Things I've Noticed

The Celebrity Who Would Be You

   
 
One of the Top 11 Roundtable Bloggers of the Century, (and much higher in my book), Prego is thinking ahead.  For when he becomes famous, he knows who should play him in a movie.  He's thought about it for a long time.  Have you?   Are you prepared?  I have, but I would be played by a fictitious combination of more than one person that would best portray me in a movie.  (See pictures of John Lovitz, David Duchovney, Bronson Pinchot, and Ray Romano above and compare to the one of me at the top left of your screen and you'll see what I mean.)  I save lots of my things so that they'll be worth a lot of money in case I become famous.  Look how much Beatles paraphenalia sells for.  Anyway, have a visit to Rustbelt Ramblings brought to you by Prego in currently snowy Buffalo.

+ Atul

Quick Quote on Efficiency

"Improved efficiency hurts no one, (except the utility companies)."

+ Atul

Let's Rethink Tipping

As I type, I am sitting in a relatively nice suite type hotel room with fresh linens and towels and even a cleaned up kitchen sink.  It's nice to come "home" to.  I don't ask for room service every day; I mean I don't clean my bedroom and kitchen every day so why should I have a low-paid maid do that for me daily?  I only have it done every other day.  That makes me wonder how much I should tip him/her.  I never used to tip maids, but they do quite a bit of work so I'm going to start.  But that doesn't mean I can tip other workers less to balance it out.

Why is it that a bartender who spends 30 seconds filling a beer or even 10 seconds getting you a bottle and opening it, gets at least 50 cents to a dollar for a drink?  Admittedly, mixed drinks take some skill and effort.  But do they really deserve as much of a tip as my maid?  I would say no.  And it makes me think that we should rethink how we tip.

I know I'll get all kinds of flack from hard working bartenders,and full-serve gas station attendants,  but maids work harder for their tip money.  So do haircutters and baggage handlers and waitresses/waiters at sit down restaurants.  Should we give waiters 5% and maids 5% of room charges.  That almost seems fair, but it would be expensive for guests.  Whatever the case, it's another example of the perpetual battle of hard-working people getting shortchanged.

There are those workers who expect 20% no matter how crappy the service.  But then what's the incentive to do a good job?  Another scenario that should be taken into account, although there's no practical way, is to forgive tipping to customers who make less money than the person to be tipped.  This would be like tipping socialism, but it might help bring more customers to businesses, those who might not otherwise have been able to afford the experience.

I've rethought tipping, but I don't want to be considered cheap and I don't want something unexpected in my food or drink.  I think I''ll just keep following the usual tipping etiquette.  I do wish somebody would tip me for doing well on a presentation though.

+ Atul

"Things I've Noticed" One Year Later

T.I.N. = Things I've Noticed

So it's about a year ago that I began this blog after I began attending a Blogging Boot Camp class in my MBA program.  It's been quite a journey as I've been able to publish many things I've written or thought about before as well as things I've noticed or thought about during the course of the year.  I want to thank you the readers, (especially the regular visitors and subscribers), who make this all worth while.  Note that T.I.N. has gotten nearly 11,900 visitors and 18,750+ page views.  There are a few friends without blogs who know who they are, and I would also like to mention Prego and Chancelucky who help make up for the fact that I don't have a friend-circle who also happen to be bloggers.  It's nice to know that others appreciate my unusual ways of thinking.  Most of the comments I've received have made me think about what I've written and some have been somewhat mean but fun to respond to.

What amazes me is how searchable I've become on Google for topics such as…
    Stand-up comedians
    Deal or No Deal Spreadsheet
    Anti-vegetarianism
    Sociology quotes (or any other types of quotes)
    Vancouver _______  (insert lakes or glaciers)
    Saab 900 _______  (insert car body part)
    George Foremen Grill  (based on a misspelling)
    Vannessa Minnillo (based on a misspelling)

One of the best benefits that came from blogging is that it has led me to read other blogs including the Roundtabler bloggers in the Roundtable I participate in.  It also led to a contact that led to me being quoted in the magazine Top Gear New Zealand.  That's always been a little dream of mine being the car nut that I am. I also was interviewed by Bella Rossa, which made me feel like somewhat of a celebrity.

It's also neat that people from all over the world have stumbled upon T.I.N. which I know is true of most blogs.  What I find interesting though is that there are often people who search on terms that are relevant to my posts that they end up on, but they don't spend more than a second to read it.  On the other hand people who come for unrelated searches by coincidence often spend minutes reading.

