How people spend time

 

I had an interesting personal experience in observing how people spend time. I generally hate long, stand-around waits for anything. As much as possible I arrange my life to avoid them; when I encounter them, I usually bail and forego the whatever, if that is an option.

The other day, I went to my local Bruegger's to pick up a dozen bagels. I do this quite frequently, and normally I phone in my order. (Hello Bruegger's--please invest a little more in your online ordering system, so a very basic activity--ordering a dozen bagels and specifying which particular bagels to include--is supported).

But for whatever reason, nobody was answering the phone. I think they use a cordless, maybe it ran out of charge or got left in a backroom. So I decided to take my chances and show up in person.

It wasn't all that busy, but it took me a good 15 minutes to get my dozen bagels. What amazed me was the number of people I saw in that time who came in and ordered just one bagel, to-go, and seemed to think nothing of waiting 15 minutes for it! 

I was chafing at waiting that long for 13 bagels. So much time for one crummy bagel!

"Before Allen Ginsberg's 'Howl,' the state of poetry in America was a little bit the way it is today - poetry about poetry, language about language."

This!!!! In general I dislike self-referential art--novels about novelists, songs about life in the band, movies about show business. But poetry strikes me as by far the worst for this trait. (Any poem that contains the phrase "these lines" is an immediate fail for me.)

(The interview the quote comes from is about Allen Ginsberg, not self-referentiality in poetry and art.)

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I believe part of the problem, in literature at least, is part of a "write what you know" syndrome. For many budding contemporary writers, what they know is Iowa Writer's workshop, MFA programs, and the daunting wall of frustrations, of sources internal and external, that beset a would-be writer.

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Possible unrelated observation: most potential readers enjoy ryhming language from time-to-time. Example: Hamilton lyrics.

The first person I knew to require broadband when relocating was my Mom

Mom and Dad got broadband early, I think in 1999. They were in their mid-60s at the time, and lived in Simsbury, CT, a Hartford suburb. They were not super tech-savvy, but were both daily AOL users, and had branched out into the open internet.

I had been aware for a few years of the coming availability of consumer broadband, via cable infrastructure. But it was not on the horizon anywhere near where I lived (Fishers, Indiana), and I did not personally know of anyone who had it. It seemed like it was very limited to a few places, like probably San Francisco. Then I somehow came across an article that said it was currently being rolled out in there area, l advised them to sign up immediately, don't debate whether it is worth it because it will be.

They followed my advice and never looked back. So much so that 2 years later, when they were relocating out of Simsbury, my mother made broadband availability a pre-condition for a next house!

(Fortunately, a couple of years had passed, and also they were moving to the NoVA area, a hotbed of telecomm infrastructure, so that requirement didn't prove hard to fulfill--especially since they wound up building in a brand-new development. )

Workplace Dating

This article makes a very good case that the taboo on workplace dating, however well-intended, is misguided. I remember reading an article 30 years ago that made the point that people spend a lot of time at work. If you didn't happen to meet your life partner in college or shortly after, the workplace is a very good bet, given the time spent and potential commonality of interests and background.

Now that online dating is proving to be a poor substitute for IRL, this makes more sense than ever.