Attention

I’m beginning to wonder if each of us has just so many f’s to give. (As in “who gives an “f”.)

Caitlin says that she rations them carefully. She reckons she’s like Goldilocks and doesn’t too few or too many - always just right.

The amount is different for each of us and it no doubt grows and shrinks over time but lately I’ve noticed I’ve hit my limit and think that I should be more purposeful in acquiring these f’s.

I’m also looking to clean out my locker full of f’s. It’s time to jettison things I care about mainly out of habit.

My local (american) football team has been awful for so long that last year I just couldn’t manage to watch them. Watching a lot less football meant that I ended up with a lot of time and energy to care about other things.

I’ll continue that and add to it.

The college football playoffs expanded to include so many teams that I’ve decided that this year I’m done with college football too. The regular season used to mean something. Even in years that my interest waned, I still paid attention to the Big 10. But the Big 10 grew to eleven then Maryland and Rutgers and USC and UCLA - it’s not that scrappy group of midwest public schools that it once was. Done.

I like baseball but not enough to figure out where the games are broadcast and who I’d have to pay to watch the games.

Basketball - done.

Whew. I cleared out a lot and that was just the sports section.

I’ve already eliminated local news and network news.

I’ll clear out more - but maybe, like Caitlin’s Goldilocks, I now have too few f’s to give.

Being Careful

The problem is that someone is always trying to give you their f’s to care about.

During the World Cup, people who won’t watch another soccer (football) game for at least another four years had all sorts of suggestions on how to improve the game.

It didn’t even make the shortlist for my f’s to give.

The trans issues being discussed in the WNBA? Not even close.

Conservation of f’s is how we are controlled. Folks get us all worked up about the trans issue or Dr. Faucci so that if we fall for it and take it on, we find we no longer care about the destruction of the East Wing, the price of gas, the war in Iran, …

Even Goldilocks was complaining about things that were none of her business.

This bed’s too hard?

It’s not your f’ing bed. Papa bear is happy with it.

This bed’s too soft?

Again, Mama bear loves it that way.

Who invited you in to walk around and start complaining?

New Ones

In the early 80s I worked for a radio station where we picked our own music.

That almost never happens. Usually a computer or some set rotation picks the music you play.

We had to vary our music based on the type of music, the age of the music, and the tempo of the music.

The tempo was supposed to go up and down like a sin wave. The age were so many brand new songs an hour, so many that had been out a while, some from the 80s, some from the 70s, and some from the 60s. The type was everything from rock, classic rock, R & B, folk rock, and so on.

I think that’s the way you should choose your new f’s.

You can look around at other people’s f’s, you can consider long-forgotten f’s, and you can seek out ones that are new to you.

That’s just one axis. On another axis you should mix stuff that’s fun with stuff that’s good for you or good for others.

I’m shopping for a new sport to care about.

Maggie and I are going to Australia for a Rugby tournament she’s playing in. She’s taught me to love the game and I’d like to find a way to watch more than the Six Nations tournament here in the states.

Steven Covey wrote about the circle of influence and the circle of concern. He argued that we are happiest when we aren’t concerned about a lot of things we don’t have influence over.

I don’t count sports as something I’m concerned about - it’s a fun diversion and gives me something to care about and chat with friends about.

Elections are coming up - there’s a few f’s I should pick up off the floor and care about again.

I don’t know if everyone is really like Goldilocks. I’m sure there are people who would be just fine with not enough f’s to give. I’m just not one of them.

Essay from Dim Sum Thinking Newsletter 333. Read the rest of the Newsletter or subscribe

Stretching the truth

A little more than forty years ago, the superintendent of the Cleveland City Schools wrote a letter complaining about the petty politics he was forced to deal with. He then drove himself to Cleveland Aviation High School at Burke Lakefront Airport and killed himself with a single gunshot.

I was working in radio as the morning newscaster and had just gotten home and had the television going in the background.

I wandered into the kitchen to make a cup of coffee and heard a bulletin interrupt the broadcast. I carried my mug into the living room and watched the story about the superintendent’s suicide. I flipped to another channel and grabbed a pen and a notepad and watched the bulletin on another channel. By the time I’d watched the third bulletin on the story I had most of the known facts jotted down.

I was the only news person at my station. Usually, we only did news between 6 and 9 am but this was an important local item. I wrote a quick thirty minute story and called the program director to tell him what I had. Ten minutes later I was on the air.

I tell you all that to tell you what I said at the end of the story. I’ve been thinking about it a lot lately because it was completely truthful but I knew it was misleading.

I finished the story and tagged it with my name, “live with what’s happening at Burke Lakefront Airport.”

That was completely true.

But listeners would assume that I was live at the airport.

I hadn’t said that, but adding that phrase painted that picture for them.

More truths

Imagine that we’re out somewhere for a pint of beer or a glass of wine.

