John R. Brandt's Blog

Blech

At the urging of my 13-year-old son, who's been curious lately about my upbringing and how it compares to his, I bought a box of my favorite childhood cereal so we could share a couple of bowls. We poured the Cap'n Crunch, doused it with milk, took our first spoonfuls at the same time... and promptly poured the rest down the garbage disposal. If it had been a wine, I would have described it as "overly sweet, with bitter corn notes that couldn't completely hide the manufactured mouth feel and finish, almost as if the Cap'n Cruncher Injection Molder had been leaking Cap'n Crunch Oil into the weirdly identical cereal bits."

As usual, If anybody tells you them was the good old days, they wasn't.

You can do everything for a client...

...except make them smarter.

Another Fancy Quote to Keep Your Boss Off Your Back on a Post-Holiday Monday Morning

"No man is obliged to do as much as he can do. A man is to have part of his life to himself."

    — Samuel Johnson

Best. Quote. Ever.

"Be good, and you will be lonesome."

    — Mark Twain

Apparently, When You're 12 Years Old, Crime Has a Six-Year Statute of Limitations

My 12-year-old son just confessed: When he was 6 or 7, and had a teacher he couldn't abide, he realized that her class came after naptime — and that, if a boy was sleeping soundly, the kindly naptime supervisors would let that boy snore another 15 minutes or so, even if he had to miss part of his next (hated) class.

"I faked that I was sleeping every day," he told me the other day in the car. "They would kind of [nudge] you, but if you went. 'Unhhh" [moves head groggily with eyes closed], they'd let you go."

I looked over and said: "I'm sure glad I've been paying that tuition all these years."

He just laughed. "Dad, I'm learning all kinds of life lessons."

Open Letter From an (Anonymous) Cranky Vendor

To Whom It May Concern:

Thanks to all of you who were hiding in your offices this Thanksgiving week from Monday through Wednesday, desperate for anything that looked remotely like work or a meeting but wasn't actually too difficult before a four-day weekend. I appreciate your eagerness in taking my call for the first time this year, and hope that you felt my sales pitch wasn't just a naked attempt to take advantage of your sudden pre-Thanksgiving goodwill, ennui and torpor, but was instead a sort of public service, in which I helped you to justify earning your salary while you shopped online for pre-Black Friday specials (I could hear you typing while I talked, but am too polite to have said anything).

I'm sure you won't be answering your phone quite so readily next week, but I do plan on following up regarding that big order you mentioned. Since I'm guessing we probably won't connect again until the days right before Christmas or New Year's, when you'll once more need a meeting buddy to explain your malingering presence in the office instead of being out on the road with customers or employees, I think I'll stop by in person this time, contract in hand. That way we can both Ho-Ho-Ho into 2010. Or at least one of us will.

See you December 22, I'll bring the pen,

You Know Who

Excellent Ancient Greek Quote to Throw at Your Nervous-Nellie Boss the Next Time He Asks How Things Are Going

"One must wait until the evening to see how splendid the day has been."

    —Sophocles

A Bucket of AWESOME

My 17-year-old daughter recently looked at a report I was working on and said, "Could you have possibly picked a more boring career?"

Well. Hmm.

This, of course, after her recent birthday celebration, at which she informed me and her grandparents that she would never do anything so boring as manufacturing research for a living.

I took the bait.

"OK," I said. "What are you going to do to make a living?"

She plopped herself backwards into a comfy chair, smirked and said, "I'm going to be AWESOME."

Brilliant.

What else could you possibly want for your 17-year-old daughter?

Management Tips from The Big Screen, #682

"Either you're part of the problem or you're part of the solution or you're just part of the landscape."

        -Sam, played by Robert DeNiro, in Ronin (1998)

Memo to All the Middle-Aged Guys in the Hotel Gym With Big Potbellies, Lifting Weights

Those hairy biceps (seriously, leave the sleeveless shirts at home) aren't going to do you much good when your heart gives out. Although they do make it easier to hoist that 16-oz. T-bone and all the trimmings into your mouth.

Dudes, get on the treadmills or the ellipticals or the bikes and save your lives with a little cardio. You can still wear those cool weightlifting gloves (which, honestly, look a little silly at the weights you're lifting anyway).

I'm just sayin'.