tylergrant

Heading out to Florida

Blog Instead of being asleep at 22:30 on 28 October 2008, kitt created this:

I firmly believe that I have done as well as I have in life because of the ultimate community I've been a part of for the last 15 years. Most of my friends have come from that community, with many of the friendships enduring beyond the original bond of ultimate.

Given that belief, it should come as exactly no surprise that travelling with a group of ultimate friends should be not only a good time, but also an adventure.

Taking Andy's advice (gee, I wish I could get him to set up his domain), four of us journeyed out to Florida today, in anticipation of the 2008 Ultimate Players Association Club Championships in Sarasota. Andy suggested people fly on Tuesday, as any delay flying on Wednesday means that you potentially arrive on Thursday and in poor shape for playing. We listened to him, and out we flew.

With me were Paul, Warren, Andy and Tyler, who really can't get enough Mischief even though he's left the team. I honestly can't say I blame him in his inability to leave Mischief. Look at me. Though, I typically don't say "Sure!" to playing poker with Paul then losing $120 on a six hour journey across country either.

When we arrived in Sarasota, Paul turned to me and said, "Hey, look. My bag has this whistle on it." He blew into it and generated the sixth most pathetic whiffing noise I'd heard from a whistle. "Hey! I wonder if my bag has one of those, too." I responded, mostly joking.

Turns out, my bag does indeed have one of those whistles, and, hey, what do you know, my whistle works. When I tweeted it, both Paul and I ended up with ear hemorrhages from the sound. Yeah, not very wise to do INSIDE the security section of an airport.

After tooting my own whistle and wandering to the car rental agency, the five of us discovered that my organizational skills do, indeed, have a weak point, and that weak point is located in the Tampa Bay car rental desk area. I couldn't find my rental confirmation number, and no one had a reservation under Hodsden. I am completely positive I had booked a car, and completely unable to find the reservation.

Fortunately, both Tyler and Paul had corporate discounts, so we were able to rent a car at a reasonable rate and head out. The car we rented had a trunk whose volume was exactly equal to the volume of luggage the five of us were willing to put into the trunk, a fact we discovered by using the Tetris skills of the four engineers standing around waiting while the fifth ran back to the terminal to pee.

The best part of the whole car adventure was, of course, having Tyler ride bitch in the back.

Into two

Blog Written with a loving hand by kitt some time around 22:26 on 6 August 2008

Communal dinner is always the best for entertainment. Take tonight's adventure: how to cut a Tyler in two. Shove him through a guillotine and drop the blade, er, doggie door.

Why I'm always the girl

Blog Instead of being asleep at 23:16 on 15 May 2007, kitt created this:

Kris and I were talking about our evening dinner. He told me a story.

"So, you know how we were cheering tonight? Well, when I tipped my glass to you, I tipped the bottom of my glass. When you tipped your glass, you held your glass in the middle and tipped the top of the glass to me.

Well, after practice on Sunday, I cheered my glass with Beth, and I presented the top of my glass. Beth tipped the top of her glass to me. I told her, 'Beth, Beth, don't you know the man rules?'

'What?'

'The man rules. You need to clink glasses with the bottom of your glass. If you touch the tops, you spread the spit around.'

'Really?'

Tyler piped up, 'Here, like this,' and cheered with me, touching the bottom of the glasses.

Beth said, 'Thanks, Tyler, for teaching me how to be a man.'

Tonight, I was thinking, 'Huh. Kitt does this, too.'"

"Great. Does that mean you're going to teach me how to be a man, too?"

"Well, if you're going to be the boy in the next life, you need to know the rules. This is why you're always the girl."

Inspiration and letting go

Blog Posted by kitt at 22:43 on 17 August 2006

Today was the last of the three days I've spent training the next developer for a previous client. The sheer amount of information I had to dump on the new developer surprised even me. I hadn't realized just how much I had developed and maintained for that organization. Three days was clearly not enough time.

I tried very hard to keep my personal opinions of one particular person at the organization out of my interactions with the next developer. Very, very hard. I did okay in my effort, not great, but okay. He understood, however, that there are issues between our two organizations, and did his best to avoid the landmines.

