Tori Amos Gets Him Really Pumped

Because of his appearances on The Daily Show, general sense of humor about himself, and seemingly genuine intelligence, Mick Foley has always been my favorite professional wrestler; better even than The Rock and Hulk Hogan.  Now, my days of watching the WWF are long behind me, but I can still remember the childhood excitement.  I am not ashamed to admit that I used to watch professional wrestling.

Frankly, I don't understand the people who look down on its viewers.  They complain that it is fake and not a real sport; so what, so are horror movies.  Everyone knows that wrestling is fake, that doesn't stop people from enjoying it.  Everyone know that in wrestling, the performers aren't really competing, just like everyone knows that in horror movies, no one really gets killed.  The bottom line is that it is just entertainment.

Anyway, today I read an article written by Mick Foley himself about the impact that Tori Amos's song "Winter" had on him.  The article is well written, emotional, and impactful and I would encourage everyone to read it.

Schadenfruede

I am really into the show Pawn Stars on the History Channel.  For those of you who haven't seen it, it is basically   The Antiques Roadshow with more shaved heads, tattoos, morbid obesity.  People bring in their stuff, it is appraised and sometimes a deal is reached.  Maybe it is the German in me, but my favorite part of both shows is when someone brings in something that he thinks is incredibly valuable and then an expert tells the owner that because of something that he did, it is completely worthless.  The look on their faces is more valuable than anything anyone has ever brought into the shop.

My job would be great if it weren't for the clients

Does anyone out there know a way to keep my clients from lying to me?  I want to know how to get the truth out of these people because it will make my job and their bill much better.  When I ask you questions, I need the whole answer, not what you want me to believe.  As long as you are paying, I am not going to try any harder if I like you than if I don't. The less time I have to spend sorting out what is true from what you are telling me, the smaller your bill will be.  Also, If I am aware of some unfavorable evidence I can prepare for it and think of contradictory facts.  If the first time I see the evidence is at a hearing when it is offered as an exhibit by opposing counsel, then there is almost nothing I can do.

When I ask questions, I am asking what the facts are, not what you think the other side knows.  Similarly, when I ask questions I want to know all the facts, not just the facts you think are important.  I am the attorney; let me decide what is important.

Clients, for the sake of your wallet, do not ask me to do things that you can do yourself.  For example, if we will need bank records for your case, go to the bank and ask for them yourself instead of having me subpoena them. Similarly, do not ask me to speak with people who have confidentiality requirements (Doctors, social workers, etc) without first giving those people information releases.

The best show ... in the world

For several years my favorite show on television has been Top Gear.  Although you wouldn't know it from the show's level of awareness in the US, the self described "poky motoring show" on BBC2 is the most watched show in the world.  Each episode is seen by approximately 350 million people around the world.  It has spawned versions in Germany, Russia, Australia, and soon America.  I download every episode and can watch them over and over.  

But, despite all the happiness and joy the show has given me, despite all the people who have I shown it too, and  despite all the time I have spent watching it, I cannot, for the life of me, remember where I first saw it.  I have thought about this for a while and I have ruled-out a few places.  I know that no person showed it to me and I know that I did not see it on TV.  I am pretty sure that I found it linked to a different random video on youtube.  Random chance can bring great rewards and great misery; I can't believe how many hours of entertainment I may have missed out on if not for luck.

Career Questions

I have never been able to get enthusiastic about almost any topic for long periods of time.  This has always been a part of my personality, but I didn't really notice it until college.  When I started at Hopkins, I was a biology major.  But, by the end of my freshman year, I wanted to take too many different courses to stay on the biology track.  Lots of people change majors in college, sure.  But, I didn't switch because I liked something more.  I switched because I liked everything more.  I couldn't make a choice, so I picked a major that allowed me to take the widest variety of classes.  

This pattern continued after college when I went to law school.  Like college, I studied intensely the first year, but then lost focus and enthusiasm on the subject matter.  I added a dual MBA degree to my law program and greatly enjoyed marketing.  

