out in the wind. It’s an age old saying, but it can’t be said enough: C.Y.A.

I recently watched a video of a army basic training graduation speech by LTC Randolph C. White, Jr. The speech was impressive and very inspiring. He said many things that I agree with, but this takes the cake:

For my money there are two kinds of men that walk the earth… men of action and all others.

You can see the most excellent speech here.

Dork night turned out to be very interesting. Chibbs “The Killer DM” struck again; this time with force majeure. In a long battle with some evil cultists, our party was completely wiped out, one by one. Kyle’s character lasted the longest, amazingly surviving for over 12 rounds after the rest of the party was eliminated. What is particularly sad is that Megan arrived at about 11pm after she got off work just in time to sit down and watch her character bite the dust. Our laments fell on deaf ears and the Killer DM continued his onslaught of doom.

We’re all rolling up new characters and plan to thwart Chibby’s next attempt and wiping us out.