57 thoughts on “October 6, 2014: Planning”

1. Sitting with my mom in hospital yesterday:
   Mom - "Do you know what really depresses me? I'll never go to another Twins game."
   Me - "Do you know what really depresses me? I will!"

   Things are not going well. And now it appears I need to explain to my brother why it is important for him to make the trip. I have kids of my own. I don't have the patience for an adult child.

   1. We lost my MiL just over a year ago - it's a tough road. I'll be thinking about you and your family. Good luck with your brother.

   2. Best wishes, Algonad. I can see that day coming -- not for years yet, I hope, but coming -- with my own parents.

   3. You and all the family are in our prayers.

      1. Dido the Padre.

         1. I'll pile on here. Sorry for the bad news, Algonad.

   4. I'm sorry, Algonad. As Corn said, it is a tough road. I'll be thinking of you, your mom, & your family.

   5. Sorry to hear this, Algonad.
      We'll pray for your family.

      1. Thanks, all.

2. Phil Mackey looks back at the last Twins playoff victory

   1. four straight years of 90+ losses, followed by a "flirtation" with a division crown, then a string of playoff years? Yes, please.

   2. Want to hear something awesome?

      I was there (getting taunted and heckled and also praised for my bravery sitting alone in the Yankee Stadium outfield)!

3. I just found out that a week after I left my position a friend was also let go. He had experienced similar problems to my own, and had similarly stood up for himself. Odd how that works.

   By the way, with that, there are now three managers for five attorneys in the region. Two of those five are mostly outside that management structure anyway.

   1. Hopefully, the people that organization exists to serve don't suffer the negative effects of the, ahh...poor, management.

      1. The two of us routinely had the happiest clients out of the attorneys in the office. They're using one of my cases as the biggest highlight in our annual report for funders. It's... absurd. And unfortunately, it will mean very bad things for clients.

   2. Did you share more about what happened and I missed it, or are you just dropping hints?

      1. 'For AMR, and anyone else who wants to know.'

         SelectShow

         I'll give an abbreviated version... About 2 years ago I complained of a hostile work environment. There were lots and lots of problems. A couple months after that, in an "unrelated" move, I got a very negative performance review. A couple months after that, I was placed on a performance improvement plan. Then, they didn't mention it again for a year. After that year went by I had a new performance review where, apparently, it was decided I wasn't living up the the improvement plan. They had a second manager sit in on that meeting and take notes. All of this, despite the fact that most of the things they listed as wrong had never been on the first improvement plan. So they put my on a second improvement plan. I've spent the past 6 months diligently jumping through every hoop they've put before me (and really, the last year and a half+, but at least the second improvement plan had some specific things I could do). But then, a couple weeks ago, they gave me a 6 month review, and once again determined I hadn't improved enough (I won't get into specifics, (e-mail if you want more, I suppose) but, suffice it to say, I've done everything they've asked, and the things they're requiring of me are required of literally no one else in the office.). So, in summary: I tried to get them to fix a problem with a supervisor. Instead, they made up a bunch of stuff about me and required me to jump through hoops for two years, so that they wouldn't get sued when they let me go. Following up on the latest review, a couple Fridays ago the ED called and said "It's not a good fit. I'm asking for your resignation." Indeed, it has not been a good fit. I was happy to give the resignation. Not having a job is terrifying, but not having that job is fantastic. I'm fairly confident they knew from the get-go what they were going to do. Just enough time passed after the complaint that they could claim it wasn't retaliation. They had another manager sit in to take notes at my previous performance review, so they had multiple witnesses and an official company line about what was said. Of course, I also handled major litigation all on my own, and they're using my work to court funders, so... clearly, it wasn't really about the work. Sigh. I'm gone from there. That's a good thing.

         1. Gross. Best of luck, Philo.

         2. 'Spoiler'	SelectShow
            As I'm sure you are well aware, your resignation means you aren't eligible for unemployment, since you quit voluntarily. Not sure if you would have been eligible if "fired" for "cause" either....

            What a pile.... Good luck, dude.

            1. 'Spoiler'	SelectShow
               One of my areas of practice was unemployment, so yeah. I knew what they were setting up the whole time. Still somehow convinced myself that actually doing everything they asked was going to matter.

               1. I really wish your organization wasn't the go-to option my supervisors keep repeating for our clients who are in desperate need of help. Not that I found them all that helpful before, but now I'm convinced they rarely ever will be.

4. Going in for one of those lovely procedures men of a certain age (or certain medical condition or history) get to have at regular intervals. The prep is the worst part, and today brings the promise of eating solid food.

   1. #itsnotabigdeal

      1. but it is a big bottle.

         1. The VA is not about to pony up for the new stuff that requires half the volume of liquid. They don't even give you the choice to pay for it yourself.

            I'm not complaining, though. As Rhu_Ru said above, it's not a big deal. And it's far better than the alternative.

   2. 

