I saw the Beatles "Love" show in in The Mirage Resort in Las Vegas on Sunday, April 8, 2007.
It was quite beautiful and arty.
Most Cirque du Soleil shows are more athletic and gymnastic and tend to feature various "acts." This show was different; more of an ensemble feel, lots of activity going on, lots of ensemble and group dancing, high energy with the occasional trapeze or rope artist or other sorts of things, including solo dancing.
Great sound, great lighting and effects. The show is in the theater that used to be the Siegfried and Roy space. It's in the round and I can tell you that the show uses every cubic inch of the space; every square inch of stage and all the way to the ceiling.
I had front row seats and everyone in the very front section ringing the stage is inside one of the effects; the rest of the house saw the outside, we saw the inside and were part of the show; we were allowed to manipulate part of the set. It must have looked really cool from the outside because it got a huge roar from the crowd when it finished.
The show is considerably longer than the soundtrack; there are other songs not included plus there is some great great great inter-action set pieces featuring projections of actors (in silhouette) portraying the Fabs acting to dialog created by edited-together interview statements, studio banter, maybe even some flexi-disk stuff. You don't see the actors as anything but silhouettes so you aren't distracted by a less-than-look-alike.
There are large video screens around the venue that add video effects and occasionally other screens are dropped from the ceiling showing Shea Stadium clips and other performances.
Both "Something" and "While My Guitar gently Weeps" are very poignant set pieces as well. Sniff sniff (tear? what tear? I wasn't crying! I had something in my eye!). "Help!" is a high energy very fun section of the show with rollerbladers and "Lucy In the Sky With Diamonds" has a gorgeous starry sky. "Revolution" has hippies and riot cops squaring off on trampolines.
There is even a reference to drinking tea(!).
If it's not the most expensive show in town it's close but both of us really enjoyed it and being front row was quite frankly worth every penny of the $165 per ticket price.
Tuesday, April 10, 2007
Monday, April 2, 2007
Linköping, Sweden
I spent a week in Linköping, Sweden last week.
Outbound I had 3 flights; LAX to FRA, FRA to CPH and then CPH to my final destination, Linköping, SE.
The FRA layover was tight to begin with, only 1:45, but the plane left late and never made it up so I had to "walk briskly" to my connecting flight. I made it OK but then I was REALLY late for the final leg. I made it though with about 2 minutes to spare after being asked a stupid question by the counter person ("Why are you so late?" "Ask Lufthansa and SAS, I did my part.").
The week was pretty boring at times so I ended up re-writing a spec for the software guys since they didn't know how to do it themselves and only partially participating in the meetings. While I was there I saw 3 Swedish National Championship hockey games on TV; the hometown team won all three.
Going home was only slightly better; I took the train from Linköping to Stockholm, overnighted at an airport Euro-Motel 6 and then got up waaaaaaaaay too early to head home with that plane ending up being late and my 2 hour layover being reduced to a brisk airport walk again only to find out the homeward leg was 1 hour late, too.
By the time I'd gotten home I'd been up 20+ hours, feel asleep too early and then woke up at the wrong time so last night I fought to stay awake until 9 PM.
One thing that really love about my job is that we are getting more and more international on each successive project. My San Diego location has gotten away from writing software and are now more of a hardware design and systems engineering location. For example, for this "Japan" project we have a team in Japan as main interface to the customer. The hardware and systems are being done in my location and the software is being done in multiple locations; Linköping, Sweden, St Petersburg, Russian and Bangalore, India.
We had folks from all of those locations in Linköping last week. During lunch one day last week, we discussed where we wanted to have the next meeting. Mikhail from St Petersburg commented that he was only about an hour or so flight from Stockholm. I looked at him and said , "I would love to come to St Petersburg. That would be the most incredible trip I've ever taken."
I was thinking about how amazing my career had changed in 20 years; to go from ultimate Cold War Doomsday Machine aerospace asshole to Silicon Valley start-ups to international travel for a huge high tech company to a place I would NEVER have been allowed to go to even 15 years ago by my first employer.
