Oh, poop--really

Really interesting story about folks in a town in Spain fighting back against dog walkers who don’t scoop after their pets.

Concerned citizens (or, as they say in Britain, “members of the public”) are mailing the offending matter back to the dogs’ owners.

A couple of thoughts on this story:

This practice ought to go viral. Except that the cost of postage could become an obstacle to adoption. But there’s an opportunity here for someone to develop & sell postage-paid packaging ready-made for would-be vigilantes to just slide the poop in, slap an address label on & drop it in a mailbox.

You don’t very often  get to use the phrase “criminal dog poop”, & I don’t really know why that should be. Ditto with “errant dog poop”. I’m going to make an effort to work one or the other of them into conversations. Just, you know, because.

Group magic. Or squirting

This is the first time I’ve been spammed by a Yahoo Group:

I fear it won’t be the last.

And I do not want to think about anything calling itself Magic Squirty (with or without the extra Y).

Need vodka.

Duck, duck, goose. I mean, duck

Whoa—this gigantic rubber ducky story has, uh, legs.

You’ll recall that the duck made headlines when it deflated in Hong Kong Harbour. (Evidently it was indeed down for maintenance and has been reinvigorated.)

But it seems that oversized yellow rubber water fowl, bearing a suspiciously-strong resemblance to the installation piece by Dutch artist Florentijn Hofman, have been, ah, popping up in multiple cities in the Chinese mainland.

And there may be “copyright issues” involved.

There are a couple of things I find interesting about that:

The idea that a pretty ubiquitous bathtub toy that’s been around since, well, since there’ve been bathtubs (kinda) is protected by copyright, is curious. Would size be the determinant in any dispute over this?

There are apparently intellectual property lawyers in China. Well, at least one, in Beijing. Who’d have thunk?

Hofman’s feathers are reported to be ruffled, & he was quoted as saying, “If they want the real duck, they’ll have to come to me.”

That’s not a sentence you get to repeat very often.

What I did for art

My post yesterday about my friend Chris reminded me of that Phillips Collection fundraiser. What a hoot.

I was a member of the Phillips Young Contemporaries, which was a museum membership category. In addition to free admission to the permanent and special exhibitions, as a Contemporary you could attend special events, which included a regular evening gallery frisnic. The founder of the museum built the collection around Renoir’s “Luncheon of the Boating Party”, so it’s got a close cultural affinity with France; another plus for me.

In 1996 they were celebrating their 75^th anniversary with a string of events, including a rather fine Bastille Day party. It culminated with the big black-tie fundraiser in September, held at the French embassy.

Well, as we say in the old country: Mon Dieu!

The only dress-up kinds of clothes I had were things I’d worn to events in the film industry, and Washington, DC, is remarkably conservative in its fashion sense. Meaning: everyone looks like they’re on their way to or from a funeral. So I went to this consignment shop that used to be on Wisconsin Avenue; the owner completely knew fashion and she knew DC. I bought two beaded silk dresses, either of which, she said, would work.

A week or so before the big night, I convened a group of colleagues at work to guide me further. (And thank God for Judy, the admin, who reserved the conference room. When I told her which room I wanted, and what the purpose of the meeting was, she got a weird look on her face and said, “Oh, I don’t think you want that one.” “Why?” “It’s got the glass panel next to the door.” Oh. Yeah. She booked me a room that didn’t have the glass panel.)

My posse ruled out the kimono-like silk jobbers (which were actually made by Francis Ford Coppola’s ex-wife; word) as being inappropriate. To a woman they wanted the long, slinky black number, even though I wasn’t sure how I’d get it zipped. (Chris volunteered to come over and do it for me.)

(See what I mean? That sucker was slin-keeee. Like a black cat, it’s hard to photograph, but it’s beaded and sequined all over. It felt fab.)

In the event, I was having recurring back problems from an old war wound that made me go for the back-up, which was the multi-colored two-piece thing, with handkerchief hems, sequins and shot-gold beading.

(Under-dress.)

(Detail of hems.)

(With over-dress.)

Well, as you know, Chris came by on the evening to make sure everything was ship-shape and Bristol fashion and I drove off to the embassy for my excellent adventure.

There were all sorts of spiffy folks pulling into the compound, and guards were checking names as you went through the gate. I’m sure the guy triple checked my name, on account of I was driving up in a 12-year-old Toyota. But I was on the list, so he let me through.

Pulling up to the building, there was a Volvo in front of me and a Benz behind me, and phalanxes of valet parking guys swarming like bees all over the place. I handed my key off to one of them and went inside to join the receiving line. As we shuffled towards the ambassador and Phillips retinue I glanced out the window. The Volvo and the Benz were still there, but my Toyota had disappeared. They were probably worried that it was lowering property values.

