Book Review

A Journey
My Political Life

Tony Blair


I don't know much about British politics. If asked, I could name Margaret Thatcher, John Major, and Tony Blair as recent Prime Ministers, but before reading this book, I wouldn't have had a clue as to the names of the current Prime Minister and his predecessor.

This book took me an embarrassingly long time to read. Maybe it was because the first two chapters talk about British politics in a way that if you are an outsider to how things worked, you had to focus to figure out what he was talking about. Or maybe it's just a reflection on my American way of talking, thinking, etc. Whatever. I eventually figured out what was going on, and the story kept going anyhow.

Anyway, Tony Blair was Britan's leader during many of the major events in recent world history. He was Prime Minister from 1997 to 2007. Some of the memorable events during he tenure include: The death of Princess Diana, Kosovo, 9/11, Iraq II & Afghanistan, peace with Northern Ireland, and others. Lots of recent history.

I remember him most for standing by America after 9/11, even when others didn't want to. I thought his observations and recollections on things like Iraq were very interesting. And it's true that he stuck with it, even when it wasn't necessarily the popular thing to do. He still believes in using hard force when necessary, and using diplomacy when that tactic is more appropriate. Once the book got going, the stories he told were very interesting. I feel like I know lots more about what happened in England during the recent past, the last three years excepting...

The book wasn't just about British international relations during Tony Blair's tenure. He also pushed lots of domestic reform over his years in office, which were also interesting to read about. It sounds like the media hated him by the end of his time in office, so I guess that's a reason to like him, right?

Anyway, one of the things he talked about that I thought was interesting involved his feelings towards building peace in the world. Basically he believes that we need to understand people of other faiths, not just fear them or distrust them on principle. When we start to understand the way they think, it becomes easier to understand their point of view, and you can work towards peace. Many times, extremism from a small minority is the driving believe that is presented, which can be damaging.

It's a very large book, not one to try to rip through solely on a Saturday afternoon, but it's interesting, and provides lots of insights to British and International events over the past 14 years, give or take.

Annual Dance Festival

Friday was the last day of school for the kids. The teachers gave up teaching several weeks ago, for some of the kids, as far as I can tell... Since it's the annual dance festival, it's time for the annual "John takes blurry pictures of the kids in the dance festival." The grades do the same dance every year. (Kindergarten in the Jello dance, 6th grade does the maypole, etc.)

Ruth really enjoyed being in the Jello dance this year.

Emma was in the hat dance. Not sure what to call it, really.

Mary did the pole thing. I just call it the pole thing. She enjoyed it, as you can clearly see. (Or mostly clearly.)

Kate was in the silly little island dance. If you zoom in on the picture, you can see the expression on her face. This is the expression she used the whole time. Clearly she did not want to be there. I asked her later, she said she didn't like that one. She must get her love of dance from her father...

Next year, I expect to have a phone with a better camera. (Mine is due for replacement this Winter.) Maybe we will get less blurry pictures next year.

Civil Disobedience

Yesterday was the last day of school for the kids. I try not to get too involved, mostly so that I don't:

1. Demotivate the kids when it comes to school
2. Say something at the school that Tara would regret me saying

Anyway, that being said, the elementary school here is a pretty good one. they do have a few quirks, however:

1. Flag Corp - The raise and lower the flag everyday. I find this a worthwhile effort, but their way of getting it done is kind of odd. They have the kids march in a sort of half step march, all in synch. People are supposed to stand aside when they come by. Yesterday at the school, they spent plenty of time over the PA trying to get parents to stop and reflect the flag, or the flag corp, I'm not sure really which. They said "At the school, we stop moving for the flag." To which in my head, I thought "But what about not talking?" I may have said that to Tara...
2. Talking heads - The principal likes to talk. We have a choir concert, the principal has to say something. During the dance festival at the end of the year, (blurry pictures tomorrow...) she gets others to join in with her. They keep going and going. Just get to the dancing already, so we can take the kids home! Do all school principals have to always talk all the time?
3. Tardies - My kids eat breakfast at the school. Last year, they had a hard time getting to their class in time to start the day. Emma doesn't eat as it is, I would tell her to not worry about being late, just focus on her breakfast. Last year we got a threatening letter about their tardies. My initial reaction was to demand to know what exactly the school thought they were missing in the first five minutes of the day. Get an accounting of all the teaching moments each class does in those first five minutes. Tara had me ignore the thing...