Photos
Outbound I had 3 flights; LAX to FRA, FRA to CPH and then CPH to my final destination, Linköping, SE.
The FRA layover was tight to begin with, only 1:45, but the plane left late and never made it up so I had to "walk briskly" to my connecting flight. I made it OK but then I was REALLY late for the final leg. I made it though with about 2 minutes to spare after being asked a stupid question by the counter person ("Why are you so late?" "Ask Lufthansa and SAS, I did my part.").
The week was pretty boring at times so I ended up re-writing a spec for the software guys since they didn't know how to do it themselves and only partially participating in the meetings. While I was there I saw 3 Swedish National Championship hockey games on TV; the hometown team won all three.
Going home was only slightly better; I took the train from Linköping to Stockholm, overnighted at an airport Euro-Motel 6 and then got up waaaaaaaaay too early to head home with that plane ending up being late and my 2 hour layover being reduced to a brisk airport walk again only to find out the homeward leg was 1 hour late, too.
By the time I'd gotten home I'd been up 20+ hours, feel asleep too early and then woke up at the wrong time so last night I fought to stay awake until 9 PM.
One thing that really love about my job is that we are getting more and more international on each successive project. My San Diego location has gotten away from writing software and are now more of a hardware design and systems engineering location. For example, for this "Japan" project we have a team in Japan as main interface to the customer. The hardware and systems are being done in my location and the software is being done in multiple locations; Linköping, Sweden, St Petersburg, Russian and Bangalore, India.
We had folks from all of those locations in Linköping last week. During lunch one day last week, we discussed where we wanted to have the next meeting. Mikhail from St Petersburg commented that he was only about an hour or so flight from Stockholm. I looked at him and said , "I would love to come to St Petersburg. That would be the most incredible trip I've ever taken."
I was thinking about how amazing my career had changed in 20 years; to go from ultimate Cold War Doomsday Machine aerospace asshole to Silicon Valley start-ups to international travel for a huge high tech company to a place I would NEVER have been allowed to go to even 15 years ago by my first employer.
Photos
Saturday, February 24, 2007
Week Over
Week Over
Well, another week with our Japan team and our KDDI customer is over. We had a good series of meetings; they seem to be warming up to us loud obnoxious Americans.
We were at Donovan's last night, one of the top 10 steakhouses in the country. We were utterly stuffed with food; I made all of the Japanese guys order a Stone Brewing Co Arrogant Bastard ale with dinner. Stone is local in San Marcos and an award-winning brewery. The ABs came in 20 ounce bottles. We had a good time and the wait staff were very cool and very helpful with the English (or lack thereof).
Today I went over the specification with them; it took about 2 hours. I am always intrigued as to what things get noticed or commented on in a review like that. Things I figured were no-brainers we wold discuss in depth, things I figured would be issues were breezed right over. I did find a few errors much to my chagrin; one or two are things that should not have been in there (but weren't caught by the internal team either so it's not like it is all my fault). We will do our best to get them to accept those deletions with the rev B next month. I was happy with my performance and that things went smoothly.
I left work early today and came home to relax. I expect to be asleep early tonight. Tomorrow I will visit my folks and try to figure out why their Mac is behaving sluggishly. I have a few ideas about what is causing it, probably the indexer that is included in Mac OS 10.4.
I need to update the rental agreement for the "Kumquat kids" and get that signed this weekend, too, hopefully.
Today I drive up t the parents' house to help them with their computer and see how they are doing.
Well, another week with our Japan team and our KDDI customer is over. We had a good series of meetings; they seem to be warming up to us loud obnoxious Americans.
We were at Donovan's last night, one of the top 10 steakhouses in the country. We were utterly stuffed with food; I made all of the Japanese guys order a Stone Brewing Co Arrogant Bastard ale with dinner. Stone is local in San Marcos and an award-winning brewery. The ABs came in 20 ounce bottles. We had a good time and the wait staff were very cool and very helpful with the English (or lack thereof).