So, I met the ambassador and his wife and a whole bunch of Phillips folk, and then walked into the reception area. And there I was—a brilliant multi-colored shot-gold redheaded butterfly in a sea of black. Men, women, guests, waiters—I’m telling you, it was nothin’-but-black.

And, let me just say: the only thing better than a guy in a dinner jacket is 300 guys in DJs and mess uniforms. Jeez Louise.

Plus—in addition to whatever other booze they were serving, they were pouring Cordon Rouge. I cut my champagne-drinking teeth on Cordon Rouge; I was officially in heaven.

Well, reader—I had a ball. I mingled. I drank champagne. I bid on items for the silent auction. I was seated at a table at the back of the room, kind of loose ends; but we had the best time. Some of the others at the table were also bidding on items and we were so excited when we found out we’d won! (Mine was a box of travel stuff, including guidebooks to France.) It was fun, too, looking at bids for luxury tours and restaurant dinners that were climbing up into the thousands.

I’m not great with crowds, and I’d been a bit leery of going to that kind of affair alone, but I just couldn’t miss that opportunity. I’d told myself that I could leave after a couple of hours, but in the event I think I finally oozed out of there around midnight. On a school night, too.

The valet guys were glad to hand off my car and I tooled off with my box of travel stuff and an indelible memory.

I’m really glad I came across that Polaroid to remind me of that experience.

Gratitude Monday: Tending the garden of friendship

A lot of my Gratitude Mondays are focused on my friends. That’s partly because I sometimes scuff my feet, pout and whine that, with a life as boring as mine, it’s hard—hard, I tell you—to find things to be grateful for. Sniff. But it’s mostly because I have the best friends in the world.

On a de-cluttering spree at the weekend, I came across a photo my friend Chris took of me just before I headed out for a fundraiser in DC, for the Phillips Collection’s 75^th Anniversary, at the French embassy. The picture is a Polaroid (this was 1996, okay?), and I’m wearing a multi-colored silk number and standing next to my 1984 Toyota, with my brick-like mobile phone to my ear, trying to look like I go to the French embassy every other week.

(No, I’m not putting the photo up. Just use your imagination.)

The thing is, Chris came over to my house specifically to give me a big send-off and record my getup for posterity. She’s like that—always there to support, to encourage and to expand the experience.

Chris taught me one of the most important lessons of my life—one I’m still learning: I don’t have to do everything all by myself. There are people around me who will help; who want to help; and who know a whole lot more than I do. I’ll give you three examples of this with Chris.

She is a wonderful gardener. She was always bringing in gorgeous flowers from her garden to set in vases on the counter by her cube. You wanted to drift down there to see what she had—even after she went to work for one of the more unpleasant VPs around.

When I decided to stop being the white trash neighbor in my Reston cluster, and replace the little patch of lawn in my front yard (which I mowed maybe twice a year and therefore looked like it was concealing clapped-out washing machines) with an actual garden, Chris helped me make it happen. She showed me how to kill the miserable grass with black webbing over it; then brought her rototiller in from Prince William County to break up the ground. She advised me on suitable plants, amending the soil and garden design. We made a glorious trip to Betty’s Azalea Ranch to pick out camellias, azaleas, hostas and periwinkle; and we shared an order at Holland Farm for masses of bulbs. (I went wild with irises, tulips and daffodils; and discovered the relationship between planting 50 bulbs in a day and knackered back/shoulder muscles.)

When my garden was on its way, Chris appeared at my door with an espaliered camellia to plant in front of my porch.

One Sunday morning I was hauling ass to get to choir practice, and I tore out my front door to find Chris and her husband forking a pickup-load of mulch over my garden. I stopped dead and thought, “Oh, I shouldn’t let them do this, I should be doing it; I should at least be helping.” Then I realized—it’s a gift, you idiot; Chris is giving you a gift.

And she was.

Although a native Californian, Chris moves to, ah, Mediterranean time. Everyone who knows her accepts this as part of the package; we adjust. And--what the hell, who says that just because I have an obsession with getting some place eight minutes before the appointment, that’s the only way to do things? It’s always worth the wait when she gets there.

(When the unpleasant VP decreed that everyone in the marketing department had to be at their desks with bright shiny faces no later than 0830 each morning, Chris moaned, “Oh, [Bas Bleu]—I’m dead meat. I’m dead meat.” Fortunately, her old boss moved to a spin-off company and she went back to work with him.)

