Party

Cory's graduation party just wrapped up. It was nice - everybody spaced themselves out pretty well, so we were able to entertain everybody relatively easily and I felt like we gave equal attention to everyone. I do wish that people could have stayed a little longer, and that some other people were able to get here and not be sick or get stuck on the other side of the very snowy mountains. He got six bottles of wine! We were left with an empty house by 5, so now we're watching Holiday Inn and relaxing a little.

It still hasn't really set in for both of us that we've now passed over the cusp of a new part of our lives. I think for me it's difficult because I've been so focused on my situation at work (the company is on shady ground at the moment and I could be laid off any day) that I haven't really thought about what the new part of our lives means. There are so many possibilities - from the silly little things like being able to go on vacation without worrying about homework, to finding a new job and a new house in a new city, and starting a family - which is what I'm most excited about.

But first thing's first - finishing crochet projects for Christmas, and getting through another week of choir practice and a bank audit at work. Well, that's second - first is to finish watching Holiday Inn.

Strategic Management

My last final for my life as an undergrad happens in about two hours. The class is Strategic Management, and I really need to focus on Michael Porter's Three Tests for Firm Diversification. But I also know that I need a 52% on this final in order to get a passing grade in the class, so the cost-benefit analysis has me writing a blog post instead. This is one of those classes where I just go through the motions and forget everything as soon as I walk out of the room. Strategic Management, heh. What the deuce does that even mean? Shouldn't I know after studying it for 3 months? Okay, I guess I picked up a couple of tidbits along the way. Writing a few papers and giving a few presentations in class has forced me to gobble up and regurgitate a few items of note. I know about the five forces. I know about support structures and about low-cost versus differentiation. But mostly I know about objectives and goals. I know more about mission statements and vision statements. I know the difference, I suppose, between posturing and what is gut-wrenchingly real.

This is my last term as an undergraduate. It's taken me longer than the average bear to get here. Part of me is still in high school, wondering what the point of college really is. It's just a piece of paper produced by a system that was invented by the man, man: It don't mean nothin. Part of me is still in the future: I have kids and a wife and a house and a job and a fairly happy disposition. College is the glue, in my mind, that holds these two positions together. It is the bridge, the door, the other cliches, that gets me from that cynical kid to the happy adult. So it's taken more than a decade to get there. It's a long bridge, it's a heavy door. Whatever. The point is that I'm done, and I couldn't be happier. Well, that's not true.

Business-speak is funny stuff. "Strategic Management." What is that anyhow? Who talks like that other than pretentious actors in pretentious television shows written by pretentious writers trying to sound less pretentious? I guess my classmates and future colleagues talk like that. I guess I talk like that now. At least, now I have a piece of paper allowing me to talk like that. But what "Strategic Management" really means is something I wish I knew more about a decade ago. It really is just a very weird, publishable way of saying "Watch your step." It is a quasi-academic way of forcing you to sit down and ask, "How long is that bridge? How stable is it? How heavy is that door? When is the right time to open it?" You ask the question today, and again tomorrow, and again next week. You wake up at 2 in the morning on some still night and ask it again with sweat dropping off your brow and your wife breathing slowly next to you. You ask it again when you're feeling stressed at a pumpkin patch on a beautiful October day and you're confused about how best to spend your time. You ask it again when you're putting peppermint sticks on your Christmas tree and putting off studying for your finals. You ask it again when you're studying for your last final of your undergraduate career.

So while I'm studying about Michael Porter and his highly publishable thoughts and considerations, I'm asking myself about this bridge I've crossed. Did I cross it quickly enough? Did I cross it boldly enough? Did I open this door with enough flamboyant gusto? Have I made my entrance into this bold new world with enough zest? I know Megan says Yes, and I know she says it with all her heart. I'm not sure what I think about it yet. Here is where Strategic Management comes in, though: The bridge continues on and the portal is guarded by a revolving door. The process continues, and it must, because I don't have the kids and the house and the dog that I want yet. What I have is a piece of paper and an ability to more accurately judge my position in my life, and my placement in this world, and the dreams and goals I have, and the methods I have to retrieve them.

My last final for my life as an undergrad happens in about two hours, and I am finally ready.

Thanksgiving

Megan and I are now enjoying a relaxing evening at Curt and Bonnie's pad. Curt and Meg are making pumpkin pie and egg nog, respectively. Earlier, I helped Curt get some shampoo. Meg is supposed to cut away some of his Gumby-like hairdo. That should be fun.

Just a couple more weeks of classes and then I will have a degree, a wall to put it on, and hopefully, some money to pay for the wall. Gotta get me a job. Frankly, the job would be better than the degree. Wait, why am I in school? Oh yeah. The circle of life.