Today I went over the specification with them; it took about 2 hours. I am always intrigued as to what things get noticed or commented on in a review like that. Things I figured were no-brainers we wold discuss in depth, things I figured would be issues were breezed right over. I did find a few errors much to my chagrin; one or two are things that should not have been in there (but weren't caught by the internal team either so it's not like it is all my fault). We will do our best to get them to accept those deletions with the rev B next month. I was happy with my performance and that things went smoothly.
I left work early today and came home to relax. I expect to be asleep early tonight. Tomorrow I will visit my folks and try to figure out why their Mac is behaving sluggishly. I have a few ideas about what is causing it, probably the indexer that is included in Mac OS 10.4.
I need to update the rental agreement for the "Kumquat kids" and get that signed this weekend, too, hopefully.
Today I drive up t the parents' house to help them with their computer and see how they are doing.
Tuesday, February 13, 2007
I Still Hate Cars
My dealer has two locations; I usually use the closer-to-me location as it is less busy BUT they couldn't do this work (alarms are dealer-added options and they have a guy who does them and the guy is at the other, big location). I got into a defensive conversation with the service manager idiot at the cloer-to-me location (I called over there first since, you now, they fucked the car up so I figure I'd give them first shot at fixing it) who told me "they do battery cable replacements all the time and they don't affect the alarm blah blah blah"
Oh. Shut. Up.
What a dick.
OF COURSE you guys fucked this up; it was PERFECTLY FINE when I gave it to you and when I got it back it was fucked up.
I took my car over to the dealer this morning because it has continued to "act up" with random beeps and burps and farts and the car alarm went off twice early Monday AM (1:15 and 1:45).
I wrote up a detailed explanation of what had happened and left the car with the (helpful and cheerful I must say) New Car Accessories Service Department manager.
I was impressed; an hour later they had called me and said they'd replaced the alarm "brain" and at no charge.
Turns out the car alarm was in fact interfering with the proper operation of the rest of the car because "Mode 2" was only 100% active after I drove off the lot today. In the past the doors would lock automatically as soon as I took it out of "P" (even in Mode 2) but today they were unlocked, I took it out of "P" and... they stayed unlocked.
"Ah ha!" I said to myself. "I am smarter than they are."
I feel like calling "Dave the Dickhead" at the closer-to-me location and informing him that now he can truthfully say that he has seen a car that was fucked up as a part of replacing a battery cable and he should shut up about it the next time someone has a complaint.
And this is why I hate people.
And cars. I hate cars, too.
Oh. Shut. Up.
What a dick.
OF COURSE you guys fucked this up; it was PERFECTLY FINE when I gave it to you and when I got it back it was fucked up.
I took my car over to the dealer this morning because it has continued to "act up" with random beeps and burps and farts and the car alarm went off twice early Monday AM (1:15 and 1:45).
I wrote up a detailed explanation of what had happened and left the car with the (helpful and cheerful I must say) New Car Accessories Service Department manager.
I was impressed; an hour later they had called me and said they'd replaced the alarm "brain" and at no charge.
Turns out the car alarm was in fact interfering with the proper operation of the rest of the car because "Mode 2" was only 100% active after I drove off the lot today. In the past the doors would lock automatically as soon as I took it out of "P" (even in Mode 2) but today they were unlocked, I took it out of "P" and... they stayed unlocked.
"Ah ha!" I said to myself. "I am smarter than they are."
I feel like calling "Dave the Dickhead" at the closer-to-me location and informing him that now he can truthfully say that he has seen a car that was fucked up as a part of replacing a battery cable and he should shut up about it the next time someone has a complaint.
And this is why I hate people.
And cars. I hate cars, too.
Saturday, February 3, 2007
I Hate Cars
Last weekend I took the car in for its 45000 mile service, which is an oil change and some other stuff. The guy told me I need to replace the rear brakes and the battery cable (it was all corroded).
"OK, fine, I'll bring it in next weekend," was my reply.
