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October 18, 2024 – The Art of War, Military Combat

October 18, 2024 /

This is week eight of the reading of the Art of War. I have to admit that this book is so short that I have read ahead a bunch and then forgot anything that I read. I then have to go back and re-read the chapter so that I have any semblance of something to write about. Fortunately at only two pages, I can even reread a couple of times a night.

I hate to admit this but I can reread these chapters and not get that much from it. I have already talked in the past weeks about Yin and Yang and eastern philosophy and this week is really no different. Most of what each one of these points are contains a strong undercurrent of Yin and Yang.

The following are the major points in this chapter.

  • Make the best of a bad opportunity
  • Balance the drive to attack with the fatigue of battle
  • The mind and mindset is as important as the physical in battle
  • Do not over extend your forces in exuberance

Once again, there is also a strong implication on the importance of leadership. Realize that this chapter opens up with the general getting orders from the ruler. That means that the general has a degree of latitude to operate but the objective is set.

I was listening to an interview this week with the daughter of Steven Covey (author of “Seven Habits of Highly Effective People”). After that, my mind wandered how these popular thought leaders were influenced or directed to their ideas. It kind of strikes me that many ‘celebrity’ authors were highly motivated by people that I have never heard from or about.

This then me to think about who we consider ‘leaders’ today. I am primarily speaking about politicians now. They are nothing like Sun Tsu or Steven Covey. By that I mean there is no Yin and Yang and very little wisdom that come from our politicians. I have to categorically say that is because politicians are not actually leaders. I think that they are more aptly named actors or maybe control freaks.

We want to believe that there is self reflection and accountability but being a not-leader shouldn’t surprise us that there is not. If you are not a leader you don’t have to do those things to get re-elected. Leaders move a group of people from one position to another. This could be physical or ethereal.

In my observation, leaders are people that apply or document good advice and tactics regardless of the source. The reason that I know people are influenced by people I have never heard of is that Covey credits these people in his work. Unless an actor is receiving an award, how often are they crediting others for the influence or beliefs? Based on what I have seen, never.

Our ‘leaders’ are sending troops to the middle east as I write. Can someone please explain to me why this is in the best interest of the United States of America? I can no longer buy into the 1960s domino theory anymore. If I had to speculate, it is that unnamed individuals are influencing foreign policy for personal or financial gain. Politicians use mask of freedom to start another war. Are you enjoying the show?

End Your Programming Routine: It is the generals who will be tasked with operating within Sun Tsu’s guidelines in the middle east. Our leaders are actually the rulers, get that paradigm straight. If we did a better job of adequately overlaying descriptions should wake us up to what is actually happening. Unfortunately, I don’t think we are going to vote our way out of this. But, I do think that we have a better chance of doing less harm and getting what we want when we are aware of the actors versus the leaders.

October 17, 2024 – The Escoffier: Cookbook and Guide to the Fine Art of Cookery

October 17, 2024 /

October is a different month. The Escoffier by Auguste Escoffier is a suggested book of the month for for the Left Coast Culinary Book Club. I say suggested because technically there is no selected book but the theme is Escoffier himself. This is also a different kind of month because this is going to be the first time ever that I will not read the book.

According to what I have heard so far, Escoffier was the first celebrity chef. Born in 1846, he was a restaurant rock star by the turn of the century. Unfortunately, that came to a crashing end when he was fired for skimming at his flagship London restaurant. While formally accepting the charges and partially paying the losses, he never publicly admitted to guilt. This was the pinnacle of his career which continued on but in a much subdued fashion.

This book (pictured), is sort of the codification of French cooking. He took what people knew and did and put it into a formal reference. This was the revolution that he brought to the food scene, particularly in areas of Europe outside of France.

Let me speak to the elephant in the room. For someone that reads almost everything that I run across, why am I not reading this? I have skimmed through the book and it is a cookbook. It is a cookbook that is in the style of “The Joy of Cooking” meaning that that it is almost 1000 pages of words. It is more important to contain the information than actually making it useable.

I will use an example. I was looking up fish recipes and I go to the one that I want. It then refers to another section of the book for the foundation technique/sauce. This is also something that is done in the “Joy of Cooking”. While this is a good way to re-enforce consistency, it is very hard on the user.

