Opening A Set

One thing that I've seen recently is this series called the "Pick Up Artist". Now, some people, when they first saw this series and told me about it, said that they automatically thought of me. Why?? :) Perhaps when I was a young turk I had many theories on relationships. Having watched the series, perhaps I should have taken some of those notes instead of making my own! Ah, water under the bridge.

What I did find interesting was the transformation of the guys themselves. To see them from when they first started to where they ended up at the end of the series was quite remarkable. True, the lines are hammed up, and sound a bit strange, but it all boils down to the confidence and belief of the guy in himself. I did like some of the moves, one where the guy spins the girl around, and in the process takes the seat she was sitting in. Gold!

So single guys, if you want some quality education in approaching girls, check it out. The series itself doesn't give that much material, but it's fun to watch.

Girls, if you ever hear the line, "so did you see the fight outside with two girls?", tell them "you mean the one where on of the girl's breast popped out?", that will stop their opening :)

Photo Update

Washington photos are up on Flickr. Enjoy!

Week(s) in Review

Ah, missed a week. Things in review:

1. Washington DC with Bec, Des and Jen was fantastic. I loved the spaciousness of the city, and the fact that all the museums were free! We had one seafood dinner (at Oceanarium) which was pretty good. Getting out of Manhattan added another 1.5hr to our trip, but for $40 for a 4-hour trip to a new city, it can't be beat. Oh, yes, I bought myself one of those space pens, the ones used by the astronauts. Now I can write upside down!
2. Poker night at a friends place, first time playing with them. Tournament style, came third out of 7. Annoying thing was second place got their money back, so I got nothing! Got beaten by a pair of 7's, when I had the flush draw and two overcard pair draws...not impressed. Will be going again, that was fun.
3. Some perfect storm of visitors to NY. We had Tax, Bei, Dex, Alan, Dave, Jo, Andrea, Gordon all coming to visit at once! Lots of drinking at our fave establishments, with a steakhouse and Korean fried chicken wings to supplement the alcohol. Good visitors are the ones who have done the touristy stuff already, are willing to go to new places and provide some service to us (thanks Dex for the BitTorrent setup :))

To top it all off, summer is definitely here. I'm walking around in my flip flops!

Good Friends

*I'm getting later and later on my Sunday post!*

We've had the privilege of having Jen and Des over for a few days before they embark on their "Across the USA" tour. It's been great to catch up with them, and once again reminds me how hard it is to establish good friendships in a foreign city.

I was comparing with Des what it would have been like to move to UK instead of US, and the amount of events that I would get to go to with friends would have been quite high from the start. Whereas here in NY, there are times where we wouldn't have that much to do on the weekend. We would sometimes have to think hard about things to do. Whilst that gives us a great level of freedom, there are time when it's just the two of us.

From that perspective, Bec and I have come to rely on each other a lot more. It has been said that NY can be a lonely place if you're here by yourself, so I'm very happy that our relationship has gotten stronger with this increased "togetherness", for want of a better term.

Slowly, we're making better friends, and I'm glad to say that I actually have one or two decent American friends. It really is about effort and time to establish that bond with people. Perhaps that is why it takes a year to really settle down into a place.

Playing volleyball definitely helps with the socialising, and now that Bec is "in" with these funky bars we go to, perhaps we might finally get some free drinks!

Truly Settled

I was asked by a colleague the other day about what I had done on the weekend, and I believe we have truly hit the settled phase of our New York stay by saying to her "oh, nothing much".

No trips to Miami, no big shows. But doing a regular weekend things, things that I could very much see myself doing in Sydney. I did some volunteer work delivering meals to elderly, dinner with friends, karaoke, lazy brunch, playing touch football, afternoon drinks with friends and late ramen Sunday dinner.

It's relaxing and enjoyable to walk around in the spring weather, and when I feel tired to go for an afternoon snooze at home.

New York, with all the glitz and glamour, still has a time and place to be worry-free.

For your enjoyment, some more flower photos.

Changes

My company went through some major management changes this week. People who were replaced had been with the company for over 25 years. Whilst the announcements were sugar coated with "mutual agreement to leave" and "he's done a fine job" etc, the fact of the matter is that the main US guy for our company was removed.

As an outsider who had been here in NY for only 7 months, the employee meeting to discuss the departures was one of the most interesting things I have been to from a work/career perspective.
I have no affinity with the guy, but there are people who have been working with him for the last 20 odd years. I couldn't imagine the shock of it to those other senior managers.

