It occurred to me this week that I no longer know why I still watch Lost. I still find some entertainment in it, but the excitement that accompanied the first two seasons is long gone. You know that every episode is going to ask more questions than it answers, and the few answers that it does offer up are to questions that I hadn’t been asking! This season has made an attempt at trying to tie up some of the loose ends of seasons past, but the writer’s strike put a serious damper on it, and probably reduced the amount of material the writers could tie up significantly. I am tempted to wait till the whole bloody thing is out on DVD and watch all of the seasons back to back from the beginning. If I did it that way I would at least be able to avoid the weekly exercise in futility. *sigh*

There was a great article over at the Brazen Careerist where Penelope Trunk breaks down some of the most annoying goings on of a typical workplace that most people wouldn’t miss. I think that she makes some valid points about the uselessness of a candy machine, the giant office party, and money solicitations at work. I think that people should be held accountable for their reluctance or inability to keep up with current work and office trends. Some of the things we find annoying in today’s office are remnants of the office of yesterday and should be put out to pasture and beaten down like the spiteful fax machine in Office Space.

Voicemail is a useless dinosaur, and people who insist on using it improperly should be held accountable. If you MUST leave a voicemail message, don’t just ask me to call you back or stop by. Give me an idea of what you want to discuss or it is unlikely that you’ll get anything back but an email. For that matter, if you want to talk to me, come by personally or propose a meeting time. Phone tag is annoying enough in my personal life so why do I need it to add to my blood pressure at work? In the time it took you to sit through my ancient voicemail message, wait for the beep, and babble incoherently for 45 seconds, you could’ve sent me a two sentence email with more substance. The point is this: If I work with you on a semi-regular basis, you shouldn’t have to leave me voicemail. The only exceptions should be to distribute important messages to employees in an emergency. I’m fine with receiving that kind of voicemail, but don’t leave a message for me asking me to come to the break room for the monthly birthday cake.

My links for 2007-09-08

My links for 2007-07-27

I have been well aware of Global Warming and eco problems since high school. I was lucky enough to go to a school where the science teachers spent time talking about real issues, not just theory and hypotheses out of textbooks. I have been concerned about weather and environmental changes for some time, so it’s great to see so many people share my concern and start making changes in their lives to curtail additional damage to the planet.

I have been personally making some changes in the ways I think, shop, recycle, and live to help reduce my personal carbon footprint. In my reading I was recently introduced to the concept of Carbon Offsets, where you give money to companies or funds that is used to plant trees, clean up the environment, provide cleaner water, and perform various other eco-friendly tasks. When I first read about it, it sounded great on paper. If you have to fly somewhere, you donate some money to plant some trees. How nice.

Jason Kottke didn’t get his copy of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows on July 21st as promised by Amazon, and he’s not the only one. UPS claimed that a delivery attempt was made and no one was there to receive the parcel. The funny thing is, he was home all day. Amazon, however, was good enough to refund him even though the problem lies with UPS.

Early last week when I left my apartment to check my mail (which is three feet from my apartment door), a UPS notice fluttered to the ground. I picked it up and a delivery attempt had been made to drop a package at my apartment not even an hour earlier. I was, at most, 10 feet from the door the whole day. Sitting here at my dining room table, doing some work online. Why would a UPS driver get out of his truck, walk to my door, and stick a note on it without even attempting to ring the bell or knocking? It took longer for this person to write up the slip and stick it to my door than it would have for them to knock. I don’t get it.

My links for 2007-07-10

If you were not convinced that the American news media has its priorities wrong, this one incident should be evidence enough. Larry King rescheduled Michael Moore’s hour long interview about his new movie SiCKO to interview Paris Hilton the day after her release from prison. Rather than showing some journalistic integrity and allowing Michael Moore to discuss his movie and the state of health care in America, King pandered to the unwashed masses and interviewed the vapid heiress for an entire hour.

I expect this kind of behavior from a talk show host, or from a major network that’s trying to win ratings. I did not, however, expect this to happen on CNN, which much of the country trusts for its news. The fact that Moore was going to be discussing his movie, which highlights the shortcomings of the health care and insurance industry in this country, makes it that much worse. Americans need to hear the truth about how some of the major health care insurance providers have denied payments for life saving treatments to their customers. Moore’s movie is a vital instrument in the campaign to create a national health care system which could save hundreds of lives each year. Instead viewers got to see Paris Hilton’s drawings from when she was in prison, and hear her read the poems she wrote while locked up. Somehow that doesn’t seem like a fair trade.

My links for 2007-06-20

As always I find myself bouncing around the web and finding new and interesting tools. It’s no secret that I read a lot of news and blogs online, and I find a lot of interesting services that way. As a blogger it’s also the best way to find new tools to make blogging easier.

Bill at bill2me.com mentioned that he was using coComment which allows you to easily track all of the blog discussions you participate in. When new comments are posted to the threads you have been tracking, it also makes it easy to return there to continue the discussion. coComment also has a Firefox extension which makes automatically alerts you to new comments. Right now I am trying it out and I have to say that I enjoy using it. It allows you to keep up with the discussion in a timely manner and make comments when they are still relevant to the conversation. By following up on discussions you can also drive traffic to your blog.