Puppet Show Second

"If I told them once, I told them a hundred times; Spinal Tap first, Puppet Show second."

This is Spinal Tap, 1984

We all need priorities even if some of our priorities are simple and misguided. In one famous pseudo rock-umentary, the metal band Spinal Tap finds itself performing before a "festival crowd" and the band, noting the promotional marquis are dismayed to find that they are billed second to a local puppet show. Rather than absorb this obvious slight, the band takes the stage and tries to perform a jazz metal set written (on the spur of the moment) by the bass player, Derek Smalls. The band has fared poorly and the puppet show crowd has thinned measurably.

We can all learn from the antics of the anti heros of the Spinal Tap saga as they drift without purpose like tiny steel balls in the great pachinco game of the American landscape trying to keep their integrity in the face of endless and dismal failure and disappointment. We realize that we will never sacrifice our self esteem as they have! Each morning as we get up to go to work we can look in the mirror with the assurance and know that in our own lives we will always recieve top billing.

Moral: Always put yourself first and the puppet show second.

Cartoon Credit: Lawrence Gilson

The Yellow Russian Tank

The picture on the left is one of the photos from my portfolio. Many of my writings and stories in this blog reflect back to the two years I lived in northern Israel as a volunteer on a border kibbutz called, Gonen. A 'kibbutz' is a community of Israelis who have decided to live in a collective settlement. They share the responsibilities of working, raising the children, running the business of the community and looking out for the interests of the members. What you are looking at is something that belongs to the members of Gonen. You have never seen this 'thing' before and never will again.

This is a working Russian T-34 tank.

In this picture, the tank has undergone some clever modifications so that it could be useful to the workers in the settlement. The first thing you will notice is that the tank is painted yellow. This paint job is to prevent the pilot of a passing Kfir or F15 fighter jet from thinking it was a real Russian T-34 tank. The tank also had its turret gun removed and was fitted with a 60 foot boom with a 'cherry picker' cage at the end so that someone could stand in the small cage and trim the tops of trees.

The kibbutz workers would drive the tank to their fields of trees to be trimmed and then cut down for use in the factories. The worker in the cherry picker would navigate up and down the tops of the trees trimming and pruning while another person drove the tank slowly up and down the rows of trees all day. As someone who drove the tank for several months, I can tell you that it is fun for about 10 minutes then it gets monotonous. The drivers seat is in the very front of the tank under where the turret gun would be and the giant diesel motor spits smoke and oil all over the inside of the tank (and up your back) while you drive it. There are basically three gears and a clutch and brake inside and the treads are maneuvered with levers that stop one tread so the other can keep rotating to turn the tank. It is very loud in the tank so I used to wear headphones all day. The operator in the cherry picker would communicate his signals by a series of air horn blasts. Those times when I got to work in the cherry picker were much more fun than driving the tank itself and riding atop the 60 foot boom while the tank was moving was pretty cool. The hydraulics in the basket were not that great so when I would press my foot onto the 'down' pedal, the boom would shoot down really fast until it got near the ground then stop suddenly.

Here is an archive photo of a World War II Russian T-34 tank on the battlefield. At that time, the T-34 was a feared weapon and was considered to be one of the best tanks in the world.

The members of kibbutz Gonen found their old tank after the Six Day War and had it brought back to the settlement so they could 'fix it up'. Gonen was built as a frontier settlement on the old Syrian border many years before the annexation of the Golan Heights in 1981 by Israel. The tank was supposedly used by the Syrians in their war with the Israelis although it was, by that time already very old. This particular tank is maintained and used as a piece of farm equipment. Talk about 'turning your swords into plowshares'.

Anyway, now you can say that you have seen a photograph of a yellow Russian tank (it even has a sun bonnet on the top to keep out the rain). You have learned a bit about an Israeli kibbutz. And you have seen a photo of the tank when it was in use by the Russians during World War II.

After you read this entry, be sure to read the one entitled 'Flying Kites in the Holiday Season' which will be posted soon. The Flying Kites blog entry is about two young people who are out to save orphaned children in the Third World and is much more important than this short, pointless one about a worthless yellow tank! Yellow Russian tanks never got anyone in the holiday spirit but I assure you that the one about our friends working in Kenya and India and their remarkable story will get your holiday season started off on the right foot.