“Hang on a minute,” I say, and take an antibiotic that I’ve been prescribed for some condition I’ve been diagnosed with.

We start to argue about something stupid. Maybe it’s sports, politics, or who the best Muppet is.

The conversation gets a little loud and an off-duty police officer who is working as security wanders over to check on us. He determines it’s a friendly discussion but asks us to keep it down.

And then years later I run for office.

An ad is run against me. The most unflattering picture of all is displayed on the screen. I look angry. My skin has an odd color to it. Behind me is what looks to be a typewritten police report with some words highlighted.

The narrator says - over scary music of course - “Drinking, Drugs, Questioned by a Police Officer for a public disturbance” as the words “Drinking”, “Drugs”, “Investigated” appear in big banners on the screen.

None of that is a lie but it deliberately paints a dishonest picture.

This is what political ads have become in my country. And they run continuously from July to November.

This is actually from a real ad running. The story is that someone called the police to report a domestic dispute.

When the police got there, the candidate and spouse had been arguing about the candidate’s long work hours. The police determined that it was a verbal dispute and there was no evidence of physical violence. Oh, and both had been drinking and the candidate had taken prescription medicine.

The banner on the ad about the incident reads, “Drinking”, “Drugs”, and “Insufficient Medical Knowledge”.

Insufficient Medical Knowledge? I’ll get to that.

There may be real reasons not to vote for this person - I’d love a negative ad that focused on that. Actually, I’d love a positive ad that focuses on why your candidate is a better choice.

Unfortunately, these negative ads work.

They say

Have you ever driven behind a truck that has a bumper sticker that says “How’s my driving” accompanied by a phone number?

No one calls to say, “I was behind truck CL-487 and they were a great driver.”

People call to say that this truck cut them off or something.

Until recently with the advent of dashboard cameras there was no way for the truck driver to prove otherwise.

People complain when they think they’ve been wronged even when they were at fault.

I had a friend who was quite a bit older than me. When he was in his eighties, someone mistook him for someone else and came up and punched him. He went to the doctor where they discovered a condition that had gone undetected for years, fixed it, and likely saved his life.

Had the previous doctors been negligent for missing this? Maybe. But he’d never complained of this condition and medicine is an art that depends on a lot of factors. He was grateful they’d caught and addressed it.

Someone else might have written a complaint to the medical board. The medical board would then evaluate whether or not the previous doctors had been negligent. A complaint - even with an underlying issue - does not mean the doctor’s did anything wrong.

So back to our candidate. The first part of the ad says that their “medical knowledge was described as insufficient to Ohio’s Medical Board.”

That’s me “Live with what’s happening at the airport.”

You’re supposed to hear that phrase and think, the candidate’s medical knowledge was described as insufficient BY Ohio’s Medical Board. But the ad says “TO” and not “BY”.

But just in case you came to the correct conclusion, the ad comes back to it at the end with “Drinking”, “Drugs”, and “Insufficient Medical Knowledge”.

Forty years ago I feel badly for the misleading statement I made because I knew when I wrote it that it was truthful but misleading. In addition, the lie I told had nothing to do with the story I was telling.

I have a feeling the folks who wrote and produced this ad don’t think twice about it. They sleep just fine.

This ad and these people are telling a lie to influence our vote. This is the sort of lie that, as the quote goes, “travels halfway around the world before the truth puts on its shoes.”

Hopefully, this is one of those shoes that will help you view these ads differently.

Essay from Dim Sum Thinking Newsletter 332. Read the rest of the Newsletter or subscribe

There

My mother-in-law used to tell everyone how much I love to fly.

I couldn’t quite get her to understand the difference between loving to be somewhere and loving to get there.

I hate getting there. It’s bad and it seems to be getting worse. For the most part things work out - which amazes me and makes me think that it’s a metaphor for the journey of life itself.

My last trip was to Calgary.

Because it’s an international trip, I get to use the United Lounge,

Cool. I can watch the World Cup final, board my flight, and change planes in Chicago.

It looks as if I have a little over an hour to make it from C29 where we land to the gate right next to it where the flight from Calgary is scheduled.

Except.

The World Cup final ends in a tie at the end of ninety minutes. My flight boards and I won’t see Spain beat Argentina 1-0. As I board I check my itinerary and the flight to Calgary now leaves from gate E16.

When we land I hurry from the very end of the C concourse to the middle where I take the escalator down, walk along two moving sidewalks, and take the escalater up to the B concourse. I rush to the end of B, wind my way over the connector to Terminal 2, and make my way to the end of the E terminal in time to board my plane.

I felt a bit of sadness as I passed by Garrett’s and realized I didn’t have enough time to get some of their popcorn. On the plus side, it was nice to get a walk in between flights.

Circling

Friday morning I’m headed back to Cleveland from Calgary.

