Last night I went out with a couple of friends who I hadn't seen in 4 years. One of them brought 'an old friend from Thailand' - who turned out to be the woman who would have been my new client had a stayed in my last job. She had flown to NYC to see me and then been told that I 'wasn't available' - weird huh.
Seeing Lisa again though just served as a reminder that my 'out of sight out of mind' policy on friendships is fundamentally flawed. It was an absolute joy to catch up with her and I'll never let as much time slip by again without getting in touch.
The fact that she's wearing so diaphanous a garment on a December 1st evening is testament to the fact that we've buggered up the globe. It was 21C here last night - about 20C above the average for this time of year and whilst at the beginning of what was supposed to be winter we got lots of weak 'if this is global warming I'm buying a Hummer' gags now there seems to be a genuine air of concern about the city.
Saturday, December 02, 2006
Friday, December 01, 2006
Long day today
The jetlag is still washing over me at irregular intervals - which means that I was up early this morning. Just as well as the call that I was expecting from my ex-president at 7pm tonight came at 7am this morning.
I do feel as though I have let her down personally and of course this is exactly what I'm supposed to feel. 'Disappointment' is a management tool that's very effective though the words today 'I am disappointed on so many levels' still stung a little.
Still I know that I'm doing the right thing - I need a little less stress, a little more certainty and the opportunity to do some really good work and I think that a move will achieve that, so I'll head in today, hand over my blackberry, send out an emotional farewell and slip quietly into the dark busom of ex-corporate employees.
Got around the problem of patchy baldness by shaving my head yesterday. A practical solution to be sure but one that has me looking in the mirror and remembering being the 'ill' guy. Am told that post illness trauma and stress is common in the 4-12 month period and that all manner of things often happen hair loss, shingles, ME... so it seems that I've drawn the longest of the straws in that my condition is both typical and none debilitating. Hurts to be SO typical yet again.
Today's pic was one that I took whilst walking around Antwerp and it's one that I really like, despite all of the technical imperfections it displays. I do like Tin Tin and he did give us The Thompson Twins... not to mention remarkably accurate imaginings of future spacecraft.
Anyway the gym beckons
I do feel as though I have let her down personally and of course this is exactly what I'm supposed to feel. 'Disappointment' is a management tool that's very effective though the words today 'I am disappointed on so many levels' still stung a little.
Still I know that I'm doing the right thing - I need a little less stress, a little more certainty and the opportunity to do some really good work and I think that a move will achieve that, so I'll head in today, hand over my blackberry, send out an emotional farewell and slip quietly into the dark busom of ex-corporate employees.
Got around the problem of patchy baldness by shaving my head yesterday. A practical solution to be sure but one that has me looking in the mirror and remembering being the 'ill' guy. Am told that post illness trauma and stress is common in the 4-12 month period and that all manner of things often happen hair loss, shingles, ME... so it seems that I've drawn the longest of the straws in that my condition is both typical and none debilitating. Hurts to be SO typical yet again.
Today's pic was one that I took whilst walking around Antwerp and it's one that I really like, despite all of the technical imperfections it displays. I do like Tin Tin and he did give us The Thompson Twins... not to mention remarkably accurate imaginings of future spacecraft.
Anyway the gym beckons
Thursday, November 30, 2006
I'm spending today on the telephone...
... explaining my reasons for leaving my current job to the various big wigs who need to know. To date the conversations have been very adult.
The reasons for my going are actually quite simple - MOMEMTUM (I need to feel as though I'm moving toward being in charge of something), MONEY (a salary that keeps pace with the rent / mortgages) and MISSION (a place that knows why it exists, what it's trying to do and how I can help)
I'm in the lucky position of being able to do what I love and to demand decent reward for doing it and I'm finally flexing some of that power.
It doesn't help of course that I'm having these calls whilst suffering the jet lag to end all jet lags - having spent the last 10 days getting to various places in the world whilst planning how to get back. We lost a day heading to London. a day at the embassy, a day heading north to my parents' house, a day getting to Antwerp, a day getting to and from Amsterdam and a day getting home yesterday.
