ath3na's talking points

Why? Because it's fun!

Sleeping Lessons by The Shins, off their album: Wincing the Night Away!

Go without 'til the need seeps in
You low animal, collect your novel petals for the stem
And glow, glow, melt and flow
Eviscerate your fragile frame

Spill it out on the ragged floor
A thousand different versions of yourself

And if the old guards still offend
They got nothing left on which you depend
So enlist every ounce of your bright blood
And off with their heads, jump from the hook
You're not obliged to swallow anything that you despise
See, those unrepenting buzzards want your life
And they got no right as sure as you have eyes
They got no right

Just put yourself in my new shoes
And see that I do what I do
Because the old guards still offend
They got nothing left on which we depend
So enlist every ounce of your bright blood
And off with their heads, jump from the hook
You're not obliged to swallow anything you despise

omg. those words... and the music.... wow! that's all i can say. excuse the language in the post title, but it really is just a great fkn song. that's all i can say. great fkn song. the kind of song that makes you want to stand in a beautiful and natural grassy field with your arms spread wide and just spin and watch the sky. here's a link to a live video, and the music video, it's the best i can do atm. listen to it and tell me what u think.

** Edit: Now you can listen to the song directly on my blog by clicking the song title (Sleeping Lessons) in the white box to the right here. Check it out! **

Thirty spokes share the wheel's hub;
It is the center hole that makes it useful.
Shape clay into a vessel;
It is the space within that makes it useful.
Cut doors and windows for a room;
It is the holes which make it useful.
Therefore profit comes from what is there;
Usefulness from what is not there.

To talk little is natural.
High winds do not last all morning.
Heavy rain does not last all day.
Why is this? Heaven and earth!
IF heaven and earth cannot make things eternal,
How is it possible for man?

He who follows the Tao
Is at one with the Tao.
He who is virtuous
Experiences Virtue.
He who loses the way
Feels lost.
When you are at one with the Virtue,
The Virtue is always there.
When you are at one with loss,
The loss is experienced willingly.

He who does not trust enough.
Will not be trusted.

Those who know do not talk.
Those who talk do not know.

Keep your mouth closed.
Guard your senses.
Temper your sharpness.
Simplify your problems.
Mask your brightness.
Be at one with the dust of the earth.
This is primal union.

He who has achieved this state
Is unconcerned with friends and enemies,
With good and harm, with honor and disgrace.
This therefore is the highest state of man.

Because I've had a lot of change going on in my life recently, I thought it appropriate to summarize my recent experiences with a collection of quotes I've found, and comment on them.

“We take great pains to persuade others that we are happy than in to think so ourselves.” - Confucious

This quote is so true to how we all feel, I believe. Confucious has this way of touching the part of our persona we don't let out much. He's very right though, we go through these acts, with the world as our stage (Shakespearean, I know), playing our lives out, vying to convince the world that we are something we aren't [always]. For once in my life though, I've convinced myself (though temporary it may be), that I am indeed happy.

"Sometimes it's the smallest decisions that can change your life forever." - Kerri Russell

Isn't this the truth? It's often the smallest decisions that make the biggest impact on our lives. These decisions are also, often, the decisions we spend more time acting on rather than thinking on. Aren't we a genius species?!

“All of life is a journey which paths we take, what we look back on, and what we look forward to is up to us. We determine our destination, what kind of road we will take to get there, and how happy we are when we get there.” - Anonymous

I'd like to reference the Confucious quote here, because it's pertinent to this particular quote as well. I'd also like to make note of the last phrase of this quote: We determine...how happy we are when we get there. It's not the world that needs convincing of our happiness, it's ourselves. Once you convince yourself that you are indeed happy, then the world will know, without your effort.

“The most wonderful of all things in life, I believe, is the discovery of another human being with whom one's relationship has a growing depth, beauty, and joy as the years increase. This inner progressiveness of love between two human beings is a most marvelous thing; it cannot be found by looking for it or by passionately wishing for it. It is a sort of divine accident, and the most wonderful of all things in life.”- Hugh Walpole, Sr.