Now, after a few days I noticed something; whenever I went out to my car in the garage the doors were locked. For 18 months I've driven into the garage, turned off the ignition (doors automatically unlock), open the door, get out, close the door. The door stayed unlocked forever. 1 minute, 1 hour, 1 day 1 week, whatever, the door would be unlocked when I came back in the garage and opened the car door.
As of last weekend (but I only really noticed it mid-week), the door would be locked when I went out. I don't like this; I don't want the car doing things uncommanded. I figured the tech did some sort of firmware update or made a little change to the car's configuration file to work on it.
So, today, I took it back for the battery cable and the brakes. I told the service writer about this; the first thing he saw was that the alarm was in "valet" mode, which he knew because there was a glowing read LED down under the dash board. He set it to "normal" mode and that was that, I assumed. When I go the car back I noticed something as soon as I got home; pressing a remote control button makes the horn go "toot toot" along with the regular and familiar to both of us "beep beep." OK, that is really annoying and also the car was still locking it's doors automatically. So I call the guy up and tell him this, supposedly he was taking notes and will call the service department and the main dealer on Monday.
Yeah, sure he will.
Several hours ago I heard the car's horn go "toot toot" all by itself. I thought it was outside so I ignored it. Then I heard it again a while later; I went out to the garage and it did it again right as I opened the house garage door. "Crap, this thing is fucked up," I thought. I knew that removing the battery cable was a traumatic thing for computer-controlled cars like mine and I was right. So, I got out the Owner's Manual and learned a few things. First, I can supposedly change the beeps for when I hit the remote; I tried to change them but was unsuccessful, I think. I also learned that this car has 4 (yes, FOUR) different automatic door lock modes. I read them all but the differences between three of them are very very subtle, mostly to do with when they lock (car in P, doors closed, ignition on vs car in anything except P, doors closed, ignition on vs something else vs MODE 2!!!!!!). Mode 2 is "No automatic door locking at all. Ever. You have to lock them yourself!"
"AHA!" I said, "A-HA!!!!!!!!!!!!"
So, I read the instructions on how to get it into Mode 2. Here they are:
0. Get in the car and close the door.
1. Depress the door lock button to unlock all the doors.
2. Put key in ignition, turn to "ON."
3. Within 5 seconds of doing that, press and hold the door lock button in the "lock" position for around 5 seconds.
Are you with me still?
4. Watch the "Door Ajar" indicator light on the dashboard - it will flash the number of times equal to the mode it's in.
5. Repeat until you are in the mode you want.
It was in mode 3, so I had to do that sequence three times to get it into mode 2.
Eventually I saw 2 "Door Ajar" light flashes. Yea, I'm in mode 2!
Let's test it! Start the car, put it in R (carefully, the big roll up garage door is still closed).
CLUNK! The doors lock.
Goddammit!
OK, well, fine, fuck that; I'll try again tomorrow in the daylight.
Time to try something else; let's try to turn off the horn tooting. I see the little red LED under the dash (under the steering column, waaaay down there actually). I remember the service guy reached under there to do something so I figured he was flipping a switch (My MSEE comes in handy every once in a while). I reached down there and - Yes! - there is a push button behind the LED. I press and release. Nothing. I press and hold. And hold. A few seconds later the red LED comes on. Yay! No more horn tooting.
So, if I can get the car into Automatic Door Locking Mode 2 I will be happy and forget those clowns over at the dealership trying to "fix" this. I'll leave the alarm in "valet" mode (I have no idea if that means it is disabled or not but who cares? When was the last time anyone called the cops because they heard a car alarm go off?). I have an owner's manual for the alarm, I think, because it was a dealer-installed factory add-on. I get a break on my insurance because I have a car alarm so it is worth something.
I hate cars.
"OK, fine, I'll bring it in next weekend," was my reply.
Now, after a few days I noticed something; whenever I went out to my car in the garage the doors were locked. For 18 months I've driven into the garage, turned off the ignition (doors automatically unlock), open the door, get out, close the door. The door stayed unlocked forever. 1 minute, 1 hour, 1 day 1 week, whatever, the door would be unlocked when I came back in the garage and opened the car door.