The book is also written in a dialect of English that is not familiar. I believe that it is a direct printing from the original. As a result, I believe that it is dated with colloquial phrases and words that are just difficult to read. You add to that French words and page flipping to get the whole picture and you can see that reading is going to be difficult.

I bought the book even though I was not planning on reading it, it seems like the authority of cooking seemed appropriate. To be honest, there are very few books that I buy with the intent of never reading. I probably should have purchased a biography or something that would have been more interesting than another cookbook but the decision was made.

Can I recommend the book aside from my hesitations? Generally speaking I would say no. There is always someone outside with the perfect puzzle piece fit. I cant think of any in this canned, mushroom soup era. You would have to be a dedicated fan or historian or something of that nature to really get energized about this book. I know, it is a little disingenuous to poo poo something that I have not fully given it a shot. I didn’t really know anything until I ordered it.

End Your Programming Routine: I don’t really mean to be negative, I just don’t see myself using this book. I barely open the “Joy of Cooking” for the same reasons. I don’t like turning the page to continue the recipe or to refer back to previous recipes. It doesn’t mean that it is a bad reference, it is about the spatial relationship and organization of information which we have much better mechanisms through technology today. By all means, feel free to disagree.

October 16, 2024 – Taking Care of Business

October 16, 2024 /

This is a takeoff from yesterday. If you didn’t listen to the podcast, then you will miss a little bit. Back when we would have those successful fishing trips, after eating a dinner or two, the rest was up to my dad. Smoked fish is one of those things that he has always had a passion for and still guards to this day.

I have heard it said that fish is best eaten fresh. To that end, I have even heard that they continue to degrade in the freezer. That is bad news because I have a salmon in the freezer that is dated 2019 that came from my in-laws freezer. The point being is that even the fish eaten two days after catch seemed to be developing some ammonia flavor, so unless we were going to eat them for four days straight, I needed to get on to some preservation mechanism. I chose smoking.

I can get the smoking down, what was scaring me was the fillet process. I know that I can learn that too, but I also know that I need practice. Unfortunately, seven fish is not enough. But, once I got over the hump of I have to do it now or it will be too late, I hacked away. I am not proud of the results, but I think I made some technique observations that will be helpful for next time.

The carcasses went into the stock pot. I have always wanted to make some fish broth. If it is anything like other stocks, this is a key component to moving dishes from OK to great. I will be working with that some other time, it was still time as the key component to what I was doing now.

I chose a dry brine. That is covering the flesh with a sugar/salt and other spices for a period of time (like overnight). That covering is to be rinsed off before smoking. I chose that because that is what my dad has always done. I also preferred the dry brine to a liquid, it seems more right to me for smoking.

The flesh was almost goopy while I was filleting. After the brining, things firmed up quite a bit. This re-enforced my decision on the technique. I made another questionable decision when the smoking was happening. The only charcoal I had was mesquite. I added some cherry for smoke, but I think a better choice would be apple or alder with plain charcoal. These heavier woods are better for almost all meats besides fish.

The smoking process took about three hours. I know that my dad uses a dedicated smoker and those fish get a lot more time under controlled conditions. But, as you can see from the picture that the fish look like leather at this point. Any more time would serve no purpose, probably they were over cooked.

The taste… I will temper this a bit by saying that I have only tried one piece to date. It was salty and dirty. Clearly, I did not rinse the brine off well enough. Dirty, I don’t know if it was my charcoal or my fish handling or the fish itself. I didn’t taste dirty when I ate the fish plain, so I have to believe that it is something that I did. Don’t worry, I am going to eat it all no matter how bad it tastes. But there is clearly room for improvement.

End Your Programming Routine: It was probably the last glorious day of the season. There is nothing better than sitting next to the smoker, in the sunshine, scrolling through the football scores. I was just pleasant and seemed like the perfect cap of a great couple of days off. Regardless of the outcome, I am looking forward to the next fishing trip and trying this all over again.

October 15, 2024 – Fishing the West

October 15, 2024 /

Hot off of my vacation, I have fishing on the mind. I talk a little about what we did, the politics and some of the current status of fishing near me. This is a topic that could literally go on for hours there is so much to talk about. I keep it to the basics today.

October 11, 2024 – The Art of War, Vacuity and Substance

October 11, 2024 /

Technically, this is week seven in the review of this book and it would be considered chapter six. Translation variation makes it a little difficult to search by the title of the chapter. So, it is more fruitful to search for ‘Chapter Six’ rather than ‘Vacuity and Substance’. That is a tip that I have learned throughout this process if you want to do more supplemental research.

