Things That Keep Me Awake At Night

So I was thinking the other night....if I died, how long would it take anyone to notice? For me I am guessing at least four days. I was discussing this with some people and one of them claimed he would notice....umm, yeah, and it has been three weeks since we have even chatted. Nice thought, but he would not notice. My work? I do not have an office to go to, so they would not notice. Kind of a weird feeling. Not like it would matter, cause I would be dead. Maybe I have been watching too much "Dead Like Me."

Silence

When you ask a question of someone and all you get in response is silence, what do you assume? I have been thinking about this a lot lately. The obvious assumption would be that they just did not hear the question. But not everyone assumes that. The other options would be negative response, positive response or apathy. Now when I send a text to someone and they do not respond, I assume it is a no. Recently my manager held a conference call and every time she asked a question, there were only crickets. In that situation I would assume everyone was feeling apathetic. As I was thinking of this, I suddenly had to laugh when I remembered a completely different response to silence when I was a kid in church council meetings. The head elder used to say, "I will take your silence for consent."

From the Archives

I think I remember this pictures being taken. The sun was in my eyes. But that is pretty obvious even if I do not remember the moment. I am pretty certain this was from a weekend excursion to Monterey with Richard and Layna.

Happiness Campaign Update

That Guy

No one wants to be that guy. I remember very well management at my last company even giving us all lectures about not being that guy, right before events especially the big ones like the national yearly recognition trip. But there is always one. I was happy that when I did go on the recognition trip, I actually knew the person that turned out to be that guy and I actually witnessed the event that gave him the title. It was the beginning of the last evening when we were all bussed to a nice restaurant for dinner before the awards ceremony. One of my teammates had already had a few drinks and stumbled into the fountain. He recovered very nicely, but not in time to avoid the title. When the very first speech was made that night the incident was mentioned. It happens in an instant and then you are stuck being that guy.

So Thursday night when I got home around 10pm, there was water gushing into my garage. When I got upstairs I realized the entire building was without water. I assumed someone else in the building had already called the proper authorities. I also prayed that since LA is always short on water, someone would come out to fix it in the middle of the night. Wishful thinking. I woke up on Friday morning unable to take a shower, brush my teeth or wash my face. Disgusting. Thank God it was not a Monday. While I was out in the field I decided to call the building manager just in case the situation had not been reported. She called me back and left me a message telling me that it was already in the process of being fixed. And that the situation was caused by the tenants in unit 7 who had run into the pipe in the garage and broke it. As annoyed as I was, with the inconvenience I immediately realized there was a worse person to be in this scenario......that guy.

Department of State

I just wrote a check to the Department of State. I do not normally like writing out checks for any sum of money, but this one seems worth it. It is time for me to renew my passport.

This is my second passport that has expired. It makes me feel a little special that I am applying for my third passport and I am significantly younger than my favorite vice president contender that only got hers last year. Or did she? I can not remember. Anyway, my first passport was issued when I was 14 and I remember my dad measuring my height for it and adding a quarter or half of an inch assuming I would grow that much in the six months before I used it. Yeah, I'm pretty sure I never made it to the height he put on my application. But I appreciate the optimism, Dad! My second passport was issued in time for me to go back for my second summer in Israel. I was never fond of the picture in it and was therefore not sad when I realized that it expired 19th of May 2009.

I am planning a trip out of the country in December and realized that I might as well get started on the important things. Last week, I had a new picture taken. Not a great one, but a significant improvement. Today I stopped at the Post Office and picked up a renewal form. Tonight I wrote out the check. Ouch. But worth it. I packed the envelope which included my expired passport and then I realized....I was sending away one of my favorite souvenirs, never to be seen again. So I opened the envelope back up and copied my favorite pages. Here they are....

On page 8 we have the South African Visa from July 2001. I left for that trip the same day Grandpa and Grandma Angle left CA after Dad's 50th birthday celebration. And only months before the Human Rights Summit in Durbin. On page 9 we have four stamps. Top left the stamp from the trip through Canada on the way to my summer at Yad Hashmona in 1999. Top right the stamp coming back to the US from my last trip to Israel tour of 2000. Bottom left the stamp from the day on Tortola, BVI with Libby in February of 2004. Bottom right, stamp from Christmas Eve 2001 arriving back in the US from the trip to London with Libby. We went to London because we figured we should take advantage of the cheap airfare when no one wanted to fly very much due to 9/11.

Page 10 arrival and departure stamps from Ben Gurion Border Control from the last trip to Israel in March of 2000. Page 11 my visa for Egypt that I never used summer of 1999. The day Craig and I got those visas was the only day I really remember using a vacation day at Yad Hashmona. It was such a hot humid day in Tel Aviv. I think we had lunch at the Planet Hollywood in Tel Aviv and I remember buying the Lighthouse Family cd.

Shalom, Chaver. May you rest in peace with all the other passports.

My goal for the next one is to fill more of the pages....

Michael Jackson

I was watching Michael Jackson's funeral last night online and it made me angry. Not at Michael, and not because I know that my funeral will not be big enough to need the Staples Center. I was angry about funerals in general. Angry about their timing. Why do we wait until people are dead to say fantastic things about them?

Growing up without a tv, I never knew what an entertainer Michael was. I only knew the weird stuff in the media.

It has been a very interesting few weeks.