As of last weekend (but I only really noticed it mid-week), the door would be locked when I went out. I don't like this; I don't want the car doing things uncommanded. I figured the tech did some sort of firmware update or made a little change to the car's configuration file to work on it.
So, today, I took it back for the battery cable and the brakes. I told the service writer about this; the first thing he saw was that the alarm was in "valet" mode, which he knew because there was a glowing read LED down under the dash board. He set it to "normal" mode and that was that, I assumed. When I go the car back I noticed something as soon as I got home; pressing a remote control button makes the horn go "toot toot" along with the regular and familiar to both of us "beep beep." OK, that is really annoying and also the car was still locking it's doors automatically. So I call the guy up and tell him this, supposedly he was taking notes and will call the service department and the main dealer on Monday.
Yeah, sure he will.
Several hours ago I heard the car's horn go "toot toot" all by itself. I thought it was outside so I ignored it. Then I heard it again a while later; I went out to the garage and it did it again right as I opened the house garage door. "Crap, this thing is fucked up," I thought. I knew that removing the battery cable was a traumatic thing for computer-controlled cars like mine and I was right. So, I got out the Owner's Manual and learned a few things. First, I can supposedly change the beeps for when I hit the remote; I tried to change them but was unsuccessful, I think. I also learned that this car has 4 (yes, FOUR) different automatic door lock modes. I read them all but the differences between three of them are very very subtle, mostly to do with when they lock (car in P, doors closed, ignition on vs car in anything except P, doors closed, ignition on vs something else vs MODE 2!!!!!!). Mode 2 is "No automatic door locking at all. Ever. You have to lock them yourself!"
"AHA!" I said, "A-HA!!!!!!!!!!!!"
So, I read the instructions on how to get it into Mode 2. Here they are:
0. Get in the car and close the door.
1. Depress the door lock button to unlock all the doors.
2. Put key in ignition, turn to "ON."
3. Within 5 seconds of doing that, press and hold the door lock button in the "lock" position for around 5 seconds.
Are you with me still?
4. Watch the "Door Ajar" indicator light on the dashboard - it will flash the number of times equal to the mode it's in.
5. Repeat until you are in the mode you want.
It was in mode 3, so I had to do that sequence three times to get it into mode 2.
Eventually I saw 2 "Door Ajar" light flashes. Yea, I'm in mode 2!
Let's test it! Start the car, put it in R (carefully, the big roll up garage door is still closed).
CLUNK! The doors lock.
Goddammit!
OK, well, fine, fuck that; I'll try again tomorrow in the daylight.
Time to try something else; let's try to turn off the horn tooting. I see the little red LED under the dash (under the steering column, waaaay down there actually). I remember the service guy reached under there to do something so I figured he was flipping a switch (My MSEE comes in handy every once in a while). I reached down there and - Yes! - there is a push button behind the LED. I press and release. Nothing. I press and hold. And hold. A few seconds later the red LED comes on. Yay! No more horn tooting.
So, if I can get the car into Automatic Door Locking Mode 2 I will be happy and forget those clowns over at the dealership trying to "fix" this. I'll leave the alarm in "valet" mode (I have no idea if that means it is disabled or not but who cares? When was the last time anyone called the cops because they heard a car alarm go off?). I have an owner's manual for the alarm, I think, because it was a dealer-installed factory add-on. I get a break on my insurance because I have a car alarm so it is worth something.
I hate cars.
Wednesday, January 17, 2007
The Trip So Far
One of my "travel laws" is that the more money you spend the greater the barrier between you and the place you are visiting.
I only somewhat feel like I am in a foreign country and I really don't feel like much at all like I am in Japan.
We flew first class (on United, which meant it was crappy first class, worse than Biz class on Singapore or Cathay Pacific) and we are staying at the Westin Tokyo in an Executive level set of rooms. Breakfast is an international buffet, so we eat American (with the exception of including broccoli on the plate) We hop in a taxi and ride over to the Motorola building. The only indicator of foreign-ness is the translator and we had one of those in San Diego in November so that's not too exotic either.