If you are a fan of Yin/Yang then you will love this chapter. Pretty much all of the points discussed contain this sort of context. In general terms the concepts are strong versus weak, first versus second, win versus lose, whole versus divided, offensive versus defensive, you get the point.

Maybe this chapter would be more insightful if we put ourselves back 2500 years ago? A lot of what was discussed seemed fairly common knowledge today when it comes to tactics. For instance, going on offense causes the opponent to devote resources to defense. When you are focused on defense, then it is not possible to execute your own offensive strategy. Hence, it is better to be on the offense rather than the defense.

An army that can split the opponents has a strength advantage. This is because it is easier to execute power when it is concentrated. This is a pretty common realization in business. When you try to do too many things, you may dilute efforts to the very most important efforts.

The most important concept I zeroed in on this chapter was at the end. To paraphrase, it basically says that there are no guarantees in victory. Or said another way, unpredictable things can always happen. By proxy, the best plans should be somewhat fluid or able to adapt if and or when the terrain is different than planned.

I think a very good example is the tragedy with Hurricane Helene. Some people left Florida to avoid the hurricane. On the surface, it seems like a very smart idea. However, spending the week in Ashville turned out to be a fatal error. As someone that lived hundreds of miles from the South Carolina coast, I would not have figured that to be a risk. But as Sun Tzu points out, things that you cant control sometimes happen.

Ninety nine times out of 100, going to Ashville would be a win win. Escape danger and have a nice vacation. This just happened to be the unforeseeable scenario. What if I have spent my whole life saving for retirement and I get killed in a car accident at 65? Would that have been a waste? I would say that there are some times that you just cannot plan for and those are the things that you cannot worry about.

However, if you are planning your whole working for life to retire and you lose your job at 63, that is a plan that needs to have some overlay flexibility. People that take reasonable risk mitigation into account in their plans are the smart ‘generals’. I honestly didn’t think that Tzu was encouraging planning for the car wreck but it is always illustrative to go to the extreme to drive the point home.

End Your Programming Routine: It is hard for me to say that Sun Tzu has caused this philosophy to be common place or that he was simply the first to document the obvious. Regardless, it is probably good to refresh on the fundamentals because it is really common for organizations to get lost in the tress. Sometimes it happens when you just try to do one more thing and pretty soon you are doing ten mediocre tasks rather that one strong one. For that reason, it is helpful to stand back and check yourself once and a while. That is a better strategy for flexibility and flexibility is the key to more victories.

October 8, 2024 – Who is Right?

October 8, 2024 /

Sometimes I think that we are so convinced that we are right that we miss what is going on around us. Our paradigm is so tight that we cant even understand the counter to our position. That is what today’s podcast is all about. You will probably be surprise on my take of ‘Law and Order’.

October 7, 2024 – Carolina in My Mind

October 7, 2024 /

This is a bonus podcast. I pushed my regular recorded podcast for tomorrow. Since I am out of pocket, I wanted to make sure to let my Carolina brothers know I see you, I hear you, I am praying for you. As preparedness minded as I am, I don’t know how you could ready for a situation like this. Keep up the good fight.

October 4, 2024 – The Art of War, Strategic Military Power

October 4, 2024 /

I read a bunch of these chapters in a row when my son was at a doctor’s appointment. A few weeks later I re-read this chapter again and last night I re-read it again. This particular chapter is more abstract then the ones I have reviewed thus far. Truth be told, I didn’t get much out of it by reading multiple times. I was hoping that if I kept banging my head and then letting it rattle around for a while it would come to me.

As a result, I went to the internet to get a hint. It is like those 3D pictures that you stare and stare until you see it. I guess that I would say that I see it, but it is not direct. This chapter is about leadership and it uses some very some very aloof analogies to make the point.

Part of the reason that it is so abstract is because this chapter is riddled with eastern philosophy. I am no expert in that, in fact I can barely recognize it. The two strongest ones were Yin and Yang (I recognized that one) and the order of fives. I had no idea that the Chinese thought that there were five notes, five colors and five flavors (that seems familiar). While I am familiar about some of those ideas, mastering the practice is a life long endeavor.