      1. My scrip referred to "colon lavage."

         1. Is "lavage" French for "blast"?

            1. That's "Colon Blow", I think.

               1. If this were the 80's, I could make a joke about Bartolo and Cocaine.

5. the cynic in me wants to call this a kind of green-washing (along with the league's aggressive pink-washing this weekend), but still a nice gesture.

6. Are we talking about books today? Because I finished Pale Fire, dammit.

   1. I haven't. I may have misplaced my copy for about 2 weeks.

      But now that you're done, you can start on Inherent Vice, since there's a movie coming out in December.

      1. Next up is getting back to The Goldfinch--I promised New Guy. (Although I may sneak in El Deafo first, but don't tell him.)

   2. I've got a draft with 10 words in it that I started last night.

      Something should go up shortly now that I'm done with classes for a while.

      1. Just another 49 words and you're set!

   3. Posted. Interested to hear your thoughts on Pale Fire.

      1. Busy afternoon, but look for them tonight.

7. So Phil Mackey went on a rant this morning about how mind-gougingly awful that 18 inning game was. In addition to pace of play (I admit the 45 seconds between pitches in the 16th inning was getting to me too), he said baseball is hard to watch when nobody is getting on base. I've heard this argument made a lot this year. I think Joe Pos even talked about how while focusing on the three true outcomes makes sense from a team-building perspective, it makes for less interesting baseball as it reduces stuff happening on the base paths.

   For our citizens that were alive during 1966-1968, was baseball hard to watch back then? Other than Lou Brock, nobody was stealing bases, so I imagine other than the 45 seconds between pitches and bullpen usage, pace of play was probably similar.

   1. Baseball was hard to watch because it wasn't available to watch! You should be asking if baseball was hard to listen to, which is a no.

   2. There were fewer pitches per plate appearance back in the Perfect Everything Years, so that alone might have helped the pace. I think the lack of batters getting on base deflates the excitement. You know outs are going to happen so you reserve cheering for when someone gets on base. If that doesn't happen then you have endless waiting.

      1. FWIW:
         

         1. So you're saying the pace should be similar to the late 80's?

            1. I didn't have handy pitches per plate appearance, but I would assume that P/PA tracks K-rate pretty closely.

               AL WHIP has been trending down for about a decade (and is now back to what it was in the mid-1970s), while Ks have been going up. Seems like games should be getting shorter as a result (although, I guess, K-rate going up and WHIP going down would seem to move pace in opposite directions; hmmmm).

               1. I don't know if the K rate really means that much more P/PA. It does guarantee at least 3 pitchers in a PA, but I really wonder if Ks are going up because players can't/don't put the ball in play early in the count of if players just are less able to make contact with two strikes (or are taking more called third strikes)?

                  1. I was going to comment that walk rates may contribute to it, but the walk rate was below 3.0 per 9 for the first time since 1968 and has trended down since 2000. If that happens again in 2015, it will be the first consecutive sub-3.0 seasons since 1921-22.

                     1. Right. K-rate up, WHIP down. I would think that WHIP is a much bigger determinant of pitches than K-rate, but I could imagine that more Ks means more pitches per PA on average.

                        1. WHIP would be indicative of P/IP but not P/PA. I would also imagine the more PAs with no one on base, the faster the pace of play.

   3. Turns out my in-laws don't have MLBNetwork anymore, so I fell asleep watching something else that my FiL dialed up.
      I go to a house with cable for a weekend during the LDSs and I get to watch one game!
      Sure, it was the Royals humiliating Scioscia in his hometown, so that was cool.

   4. Also, for me, the Giants are up in their series 2-0-1.

      1. so, another tie and the series is over, right?

   5. Maury Wills was stealing bases, too.

      I was age 7-9 from 1966-68. I thought baseball then was great. Of course, I had no other style of play to compare it to at the time.

      One of the things that always strikes me about baseball is that the people who claim to love it the most seem to constantly run it down. "It's too slow. There's too many strikeouts. There's too many home runs. The pitchers don't throw complete games. The players are overpaid babies." On and on and on. I wonder sometimes if some of these people who claim to love baseball actually even like it.

      My opinion is that baseball was a great game in the 1960s. It was a great game in the 1970s. It was a great game in the 1980s and the 1990s and the 2000s. And it's a great game now. Is it the same? No. Could it be improved? Sure. But it's a great game. It would be nice if some of these self-appointed Guardians of the Game would acknowledge that once in a while.

      And for what it's worth, I was listening to the car radio Saturday night, and I thought the eighteen-inning game was awesome.

      1. I'm with you Padre. The only time I didn't love baseball was 1994/1995. And that's because I was bitter about the strike and thus didn't get to appreciate the magical seasons Greg Maddux had (I also was young and hated all things Braves then, too). It would take a lot of awful things to get me to not think the game was the best ever.

         1. Pretty much the only thing I dislike about baseball plays in the American League in the Bronx.

            1. I was thinking this afternoon that if the Yankees really want to honor Derek Jeter, they should just disband the team and go out of business.

               1. Really, from what I've heard all season, how can they possibly go on?

               2. You get all of the WGOM bucks for this suggestion, Padre.

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