Anyway, that's all I can think of off the top of my head, I am sure there are others. Today at the dance festival, I saw something I thought was fantastic. The thing ended, and some of the classes started to leave. They got on the PA, and said something to the effect of "Teachers, we are not done yet. Please remain here while we finish up, sing the school song, and then have flag corp." Tara and I were leaving at that point, and they starting singing the school song. I didn't know the school had their own song.

As we were leaving, there was the second grade, all carrying their chairs away while singing the school song. They didn't care that they were supposed to sit still, they were done. School was over for the year, it was time to go. Priceless civil disobedience...

Atlanta Marriott Marquis

I stayed at the Marriott Marquis in Atlanta. It has something like 47 floors. When I checked in, they asked me if I wanted to have a room on the upper tier or the lower tier. I picked lower tier, and was on floor four. I figured if there was an emergency, I wouldn't want to be walking down 40 flights of stairs to get out of the hotel.

There was no emergency.

Still here

One of my friends has been complaining this week about the silence around here lately. Guess it's time to get back to it... Here are some details around some recent tweets:

{May 9} Today required heavy editing, but I think it managed to maintain it's 'G' rating...

• Some days needs editing. Some days I need editing. Some days I need heavy editing. Every once in a while, I just throw up a firewall, and don't say anything. It comes and goes.
  

{May 9} Just nuked my calendar to get rid of a set of broken reoccurring events. If I forget your birthday or whatever, I blame @googlecalendar :)

• When I converted from using Outlook/Exchange for email and calendar a few years ago, a pile of reoccuring meetings ended up coming into my Google calendar as reoccuring, with no end date, but detached from each other, so you couldn't just delete the series, but you had to delete them one at a time. I had a couple that were duplicates of the same meeting as well. I've been deleting them one by one when they annoyed me enough. On the 9th, it annoyed me to no end. I deleted a bunch of the duplicates, trying to figure out if they were deleting somewhere in the future, somewhere in the past, or something. No dice. I ended up completely wiping out my calendar to get rid of those silly calendar items. It worked, and I mostly got my calendar back together, I think. It's definitely much cleaner.
  

{May 10} May 2 - DHL was given two large boxes to ship back to HP. DHL just called, they still don't know what to do with them. #notakebacks

• I talked about a support experience with HP last month. I thought that was the end of it. HP scheduled to have a DHL courier come out with the parts, and take the bad parts away. I was sick in bed the day this was supposed to happen, but the courier was an old guy in a beat up van. He took the parts away, and for tow weeks, DHL couldn't really figure out first, where the boxes went, then second, what to do with the boxes, and then finally, how many boxes we actually gave them. I talked to them last week, and convinced them that I sent two boxes back, not three, and they should just get them back to HP. I half expect to hear back from DHL again next week on this, a full month after they took the boxes away...
  

{May 12} Woke up this morning with the "Sanford and Son" theme running in my head. I'm not sure why...

• "I'm coming Elizabeth!" - my favorite part of the second Shrek movie.
  

{May 14} I am seriously considering giving up Cheetos for good...

• Cheetos make a mess. Cheesy fingers, you eat too many, and they give you a gut ache. I ate too many that day. Haven't had any since. We just bought a bag today, we'll see what happens...
  