Yesterday was a particularly bad day at work. The above mentioned person that I tried to keep my (not positive) opinion to myself, antagonized Mike to the point of unbelievable anger. It was an eye opening experience for me. I've never seen Mike mad, much less so mad that I feared he might physically damage something (say, a wall or a chair). No client relationship is worth the stress this client has caused me, much less the health of my business partner.

The experience had one very good outcome, however.

I am done with this client. Completely done.

When I said goodbye to the new developer this evening, the stress with this client disappeared. Gone. Poof. As I file through my index cards, looking at what I need to do, I'm crossing out the leftover items from that client. I'm done. Completely done.

The interesting moment will be tomorrow, when I receive some communication about some process at the client's site is failing. I've been composing the response in my mind. It'll go something like, "Most people learn cause and effect by sixth grade, and understand that actions have consequences. You've been rude to us. You've been mean, and nasty, and disrespectful to both partners of this company. Your actions have consequences, and the answer is no."

Done. Completely done. With no regrets.

It's time to spend the time and effort I've been putting into other's projects into my projects. Time to start those projects go, go, going.

Also known as, "Time to do cool shit."

After I said goodbye to the new developer, with the phrase, "Good luck! You're fucked!" echoing in my head, I went to practice.

I haven't been to practice in a long while, from both being gone at OSCON, New Mexico (Kyle!), and Phoenix for pretty much the last three weeks, and injured from GRUB. So, my whole goal today was to keep going, work as hard as I can at the moment, and keep going.

Inspiration comes from interesting places. We were playing five pull, and ended up having to run four sprints at the end of practice. I lined up two people from Tyler, who decided to run the last sprint backwards. Three steps into the sprint, I realized he was actually running backward faster than I was running forward.

Along the same thoughts as earlier, I thought, "No fucking way is Tyler going to beat me running backwards. No. Fucking. Way." and ran as hard as I could.

He didn't beat me.

And I finished the practice as I wanted to: working as hard as I could.

Thanks, Tyler, for the inspiration.

I have $80 that says...

Blog kitt decided around 10:59 on 31 August 2005 to publish this:
Last Friday night, Mischief descended on Wes' house for the inaugral event of the Shirley-Paul-I'm-gonna-kick-your-ass duodecathalon. The first event was, somewhat appropriately, a DDR dance off. Other events include Being Tall (Paul at 6'+ will probably win that one), Being Short (Paul will lose that one to Shirley's 5'5"), and others that, no doubt, include ro-sham-something.

The winner gets breakfast in bed. Said winner does not have to let the loser into the house. Should said loser wake up said winner before serving breakfast, the attempt doesn't count and the loser has to try again.

I arrived a little late, working on various projects. As I arrived, a ro-sham-eat had just finished up. Wes ran out of the kitchen and came back into the room dragging his dog's kennel. I looked at the crate, one made for the big, big dogs, and declared three people could fit in it.

Wes and several others looked at me like I was insane. Three people in that kennel? No way!

I responded, "Not only can three people fit in there, but if one is one of the small Asian women, the other two could be Tyler and I."

No one believed me.

Tyler was game, and, after taking off his shoes, crawled into the crate. He lay on his back, taking up most of the bottom of the crate. No, no, no way could more than two people fit in the crate, the men called out.

I asked Tyler to move to the back of the crate, and I "tried" to climb in next to him. The trick is, of course, to all great cons is to not quite fit.

Well, if I had truly been trying to con these guys.

When I didn't quite fit in the crate with Tyler, everyone started calling me on my "three people" declaration. I responded quickly by pulling out my wad of cash from my pocket. "I have 60, no, 80! Eighty dollars says I can fit in the crate with Tyler and Shirley or Pei. Eighty dollars."

Both Kevin and Paul immediately offered $20. Easy money they joked. Hand over the money, Kitt.

Silly boys.

I could get four people in that crate for $100.

Tyler unfolded himself from the bottom of the crate, I slid in next to him, and Pei zipped in, pulling the cage door closed behind her.

Easiest $40 ever.

EVAR.