I enter the United States at the Calgary airport so the tight connection in Chicago looks just doable. Again, I have a little over an hour between flights and again the gate I land at and the gate I take off from are right next to each other in Chicago.

Oops, nope there’s a change. I’m going to land at an E gate and take off from a C gate.

Wait a minute, there’s another change. I’m going to arrive at a G gate and take off from a C gate.

Then we do something I’ve never done before on a flight.

We circle the airport in Chicago twice.

“Oh come on Daniel,” you say, “you’ve never circled an airport?”

Well, that’s clearly not true. I’ve often been on flights that approach an airport and circle waiting for their turn to land.

This was different. We landed, taxied to our gate, and found it full.

The pilot stopped short of the terminal and announced that there was a plane at gate G 12 so we’d have to wait for them to push back but that should be soon.

Then he announced that actually, they couldn’t wait so we’d have to circle. And we drove past C (where my next flight was boarding in under an hour) all the way around the airport and back to G. The gate was still full so we drove past C again and all the way around the airport. We finally got off the plane ten minutes before my next flight would board and it was a twenty minute walk away.

Back

I got to my gate while group five was boarding. Got into my seat, turned off my phone when the door was closed, and didn’t listen to the recorded safety instructions.

Then the pilot made an announcement.

He was sorry but the crew before him had noted that there was a problem with the window and they’d thought it would be ok but it wasn’t so we had to get off the plane so they could fix it and listen for announcements of where the replacement plane would be.

I glanced at the United app. The flight status was “Deplaned”. It was 2:20 and the app said the next announcement would come at 3:00.

An announcement popped up asking me if I’d like to rebook my flight.

Did I? Didn’t I? There were three seats left on the 3:50 flight.

Sure, I decided and tapped on the flight. There were no seats left.

At 2:45 my phone pinged with a note that my flight was now leaving from the B concourse at 3:40 and we’d be boarding at 3:00.

Cool.

At 3:10 people were still getting off the incoming flight and our flight crew hadn’t arrived.

It didn’t matter. We were all on board by 3:40 and the plane pushed back on time.

Things had mostly worked out.

There were a ton of life lessons and metaphors in my trip to Calgary.

That said, my mother-in-law was wrong. I loved being in Calgary for the conference at the Zoo. I did not love getting there.

Essay from Dim Sum Thinking Newsletter 331. Read the rest of the Newsletter or subscribe

The end

Kim and I used to love this Chinese restaurant on Shaker Square.

The chef at the kitchen I worked at would make fun of their food but we liked it and we really liked the people.

One of the touches that I remember is that as you finished the meal the owner would come over and refill water glasses and check to see how your meal was and did you want anything.

He knew that usually the answer was that everything had been great and we’d just like the check please.

He always had it with him and would give it to us and return to accept the payment and thank us for coming in.

We always left with this interaction in mind and always planned to return because we left with a smile on our faces.

Contrast that with the more common situation.

The wait staff delivers all of your food. Before you can take a bite they stop back and ask how everything is.

Then they leave you alone.

They’re probably overworked and delivering food and taking orders at other tables.

Maybe they wander back to see if they can get you something else - dessert perhaps. And as soon as you say yes or no, they’re gone again.

You finish and want to pay your bill but they’re no where to be found.

You sit and sit and your memory of a good meal and good service fades and your last impression isn’t a good one.

Service

“But Daniel,” you say, “often now there’s a QR code on the table. You just point your phone at that, pay, and leave.”

It’s not the same.

Now you can often order by pointing your phone at a QR code as well.

Maybe for some places and some situations - but, and I can’t believe my introverted self is saying this - I love the interaction when I go out.

I love asking the wait staff for their recommendation.

A good one will ask me a few questions and suggest a few items. A bad one will go down the menu and recommend virtually everything.

A great one tells what they like or order or taste and understands that my tastes might be different.

I don’t want to point my phone at a QR code and scan the menu. That’s the bad waiter recommending everything.

Banking

I went into a bank the other day for the first time in I don’t know how long.

I had someone working on my house who needed to be paid in cash.

I remember when banks were filled with tellers and activity. I knew my bank manager by name and they helped me get a house lone, organize my business, and set up different passthrough accounts to make my life simpler and safer.

This bank had one teller and a security person.

I waited in line, passed my slip to the teller, and waited while she corrected my entry and gave me what I needed.

During those ten minutes, several people walked up to the ATM, took care of their transaction, and left.

An ATM or a drive through ATM would have been quicker - but when did we prefer interacting with machines over people?

You know - I lied.

I was in a bank a month ago.

I’ve been trying to cancel one of my credit cards for more than a year. I’ve tried online. I’ve called the number. I’ve sent email.

I don’t use the credit card anymore. I haven’t made a purchase with it for more than seven years. I just want to cancel it.

When I was in California I walked into one of their banks. I explained what I wanted to do. Well, the teller told me, she didn’t handle that sort of thing. I should come back in a week or two and talk to a manager.