The Wisdom of Oz

"Dear me!" remarked the Scarecrow, "what unhappy thoughts you have to be sure. This is proof that born brains cannot equal manufactured brains, for my brains dwell only on facts and never borrow trouble. When there is occasion for my brains to think, they think, but I would be ashamed of my brains if they kept shooting out thoughts that were merely fears and imaginings, such as do no good, but are likely to do harm"

The Magic of Oz by L. Frank Baum

The Scarecrow of Oz is one of the most recognizable literary characters in the last one hundred years. Simple minded and pragmatic, he bumbles through each story and adventure, a warm and cheery companion to his friends as they experience strange adventures in the Land of Oz. We who live in the real world could all learn something valuable from the Scarecrow, a character who has every reason to pass through life feeling humiliated and self concious. The Scarecrow is frail and fragile, he is made of straw and cannot walk for any length of time without stumbling and falling down. He is timid and fearful but is the first one to offer to sacrifice himself for the good of his friends if danger awaits them. He even looks comical and in his early adventures found it difficult to gain the respect of his peers because of his ridiculous appearance.

I had a friend many years ago when I lived in the Middle East. This fellow, Richard was from South Africa. Richard had fallen into some type of machinery when he was a very small child almost losing his life in this tragic accident but was somehow saved and stitched back together. When I met him he was about twenty years old and had arrived to live and work on the settlement I lived on at the time with many other travelers from all over the world in northern Israel. When the doctors had put Richard back together again after his accident they had done the best they could but his appearance could only be described as alarmingly peculiar. Richard was about five foot six inches tall but one shoulder was hunched higher than the other. His hands and legs and body on his right side were all normal and strong but the machine he had fallen into had caused his head to be severely injured and his left arm and leg were weak as though he had suffered a stroke. One eye was false and was sewn in place lower on his face than the other eye and he had a wry grin because of severe muscular nerve damage which left him with a sort of unilateral sneer and he spoke out of the right side of his mouth like Humphrey Bogart. The right eye was undamaged and peered with a directness that made you forget that the other eye had been lost. He had hair that was not exactly lusterous but did, for the most part cover the majority of his scalp. One other thing that was very obvious about Richard from the moment he arrived on our settlement in northern Israel, women loved him.

This strange looking fellow had spent his entire life being stared at, pointed at, laughed at and judged. He looked like the character of Quasimodo in the famous book, 'The Hunchback of Notre Dame'. He set out from South Africa and planned to travel the world on his own. Richard was not part of a tour or a University junket, he was a regular vagabond traveler and accepted the risks and hazards of life without any safety net just like anyone else. He made his way from South Africa and traveled up the coast of Africa to Egypt and finally to Israel all the while enduring the strange looks and passing comments of his fellow travelers. Suffice it to say that if Richard was standing right next to Mick Jagger, Bono or the Queen of England, Richard would be the person you would notice first and would be more memorable than any international celebrity.

Women loved Richard because he had an infectious sense of humor, the quickest wit and the most winnning smile of any of us in that small community. He would tell the rudest jokes and laugh through the one side of his face while tears of laughter would come out of his good eye. Richard clearly loved women but more surprising than that, he expected that women he met would love him back. And they did. Looks clearly were'nt everything where Richard was concerned and, in his case, looks were a potentially severe impairment to his social life. It did not matter to anyone and it was surprising how quickly we forgot his poor facial reconstruction once he became our friend. Within several months, the Lebanon War started and we volunteers scattered back to Europe and elsewhere. It is rare in life to meet someone who so completely overcomes adversity and hardship so as to leave a lasting impression of only courage and laughter with the people he meets.

The Scarecrow of Oz is famous for making self effacing remarks about his construction and appearance as he trips, stumbles, catches fire and gets torn apart and his straw scattered through his many adventures. If he makes a passing reference to his ridiculous appearance this self effacing comment is always followed by a hopeful nod and an appeal to the reader not to forget his personal strengths and the story moves on. Since all of the Oz characters are flawed or misshapen in some way, we accept that it is a land full of misfits (just as in real life) so children who read the Oz stories learn to see past these visual descriptions and focus on the hearts and strengths of the characters. Most people we see every day are not as disfigured as Richard but we all have our flaws and many struggle with paralysis, amputations, illness and the curses of old age. As familiar as we all are with the characters in the Oz stories it is so easy to overlook their anomalies and to see the good in them. As we go through our daily lives we should all remember the poorly made Scarecrow who, like many real people, possesses great strengths and courage while suffering the misfortune of having the appearance of consisting solely of cloth and straw.