{May 16} Keynotes at conferences are a lot like infomercials. "You get not 1, not 2, but 4! All in your private cloud! Order now!" #msteched

• The best 'keynote' I attended at a conference was with the Mythbusters. Normally they grate against me in some way. I will never attend one again without thinking about infomericals. Anyone who has been at a technology conference and attended a keynote address should know what I'm talking about.
  

{Sample of tons from last week} Guy on the escalator was annoyed that I did not walk down, but stood there. Stairs are to the left, buddy. My ankle hurts... #MSTechEd

• I went to this year's Microsoft TechEd conference last week. There were some interesting sessions there. The conference was held in Atlanta Georgia, in the big conference center down there. I had been to an HP conference there a few years back, if I'm remembering right. I had forgotten how much walking was required in that convention center. I estimate I walked 2-4 miles a day down there. (May not sound like a lot to you, but it's a lot for me right now.) Since then? Nothing. The conference had a twitter contest, where supposedly someone would win a prize for the best tweets. I have no idea if anyone won anything.
  

{May 20} As is my tradition, my old toothbrush is being left behind at the hotel. Someday my DNA will be harvested because of this habit...

• No one finds this weird, right?
  

{May 24} If there is no response to the note I wrote to one of the kid's teachers this morning - I will be secretly disappointed... #grumpyparent

• I lashed out at 'behavior cards' again this week. I wrote on the card something to the effect of "Can we please stop doing these things now? If the answer is no, I have stronger feelings about these behavior cards." I don't know what Mary's teachers said about those things, but it made Mary crazy if she ever forgot the thing on a school day. There was no response to the note, but the cards stopped coming home. I like to think I won, but Tara believes they stopped because Mary's teacher had a baby that morning. Whatever, I'm just happy to be done with the school for the year. (Today was the last day of school here.)
  

{May 26} Feel asleep on the ouch tonight. Now I feel like I folded in half - the long way...

• Someday we will replace our couches with new ones that are very comfortable to sleep on. The risk there is falling asleep on the couch, staying there all night, and not making it to the bed. The good thing about our current couch is you fall asleep on it, and wake up with weird aches and pains. Sleep all night on them, and they make you pay.
  

{May 26} less than two hours left to claim the play tickets before I randomly give them away. Who wants them?

• We had tickets to "Dairy of Anne Frank". We had other plans. I took the tickets over to the theater to give them away. Not lots of people going in to see the play. Tried giving them to a young couple, but they had tickets at the will call. A lady and her daughter were near there, and said they wanted them. Hope they enjoyed it.
  

{Today} Why is it that when I eat rotissery chicken, the C*H*I*P*S theme starts in my head? Weird repressed memory? Or jumbled associations?

• I have no idea what this was about. Just the way I am sometimes, I guess.
  

Restaurant Review

Mama Ninfa's Mexican Restaurant
Atlanta, Georgia

This evening I waked over to the Hard Rock Cafe, but when I got there, they were closed for a private party. And I wasn't the private party they were closed for. Half way back the block was a little Mexican restaurant with a couple of little old ladies trying to give people menus. I went back to the Mexican restaurant.

It was really good. The staff was friendly, the service was very fast, and the food was good. I had their beef fajitas.

Long story short - The food was good, it didn't cost too much, and I'm full. If you are in downtown Atlanta, looking for Mexican food, I suggest Mama Ninfa's. Much better than Jalapeno Charlie's...

Night at the ballpark

I try to make it a rule to go to a baseball game in any major league city I visit during the warm months. (Doesn't always work, but I try to make it a rule.) I am in Atlanta, (in case you couldn't tell) and got a chance to take in a ball game tonight.

It is a bit on the cool side for Atlanta in mid-May right now, today's high was around 60, during the game it was in the mid-50's, with the wind blowing. Ok for me, but I guess not so much for many of the natives, the stadium was only a quarter to a third full. (Side note: I estimated that the place held 25,000 people, but Wikipedia says 50,000. That either shows how poorly I estimate, or how badly Wikipedia can be off sometimes. It also means I may have guessed wrong on the number of bears in the car at the conference today...)