I’m finding this more and more. As we interact more and more with machines, the people either aren’t available or aren’t that helpful.

Take my money

I walked into an Apple Store the other day to buy an Apple Pencil Pro.

I was already aggravated because I’m spending money on something that I likely left on a trip somewhere or in my couch cushions or in a bag. I’ve looked for a month and can’t find it.

I walk in the store and immediately find what I need.

In the old days you could walk up to any of the many employees and they would either take your money or walk you over to someone who would.

Nope.

I walked up to two employees who were chatting with each other and having a good time and asked to pay.

One of them directed me to Luke at the pickup table. He was the one person I could pay.

Luke had a line of four people waiting for him after he was done with the current customer.

I asked if there was another way I could pay. They said no, Luke would be available soon.

I left my item with them and left the store.

Now, it seems, I could have paid for the item using the Apple Store app and one of them should have told me that and perhaps showed me how.

They went back to chatting with each other. I left the store with a sour feeling about the current state of Apple retail.

I longed for the days when someone cared enough to refill my water, ask me how my meal was, and took my money.

Epilogue

Usually my essay would end there but I had lunch at the River Cafe on Prince’s Island Park in Calgary.

Two dishes caught my eye. There was a fish and game board that looked good but the Red Lentil Hummus came highly recommended.

I asked the waitress and she was outstanding.

She told me the Red Lentil Hummus was very good but it was meant for sharing and that if I ordered that my lunch would just be one note.

I thanked her and said, unfortunately it was only me for lunch. I sighed and thanked her and ordered the fish and game board.

She winked and said, let’s see if we can get the hummus to be one of the dishes on the board.

Sure enough when it arrived there was a tiny ramekin with the red lentil hummus and it was the perfect amount and went well with the other items.

I watched as this waitress worked the same magic at every table around me. I saw her take a phone from a child at the next table and enter the wifi code so that he could stay occupied while his family enjoyed their meal.

This was exactly what I needed today. The meal was great, the service was perfect, and the experience was even more than the sum of its parts.

Essay from Dim Sum Thinking Newsletter 330. Read the rest of the Newsletter or subscribe

*Next

I’m thinking through what to do next.

Yes - it’s going to be one of those essays. You can skip it and meet me back here next week.

I love what I do and want to keep doing it - but the money seems to have gone out of it.

I know - boo f’ing hoo it’s happening all around us.

I’m actually not at all sad - I’m just trying to figure things out.

For the most part, my life has been great.

For the most part, my life is great.

I’ve gotten to do amazing things. Truth be told, I can continue to do those things - it’s just that nobody’s going to pay me for it anymore.

Then it wasn’t

I was catching up with a woman I know and she was telling me about a relationship of hers that just ended.

It lasted six years.

And then she said the thing that’s stuck with me.

“It was good until it wasn’t.”

I loved that there was no boo (f’ing or not f’ing) hoo.

(f’ing or not f’ing - not exactly Hamlet)

It was good, then it wasn’t, and now it isn’t.

I love that she didn’t go back and find fault with her partner throughout their relationship. She’s happy for what she had and sad for what she doesn’t have.

So many of the secrets of life are found in lessons from some corner of your life or from the life of someone you know or have heard about or even from a fictional character.

It’s why I write this newsletter. I write about someone’s story way over there and find myself saying, “damn, there’s a lesson in there for me too.”

Ove

A woman gave me a copy of the book “A Man called Ove” just after Kim died.

I finally started reading it this past week.

Well, that’s not exactly true.

I put the paperback in a box while we were cleaning up the house and I wasn’t sure where it was. So I got the audio book out of the library and I’ve been listening to it.

The story keeps moving from the present to the past.

I hate books like that.

But somehow I really like this one.

It’s about a man who has strong opinions and is fairly rigid and let’s other people know what he thinks.

“So,” you say rolling your eyes, “nothing like you.”

The man’s wife has died and there’s a big hole in his life.

“Nothing at all.”

Spoiler alert - I’ve gotten to the part where he’s tried his fourth suicide attempt.

That is nothing like me. I’ve told Maggie that if they every find me dead and want to rule it a suicide, she should have it investigated. I’m way to frightened by death to do that.

Even so - there are lessons in this book that resonate. I see some things about Ove that I see in myself. Not literally. More like a caricature. But they’re there and they need addressing.

I’m working on them - but suddenly I need to decide more concretely what to do in the next phase of my life.

Unlike Ove - I recognize the presence and assistance I get from the people around me and I make sure they know it.

And then

I told you last week that with Maggie’s help and encouragement, the first floor of my house is clean and presentable.

You’ll be happy to know that a week later, it still is.

Also in that week I hired a landscaper who cleaned out the flower beds, cut back the bushes, and edged the lawn.

All of that frames the newly painted house and garage.