The Zen of Wile E. Coyote

"Allow me to introduce myself. My name is Wile E. Coyote...Genius. I am not selling anything, nor am I working my way through college, so let's get down to cases. You are a rabbit, and I am going to eat you for supper. Now, don't try to get away! I am more muscular, more cunning, faster, and larger than you are and...I'm a genius. Why, you could hardly pass the entrance examinations to kindergarten. So, I'll give you the customary two minutes to say your prayers."

What Wile E. Coyote is saying is that since he believes himself to be both intellectually and physically superior to the Road Runner, he sees the issue of 'supper' as pre ordained. It only remains for the prey to surrender and he can then move on to other, more meaningful aspects of his day. Life does not often deliver results in this way. Life must be taken on lifes terms. But that is not to say that we should not approach life with self confidence and self assurance.

In his most recent book, 'Outliers', Malcolm Gladwell details some of the circumstances that lead some individuals to great success and personal wealth. Throughout history only a few people have risen to the top of their chosen professions. These few people have been the recipients of a unique set of life events and opportunities but they have also had tremendous drive, ambition and passion for what they do.

So...who do you picture to be the exact opposite of the upwardly mobile, confident junior executive? I've been reading to my daughters every night for the past several years and it strikes me that the one character in all of the books we have read together that would serve to represent the opposite of Wile E. Coyote is the dull, nearly-silent and depressed character of Mr. Bucket in 'Charlie and the Chocolate Factory'. This ghostly, chronically fatigued and almost invisible character element to the story toils away alone each day in the worst conceivable dead end job; doing physical labor working as the cap screwer in a toothpaste factory. Mr. Bucket cannot come up with a plan to better himself or to support his family except in the direst poverty because, while he is a character with feelings he has no vision, no energy and no passion in life. Mr. Bucket does not consider himself to be a genius and he probably never has.

Closer to the Warner Brothers theme, another character to consider is Elmer Fudd. Always confused and slow-of-wit, ever the stalwart hunter of "wabbits", Elmer lacks creativity, common sense and cannot conceive of a plan to hunt Bugs Bunny that does not begin and end the same way every time. Elmer Fudd does not consider himself to be a genius. He probably does not even know what a genius is.

Bill Gates, George Lucas, Oprah Winfrey, Steven Spielberg, Bill Clinton, the Beatles, Richard Branson and many others in our modern era have achieved tremendous wealth, fame and power. Was it all etherial timing, a particular juxtaposition of the stars or a slight nod from God that created these outliers in our society? Or was it supreme belief in themselves and their personal gifts and abilities along with their relentless attention to the possibility of opportunity that brought riches and fame to them.

For Elmer Fudd to have become rich and famous it would have to be because he accidently ended up in the same cartoon as Bugs Bunny who was a true genius.

And that goes double for Daffy Duck!

Ref: The Bugs Bunny/Road Runner Movie (1979)

The Happiness Scale

"Take care of your people. Create and sustain a business where they can live, not just make a living."
Gary Erickson, Clif Bar founder and author of, 'Raising the Bar'.

Is it possible to create a way to benchmark contentment in the workplace among employees? Can a manager use this tool translate into a healthier and more sustainable business model? I propose a new way of assessing the emotional health of the company; The Cooperative Engagement Scale. The CES will utilize previously untapped descriptive terms and adjectives such as; remarkable, insightful, dedicated, profound, historically motivated and resentful. Since working within the tight bubble of an office or plant is often very similar to working and living in a commune, a boarding school or Israeli kibbutz, we mangers should be able to create a model to assess workplace satisfaction as it relates to a productive group interaction and individual inner calm.

There are established methods of assessing an employees aptitude for certain types of jobs and tolerance to close working relationships with different personality types. The Big 5 Inventory Test is one example of this type of testing and is described as follows:

"This 44-item test, developed by Oliver P. John, Ph.D. and V. Benet-Martinez in 1998, is in the public domain and has been normed on tens of thousands of adults. It provides a score for each of the Big Five personality traits (Conscientiousness, Agreeableness, Emotional Stability, Extroversion and Intellect or Openness). Scores on these traits can often explain important issues for adults and thus simplify counseling efforts. For example, an extrovert working as a night janitor was depressed. Finding a day job, where he could relate to other people, went a long way toward relieving his depression."

The thesaurus generates a list of vague terms which may have meaning when placed in a structured context.
Contentment: satisfaction, ease, happiness and gratification

Happiness: approval, fulfillment, contentment

Cooperation: collaboration, teamwork, mutual aid

In Guy Kawasaki's excellent book, 'The Art of the Start' he details his own intuitive way of evaluating his own reaction towards his employees and business partners. Guy has named this The Stanford Shopping Center Test. He writes,"Suppose you are at a shopping center. You see a candidate (or employee or partner or service provider) before he notices you. At that point, you can do one of three things:

1: Scoot over and say hello.