There was a lot of "the board members are only concerned with the stock price, but we're concerned with a place for people to have a job and support their families" seems very us vs the big bad corporation. In the end, I believe we're all here so that we can make money, and if the guy is not performing or he's not the right guy to implement some improvements, then it's time for some new blood.

The strangest thing was the message the other senior guys were saying, that "things around here won't change much", and "NY is what we want the company to be". Given that the main guy was removed, you would think that change is in the air, and that if you don't toe the corporate line (as a regional business) you'd better watch out. The message from corporate was none too subtle.

As the financial controller said to me (again, he's a new guy to the company), this is just the beginning. Who knows what other changes are coming through.

I heard that when he was leaving, the main guy said that "I'll be back in a year to take this company". It's definitely an interesting time to be in the US!

Consistency Is Key

I've come to the realisation that in relationships, consistent behaviour helps stablise a couple.

Think of it like a stockmarket. I would argue that consistent quirks (sometimes a bad behaviour, maybe something that annoys one partner) would not break a couple down. Perhaps consistently bad behaviour will break up a couple, like some death by a thousand cuts. Everyone has their own quirks, and each couple will have their own rules and behaviours. However when one person strays from that expected response, it casts doubt on their other areas.

It is the "inconsistent quirk" that has the potential to threaten an otherwise stable relationship. The inconsistent quirk could be not standing up for your partner, or attempting to split a bill when usually we don't. That's the volatility that puts the relationship outside the normal bounds and makes people think more about whether this person is "really right".

Of course, all this does not change the fact that a bad behaviour is something that needs to be addressed, for a relationship to become better, not just stable. On that point, a unexpected surprise in good behaviour takes the relationship to the next level. And we all love surprises :) 

Court Sense

We recently had a friend try out for our volleyball team, and we decided that one of the issues he had was a lack of playing time and "court sense". I didn't know if that was being too harsh and whether people can pick that up quickly.

I'm now in the process of trying to answer my own question. I'm now playing some touch American football, and it's so hard. Skills-wise, I can catch ok, run ok etc. But positioning and anticipation are just terrible.

We play one-on-one marking, so I'm usually up against a guy. I'm constantly being outrun or outdodged (and the no-stud sneakers with are definitely not helping with gripping the ground) when I'm defending. When we're attacking, I'm not getting many passes, most likely because I'm not "in motion", and passing to a stationary target makes it a lot easier for the other team to intercept.

Will I learn in the next 4 games before the season finishes? Probably not. So was I too harsh in the "court sense" judgment for volleyball? Probably not, it does take a while to pick up.

Will I keep playing touch football? I'm a maybe on that one, dodgeball seems a lot more interesting!

Book Review: Speed Reading

I just read a good book about how to read faster and the key point is to realise that most things you don't have to read every word. A quick skim of the contents, then the first paragraph, the first sentence of each paragraph and conclusion will garner about 70% knowledge of what the article is trying to say, especially if it is well written.

The other point is that your mind subconsciously understands and recalls more than what you think it does, and that you can read faster than you can hear. Hence if you are talking to yourself when you read, usually it means that you're reading too slowly.

They have some smart suggestions of how to read faster, with grouping of words together (so you don't read every word), stopping your eyes a few cm before the end of the line (to maximise what your eyes are seeing), and doing the white card thing (but pushing down the pages so that you eyes are forced to move on).

There are exercises to do, but I have to admit I skipped most of them :)

Career Opportunities

Argh, so much for a Sunday post, been in a conference the whole week.

A work friend told me a story that in his first year out into the corporate world, the tech bubble busted and he got laid off. Ever since, he's been a big believer that no one looks after your career except yourself.

This conference last week has made me feel a little bit different to that. As per my post a few weeks back about my project getting canned, I've been operating at a fairly low capacity, and doing mostly support work. I was starting to consider "what next?" and thinking of other possibilities (even outside of the company).

I came down to Charlotte for some other work, and ended up being invited to this global ICT conference. Within this week, I have been promoted to a Project Manager again, and gotten some global work. It was good to get nominated (without any suggestion from me) in front of the bigwigs as the person to do the job.

Perhaps managers do look after their staff, at least in this company.
Perhaps this comes from being able to deliver in previous instances, and past history in the corporate world counts as something.
Perhaps no one else wanted the role!

In any case, it's project time again. 6 weeks to go-live :)