It looks so good that I had to send an email to my neighbors to let them know I’m not moving.

Many told me they’d been wondering.

And now it’s time to look at the work I do.

I love the work I do.

I constantly learn new things and get to teach it to others.

For the most part I teach, write books, and speak at conferences about Apple technology. Each June Apple introduces the stuff that’s new and that’s what I teach for the following year.

My books, workshops, and conference talks always led to companies bringing me in to teach private classes. That’s where I made the money that justified me making nothing or almost nothing on the rest of it.

But companies don’t seem to be doing that anymore. Their employees - at least the ones they haven’t laid off - can learn stuff from free videos or can use AI tokens to get help from Claude Code or some other agent.

Like a skilled craftsman - and I consider writing and teaching both art and craft - I’ve been replaced by a machine.

Boo f’ing hoo.

And like those skilled craftsmen, I’m sure there will be enough work to sustain me once we get past this initial bubble.

I’m confident that in five or ten years enough high paying work in these areas will come back. If I were younger, my plan would be to continue to work and get better and stay visible during that time.

It is

Do I need to get paid?

No.

But, it turns out that I’m less-evolved than I would like. I measure my value to others by whether or not the work I do is worth being paid for.

I’ve identified that and voiced it and hope I can get past it.

I love learning new things. I love writing books and teaching others.

A few years ago I met with a friend in Edinburgh and told him that my plan was to work until I was 70.

He asked, “why?”

It was a good question.

It’s as good a question as why, if I can afford it, should I only work as long as someone pays me.

I may write different sorts of books. I’ve long wanted to write books about calculus, statistics, and inspiring stories. I’ve wanted to draw well enough to produce books with hand-drawn illustrations.

Not worrying about making a living from it is kind of freeing.

I’ve been looking back at my career thinking, it was good until it wasn’t.

And then I realized, it is again.

Essay from Dim Sum Thinking Newsletter 329. Read the rest of the Newsletter or subscribe

Some day

Some time last year Maggie and I talked about doing something to mark twenty years since Elena died and ten years since Kim died.

There’s something about round numbers.

We talked about having a small gathering for family and maybe a few people.

Last year this year was far enough away that it seemed like something we should do.

And then, as they say in books, time passed.

Autumn turned into winter. Winter turned into spring.

Maggie remembers everything. I mean, I have a good memory, but she remembers everything.

Before spring could turn into summer, Maggie brought it up again.

I looked at the state of my house and thought, “I don’t know. I can’t really have people come here.”

As if reading my mind, Maggie looked around and said, “we can do it. I’ll help.”

We went to Japan. She visited over Memorial Day.

“So,” you say, “spring turned into summer.”

Yes. Spring turned into summer. On the other hand, my house had not magically become presentable.

I hired a handy man to take care of a torn shutter and a dozen other items that came up. I hired a company to paint my house. I looked for landscapers to clean up the yard.

None of that got the house in shape for thirty or more people.

Little by little

In the past two weeks Maggie has pushed me towards getting everything in order a little bit at a time.

She knew I’ve been meaning to replace my lawn chairs and she happened to find some on sale on our way back from a visit to my mother.

She and a friend were out the next day and happened to pass two matching reclining chairs that someone had put out on the front lawn. Actually there were three but two were in new condition and just needed a wash.

We have a canopy in the backyard we bought for Maggie’s high school graduation party. It’s a metal frame with a tent covering.

Over two winters the tent got worn and torn and we’ve had a useless metal frame in the back yard for ten years.

But, Maggie remembers everything.

She reminded me that years ago I told her we ordered a replacement tent covering.

She sent me down to the basement to find it.

Miraculously, I was able to put my hands on the box, blow the dust off, and bring it upstairs.

It was addressed to Kimberli Diemert and shipped in June 2016. Kim died that August.

Ten years ago. One of those round numbers.

We took the tent out to the back yard and Maggie helped me pull it over the frame.

Just like that we have an outdoor area available.

And then

Inside Maggie has been pushing me little by little - the key is for me to not feel her hand on my back. By the way, that’s the key to pushing her as well.

I get up pretty early while Maggie goes to bed pretty late. In between we’ve been visiting friends, eating, going to games, and preparing for the party.

I’d come down in the morning and notice the living room is much cleaner with a few piles of my stuff left.

Maggie had straightened a lot but left the things I had to go through.

After a few days of this the downstairs was starting to look pretty good.

“You have to clean the kitchen,” she said.

I did. And all of a sudden I had some shelf space for items I’d left in the dining room.

The house hasn’t looked this orderly since Kim died.

Four days before the party I started cooking pancakes in eight different colors and more bacon and sausage than thirty people could possibly eat.

I first made colored pancakes for Elena twenty-five years ago and we hosted a breakfast on her birthday for the ten years after she died.