Now, I don't know what to do with my life.  I am not that happy in my work as an attorney and I am thinking about looking for a job in market research.  If I get one, will it really make me happy or will I just end up looking for something else in a few more years?  Working as an attorney, I would likely make much more money in the long-run than working in market research. But, I can't keep changing jobs the rest of my life and expect to get anywhere. And, if I am never going to enjoy what I do for a long period of time, then why not just stay in a job that pays better?  I want to establish a career for myself, but I also want to enjoy what I do.  I have always loved cars and I don't think I will ever get tired of driving.  Maybe I should just become a trucker.

Why isn't CSPAN always this good?

I am really hoping that Stephen Colbert isn't the last comic that Congress will call to testify.  

World's Worst Phone

There are several companies that I don't like for various reasons: bad customer service, unreasonably high prices, defective products.  But, in my mind, worse than all others is LG.  I have to preface this story by stating that everything in it is true; if I were making this up, I would be much less frustrated with where I work now.  

My old phone, the world's worst phone, was an LG.  At first I really liked the phone; it had a qwerty keyboard - this was a couple years ago - and was much easier to type on than my phone before it.  What I later found out was that while the phone may have done many things well, it completely failed to display any symbol when I had a voice-mail.  Most of the time this wasn't a big deal.  Because of caller ID, I could see who had called and guess whether he or she had left a message.  Of course, there were some calls where the caller ID said "unknown," but these were invariably telemarketers who I simply ignored.  

In the spring of 2009, my last year of law school and business school, I was excited for the future.  I had received multiple job offers and was feeling lucky to have employment in such an uncertain economy.  Despite my success in my job search, I was still applying for careers that I thought would be more exciting or highly paid.  One of the places I applied to was the National Clandestine Service division of the CIA.  

At that time, the CIA was undergoing a large recruitment drive at business schools and the University of Iowa was one place they held an event.    At the presentation two people with fake names gave the highlights of what potential new employees would be doing: after training, new agents would do at least a year long tour in a hostile environment before being reassigned to a safer place.  I should explain.  The vast majority of what the CIA does is fairly boring; most of their workers are economists and engineers who rarely leave metropolitan Washington DC.  National Clandestine Service operatives are the actual spies; they are stationed overseas and given a cover job at an embassy or a front-business.  Clandestine Services agents do not have diplomatic cover.  One such agent was Valerie Plame, the CIA agent outed by the Bush Administration, another is Robert Baer, who was the basis for George Clooney's character in Syriana.  This is real James Bond type stuff.  What little boy's dream wasn't to be a secret agent?  Even though my future career as an attorney had a much smaller risk of death or torture, I logged on to the CIA's website and applied without hesitation.  

A couple weeks later my phone rang.  The caller ID said "unknown" so I ignored the called having been conditioned to believe that I was avoiding a telemarketer.  Over the next two weeks this happened three more times.  Over the following two weeks I had not missed any calls from anyone who would have left a voice-mail and as a result had not checked my voices messages for over a month.  Finally, I missed a call from my parents and checked my voice mail.  I had five new messages.  One was from my dad. 

The other four all had the exact same message.  A female voice said, "Mr. Slavik, I am calling about the application that you filled out online.  We would like to speak with you.  Please call 202 -***-**** and ask for Karen."  The message did not say who it was from and did not give "Karen's" last name. 

After hearing the messages I was thrilled and furious.  I was thrilled because I knew 202 was a Washington DC area code and the CIA was the only job that I applied to in that area.  I was angry because it was now several weeks after the messages were left and my damn phone never told me I had a message.  I quickly called the number the message gave.  

I woman picked up the phone and said, "recruiting."  I explained how I had received a message asking me to call the number and ask for Karen.  I was then transfered to a answering machine with a message that did not identify who the machine belonged to.  I gave my name, phone number, and explained why it took me so long to call.

I am not a religious person, but I prayed that "Karen" would call back.  She never did.  Now I can only curse LG and wonder at what might have been.