Mind I'd rather be at home on the telephone than running the maurading pre-Xmas shopping hoards of Brits who have descended upon New York on the back of a dollar to pound exchange rate of 1.95 - if I hear another Essex voiced cry of 'I'll need an extra suitcase to get all of this stuff home' then I shall scream. If there's one thing that NYC can do without it's fat, 'blonde', tasteless gangs of clueless British housewives clucking 'cheap, cheap, cheap' as they elbow their way around Macy's (which isn't the American Harrod's ladies - it's the American Debenhams)
Perhaps Bloomberg could pass a decibel law and turn back screeching harridans at customs...
The reasons for my going are actually quite simple - MOMEMTUM (I need to feel as though I'm moving toward being in charge of something), MONEY (a salary that keeps pace with the rent / mortgages) and MISSION (a place that knows why it exists, what it's trying to do and how I can help)
I'm in the lucky position of being able to do what I love and to demand decent reward for doing it and I'm finally flexing some of that power.
It doesn't help of course that I'm having these calls whilst suffering the jet lag to end all jet lags - having spent the last 10 days getting to various places in the world whilst planning how to get back. We lost a day heading to London. a day at the embassy, a day heading north to my parents' house, a day getting to Antwerp, a day getting to and from Amsterdam and a day getting home yesterday.
Mind I'd rather be at home on the telephone than running the maurading pre-Xmas shopping hoards of Brits who have descended upon New York on the back of a dollar to pound exchange rate of 1.95 - if I hear another Essex voiced cry of 'I'll need an extra suitcase to get all of this stuff home' then I shall scream. If there's one thing that NYC can do without it's fat, 'blonde', tasteless gangs of clueless British housewives clucking 'cheap, cheap, cheap' as they elbow their way around Macy's (which isn't the American Harrod's ladies - it's the American Debenhams)
Perhaps Bloomberg could pass a decibel law and turn back screeching harridans at customs...
Tuesday, November 28, 2006
Not my life yet...
It will disappoint many of you almost as much as it disappoints me to hear that I'm not, yet, a man of infinite leisure and flexible gym appointments. Jude is still beavering away at the PhD and won't graduate until May after which there's at least a few months before she starts a job - and still no firm indication of what and where that job may be.
So no Colorado or Canada for me just yet - instead I'm moving all the way to Tribeca where I'll be doing any number of projects for What If? - an innovation company that has a really interesting social strategy side and offers the chance to work with big brands on short projects again.
Why innovation? Well I'm good at it, I liked the people that I met at the company, I like that it's growing and the direction in which it's growing, I like that it will keep me in lofts and age inappropriate clothing in a way that the last lot couldn't and I like the degree of flexibilty that it will give me.... right now I'm working out of New York but snow capped mountains and gainful employment need not be mutually exclusive anymore. But what I liked most is that they wanted me there, really wanted me there and that's something I crave (sad but true)
So it's goodbye cruising, goodbye sofa, goodbye self-pity and hello to a new challenge, a new cast of characters and a fresh start.
So no Colorado or Canada for me just yet - instead I'm moving all the way to Tribeca where I'll be doing any number of projects for What If? - an innovation company that has a really interesting social strategy side and offers the chance to work with big brands on short projects again.
Why innovation? Well I'm good at it, I liked the people that I met at the company, I like that it's growing and the direction in which it's growing, I like that it will keep me in lofts and age inappropriate clothing in a way that the last lot couldn't and I like the degree of flexibilty that it will give me.... right now I'm working out of New York but snow capped mountains and gainful employment need not be mutually exclusive anymore. But what I liked most is that they wanted me there, really wanted me there and that's something I crave (sad but true)
So it's goodbye cruising, goodbye sofa, goodbye self-pity and hello to a new challenge, a new cast of characters and a fresh start.
Monday, November 27, 2006
Succinct
Well I finally got to hand in my resignation today. Or rather to e-mail it in as I'm still in Belgium - I'll do the official handing of paper and clearing of desks on Thursday when I'm physicakky able to pick up my shit and go.