Then Kim died and people stopped coming over. Not all at once - but over time. And it may not have been them - it might have been me. And then we all locked ourselves away for COVID. And then -

And then.

Show time

The morning of the party I got up at seven to finish some items that I’d promised Maggie I would do.

I meant to the night before as she put together a slide show that would run on the TV with memories of Kim and Elena.

I ran out of steam and told her I’d finish in the morning.

I cleaned off the buffet and moved chairs into the living room. I prepared an urn of coffee that I would plug in just before guests arrived. I mixed six quarts (roughly liters) of pink Country Time lemonade and put the full dispenser in the refrigerator.

Maggie came down around nine, ran the vacuum one more time, and helped me arrange the table.

We placed a cutting board for the bagels, plates for the butter and cream cheese, the syrup, a huge plate for the pancakes, and two bowls for the meat on the table.

Everything was coming together.

I plugged in the coffee, put out the lemonade, and plugged in the coffee.

I preheated the oven. When my phone buzzed to tell me the oven was ready - because sometimes the oven needs to reach me to tell me things - I put a third of the bacon, a third of the sausage, and one of the eight bags of pancakes in the oven.

And then it was eleven and people started to arrive.

A half hour later the house was full of love - just like it used to be.

We shared our favorite memories and made some new ones.

Essay from Dim Sum Thinking Newsletter 328. Read the rest of the Newsletter or subscribe

Hooked

I played soccer - what many of you call football - in high school.

I was slow and not that coordinated - I was not very good. But I showed up, practiced hard, and played when and where I was allowed to.

That might have been my first life lesson from football.

These past few weeks, despite me thinking I would give it a miss this year, I’ve been getting caught up in the World Cup.

Oliver and I watched the Spanish broadcast of US vs Paraguay in a Mexican bar in South San Francisco before my flight home.

Kevin, Lisa, and I watched the Fox broadcast of US vs Autralia in their living room projected on their big screen.

Maggie and I stopped in a bar before dinner to watch the start of Germany vs Côte D’Ivoire and then went to the Philly FIFA fan-zone to watch Curaçao vs Equador on a big screen.

And suddenly I was hooked. I started checking scores, listening to podcasts, and even started rewatching Ted Lasso.

It was there that Danny Rojas reminded me that “Football is life” and so I offer you three life lessons from this year’s world cup.

Play on

Football is famous for flopping.

Someone runs near you and you throw yourself at the ground as if you’ve been hit or tripped hoping that the ref will blow the whistle and rule in your favor.

But in this year’s world cup there is also a fair amount of actual fouls that could be called and the ref does nothing about it.

It’s not that the ref doesn’t see your opponent grabbing your shirt or tripping you. The ref also likely saw you doing the same thing a minute ago. But, if it doesn’t have an impact on the flow or outcome of the game the ref signals that you should play on and you should.

There are players who run next to the ref pleading their case.

There are all sorts of theories that this will influence the ref in the future. It never causes the ref to reverse their decision.

And that’s life lesson number one. There will be exceptions to this one - but in general I’ve found it applies.

There are times when you are wronged - truly wronged. Someone is obstructing you or holding you back or even worse.

Look around for the ref. See if anyone is there to give you justice. Maybe even plead your case so that it’s noticed next time.

But the game is continuing and you need to get yourself back in it.

I’ve wasted time whining about a wrong or trying to get someone to right it. That time would have been better spent back on the field.

Strategy

After the US beat Australia, they had six points in the group stage. This meant that no matter what happened in their final game, the US would continue to the next stage of the playoffs.

So how should they proceed? How seriously should they take their game against Türkiye?

The US decided to take it very seriously. Almost all of the players had not started in a game.

They could have played their starters and most pundits agree that they would have won.

Instead, they gave other players valuable playing experience, avoided injuring their starters, and gave their star - who had been injured in the first game - a chance to play for thirty minutes in the second half to get back in the swing of things in a real game.

That’s life lesson number two. Suppose you know you’re in a situation where the outcome is guaranteed. Maybe you know that you’ve already lost or maybe you know that you’ve already won.

That’s actually very freeing.

If you don’t care anything about the outcome of a given situation, what might you do differently.

I’ve heard tons of examples of someone who went in to interview for a job they had no chance of getting. It loosened them up so much that they did things that they never would have otherwise done and they got the job.

If the outcome doesn’t matter - what would you change? Bonus: do the same even if the outcome does matter.

Open

I heard people talk about how the US sucked against Türkiye. The players on the field were just awful.

They really weren’t. They’ve been scouted and coached and developed since they were young kids. Many of them moved away from home to work on their game before they were in high school. The eleven players who started game two might not have been the top eleven players in the US but they were better than almost everyone in this country.

I was probably worse than almost everyone in this country but one thing I remember is that even in a moderately well-coached team, there is always someone open that you can pass to.

Often the open person is behind you.