In other words, the barrier is very very high. I expect the weekend to bring the barrier down for a while; we are going to finally do some exploring of the town.
Today's meetings are the tough ones; we meet our customer and give them the "bad news" regarding the schedule slips and other stuff. Our Dear Leader will earn his salary today.
I only somewhat feel like I am in a foreign country and I really don't feel like much at all like I am in Japan.
We flew first class (on United, which meant it was crappy first class, worse than Biz class on Singapore or Cathay Pacific) and we are staying at the Westin Tokyo in an Executive level set of rooms. Breakfast is an international buffet, so we eat American (with the exception of including broccoli on the plate) We hop in a taxi and ride over to the Motorola building. The only indicator of foreign-ness is the translator and we had one of those in San Diego in November so that's not too exotic either.
In other words, the barrier is very very high. I expect the weekend to bring the barrier down for a while; we are going to finally do some exploring of the town.
Today's meetings are the tough ones; we meet our customer and give them the "bad news" regarding the schedule slips and other stuff. Our Dear Leader will earn his salary today.
Friday, December 1, 2006
Speed Racer and Giant Robot Come In Handy
I am assigned to two different programs. The first is for ONO, the largest cable TV company in Spain. They are currently buying two products from us and want to buy two more. I am assigned to these two new products. The program manager is a guy I like and he likes me so he was very very happy I joined him to get this stuff done. I've done such a good job so far he wants me to take over the other two products, too. These two are problematic because a year or so ago a decision was made to let our Taiwan-based manufacturing group do these designs as well (design work and manufacturing work are two different things). They've dropped the ball on it big time and now they want me to straighten everything out.
So, that program has a customer in Spain and a development and manufacturing team in Taiwan. I have morning conference calls with Spain and evening conference calls with Taiwan.
The other program I am assigned to is for KDDI, a very large telecommunications company in Japan. This program is for a product that allows you to watch TV like a cable TV box and also transfer videos and music from the box to your phone (watching videos on your phone is a big thing in Japan, something we in the US are way behind on). This is a complicated program because there are many companies involved; we here in San Diego are specifying the requirements and doing hardware design, there is a Motorola division in Stockholm, Sweden and St Petersburg, Russia involved in some software and other software companies in Japan also involved. This program has visibility at the highest level in Motorola, too, so that adds to the pressure.
I expect to be fully occupied through January with a few trips to Sweden and Spain through the first or second quarter of '07.
I've been in all day meetings with the development team on Wednesday and now today and tomorrow with the customer and the development team. Last night I took the Swedes (software stack developers and a recent acquisition of ours) to Il Fornaio in Del Mar last night to get to know them and to let them know that they aren't working with a typical clueless American and we got along great. We talked about guitars at one point and photography and other stuff. A successful evening and I think I will bring in to the meeting tomorrow my Rickenbacker bass to show (off to) them.
Tonight I initially begged off on going out with everybody as I was tired and am trying to kick my chest cold once and for all (I promise I will be 100% next week) but later I was specifically requested that to go since the key upper managers were not available. I was the ONLY Mot San Diego guy there. Eventually someone with some financial fire power did appear and he picked up the tab. I was not looking forward to having to pay for 20 guys at Roy's (very nice Asian Fusion place in UTC).
I sat with some of the Japanese guys and the translator. At one point one of the guys says to me, "You must know about Japanese animation." I replied that I was aware of anime (the style of Japanese animation/cartoons with schoolgirl superheroes with big eyes and long legs) and other sorts of these types of things but I had never watched any of it. I started thinking about my childhood in LA and so I decided to try something. I said, "But, I remember as a kid two cartoons I liked. One was 'Kimba the White Lion' and the other was 'Speed Racer.'" We had been speaking in English so I asked the translator to help me out. Kimba didn't ring any bells and I knew that it wasn't called "Speed Racer" in Japan but I described the cartoon and the guy lit up and said, "Mach Go Go Go!" "Yes!!!" I replied remembering what the Jap name was since he'd said it. They were VERY impressed.