I'm working on a project for programming. I'm working on a project for government accounting. I'm working on a project for strategic management. All these things are due next week. Sheesh. Not much room for loving turkeys and all that. But priorities aside, I hope to watch the Seahawks play Dallas tomorrow. And by "play" I mean "lose horribly to." Man oh man, not a good season this year.

Let's see. What am I thankful for? I'm thankful for my family, of course. Mostly the wife who puts up with my fingers in her nose. But also for my sister who needs to get cured, and her family who supports her. Also for Mom who's put up with all sorts of kids' fingers in kids' noses for years. Also, I'm thankful for the other one. What's his name? Oh yeah. Joel. Joel, who should come up to Oregon to celebrate the fascinating occurrence we call "weather." I'm also thankful for accounting, as strange as that sounds. The apple doesn't fall far from the tree, and I wanna be sure to classify it as a current asset. Or a long-term liability. We'll see where that goes. Speaking of which, I'm thankful for my dad who had a pretty swinging Thanksgiving last year. In fact, it was a year ago that we saw Taj Mahal at a swinging bar in Seattle. That was a pretty cool Thanksgiving.

But back to this year. Blast it, I got no more words. The house smells of cinnamon and nog. I hope your turkey is warm and your hearts warmer.

Pumpkining

Last weekend we took advantage of the nice weather as well as the promise of a couple of free pumpkins and went down to our Community Sponsored Agriculture farm for an hour or two. Gathering Together Farm is just south of Philomath, which is just southwest of where we live. It's super close to downtown Philomath but still feels like you're out in the country somewhere. GTF has a very nice little stand and restaurant area which is out underneath a covered porch. We have yet to eat there and I believe their offered meals are winding down for the season, so maybe next year.



We had the option to take the hayride out to the patch, but we opted to walk down the dirt path instead. We met goats and chickens on our way, and peeked into greenhouses and saw tomatoes and peppers growing. The trees hadn't quite gotten to their peak in terms of color, but they were awfully pretty anyway, especially the large stand of birches at the alpaca farm across the street.



We left the stand for the patch at the same time that the hayride did, so by the time we got to the pumpkins the hayriders were in the midst of choosing their gourds. I loved the look of this little patch - it was like a tiny clearing in the trees, and looked almost wild. In some patches the farmhands clear away most of the vines and cut the pumpkins off so that all you have to do is pick it up and tote it home, but here they provided clippers to us and we walked on the huge leaves to keep from getting our shoes too muddy. We ended up using our keys to saw through the vines of our pumpkins.



We walked back again, and said hello to the pigs in the pigpen by the stand. (In their newsletter two days later they said they slaughtered one of them a few hours after we were there - poor piggy!) Back up on the porch, we each had a glass of apple cider and a cinnamon-sugar potato doughnut, and then headed for home.

Tuesdays with Brokaw

The only thing I like more than presidential debates on Tuesday evenings is FactCheck.org on Wednesday mornings.

[Pause to remember HTML and insert hrefs.]

You know, now that I've had some time to think about it, I really like quite a few things more than either of those. I like rivers and I like a full moon. I like chocolate syrup on a spoon. I like a fairly funny cartoon. Speaking of cartoons, my new favorite is Order of the Stick. I'm no DnD (that's nerdspeak for Dungeons and Dragons, a game nerds play) nerd, but I get most of the jokes in this simple comic about a guild making its way through a dungeon. It's pretty good storytelling, with a touch of self-reference which I almost always enjoy.

But that's neither here nor there when the economy is in the toilet and we're electing the next guy to wave a lit match and say "I didn't do it." Ok, that's a cynical point of view. Thankfully, we have the presidential debates to let us forget about this country's problems and focus on petty differences between candidates who espouse mistruths in order to make the other guy look bad in order to make the accuser look good in order to prop him up as an example of American integrity. Bah. More cynicism.

I really enjoyed the VP debates last week. I was partly waiting for an infamous gaffe by either of the number twos. It was going to be my "Where were you when...?" moment of 2008. Now I guess I'll wait for something else. Snow on Mars? Meh. How about GnR releasing Chinese Democracy? Heh. Anyhow, I thought Biden was bland and Palin was a bit too winky. Seriously, if she winks at the camera one more time I'm going to vote for Obama. Really, I'm voting for Obama no matter what she does, but don't tell her that. Just, no more winking, kay?

So tonight I'm going to watch the next debate and have a good time. Oh yeah, when I was waiting for the veep debate to begin, and CNN told me that there was 15 minutes until they showed up on stage, I got a little flutter in my stomach. That's sick.

Applesauce

This afternoon I used some local Gravenstein apples to make applesauce. It's becoming a fall tradition for me, but the last time or two that I tried it I got distracted and burnt it, and had to throw it out. So I was determined not to burn it this time. That sounds kind of silly, because applesauce is super easy, but you know me.