That choir I mentioned? We put on a concert of Haydn’s The Creation. Baroque orchestra, professional soloists, the whole megillah. Chris drove all the way in from PW County to attend. She appeared some time after the Genesis, but I was so happy to see her there. It’s the only time someone I know has paid money for a performance I was part of.

(BTW—I’ll give you this for nothing: if you’re going to spend nearly two hours standing up and sitting down on a folding metal chair, don’t wear a leather skirt. We had to wear black skirt/trousers and white shirt, And I had this black leather skirt I was rather fond of and didn’t get a chance to wear very often. It turns out that…well, never mind. But it’s not a good idea.)

And, finally, back to the photo of me on my way to the French embassy. When I decided I was going to go to the (black tie) fundraiser, I convened a group of (female) colleagues for a lunchtime try-on and vote session, because I didn’t know what to wear. I mean—I’m from LA and had worked in Hollywood; my idea of dress-up didn’t quite synch with DC style. Chris really wanted me to wear the, ah, form-fitting black number; but—while I could indeed get into it—I wasn’t entirely comfortable in it. When I said I didn’t think I’d be able to get the zipper in the back up, she volunteered to come over to my place and do it for me. (She didn’t have any suggestions for how I’d get it down at the end of the evening.)

In the end, due to circumstances beyond my posse's control, I wore the backup choice, the multicolored silk jobber with handkerchief hems. And Chris was the one to come over to admire the finished product and send me off with a vote of confidence on the night.

And she took the photo.

Finding that picture this weekend was a gift, a surprising, wonderful gift. It reminded me of friendship, my friends and Chris. It also reminded me of that lesson. 

Thanks, Chris—I’m still on the learning curve.

The constancy of friendship

On Fridays I tend to cry “whaaaa?” and let loose the dogs of loopiness on this blog. But I was driving down El Camino Real this morning when NPR’s Friday morning feature “Story Corps” came on. I had to pull over to concentrate on the exchange between Peter Obetz and Jeff Jarrett, as they talked about their friendship.

Do yourself a favor and listen to the clip. I mean, really listen to their voices. This is literally one of the most heartening things I’ve heard this week, and I’m doing you a service by sharing it.

"Our friendship is the only thing that's constant." Damn.

Twittervice

One of the things you see a lot of on Twitter is, well, God-awful amounts of happy-clappy aphorisms that purport to be words of encouragement, but in fact are just mechanisms for getting the tweeter’s name/face into your feed.

A lot of the time the sayings are attributed to someone. Who may or may not be anyone you’ve ever heard of. (I certainly haven’t heard of many of them.) I suppose that if you cited Robert Browning when spewing forth a random collection of words, it would suddenly take on Deep Meaning. Or even Vince Lombardi. But Henry Cloud?

There are many people who churn this stuff out—they must have the tweets stockpiled. Because they come out in spurts, like someone turned on the spigot; then later they come out again. With the same drivel.

I’m going to give you just a quick sampling of ones I picked up over a very short period of time—because I’ve trained my eyes to skip over the people who tweeted or retweeted. & I'm not breaking training even to share with you.

Now, this one even invites you to RT. As bloody if.

I don’t even know what that one means. But apparently it’s key to both business & leadership. Which may explain quite a lot.

Uh—so why even bother?

&--if you’re not clear about the language, maybe you shouldn’t be handing out life-coaching wisdom.

Alice in Twitterland

I mentioned yesterday that I have two Twitter accounts—the “grown-up” one where I’m trying to show prospective hiring managers how socially with-it I am, as well as eager to soak up all the very latest technocrap, etc., etc., etc.—and the one I activated to try to drive traffic to my blog, and maybe connect to forensic/police sources.

Well, that’s been quite the eye-opener. On my non-professional Twitter profile page, I link to this blog. Since I started actively using it, maybe a month ago, around 100 people have “followed” me. (There are fewer now, because you can “unfollow” as well. And if a follow is not immediately reciprocated, people typically break the connection. Because it’s all about what they can get.) Of that number, three have actually clicked on the link to my blog. None of them has returned, that I can tell.

It’s enough to make a girl enter a convent. Without broadband.

So—people click “Follow” without having any notion of (or caring) who you are or what crack-brained theories you espouse, because once they’re connected to you, all that matters is that you look at whatever crack-brained crap they’re spewing out.

And, boy do they ever do that.

I follow about 140 people on this account—mostly writers, publishers, British cops (my novel is set in England, remember?) and just people who sound interesting. I’ve got a handful of “social media thought leaders” because they’ll follow anyone, and you need to have followers before people will follow you. (Look—of course it doesn’t make sense, but that’s the way it is. If I had a very large extended Italian family, I could just scoop them up, but I don’t, so I have to start out with what’s out there.)