On the downside, blogging is somewhat addictive, especially checking stats and stumbling upon other interesting stuff in the blogosphere.  I suppose what's most ironic is that I used to hate to write when I was in grade-school.  Now I love to write, and "Things I've Noticed" has become a creative outlet, one in which I can establish published credit for things I've written to possibly use later if I ever get around to writing a book.  In the meantime, I should finally get around to redesigning my blog and giving it some non-templated personality.

+ Atul

That Special Pop Moment

Joe's hairshirt seems not to be bothering him so much this week as our Roundtabler of the week.  He's focusing on something positive,  not so high class but nevertheless important, at least to you.  Which moments in popular culture meant a lot to you even if the critics would disagree?  Click on over to Joe's blog, Hairshirt and write about the soda (I mean coke, I mean pop) moments that meant a lot to you.  Whether it was a scene from Real Genius or a certain moment in "Chains of Love" by Erasure that just did it for you, share with the blogosphere.

+ Atul

Quick Quote on Technology

"Technology makes the dumb smart and the weak strong."

+ Atul

U.S. and Them, Metric System, Conventions for Dates

We are Americans who are proud to be unique from the rest of the world.  At a relatively young age of 230 years, we have figured out our own way of doing things, (with a little help from the British of course).  We stubbornly hold on to units of measurement the way we want them.  Inches, pounds, miles, feet, ounces, gallons are all things that we love as if they were sentimental heirlooms.  Metric system be damned.  Never mind that the metric system makes more sense since it is based on real things like the size of the earth and the properties of water.  It would be advantageous for us to switch to the units most of the world uses, but we mostly refuse.  We have become big enough to have our system of measurements stand on its own, and it doesn't hurt that  Britain chooses to retain units like gallons and tonnes, although they're slightly different than our gallons and tons.  It's all confusing.  Having worked in the auto industry, I can tell you that in the U.S., they have converted to metric distances for designing parts, and computer chips run at gigahertz which is based on the metric giga prefix, but when it comes to things like fuel economy and power, carmakers here have stuck with miles per gallon and horsepower because those are the units in which consumers like to hear the figures mentioned.  We are out of the loop and I think we should change, especially as other parts of the world like China and India, (purely metric) become stronger economically.  Even Canada is metric.  It is hard to "think metric" though when we have become used to U.S. units of measurement.  I try, but I have to convert in my head mathematically and that's not natural.

There is one way in which the way we do things here makes more sense though.  When we want to talk about decimals or partial units, we use a period to spearate the numbers.  This is logical because it defines the end of whole units and the next 'sentence' is decimal units.  We use commas as pauses between digits on the same side of the decimal point.  It's just like language.  On the other hand, the Europeans use a comma to signify the changeover from whole numbers to partial numbers and they use periods to go from hundreds to thousands for instance.  I do like how they use periods to break up phone numbers.  I think that just looks cleaner and I have adopted that practice myself.  Starting the week with Monday makes more sense since Saturday and Sunday are part of the weekend.

When it comes to dates, putting the date before the month makes more logical sense, but I don't find it natural in the way humans think.  Knowing the date before knowing the month doesn't help much.  Putting the month first gets you in the neighborhood of time you want to be in, then the date pinpoints it a bit more.  And the year should stay last because, in most cases, we talk about the current year.  It's sad that in the year 2007, in a global economy, we don't know if 03/09/07 is March 9th or September 3rd.  But I'm torn on this one as the Euro way does divide the date number from the year number.  I'm not sure which I favor, but following the Euro way allows for more global consistency.  (You'll have to excuse my ignorance of date systems beyond the U.S., Europe and India).  Are we ever going to change and match up with the rest of the world?  I hope it happens in my lifetime.  It will be rough, but I'm willing to sacrifice and make the adjustment.

+ Atul

Time Magazine's Person of The Year Is Made of People

Stephen V. Funk is so cool that he's Time Magazine's Person of The Year as he explains in this week's Roundtable post.  But so are you. It's an amazing first for 99.99999% of us who have never been Person of The Year before.  Relish  it.  Or, have a visit to Stephen's blog and tell the world who you think it should have been for 2006.  After you're done with that, you can visit all the other Roundtabler's blogs, (see list of links at the right),  and comment there as well.  You might as well tell the world before the novelty of the award goes away.

+ Atul

Quick Quote on Excuses

"Excuses are just bad explanations."

+ Atul

Pictures of Cultus Lake near Vancouver, BC Canada

Some of the best photos I've taken in recent memory at a cool area called Cultus Lake in the mountains while the sun was setting.  Certain ones remind me of Lord of The Rings scenery for some reason.

+ Atul