So I cored and chopped the apples and threw them in the pot with a little water and some cinnamon and allspice. I didn't bother peeling them, as I like the added interest in texture; plus the peels are where the good nutrients are. (I don't peel my potatoes before I make mashed potatoes, either, for the same reason.) After about ten minutes, they started getting soft, and I realized I'd put a little too much water in so I sucked it out with a baster and put it in a mug and drank it like cider.


I let the applesauce boil on medium for half an hour, and then mashed it up with a fork. At one point my thumb slipped off the fork and I put my fist into the hot sauce, and burnt my bird-makin' finger a little. Barely hurt, though. I put a little lemon juice in, but gravensteins are a pretty good level of sweet vs. tart so I probably could have gotten away with not putting any in. I didn't put any sugar in, as I like tart sauce.


Then I put some in a ramekin and ATE it. It was yummy. I like it best when it's warm, and chunky. Mmm. I wonder if it'd also be yummy with pumpkin in it. (Maybe when we go back to the farm for our pumpkins in a few weeks, I can bring back ingredients to try it!)

Those Deviant Derivatives

I'm in queue for Alterac Valley. The Horde have won nearly every battle so far today. I'm hoping to change that, though I doubt prime-time will be on my side. While talking to my guildies, Megan gently suggested a healthier use of my time. So while I wait for that battleground to begin, I figured I'd write a paragraph about it.

But seriously. I'm also watching Anderson Cooper talk to some CNN guest about the current state of affairs. I don't mind telling you that my eyes get blurry and my brain gets fuzzy when I think back to Accounting 319 when Professor Whats-his-name (how do students remember professors' names?) went over accounting for derivatives. That is, after all, the problem with the recent "market adjustment" -- as Bush calls it. Hearing the guys on television say they don't understand derivatives helps me not feel so stupid. In fact, I read a pretty long article at WSJ about the accounting behind these derivatives and how it came to today's crisis. I understood that article about as much as that day or two in Accounting 319, but the author made sure to mention that few people really understand derivatives and how they work -- or don't work.

Here's what I know as those rascals in Alterac Valley finish up. Some weird stuff is going on and it's not due to preferences of red states and blue states and people who were greedy to buy houses they couldn't afford, and greedy to sell houses their customers couldn't afford. It really does come down to basic accounting fundamentals. These companies were able to hire really smart guys who really understand FASB and GAAP and all that and they can manipulate fundamental ideas like what's a liability and what's an asset. The manipulation falls somewhere in that hazy word, derivative, and it's a bit scary that I'm heading into the workforce as one of the stupid guys who can write a journal entry according to the name of the game, but can't yet intentionally exploit the rules.

Meme

I rarely do memes but I was actually tagged (thanks Laura!) so I decided I'd do it. Cory was going to do it too, but apparently it didn't save or something so mine is all you get. :)

20 years ago I... was 8 years old, starting second grade at Harold Oliver Primary. I actually don't remember a whole lot about second grade. I had a friend named Cindy Berube, and we would play underneath the big douglas fir trees in the schoolyard. They had roots that came up out of the ground in places, so we would play house with root chairs and tables. I remember sweeping the "floor" with fallen branches, and I would get mad at Cindy sometimes because she pretended she was the mommy and I was the baby, and she was really annoying. We also had a reeeeeally tall slide (or so I thought) and fun teeter-totters (that my sister would later fall off of and go to the hospital) and huge truck tires that were laid vertically and end-to-end that we could go inside of or jump across the tops.

10 years ago I... was 18. I'd just graduated from high school the year before, and flew by myself to Australia to visit my aunt and uncle and cousins for the summer. I took my cousins on the train to Sydney, I ate Turkish Delight (YUM), I fed kookaburras and saw wild kangaroos, and had an all-around great time. My aunt worked at a photo studio so we took a couple of Saturdays and played around in there, with different hairstyles and outfits and things. I also went on a blind date, which was sort of disastrous (for dramatic little me, anyway) because I was super nervous, and stood in the corner of the pool hall with my coat and umbrella in my arms, trying to figure out what the slang they were using meant. Haha. So 10 years ago today I was back from Oz, and preparing to go far away to Monmouth for college at Western Oregon University and live in the dorms.

5 years ago I... was newly-married! After a 2-year relationship and a cross-country move, I'd just come back to Oregon two years before and very soon after that met Cory through my friend Nicoal. We got married in July and were having a good time being newlyweds. I was working at Columbia Sportswear, and living right across the street (technically - the complex was big and I was on the corner furthest from Columbia, so it was a longer walk than if my apartment was RIGHT across the street). In September we were doing the South Beach Diet and walking in the mornings, I believe. Good times.