Then I said, "I remember one more..."
"OK..."
"Giant"
"Robot"
and all three of them went through the roof! "Giant Robotu!" So they start talking about Giant Robot. "The very last Giant Robot episode was verrrrrry sad." said one of them. "Oh, you MUST come to JAPAN!!!" the VP said.
So we bonded, me the SoCal native USian and these three Japanese guys from Tokyo because I, as a kid growing up in near-inner city LA had been privileged enough to be able to watch Speed Racer and Giant Robot as a kid 35 years ago. How many times has something I did innocuously or weirdly or whatever because I was a nerd or a bookworm or whatever I was back then as an awkward 10 year old kid come back to pay off in my life, even in a small way?
I drove home tonight wondering the what and why of these strange coincidences in my life and asking myself how many more times will I be able to claim a bond with a stranger because of them.
So, that program has a customer in Spain and a development and manufacturing team in Taiwan. I have morning conference calls with Spain and evening conference calls with Taiwan.
The other program I am assigned to is for KDDI, a very large telecommunications company in Japan. This program is for a product that allows you to watch TV like a cable TV box and also transfer videos and music from the box to your phone (watching videos on your phone is a big thing in Japan, something we in the US are way behind on). This is a complicated program because there are many companies involved; we here in San Diego are specifying the requirements and doing hardware design, there is a Motorola division in Stockholm, Sweden and St Petersburg, Russia involved in some software and other software companies in Japan also involved. This program has visibility at the highest level in Motorola, too, so that adds to the pressure.
I expect to be fully occupied through January with a few trips to Sweden and Spain through the first or second quarter of '07.
I've been in all day meetings with the development team on Wednesday and now today and tomorrow with the customer and the development team. Last night I took the Swedes (software stack developers and a recent acquisition of ours) to Il Fornaio in Del Mar last night to get to know them and to let them know that they aren't working with a typical clueless American and we got along great. We talked about guitars at one point and photography and other stuff. A successful evening and I think I will bring in to the meeting tomorrow my Rickenbacker bass to show (off to) them.
Tonight I initially begged off on going out with everybody as I was tired and am trying to kick my chest cold once and for all (I promise I will be 100% next week) but later I was specifically requested that to go since the key upper managers were not available. I was the ONLY Mot San Diego guy there. Eventually someone with some financial fire power did appear and he picked up the tab. I was not looking forward to having to pay for 20 guys at Roy's (very nice Asian Fusion place in UTC).
I sat with some of the Japanese guys and the translator. At one point one of the guys says to me, "You must know about Japanese animation." I replied that I was aware of anime (the style of Japanese animation/cartoons with schoolgirl superheroes with big eyes and long legs) and other sorts of these types of things but I had never watched any of it. I started thinking about my childhood in LA and so I decided to try something. I said, "But, I remember as a kid two cartoons I liked. One was 'Kimba the White Lion' and the other was 'Speed Racer.'" We had been speaking in English so I asked the translator to help me out. Kimba didn't ring any bells and I knew that it wasn't called "Speed Racer" in Japan but I described the cartoon and the guy lit up and said, "Mach Go Go Go!" "Yes!!!" I replied remembering what the Jap name was since he'd said it. They were VERY impressed.
Then I said, "I remember one more..."
"OK..."
"Giant"
"Robot"
and all three of them went through the roof! "Giant Robotu!" So they start talking about Giant Robot. "The very last Giant Robot episode was verrrrrry sad." said one of them. "Oh, you MUST come to JAPAN!!!" the VP said.
So we bonded, me the SoCal native USian and these three Japanese guys from Tokyo because I, as a kid growing up in near-inner city LA had been privileged enough to be able to watch Speed Racer and Giant Robot as a kid 35 years ago. How many times has something I did innocuously or weirdly or whatever because I was a nerd or a bookworm or whatever I was back then as an awkward 10 year old kid come back to pay off in my life, even in a small way?
I drove home tonight wondering the what and why of these strange coincidences in my life and asking myself how many more times will I be able to claim a bond with a stranger because of them.
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