I paid $6.50 for my ticket, which ended up being on the upper portion of the bottom tier, along the first base line. I could have sat way down in front, there were so few people there, but I figured the upper deck provided some wind block, the few was great, so I kept myself planted. I had a ball park dog and fries for dinner, the lady in front of me gave me some of their peanuts. ($6.50 for a bag of peanuts. She was saying the exact same bag was $2 at Walmart, then she pulled one out of her handbag. A classic case of smuggling contraband into the ballpark. And now I'm complicit to the crime, since she shared...)

MLB has a smart phone app, where you can 'check in' while you are at the park. They had a promotion going at Turner field, now through the middle of June, if you check in at the park, you can get a free Braves hat. (One per phone for the duration of the promotion, some restrictions apply.) It's not the greatest quality ball cap in the world, but it's perfect for one of the kids...

We walked down to the ballpark shuttle, it was $2 for the trip down there, and really was a good way to get to the ball park. On the way back, I think someone tried to pick pocket me, but they hit the wrong pocket, and came away with nothing. (Also, my money and cards were in my inside jacket pocket, so they wouldn't have gotten anything of value, besides my temple recommend...)

All in all, it was a fun night. The conference had their Expo reception, the game was much better than watching a bunch of tech guys drink, and wandering around eating too much food. The Braves won the game, 3-2, over the Houston Astros. Their closer came out in the 9th inning, and was throwing 95-98 MPH fastballs. 98 MPH is noticeably different than 85 MPH. How does anyone hit something going that fast?

This was actually my second trip to Turner field. I don't remember who they played last time I was here, I just remember that it had rained just before the game started, and there was this fog over, around, and through the whole stadium...

Book review

Hope in Our Hearts
Russell M Nelson

This book is a collection of talks from Elder Nelson over the years, on the three general topics of 'Relationships and Family', 'Doctrines of the Kingdom', and 'Personal Growth'. A couple of the talks I remembered, at least generally, but most I didn't. In the introduction, Elder Nelson says that everyone encounters challenges and frustrations in life, but faithful people can be produced by 'continuous consistency in keeping the commandments of God'. I think that was kind of a theme in all the talks in the book. It was an interesting and inspirational book.

Restaurant Review

Jalapeno Charlie's
Atlanta Georgia

Tonight we decided to catch a restaurant close by the hotel, so we could get in before things got too busy around here tonight. We picked a Mexican place called "Jalapeno Charlie's". Actually, they said they were 'Latin Mexican Fusion', whatever that means.

I got the blackened fish tacos. They were ok, I would put them several notches above the fish tacos at Los Hermanos back home, but I might put them with on par or a notch below the crispy fish taco at Del Taco... I'm not sure what I expected. It was like they took a piece of fish, fried it in oil/butter, blackened it, and slapped it in a flour tortilla. Maybe I expect cabbage in my fish tacos, or something. I wasn't super impressed, but I didn't spend ten dollars on it, in downtown Atlanta, so I guess that's ok. Better than spending twice as much, and being disappointed all around...

After we left, I figured out the fusion part of the restaurant. That's when the food fuses to your sternum for a while afterwards. There was also something with sugar in it, I could feel it afterwards, and likely will wake up in the morning pretty sore, which is not a great start to a week on the road.

I would like to get some fried chicken while I am here. Jim wants to go to a German restaurant. Anyone else have other suggestions?

Perfect Squares

This month I turn 36. 36 is an interesting number. It's a perfect square 6x6=36. It's also the product of two perfect squares, 9 (3x3) and 4 (2x2). 9 x 4 = 36.

The last time this happened was when I turned 16. The next time it will happen is when I turn 81. Seems to be a reason to celebrate 36, I would say. But then you would say that I'm a nerd...

Tara asked what I wanted for my birthday. I told her anything was fine, as long as it was square.