With that in mind, I am not sure exactly how the technique of go hard/go soft is actually a successful military tactic. I suppose that I could take it as far as tactics are situational. That seems intuitive at least. But, since this chapter is about leadership, I have heard it say that the best leaders know how to motivate people by a mixture of toughness and softness. I won’t say it is common sense because I have come across a lot of bad leaders but at least it feels right.

Without reading the cliff notes, I picked the last section as what I thought was the most impactful section of this chapter. The text talks about logs and rocks as sort of moving as a result of natural consequences. It is the leader that positions the logs and rocks to roll down the hill and stay stationary on a flat surface. Or said another way, the leader is the one to own the battle’s win or loss results. That is something I can get behind.

Many times I think that leaders get too much credit without enough blame. Let us think about the President for a moment. Whether we will have one or the other as president, it generally won’t change the temperature in my pool so to speak. When the economy was on fire in the late 1990s, Clinton didn’t do that. He just happened to be in the right place at the right time. W Bush didn’t cause the financial crisis of 2008, he just happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time.

Now, he didn’t do himself any favors by continuing to support money printing under the federal reserve. He also got lucky that financial takeovers stopped the economy from totally failing. But to actions that he did personally as president had little to do with the overall outcome. What I am trying say is that leaders enable the conditions for success or failure. Depending on whether they guess right or not has potential outcomes.

You can bet that if we see a President Harris, that administration will be open to communing with socialists. You can also bet that if we see a President Trump, that administration will be open with Oligarchs. Both will be dreaming about a Fascist future. Because that is our destiny, it will likely be so. Tell me, what would I credit either with? Certainly not a better future based on American ideals. But they won’t do it by themselves, the constituents, the appointees and the people working the system will be the ones doing the work. Only the accountability goes to the leader.

End Your Programming Routine: In the end, I agree that leaders should be accountable. I also agree that there are many things that can be done to influence the results. But ultimately, leaders design the boat, they don’t make it sail. If their design for a sail boat contains no sail, then obviously that is going to fail. Putting the proper boat in the water isn’t going to guarantee that it sails either. There are factors like having wind that we just cannot control.

October 3, 2024 – And… Finally

October 3, 2024 /

My vision is finally complete. I won’t deny that it took so long that I wore out my chair but all the cast-offs and things that I wish I had installed (even some luxuries) are there. I have a new chair coming, just another day or two. The one I picked out got nixed by my wife for cost, but if I don’t like my new chair, I will be pushing for an upgrade.

Since the summer time, I have noticed that I have been having some back soreness. I observed that it went away when I spent several days at the hospital. It could be a number of things but I starting with replacing my office chair. I have sat in it a number of hours every day all summer long. And since it was given to me because it hurt the giver’s back, it is my number one suspect.

I was kind of on the fence about the TV and the surround sound. My thought for the TV is that it is a second monitor. It could be helpful in some group call settings, etc. That is a pretty thin reason. The truth is that I wanted it and when I saw one second hand for $12.50, it was a done deal. Once I had the TV, I had to also add the surround sound. I spent the time and expense to wire it up when I was building the space because that was my plan all along.

My piece de resistance is that I found an inexpensive sub-woofer to connect to the sound system. It is the 30 year long fulfillment. In the late 1990s we were denied credit at Montgomery Wards to purchase a full surround sound system. We told my in-laws about it and they immediately purchased it. I was slightly sad every time I looked at it, but the receiver and speakers got moved around and eventually deprecated.

The joke is on Montgomery Wards now, I am doing better than ever financially and they are out of business. I ended up with a much better system anyway. Once I realized that I could buy a subwoofer used at a reasonable price on eBay, it was a matter of the right time and place. Unfortunately, I have been working so much that I haven’t had a chance to really wring it out. The only thing I have done was the Dolby test. But it sounds fantastic with proper rear speaker placement and the subwoofer installed.

The space is truly my happy place. It is where I work (a lot), it is where I record my podcasts and due most of my writing. Now I can turn on football while I am putting in those late nights. It is always the first place I go in the mornings, even on the weekends. I can hide out until people start waking up and then I come upstairs to get the day started officially.

The tapestry on the wall is from my great grandmother. The pillows on the couch were made by my grandmother as part of our wedding quilt (which is now threadbare). The blanket on the couch was actually my wife’s when we first met. The pictures on the wall is my family crest and the other was from my father-in-law’s estate. My coat is an award that I won from a former job for meeting team performance metrics. I am surrounded by heritage, not just cast-offs.