2: Figure that if you bump into him, fine. If not, that's OK too.

3: Get in your can and go to another shopping center.

**If you picked number 2 or 3 don't hire that person. Life's too short to work with people you don't naturally like especially in a small, young organization"

Our new management tool, The Cooperative Engagement Scale should generate a clear picture of a prospective employee's inner calm and sense of purpose and well being. A few test questions might read like this;

1: If you had a Ferrari, what color would you choose?

2: How frequently do you say the word, 'scintillating' in the course of a normal day?

3: Do you let your four year old daughter watch Ultimate Cage Fighting competitions on cable TV?

4: How would you respond if your adult co worker expresses that he or she still believes in Santa Clause and the Easter Bunny?

We all need to work together and to accept each other for our individual strengths and weaknesses. The Cooperative Engagement Scale will be the new way to benchmark our aptitude for cohesion and collaboration. I am working on it every day but would'nt it be great if we could use the internet to allow everybody to submit questions? Now that I think about it I wonder just who in my office actually watches Ultimate Cage Fighting?

References:
Kawasaki, Guy. The Art of the Start. Portfolio Books, 2004.

Erickson, Gary. Raising the Bar. Jossey-Bass, 2004.

The Official American Dog

"To his dog, every man is Napoleon; hence the constant popularity of dogs." Aldous Huxley

Queen Elizabeth of England has a couple of short, brown furry dogs. George Bush has two short, black Scottish Terrier dogs. The Reagans had a big dog once but they traded it in for a short dog because the Secret Service was afraid that the big dog would pull Nancy Reagan off the Presidential helicopter steps. For the remainder of the Reagan presidency, we Americans were forced to be represented to the rest of the world by yet another small dog. Outrageous! Appalling!

President-elect Barak Obama will be moving into the presidential residence this winter with his family. What type of pet should the Obama family get that we can all be proud of as Americans? I have a few suggestions which I have listed below;
1: Big dog
2: Bigger dog
3: Cat - (only if dogs are not available)

Here are the pets the Obama family should avoid at all costs;
1: Hampsters
2: Ferrets
3: Reptiles of all kinds
4: Birds

I say the selection of a 'First Pet' for the First Family should be left up to the American people! We should be allowed to vote on the pet and have a nation wide bake off to choose the name of the pet. This is an important decision and one the rest of the world will be observing closely as an indicator of our ability to lead the world in other important matters. Mr. Obama cannot be the leader of the free world and own a tiny, furry, yapping pomeranean. The White House Press Corp should be free to walk around the South Lawn without being afraid of having their socks snapped off or their shoelaces shredded by the tiny teeth of an itty bitty dog with a chip on it's little shoulder (or whatever a dog's shoulder is called).

We need an Official American Dog. I cast my vote for the best dog in the whole darned dog world; the Black and Tan Coonhound. You've seen these dogs around the neighborhood but probably not in the movies or on TV. These are the medium sized dogs that have the black and brown patterned coloring with those wise looking, expressive "eyebrows", the friendly dog smile and that calm demeanor. The black and tan coonhound is a dog for all the people. You will not see the black and tan dog in Madison Square Garden parading around for the annual dog show. The humble black and tan coonhound will have been eliminated in the early rounds of the competition before the final dozen compete on television. At the time of the dog show broadcast, the sublime and composed coonhound will be resting in the Green Room in Madison Square Garden having some kibble and telling the other loser dogs that he "did not really want to be there anyway."

The Presidents Dog should be the type of dog that our Secretary of State could take for a walk around the park on a stroll with the Secretary of State from another country as he (or she) negotiate the next free trade agreement without being embarrassed or interrupted by stupid barking or multiple attempts by the dog to pee every three feet. The black and tan coonhound would sit quietly during presidential photo ops without seeming to steal the spotlight. A painting of this stately dog would really look cool on a postage stamp, adding pizzaz and style to almost any postal envelope and kicking the boring Canada goose (and those stamps of old baseball players that I have never heard of) right out of the US Postal Service stamp lineup. How many goose stamps do we need anyway?

So I encourage everybody reading this blog to vote for the Official American Dog! We need a solid canine presence in the White House so that all those other countries that have leaders with dogs will know we Americans mean business and that we are serious Presidential pet pickers!

