Category: Life

Last week was terribly frustrating. I am working on a high-profile project at work, and something that is critical to my segment. The group that is taking the lead on this project has deep expertise in most areas necessary to the success of the project, except for one area: knowledge of the segment to which we’re marketing. That’s where I’m supposed to add value, along with three or four other people with similar expertise.

Instead, however, the lead group won’t even talk to us. If we chime in on virtually any issue, we’re simply ignored. I have developed strong relationships with people in that lead group over the past two years, and now, when I open my mouth to contribute, all I get is condescension. Basically, instead of trying to collaboratively develop a program, I’m in an unnecessary turf war.

My only remaining tactic is to run and cry to "mommy" and "daddy" (two senior executives that have leverage over the group in question). Problem is, we’re not losing one or two big battles. We’re losing lots of skirmishes that are irrelevant by themselves. When I go to "mommy" and "daddy," they justifiably point out that each little bit isn’t important. Only once have I made any progress, because the position this group was taking, while valid along one narrow logical path, was utterly unjustifiable from a broader perspective.

It’s death by a thousand cuts.

A colleague at work, Dennis, made a point to tell workers at the cafeterias the day after the boycott "we missed you yesterday." He said he got a warm, broad smile every time he said it.

I wish I’d thought of that.

A friend of mine, Christine, blogged about the online dating height thing recently (Link: Katabasis), and I couldn’t help but chime in, considering my own obsession with height and online dating.

So, average heights for men in the US are estimated to be between 5’9" and 5’10". The average height for women ranges between 5’3.5" and 5’4". As compared to 100 years ago, however, the average height of men was between 5’5" and 5’6", women 5’2" to 5’3". The differential is part of sexual dimorphism, or the physical, non-reproductive differences between males and females of a species (e.g. the differences in plumage between male and female birds).

The thing to note is the increase from an average 3" in difference to 6" in difference between human males and females. This means a lot. For example, for me, it means that, if potential mates insist on that differential, I can date women who are 5’2" or shorter, instead of 5’5" or shorter. My friend Christine, who is 5’7" would have to have a man 6’1" instead of 5’10" to maintain the differential.

The challenge is that height falls in a normal distribution: half of the population is shorter than the average, half is taller. The mean deviation is also extremely narrrow, about 3" for men, meaning that 68% of men are between 5’6" and 6’0". In otherwords, a mere 16% of men are 6’1" or taller.

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Nine years.
Ten chapters.
126 pages.
882 paragraphs.
63,650 words.
301,546 characters.

[photo right: the full manuscript, single-sided, double-spaced. The page count above is single-spaced on 5.5×8.5 paper]

It’s done. It’s written. I started nine years ago, in July of 1997, to write a book about my experiences in the West Bank in 1997. The basis of the book were my blog entries from February, March, April and May of 1997.

I put the book aside within one year, barely two-thirds written. I only picked it up again in 2004, the summer after business school when I was looking for a job.

Now it’s done.

Oh, I have a few weeks of editing and tweaking, and some of the sections are weak. But it’s done. There’s no more to write.

To put it in Oracle marketing terms, I’ve been thinking about my click-through-rate and my cost-per-download. I’ve been using the same online-dating site, personals.salon.com, for three years now, with mixed results. I tried this site because Jonathan and Christine–two friends from the tech crowd at NYU–met their spouses on the site. I also fell in love with their business model: pay-per-use, or, more accurately, pay-per-contact.

Almost a year ago, the original pay-per-use company went bankrupt, and the remaining assets–including the customer base–was purchased by a competitor that adheres to the subscription model. This happened exactly one year after I moved back to San Francisco so I’ve had two years to evaluate the models.

I have noted that my response rate–that is, the ratio of women who reply to the number of initial emails I send–has gone down.

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I find myself in an odd place professionally. I have a paycheck, a desk, and a segment to market to. But I don’t really have a job or function. It’s an odd sort of uncertainty.

Today, I received a check for $381.42 from E. Lynn Schoenmann, the Chapter 7 Bankruptcy Trustee for EmployeeService.com, my employer until 11-Jan-2001. You see, EmployeeService.com failed to pay wages to a single employee for the final two weeks of service.

$381.42 is a mere fraction of what I was owed, of course. I was owed $2,700 in wages, plus $2,538 in upaid vacation time.

I padded that even further with the California Labor Code, sections 201 and 203 (I was unemployed–I had lots of free time). Section 203 conveniently requires an employer who willfully fails to pay wages upon discharge to continue paying the employee for thirty days as a penalty. Considering that EmployeeService.com did not file a bankruptcy claim until mid-March and had money in the bank at the time all employees were laid off (11-Jan-2001), I figure that qualifies for "willful." Anyway, that came out to an additional $6,500, meaning I had a claim for $11,538.

So I got 3.3% of my claim.

At least I can finally deduct the remaining $11,156.58 as an unrecoverable debt on my taxes. And I have an extra $381.42!

My friend Kevin went on a first date last night with a man he met on The Onion personals (the same service I use). He had thought the fellow was a very well preserved 35 based on his picture. But, the picture was taken eight years and forty pounds ago. Another friend, CK, went on a date with a fellow who claimed he was 5’11" and turned out to be just an inch or two taller than her.

Lying on online personals is pervasive, but it brings up the question of incentives and cultural norms. Kevin, CK and I both tell the truth in our online ads. I’m not the tallest guy, I’m scrawny, and that’s there in the profile. Neither Kevin nor CK can claim to be athletic or slim/toned. But here’s the thing: everyone else does lie.

So what do you do?

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