Isn't it wonderful to find another person in this world with whom your soul can agree? It's such a rare occurrence, and one that you can never expect or plan for. This is most definitely the most wonderful of all things in life.

“Friendship improves happiness and abates misery, by the doubling of our joy and the dividing of our grief.”- Marcus Tullius Cicero

True friendship is hard to find, but easy to keep. Once you find it, it's like enlightenment, it is pure joy (which is the name of this post, in Simplified Chinese).

I hope that if you know me already, I've helped you find some joy, and if I ever meet you, that I can help spread the joy that has been endowed to me. I hope that I can choose to be as happy with life, as I am right now.

If you didn't already know, I minored in Religious Studies. Now, while it's not necessarily narrowed down on paper, I did focus mostly on Asian Religion, more specifically Taoism, Buddhism, and Hinduism. With that being said, I'd like to briefly describe the concept of Wu Wei. Hopefully this will be the first of many many posts on such subjects.

The simplest definition of Wu Wei (pronounced woo way) is knowing when to act and when not to act. Wu may be translated as not have; Wei may be translated as do, act, serve as, govern. Quite literally it means "without action." Wu Wei is a fundamental tenant of the Taoist school of thought. The aim of wu wei is to achieve a state of perfect equilibrium, or alignment with the Tao, and, as a result, obtain an irresistible form of "soft and invisible" power.

In the context of my life, I like to use the simplest definition of knowing when to act and when not to act. This is something that a lot of people do not give much thought. Why do things happen as they do? Is there a reason that that person told you that thing at that particular time?

The concept of wu wei is not necessarily that you put a whole lot of thought, time, or energy into knowing when to act or when not to act, but rather that you have become one with the Tao enough so that you just know.

I like to think that I know when to act and when not to act, without much effort. Sometimes though this doesn't work out as well as I'd like, especially since I seem to like to talk a lot. It's my mouth that usually gets me in trouble. So do we pay attention to the particular way in which things fall in our lives? Are the things in our life that we conceive in our lives to be ironic, really just the natural order of things? Ever consider what would happen if that particular thing didn't happen at that particular time? or if that person had said something different? or if you had gone a different direction?

I'd like to touch on some of these idea's in relation to the Taoist, Buddhist, and Hindu schools of thought. This is just the beginning.

By the time most of you read this you'll have missed this one in a lifetime moment, but being the good friend I am, I'm going to tell you about it so that you will have not missed out.

At three minutes and four seconds after 2 AM on the 6th of May this year, the time and date will be 02:03:04 05/06/07. This will never happen again. Europeans will have to wait until June 5th for this event.

Now I'm sure you've all noticed the coincidence. At exactly that time we will have a consecutive number pattern from 2-7. This perfect sequence will occur only and exactly once. I mean, it will occur again 02:03:04, on May 6th, 2107, but I'm not entirely sure I'll be around for that, seeing as that it's 100 year's from now.

If you think about it, every second only occurs once, which means that each individual number sequence is unique and special, but we're so busy with our lives that rarely do we think about such things.

With this perspective, "time-management" takes on a whole new meaning. Each and every second produces a genuinely unique pattern that will never again occur!

So I say take this very moment to do something. Celebrate this moment. Be joyous in the second. There is no time for procrastination, the time is now.

I should take my own advice, so I plan from now on to live more in the right now, the this very moment.

It's one of those days where you wake-up, and only because the phone was ringing, relentlessly. You look at the clock after bolting to answer the phone only to realize that it's 7:45 and you're supposed to be at work by 8, and it's a 20 minute drive there on a good-day, with no traffic. Yep, this is how my morning began. Late. So, I get to work, with no breakfast -though I must admit that my brother was particularly nice to me this morning, which is in itself different- just to be sent out to Hardee's to get everyone breakfast. Now I'm not complaining about this, as I wasn't looking forward to the Strawberry Pop-Tarts my brother tossed me from the front door. So off I go for breakfast, and I still can't seem to get woke-up completely. You see, my Mom finally turned on the air condition last night. I must say, it was the best sleep I've had in weeks. So, with all that being said... show me some love, I need it today. =D

**Edit: What do you think of the new template? I thought I'd change it so that mine wouldn't be just like another certain unnamed bloggers (who's name starts with an M and ends with an ike). Like it or should I go back to the other one? I did like it. Your opinions please...