I had visions of promo-ing a movie or reading a book on the couch or beating Need for Speed 2 the second time. That hasn’t come to fruition yet, nor do I think I will spend a lot more time than I already do in there. I would go as far as to say that I already may spend more time in my office than I do in my bed on average.

If I was being honest, I would like to have a little more storage. I would like to have one of those half file cabinets and maybe another under the desk storage drawer. I really don’t think I have any additional room for the file cabinet so that will probably never happen. I could probably add a few more decor items. For the most part, it is done and I am happy.

End Your Programming Routine: Outfitting my office with all of the techno-junk, personal items and do dads has been a pursuit for three years. All of my time building things, research into cables and cards, installing, testing and optimizing has been a lot of fun. In many ways, I am sad to be done but I need to move on. I need to be investing my time and money preparing for my hike next year. I am already feeling behind the gun on my preparedness for this event.

October 2, 2024 – Getting Rich By Acting Poor

October 2, 2024 /

Now that is sensational. I also am not claiming to be getting rich but I am using a technique that rich people use. That would be don’t spend excessively on things that don’t matter. Since getting rid of my Mustang four years ago now, my vehicles keep getting older with more and more miles.

We have kind of poked at replacing the Navigator but the price of newer to new cars has become astronomical. We were thinking something around the Explorer size but going from no car payment to $900/mo for six years seams untenable. So we keep kicking the can knowing that the day will come that we need to bite the bullet and replace at least one vehicle.

Having been an owner of cheap cars, I have developed a philosophy that cheap cars are a good thing. Let’s think about it for a minute. If I paid $1000 for a car and it lasted two months, that would be $500/mo or half of what I would pay for an Explorer. This is not paying for things that do not matter. I am paying for transportation, not style points and that is half the cost of something new.

Of course, at some point having to replace a car every couple of months can be a hassle. That being said, at this price point you can afford to be choosy. So, maybe a $2500 car that lasts a year is really $200/mo. This is a far cry from new car prices. Think about it, all time beyond that is a bonus.

One thing my summer in Portland taught me is that a Navigator L (for long) in the city is a hassle. It is hard to find a parking spot and maneuver in tight spots. My tactic is try to get farther away from the door and hopefully find more open spots. Otherwise, it is multiple back-up, pull forward until I inch into a spot with traffic piling up behind me. But, going farther from the door is hard on the patient that can barely sit in the seat for the ride in the first place. However, you go with what you got.

Since I was under five during the last fuel crisis, the truth is I haven’t paid a whole lot of attention to operating costs. That being said, I won’t deny when you hit the cut-off limit of $125 for fuel it stings a little bit. With only me driving, I typically only had to refuel every two weeks so it was bearable. But, I could do a lot better than 12MPG as well.

About six months ago, my dad called me and said that he was thinking of buying a new car. His reasoning was that he wanted to make sure that he wasn’t stuck with only EV’s as options. He is also 78 so it probably will be his last car. But he asked me if I would be interested in buying his old car. I said sure.

My youngest son is a driver now and so he has taken over my pickup which has been my primary vehicle since I sold the Mustang. My wife just started driving again after stopping at the end of last year. That left us coordinating schedules much more tightly than we have ever done as a couple because we have always had a vehicle per driver. Adding another inexpensive vehicle seems like the right ticket.

It’s not all sunshine and roses because everything has a cost. Just possessing the car has registration, insurance and maintenance costs. So, truly acting poor would be to make due with what we have. I mention this because it should be considered when making this decision. I am still paying something for the privilege of convenience. My hope is that lower operating costs will offset the additional cost of ownership somewhat.

I wont drag out the negotiations and all of that. But, I ended up taking the possession of the vehicle a little over a week ago. I was telling him about my philosophy of cheap cars and he said ‘You agree with Warren Buffet then’. I didn’t know that, but I guess that I do.

End Your Programming Routine: I cant help but throw my opinion in. I think a lot of people are car poor because their image is more important than their budget. I come to this conclusion because I know what cars cost and I also know that our household income is pretty high. I also know that my newest car is 14 years old and has 240,000 miles. Adding an inexpensive car offers more flexibility and will extend the longevity of what we have and no car payment. Me and Warren Buffet agree.