The temptation of course was to wait another 4 days and claim the pay for those days before telling anyone but that would have been both greedy and just a little below me (I like to think)... besides I've been having the most extraordinary dreams about my ex-president in which she was setting Spy vs. Spy like traps and used all kinds of Monkey magic on both Judith and me in revenge for my leaving and I'm hoping that doing the decent thing will stop the nighttime horrors.
Leaving was harder than I thought but a glance in the mirror (the hair is falling out, I haven't had to shave in 10 days and the hands shake) showed that it was time. Too much travel, too little reward and too great a distance from the decision making process was what killed the bizarre Bobby and Whitney affair that I had with company of old. So it's done. Done, done, done - despite the fact that the corporate e-mail was down this morning.
Spent yesterday in Amsterdam - Jude's mom was with family at a very Grand hotel in a very ungrand area of the red light district, Jude was in Edam visiting granny and I got to wander the Brit filled streets and photograph them propositioning Eastern European women who see their grubby hands as a step closer to a better life - if not for them then for future generations. Pics will be posted on Flickr just as soon as I get home to upload them.
I'm hoping that the sudden hair loss is a stress related thing - it's quite common 3-6 months after major disease; the body suddenly says 'well that was nasty" and starts to play up a bit. Of course I have managed to find 18 cases of cancer of the scalp and thus have that sitting somewhere in my primative lizard brain. Hey - rare versions of common cancers are my thing.
But anyway - here's to the next year. A new job at last, a PhD'd wife and a fresh cast of characters...
The temptation of course was to wait another 4 days and claim the pay for those days before telling anyone but that would have been both greedy and just a little below me (I like to think)... besides I've been having the most extraordinary dreams about my ex-president in which she was setting Spy vs. Spy like traps and used all kinds of Monkey magic on both Judith and me in revenge for my leaving and I'm hoping that doing the decent thing will stop the nighttime horrors.
Leaving was harder than I thought but a glance in the mirror (the hair is falling out, I haven't had to shave in 10 days and the hands shake) showed that it was time. Too much travel, too little reward and too great a distance from the decision making process was what killed the bizarre Bobby and Whitney affair that I had with company of old. So it's done. Done, done, done - despite the fact that the corporate e-mail was down this morning.
Spent yesterday in Amsterdam - Jude's mom was with family at a very Grand hotel in a very ungrand area of the red light district, Jude was in Edam visiting granny and I got to wander the Brit filled streets and photograph them propositioning Eastern European women who see their grubby hands as a step closer to a better life - if not for them then for future generations. Pics will be posted on Flickr just as soon as I get home to upload them.
I'm hoping that the sudden hair loss is a stress related thing - it's quite common 3-6 months after major disease; the body suddenly says 'well that was nasty" and starts to play up a bit. Of course I have managed to find 18 cases of cancer of the scalp and thus have that sitting somewhere in my primative lizard brain. Hey - rare versions of common cancers are my thing.
But anyway - here's to the next year. A new job at last, a PhD'd wife and a fresh cast of characters...
Sunday, November 26, 2006
My brother has a baby
you can see her here - 9 months old and raring to go at life - everything still an adventure to be tasted (literally).
It's an attitude I try to share - and with my hair suddenly and rapidly falling out it might be a look that I soon share too - thank God Matt Lucas made 'baby faced baldness' something other than social death huh?
Driving from Antwerp to Amsterdam today - Jude's mom at a party, Jude visiting granny, me taking as many pictures as I can in the couple of hours I have before meeting an old friend and her new family on a houseboat.
I need to write a piece on American Value brands too - so I'll take pen and pad with me and get that done. It's actually a piece on value brands in the US so am thinking Wal-Mart, Target, Kia, Suave and some other cheap yet cheerful offer (Kraft? / South west airlines?)
Breakfast though calls and so I'll retreat to the kitchen in the hope that Jude's muffin has thawed sufficiently to be edible....
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