So, I just had to share this, particularly have sharing my particular person vexation yesterday. I thought it ironic that I run across this today while stumbling. I did not come up with these on my own, they are simply copy and pasted from Tech Republic. The original can be found here. I just had to repeat them since it seems to go with the flow.

Please read on...

We all work in different environments, in different industries, with different departmental structures, different installed bases, and different users. But as support techs, we share the common goal of helping people and computers live in harmony. Over the years, I've worked in a variety of industries, from commercial aircraft manufacturing to management consulting, from a chemical plant to a ceramics factory. And although the hardware, software, and people have changed, the irritants have had an alarming tendency to remain the same. So here, in no particular order, are my top 10 persistent peeves.

#1 Users who insist on giving you their diagnosis of a problem rather than a neutral description of the symptoms.

A classic example of this is the VP who constantly tells me that the T1 is down whenever he can't browse the Web or log into SAP. Instead of describing the symptoms, the VP tells me, "The T1 is down; fix it." This type of behavior is doubly annoying. Not only does it complicate the troubleshooting process, but it is also often difficult to disabuse the user of his misconception, leaving him, in this instance, with a false impression of an unreliable T1.

#2 Users who hover around asking questions while you're troubleshooting—and worse, making suggestions.

As much as I like to share my knowledge and educate users, I don’t want to do so while I’m struggling to figure out exactly why Ethel can’t print. This is particularly irritating when dealing with an apparently insoluble problem, as the user’s probing questions, which I can’t answer, are a reminder of my incompetence.

#3 Users who deny having done anything that may have caused the problem.

This is the "What? Doom is installed on my computer? I have absolutely no idea how that could’ve happened" phenomenon. In one instance, a summer intern from the local university MBA program called the help desk to complain that he couldn’t access the network. A quick survey of his computer revealed that it no longer contained any files beginning with the letter n. The intern vehemently denied having deleted any files whatsoever but eventually confessed that he didn’t have anything to do so thought he’d delete all the files he didn’t recognize. Why he started with the letter n remains a mystery.

#4 Being treated like a user by tech support from another company.

I dread problems that result in a call to the manufacturer’s tech support department. I will experiment, read manuals, Google the error message, and sacrifice chickens on the keyboard before I will call a tech support number for a problem I can’t resolve. My pride simply can’t handle answering the most basic questions: Have you checked that the printer is in fact plugged in and turned on? ARRRGGGH. Get me out of here. Please, please, please, put me straight through to your highest support level because I can guarantee that I have tried everything you are going to suggest at least three times. Oh wait, never mind, the power strip was turned off….

#5 Purchasing departments that change purchase requests.

I understand and appreciate that part of the role of the purchasing department is to find the best possible price, but I do not appreciate it when they substitute what they consider to be an equivalent item because it is cheaper. One particularly irritating instance of this was an order I submitted for Kingston RAM for a Lexmark printer. When the RAM arrived, I failed to notice that it was Golden RAM instead of Kingston. It simply didn’t work. A quick check of the Lexmark documentation confirmed that Golden RAM was not acceptable, but as the RAM was now “used” it could not be returned. The purchasing clerk had made the substitution on the advice of our VAR, as there was a special on the Golden RAM that made it a third of the cost of the Kingston RAM. This proved to be a very expensive attempt at cost savings.

#6 Internal junk mail.

We go to great lengths to minimize the junk mail being sent into the organization, but there seems to be little we can do to eliminate the jokes, photos, and movies being shared internally. Policies preventing or in some way restricting personal mail are of limited use unless mail is manually screened or spot checks are made. Merely using the corporate e-mail system for sending the occasional personal message is not a big deal, but when people start liberally using “Everyone” or create folders for “Recipes,” “Baseball,” and “Boy Scouts,” I tend to get a little annoyed.

#7 Users who think part of my job is to spend my lunch break telling them how to fix their home computers.