3 years ago I... had been working at the lumber mill for about 5 months. I'd started in April as a temp at the front desk, and was hired on permanently in July. By then I'd taken over log accounting as well, and I think had started doing some accounting stuff as well. I was enjoying the last few days of quiet before the college kids came back - we lived on 9th and Adams in a "garden-level" (half-basement) apartment with neighbors who would get drunk and pee off the balcony, and play their music too loud. Around this time one of my neighbors asked if we'd seen the homeless guy who'd been sleeping in the laundry room. Heh.

1 year ago I... was learning the nuances of my old boss' job. She'd quit at the end of August and I took over most of her job (some of it went down to our sister company for someone else to do). I'd been going down to our sister company in Saginaw quite often to do log accounting for them as well as for my company, and then once my boss put in her notice they hired someone to do logs in Saginaw and I was trying to train her and get myself trained for my new position as well. I ended up going down to Saginaw almost every day for three months to train. I wasn't feeling all that confident and some of the new projects I had to do were pretty intimidating for awhile, especially since I didn't have a whole lot of training time. Cory also quit his job right around this time, so he could go to school full-time. That was a big change!

So far this year... I've been bringing home the bacon while Cory finishes up his accounting degree, work has been slow, I've been daydreaming about starting a family, and have been really enjoying the veggie box we get every week from our local farm.

Yesterday I... helped Cory put Lego sets together so we can take photos of them and try to sell some of them on eBay. This was the end of a weekend full of cleaning up the spare room and getting rid of a bunch of stuff. I also had a chai and some good conversation with a good friend who lives in my apartment complex.

Tomorrow I will... probably follow the same old routine - go to work, come home, grab our CSA box, make dinner, and maybe bake some bread (I'm trying to get back in the habit of using our bread machine).

Next year I will... hopefully be adding to our little family, and maybe staying at home while Cory utilizes his new accounting degree (and CPA certification!) at a shiny new job!

I Don't Like Ike

Cory's sister and her family live in Houston, TX - in the path of Hurricane Ike. We're glued to CNN this evening and probably will be staying up late to see how things are going for them. It looks pretty bad and we're nervous. Keep Texas in your thoughts tonight!!

UPDATE 9/13: Just got a call from my sister-in-law - they're OK! They have no power, but she said not a whole lot was damaged, besides her gutters and the trees outside.

Greeny

The Granholm family is on a relatively meager income at the moment. Cory is about to start his "last" semester at Oregon State University, where he has two more classes before he gets his degree. (He's currently negotiating with his counselor to figure out if he needs to take any more credits before he takes his CPA test.) Because we wanted him to be finished with school soon enough to use his degree before he retires, he quit his job (which he'd been at for 12 years!) last September, and we've been living on his financial aid and my salary. It's worked out pretty well so far, though we're not going out buying houses and cars or much of anything extravagant.

In the past several months, I've been reexamining what I suppose could be termed our Carbon Footprint. Though I'm not so concerned about Leaving No Trace for future earthlings, I've been interested in paying more attention to our volume of recycling versus re-using versus throwing things in the garbage. We bought a handful of Envirosax for our groceries awhile back, which have turned out to be a great purchase. Not only are they keeping plastic bags out of Coffin Butte landfill, but they're cute and Trout likes to sleep on them when they're in a pile on the floor waiting for me to re-roll them into their little compact forms. I've been using more natural soaps, reusable... feminine products (not as gross as it sounds, and it's so much better than disposable stuff!), and yesterday I made my second batch of laundry soap!

What brings these two sort-of-unrelated paragraphs together is that I've found that in many cases living with more consciousness towards the environment can actually end up being cheaper than the chemical-filled convenience products on most store shelves. For instance, the laundry soap ingredients end up costing a penny per load, and the little bit of Tide we have left costs closer to 31 cents per load! Plus it's fast and it's fun and you can experiment with essential oils. When we have kids we'll have even more opportunities to be good to the earth and save some money on essentials - I'm actually looking forward to picking out cloth diapers. :)

I know that "thinking green" is kind of a catch phrase at the moment, and I don't usually subscribe to the trend of the moment, but I think this is a win-win situation for our planet and us, as long as one mostly stays away from the expensive products that tout their eco-consciousness and spends a little extra time on research and making our own products, we'll be happier and healthier AND keep a few more dollars in the bank for a special occasion!

September Morn

Sitting here getting ready to hear McCain talk about his politics with the people. Megan's slicing up some watermelon for us. The air is crisp and getting crisper, the odors of autumn are flowing into our open windows, and wealthy old white men make me feel uncomfortable when they dance.

Best sign we've seen so far at the RNC via C-SPAN: "COLLEGE REPUBLICAN'S FOR MCCAIN." I may have paraphrased, but the apostrophe is accurate.