To view the New American Presidential Dog (that you will be voting for), link onto:
http://www.coonhoundrescue.com/

Ozymandias was a Teenage Camel Tipper

Today's middle managers and plant supervisors work hard for their companies and have had to prove their worth and toughness many times to get where they are. The vision of the grizzled, crew-cut crew boss is someone who, you can imagine ruled the neighborhood as a kid and kept all the other kids in line. If you look around at the CEO's and leaders of business and industry, these seem to be the studious types who applied themselves to the task of learning how to best get along with others and to take advantage of opportunities to advance up the corporate ladder. Each type of leader plays to their strength and each would be ineffective without the other. The leaders of the companies need the leaders of the staff or crew to make the companies work and vice versa. I wonder about these supervisors and team leaders and how they differ from the rulers and conquerers in the ancient world. Leaders are very different today than just a few short centuries ago....

In the famous poem by Shelley, Ozymandias is the fictitious monomaniacal ruler who built his famous city and statues glorifying himself before devastation and tragedy erased all of his achievements from human memory.
I met a traveller from an antique land, Who said: Two vast and trunkless legs of stone Stand in the desert. Near them, on the sand, Half sunk, a shattered visage lies, whose frown And wrinkled lip and sneer of cold command, Tell that its sculptor well those passions read, Which yet survive stamped on these lifeless things, The hand that mocked them, and the heart that fed; .And on the pedestal these words appear: 'My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings; Look on my works. Ye Mighty, and despair!' Ozymandias

What must this powerful ruler have been like as a boy growing up on the high plateaus of Asia? I imagine that young Ozymandias (his friends probably called him 'Ozzy') had a 'discipline problem' and probably did not do so well in school. He was probably a frustrated student in class although he could make small weapons in 'Shop'. Ozymandias probably grew up in a vast metropolis like the ancient city of Balkh, which has all but vanished from the deserts of what we now know as Afghanistan. Lets say he did grow up in Balkh, he must certainly have witnessed violence and death and gained an appreciation for the spoils that come from weilding great power. Like the statue in the poem, little was left of this ruined civilization after it was conquered by Ghengis Khan and others. A typical Saturday night in Balkh would have offered many opportunities for mischief for a young lad out looking for trouble and a chance to prove himself to the other kids in his neighborhood.

In farming towns all over the US the sport of 'cow tipping' is considered a trial of strength and a rite of passage with just a bit of danger thrown in (after all it is a cow). Going up to a drowsy, unsuspecting Jersey at night and pushing the top heavy animal on it's side in the mud is probably lots of fun to a small town teen with little else to do. An ancient desert kid might have practiced 'camel tipping' (goat tipping is for babies) and then had aspirations of world conquest and glory from there as he grew older. The self confidence one gains from trials of strength can open many doors to a young fellow who is trying to better himself. The camel tippers in the ancient world probably grew to become the best conquerers even though they may have lacked such things as; good judgement, social responsibility and global vision. These old guys sure could show how strong they were!

The CEO's of business and the leaders of our multi national corporations are no longer the aspiring, sword weilding pillagers and looters that they once were centuries ago. While 'pillaging and looting' are relative terms (and are often accomplished electronically) my point is that the neighborhood bully who ruled the other kids through fear and intimidation probably will not make it to the top of the excecutive food chain by using the same tactics. As in the example of Ozymandias, the face of leadership is changing and the new wave of commanders have to be skilled communicators and negotiators and not just good 'cow tippers' who can bully their peers. Without competent, forward thinking innovators who can work and be productive in a democratic environment we too will go the way of Balkh and Ozymandias and our life's work will be reduced to a footnote on a scrap of rock.

Ancient History Lesson
"Balkh was old long before Alexander’s raid, and its history of 2500 years records more than a score of conquerors. The Arabs, impressed by Balkh’s wealth and antiquity, called it Umm-al-belad, the mother of cities. When the Silk Road was the chief artery of commerce between East and West, Balkh was second to none. But then came Ghengis Khan, and wreaked upon it the utter devastation that has made the Mongols’ name a byword for barbarism. Balkh never fully recovered, and eventually faded into a village; the seat of government shifted to scruffy but vigorous Mazar-e-Sharif. Catastrophe struck in 1220, when Ghengis Khan chose to make an example of Balkh, perhaps as punishment for an uprising. One hundred thousand Mongol horsemen embarked on an orgy of slaughter and destruction that left nothing standing; a few weeks later they returned to pick off the survivors of the carnage." Quoted from Frank Harold