Month: December 2020

Just in time for year’s end, here‘s a thought-provoking article on WFH – Working From Home – titled “Are You Sure You Want to Go Back to the Office?” The gist of it is, NO, Virginia, you really don’t. And as someone who spent 14 years commuting long distance, and another 4 years flying back and forth to remote work destinations, I concur.  Believe me when I tell you, downtown Topeka is NOT where you want to be spending extended time away from friends and family for work!

For those averse to clicking and reading, here’s the lead…

There’s a common refrain among people who’ve been marooned in their homes this year, trying to manage their jobs and their children’s distance learning, always fighting the losing battle against the dishes, the laundry, the dog hair, the grocery list. “I cannot wait to get back to the office,” they say.

But people don’t really want to get back to the office. They want to get out of their apartments, their houses, their parents’ houses. They want their children back in school, also out of the house. They want to see people’s faces again, have conversations with people who are closer than six feet from them. But that doesn’t mean that they actually want to be back in the office. At least not the way the office was before.

 

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And for those who want more?

 Well, I guess you’ll just have to click and read.

Happy WFH – Working From Home – New Year.

And stay flexible, y’all.

It has been a while since my last post, so I’ve got a real treat saved up for you. The article’s from the New Yorker – by Ian Crouch. But the real gem is a short (18-minute) film embedded inside – by Lyn Goldfarb. The title is “Inside the Workshop of a Classic Toy Inventor.” It’s about a man named Eddy Goldfarb. And in case you didn’t put 2 and 2 together, Lyn is Eddy’s daughter.

Eddy was born in 1921 – same year as my dad. Over the course of all those years he invented 800+ classic toys. Some of them, like the chattering teeth, you’ve probably seen, maybe even owned. Others, like the solar powered waving windowsill plants, maybe not. But something about this story, and this man, captures my imagination. Perhaps it’s the combination of creative mechanical genius with a relentless spirit of optimism that really gets to me. Or maybe it’s just that I like the chattering teeth – I dunno. In any event, come with me inside the workshop of a toy inventor. You’ll be glad you did.

With all the crap we’ve endured in 2020, just in time for Christmas, here is a ray of sunshine, folks. Even if you don’t read the article, watch the film.  New Yorker article is here.  The film is linked inside the article. Note caption, below.

The inventor of more than eight hundred toys on why making playthings is a noble profession.

See the shockingly normal 2020 White House Christmas trees here.  Note the following; and in response, I say – sincerely – “Bravo, Melania.”

“Blood-red trees these are not.“

The bold aesthetic choices that drew so much flak and snarky memes in Christmases past are noticeably absent. There are no blood-red trees, as there were in 2018, which various news outlets called “creepy” and “deeply haunted.” There is nothing akin to the icy, underlit branches of 2017 that turned the East Colonnade into what some likened to a barren, dystopian landscape.

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Perhaps we can all return now to some semblance of normal? Gotta be worth a shot. Below is me with what one snarky correspondent commented “looks a little puny on the bottom.” To which I can only reply…

“Hey, we can’t all be as well-endowed on the bottom as 45 was.”

Guess we dub this one the inaugural salvo of the “Girther” movement?

Better late than never, that’s what _I_ always say.

Also:  Feliz Navidad, y’all!