You’ll see someone with the ball beyond the halfway point pass it backwards, and that person passes it backwards maybe even to their own goalie. The goalie passes it across to the other side and that person passes it up to someone who is even with the original ball handler but on the complete opposite side of the field.

The ball traveled from the left side near the halfway point to the right side near the halfway point but it didn’t travel in a straight line.

That brings me to a final, compound life lesson.

There is always an open pass. There is always an option available to you.

One of the effects of stress and/or depression is that you can’t see the help that surrounds you - you can only see the challenges.

But, you say, the open pass is behind me or next to me. It’s no better than where I am today.

Sometimes that open pass behind you is how you get around the obstacle in front of you. It’s how we swing the ball to the other side of the field.

Bonus: take those shots on goal when they present themselves. Most of those shots won’t score and it may take a long time to set up the next shot but the shots you don’t take never score.

Football, as Danny Rojas reminds us, is life.

Essay from Dim Sum Thinking Newsletter 327. Read the rest of the Newsletter or subscribe

Nudge

I came back from Apple’s Developer conference feeling re-energized and refreshed.

It’s the people.

As an introvert, my energy is drained by big crowds of people so I spend the week meeting with people in small groups. Often it’s just me and one other person catching up over coffee.

One friend was telling me of the impact one of my keynotes had on him.

He’d known for a while that he needed to make big changes in his life and something in my talk resonated with him and he made them.

Now, less than a year later, his job, his relationship, and his living situation are all changed.

Despite him thanking me for the push - I did nothing.

He knew what to do.

Your watch

One of the many things that Kim did for me, was she told me when it was time to move on.

You know by now that I stay in things too long.

My friend Chris used to say it was because I thought I could fix things.

Whatever the reason, Kim would say, “you need to find another job.”

It’s not that she had particular insight into the job and it’s requirements. She saw that I was unhappy. She saw that I was ready to move on from the job.

In a way, she was giving me permission.

In a way, she was giving me a push.

In a way, she was showing me myself.

It’s that old joke that a consultant is someone who borrows your watch to tell you what time it is.

A friend, a therapist, a colleague looks at you to tell you what you already know you should do.

Go ahead

This year I went to be near Apple’s conference to figure out what I should do next.

I continue to write books even though the money has gone out of them.

For years I’ve written books for me - they’re a great way for me to learn a new topic in depth. A side result for my business has been that companies then bring me in to do private training. That seems to have gone away or largely diminished. Companies seem to be providing the employees they haven’t laid off with tokens instead of training.

I told my younger friends that if they can hold on, I think there will be high-paying work for them in the future. As companies reduce the number of programmers, junior positions will disappear and universities will produce fewer Computer Science graduates. There will be a need for highly skilled programmers and analysts - but it will take a while for that to happen.

At my age, I’m unlikely to benefit from this.

So what do I do?

I’ve talked about producing video courses but the money seems to have gone out of that market as well.

I’m thinking of working on my drawing skills and turning some of my keynotes in to books or maybe write that Calculus or Statistics book.

After my coffee companion has told me how my talk gave him the nudge to do what needed to be done, he offered to do the same for me.

I too need to make decisions about my work, my relationship, and my living situation. Do I stay where I am or leave the country? If I leave the country where do I go? If I don’t leave the country where do I go.

My friend gave me the advice he was given.

“You know what you need to do,” he said. “I can give you the words you need to say to make the changes you need to make - but you know them.”

I know them.

For you and your decisions - you know them.

Say it.

Essay from Dim Sum Thinking Newsletter 326. Read the rest of the Newsletter or subscribe

Sam

There’s an episode of the West Wing from 1999 in which the staff is vetting candidates for an open seat on the Supreme Court.

The episode contains an argument about whether or not the U.S. Constitution guarantees the right to privacy.

Certain privacy related rights are guaranteed in the Bill of Rights.

The candidate, who stands in for actual justices and their position, argues that these enumerated rights indicate that the founders could have included privacy if they’d seen it as essential.

This is a classic Sorkin straw man set up so that Sam can knock it down.

It’s the rest of Sam’s speech that sticks with me.

“It’s about the next twenty years. The 20’s and 30’s it was about the role of government. The 50’s and 60’s it was about civil rights. The next two decades are going to be privacy. I’m talking about the internet, talking about cell phones, talking about health records, and who’s gay and who’s not.”

Privacy.

Safety

I was thinking about that speech after Apple’s WorldWide Developers Conference (WWDC) last week.

Apple talked a lot about privacy during the keynote.

They stressed the importance of privacy when it comes to your data and gave examples of how they continue to address the challenges in their AI efforts and in ensuring kid safety.

In fact, Apple has been talking about privacy in their keynotes and other presentations for more than twenty years.

I’m always surprised how little that matters to investors or the general public.

Maybe I worry more than I should.