(Or, actually, it’s possible to buy fake followers. People do that. People will do anything.)

The social media gurus do a fair amount of churning out their stuff, and I can pretty much skim that, because I’m picking it up on my professional account. Then there’s the category of aphorists—people who just like to upchuck the twitterized version of those inspirational posters corporations like to decorate their company walls with. I’ll deal with them separately.

But, you know what? It’s the writers (largely the self-publishing, e-book or paperback-only crowd, to be sure) who do nothing but endless, mind-numbing self-promotion, 140 characters at a time. Again and again and again.

I’m not sure when they have time to actually write their, you know, e-books & crap. And--as with the positive thinkers and thought leaders, they must have bots doing a lot of this, because I don’t think it’s possible for human fingers working at a regular keyboard to even cut-&-paste and click “post” as fast as they churn it out. There’s one woman, a writer of fantasies, in South Africa—one morning last week I counted more than 150 tweets from her in about a 40-minute period.

And then there were the retweets. That woman will retweet a ham sandwich. Especially if she’s mentioned in the mustard.

Then—later in the day, a whole new spate of the same old stuff.

I’m telling you—someone needs to take a machete to that woman’s Internet connection. Where are the damned crocodiles when you need them?

And let me just state the obvious, Spammer-twits: the instant I see your name in a tweet, I skip the content. Just like I don’t even see online ads or hear TV commercials. Your name means “nothing to see here, move on, move on”, so I do.

It's called Twitter for a reason

As long as I’m talking about Twittering, I have two Twitter accounts—one is my “professional” one, where I follow and comment on things like Agile product development methodologies, software and companies I’m interested in, and news affecting the high tech sector. The other is associated with my blog, so I follow whoever seems interesting and occasionally comment on things that strike my fancy.

Just like I do, you know, here.

The thing about Twitter is—there is a freaking 24x7 tsunami of absolute, idiotic, pointless, badly-spelled crap out there. Being on the “business” side is no defense from this, because there are plenty of self-proclaimed “thought leaders” (God give me strength the next time someone introduces him/herself to me as that meaningless term, because all I want to do is shove a fistful of infographics down their throats) who spew and re-spew factoids and injunctions on how to capitalize on this or that trend.

The worst offenders are the “thought leaders” in “social media”. They’ve got bots churning these things out at a rate of knots, and when they’re not tweeting, they’re retweeting crap like you wouldn’t believe. And by “retweeting”, I mean not only do they RT the maxims of others, they just take what they sent out a few hours ago and post them again, either as something new or a RT.

Yes, they RT their own tweets.

If someone retweets a post of theirs, they retweet the retweet. If someone mentions them in a tweet, they retweet. It’s all about getting your Twitter handle in the feeds of your followers, your little avatar in their faces.

On my professional account, I follow about 300 people. Most are in the SaaS software and social fields—they’re the ones who automatically follow you if you follow them. The socialites are also the ones tweeting at least 500 times per day. Some work for companies I’m interested in; since they have actual, you know, jobs, they’re somewhat more measured in their output.

Even so, after going away and returning to Twitter after a few hours, it's not possible for me to actually read all the hundreds of tweets and retweets that have accumulated in my feed. I have no idea what people who are following tens of thousands of twitterers do.

(I’ll say that it’s also interesting how tech companies use social media. I don’t follow companies on Facebook, because that’s not where you find B2B engagement. But when I follow a, say, SaaS company specializing in tag management and big data analytics, which only has 700 followers and 1400 tweets…well, they’re not really taking advantage of the platform. But it’s hard to point that out to them in an interview. For some reason, it doesn’t seem to play well when you tell them they’re not actually sitting at the cool kids’ table in this regard. At the least, they’re not taking a systematic approach to expanding their reach, which—if done right—should cost them not very much and at least gain them some social street cred. Just sayin’.)

I admit to being a mere padawan in this field. So I find it interesting that I’ve figured more out about it than some companies who tout themselves as being on the bleeding edge of some bleeding edge technology.

I’ll speak tomorrow about some of the specific crap that comes my way—mostly via the blog-related account.

Tweeting for history, Chapter 2.5

Well, hmm—I posted the comments below about rapper Boya Dee’s real-time Twitter coverage of the killing of a soldier in Woolwich.

And then this morning, I fired up the old laptop and find that after a week of lying low with respect to the media, he’s written a thought piece in The Guardian.

When I say “thought”, I mean that it’s a thoughtful, considered argument for people to make the effort to just get along with one another.

It would be nice if it had some reach.