During one particular job interview, my prospective new boss announced that he would hire only people who “eat, breath, sleep, and think computers 24/7.” I stood up, shook his hand, and told him I was wasting his time and wished him luck. Not that there’s anything wrong with being computer-obsessed; it just so happens that I’m not. If I were, I would probably welcome having my peanut butter sandwich interrupted by, “Uh, every time I try to access the Internet, this message pops up and then the mouse freezes. What’s the deal?” I’m more than happy to help people out. I just resent being asked at work where I’m a captive audience.

#8 Users who complain about not being able to use a new application, when they “didn’t have time” to attend training or read the documentation you painstakingly prepared.

I find this situation especially irritating because in most cases, the user really didn’t have time to attend training or read the documentation—so it wouldn’t be fair of me to vent my frustration on the user. This is a symptom of the far bigger problem of expecting too much of too few employees. Instead of being irritated at these people, I find that they have my deepest sympathy, as they are usually the most overworked and pressured people in the organization.

#9 Being summoned to a user’s office to resolve an urgent computer problem, only to be kept waiting.

This is extra annoying when the person in question is on a personal phone call with her husband to discuss plans for the weekend. I never know how long to wait. Leaving instantly would seem churlish, but once I have waited beyond a certain length of time, leaving and having to return a few minutes later simply increases the total time wasted. Fortunately, in all but the most intractable cases, treating the user as a used car salesperson by starting to walk away usually elicits a cooperative response.

#10 The positioning of the IT department in the organization.

During the course of my career, I have reported to an office manager who reported to a regional office VP; to an IT manager who reported to the CFO; to an IT manager who reported to another IT manager who reported to the CFO; to an IT manager who reported to a committee; and to a department head who wasn’t sure who he reported to. Whereas most departments know where they are positioned within a company, no one seems to quite know what to do with IT. All too often, the IT department is made into a subdivision of some other department, which then has unfair control over the IT resources. In other instances, each department or division has its own IT function, which may or may not have a well-defined relationship with corporate IT.

Tell me what you think...leave a comment.

Pet peeve is the game. Interruption is the name.

Answers.com, which I've come to rely on (particularly having such smart folks around me), defines a pet peeve as... Something about which one frequently complains; a particular personal vexation.

With that being said... I hate to be interrupted. This would be my primary pet peeve, I suppose. Again, I'll reference Answers.com to define interruption:

1. To break the continuity or uniformity of: Rain interrupted our baseball game.
2. To hinder or stop the action or discourse of (someone) by breaking in on: The baby interrupted me while I was on the phone.

Now, I know, call me stupid, but the word interruption doesn't necessarily need defining you might say. This is true, however, I'd like to note that some people don't fully seem to understand the definition. To break the continuity or uniformity of, that means if I'm in the middle of a sentence and you begin to talk, you've then interrupted. This is where my frustration comes in mostly. It's the interruption of conversation or of a task I may be working on. This is something that the majority of people pay no attention to because, as my good friend would say, they're self-absorbed (which will be the subject of a post all to itself one day).

I get particularly frustrated when interrupted, mostly because if it's something I feel strongly about, then I likely have a hard enough time saying without having someone barge in and interrupt me mid-sentence. I feel like, if I'm gonna take the time to formulate the words, and come out with them, and think you care enough to listen, then you should.

The other way interruption exasperates me is what often happens when I'm at work. I realize that my main priority is to assist our patrons in their computer endeavors, and I'm okay with that. I like to help people. It's just that I also have other things that need done, and it can be very frustrating when you get into something just enough.... and then get interrupted to go and help someone. I usually feel bad about getting frustrated but, I have ADD, and once I get a steady-flow going on the task at hand... I'd like to keep it going. Oddly enough though, I've found that I can keep a steady IM conversation going, while working on the task at hand... am I good or what? I guess I'm just a h4xX0r*.

Anyway, just to specify, so I don't sound like a shrew, nothing in particular prompted the writing of this post. I couldn't decide what to write on and I thought that discussing my pet peeve's might be a good subject for discussion. So, what do you think? Think I'm a n00b? Think I'm a h4xX0R?

*Hacker