After all, with 300+ issues of this newsletter out, a very bored and unambitious AI agent could be trained on this and know quite a bit about me.

But each week I make the decision to write this and to press “Send”.

That’s not the sort of privacy I worry about.

Even though we reveal more of us than we should in social media posts, these reveals may be ill-advised but they’re voluntary.

Your face

We used to go with my father-in-law to the horse track. He worked security there and brought us along for a nice brunch now and then.

These were the days before cell phones - I have no idea what it would be like now - but then, you weren’t allowed to use a camera to take pictures.

The track protected the privacy of people who came out to place a bet or watch a race.

Now there are cameras everywhere.

I now board a plane and walk through passport control just by looking at a camera.

I worry about the many times a day we share our image or other forms of identifying information because it makes a transaction easier.

I worry about the many times a day we share these things because it makes a transaction possible. Why does this company need this piece of information from me - for my convenience.

In a recent episode of Pablo Torre Finds Out, it was reported that Madison Square Garden and other Dolan properties use facial recognition to keep people out of their venues.

These aren’t terrorists or dangerous people. They famously kicked out a mom who was chaperoning a group of Girl Scouts to see a show at Radio City Music Hall. The woman works as an attorney for a law firm that has sued one of Dolan’s companies and so all of the employees are on a list of people banned from any Dolan property.

Essential

I know there’s nothing in the Constitution that gives me the right to attend a show at Radio City Music Hall or the Sphere or a Knicks game. But something feels off.

I’ll grant you that Siri has been bad a long time and could have and should have been better (this is the year - they tell me).

But I really like the design that keeps my information and queries on the device I’m holding. I don’t need to worry about who will see the query or response whizzing by on its way to or from the internet.

This year Apple talked about continuing to put an emphasis on privacy.

And their stock went down.

I don’t know why this isn’t seen as essential and something we want from these devices we expose to the most intimate aspects of our lives.

The “next twenty years” from Sam’s speech covered the past two decades.

If anything, our need for privacy protections has gotten greater not less.

Essay from Dim Sum Thinking Newsletter 325. Read the rest of the Newsletter or subscribe

Grab

On a recent episode of Trevor Noah’s podcast, his guest told the story of having his phone stolen.

He was walking in Philadelphia and someone on a bike grabbed the phone out of his hands and pedaled away.

The nature of the theft made the guy feel even worse.

If someone robbed him at gun point or knife point then he’d have a story that others would understand.

You’d feel bad for him that this had happened.

Somehow this was different. Some person on a bike stole his phone.

Smash

In either scenario the victim isn’t to blame.

I mean, sure, someone would say “what are you doing walking around with your phone out like that?”

But that’s what we do.

When Kim and I moved into our first house there were old radiators in the garage so we had to leave our cars out.

A week after moving in, someone went from house to house breaking into cars and stealing the radios.

Our cars were locked behind our house and still someone broke a window and stole my radio.

When we called it in the officer asked if our cars were in the garage.

Sigh.

Mine

This is not an essay about theft in the time of AI - that’s for another day.

But years ago someone contacted me to tell me someone had stolen something I had written and was using it without attribution.

It was so obvious that one of my readers had noticed.

In one of my books I’d written a poem to illustrate a point. Someone had taken the poem and presented it in a talk they gave on the same subject.

I know we worry about theft because of our exposure to technology - I’ll give you an example of that.

In the early days of Twitter people would post, “I’m off to meet a friend for coffee.”

And then someone figured out that they could scan Tweets and post who would be away from their home for a while.

Suddenly your house or apartment was a target.

The theft of the poem or the radio or the phone is kind of old-school.

Monitor

I don’t know if you’ve heard the story of the movie “Monitor” but it’s a lot like my poem story.

Eight years ago Matt Black and Ryan Polly wrote a short film named “Monitor”. They produced it and posted it online.

Then about four years ago they got a call from someone who’d been invited to pitch his take on how to make a story named “Radio” into a feature film for a big time producer at a major studio.

“Wait,” you ask, “why would someone call Matt and Ryan about this other film?”

Ah. Because it wasn’t another film.

The writer, Nick, had recognized that “Radio” was really “Monitor”.

Someone downloaded Matt and Ryan’s short film and replaced the title and credits with their own and had taken it to a studio to get a deal.

And they had gotten a deal. And now the studio was looking for writers to turn this little short into a full feature film.

So it turns out the director who had stolen their film ended up getting caught.

Then someone called Matt and Ryan and asked if they had any ideas for turning the short into a full feature.

So they lied and said “yes”. After some starts and stops they end up making the movie and it’s coming out next year.

Why did I tell you this story?

I don’t know. I liked that it’s a story of a good old-fashioned theft with a happy ending.

Given that their movie is a horror film, I’m more interested in a movie about the movie than the movie itself.

Essay from Dim Sum Thinking Newsletter 324. Read the rest of the Newsletter or subscribe