Chopper hates Subway.
Move over Bunnings, now Subway is on my Shitlist
Posted by Heath Franklin's Chopper on Wednesday, January 20, 2016
A reasonably educated person trying to make sense of it all, and a little tormented as a result. Thinking aloud, mostly. These opinions rarely reflect the ideas of any of my employers.
Sunday, January 31, 2016
Sugar in my coffee? Can I trust you?
Harsh words on growing old
Friday, January 29, 2016
Saying no: A new survival skill
I can't believe that my New Year's resolution is to say no a little more often.
From the first days of me trying to get employed I've always been trying to get other people to say yes to having me work for them. But it seems now there are many people asking me to work for them.
I've been counting on that Australian age demographic bulge to work in my favour for about 20 years. It's only now that I seem to be a little in demand as other people are slowing down or retiring.
But I made a pig of myself last year. I said yes to everybody - got half way through, was in huge trouble and continued to say yes. I didn't perform at my best and it was clearly obvious. When the blame game starts you have to eat the shit sandwiches that you prepared for yourself and I'm still munching furiously.
A very capable older guy - sort of a mentor at the time - had once said a couple of things about saying no:
When you are capable you have to say no fairly often
Your quality of life can be measured by the quality of the things you say no to.
I have one major client and a number of peripheral ones. I think this year maybe time for focus and that means saying know a little more often.
Thursday, January 28, 2016
The "Hate" series: Love is blind, but hatred is numb to logic
Love may be blind, but this I'll state — it's eagle-eyed compared to hate. ~Robert Brault, rbrault.blogspot.com
I have watched many intelligent people fail to separate the argument of a person from that person making it. It's embarrassing for me to watch a person I respect get twisted into a ball of contradictions because they hate the person who happened to make a point they agree with.
The "If" series, foes and loving friends
Monday, January 18, 2016
The metaphor of the busy airport: Be deliberate
Walking through busy airport this morning I came to think of a hokey metaphor. There are 3 types of people in this world; people who are actively going somewhere, people who are actively going nowhere, and people who are actively doing neither.
The first type of person is not getting in your way because they are in the flow of people. The second type of person have taken a spot somewhere out of the way and are just enjoying being.
The people who caused the problems where are those who are in the flow of people and slow down, stop, dawdle and generally slow things down.
So the moral of the story is you can be actively going somewhere or you can be actively going nowhere and won't be getting in anyone's way.
But it's when you think you're going somewhere and not really giving it all of your energy that really you just getting in the way. So be deliberate.
Sunday, January 3, 2016
"Rust paint" - it's a thing; go with it!
Friday, January 1, 2016
Yes I do miss my mum
Another reason not to crap on people as you rise
I was thinking about the rise and demise of some of the people around me and it came to me yet another reason to not shit on people as you climb the ladder.
Sure I know the old cliche, and that is that you better be nice to people on the way up because you meet the same people on the way down but I think it's more complex than that.
Many people rise and don't come back down so they don't meet those same people on the way back down. But those people who rise leave a legacy - they leave a history.
And if I were to crap on people at every step on the way up then I just leave a whole bunch of detractors behind me.
For those people who are sitting at the top - imagine having all of those enemies sitting down there just looking to take their shot at you?
That's all academic to me because there is no way I'm reaching the pinnacles of anything in my life. But I do like the idea that there is yet another reason not to crap on the people around me.
That said - no matter how hard one tries, one accumulates enemies. But if I can answer to myself, then the rest is up to those who chose to hate me.
Teaching skydiving: this is why I do it
Sure people always ask me about why I jump out of a plane. The simple answer is "why wouldn't you?" But it's a more complex question as to why you would act as an instructor for a student jumper.
Given that getting to the DZ takes a day out of your life, that you essentially get petrol money and willingly except a fairly large risk the question "why would you be an Accelerated Freefall (aff) instructor?" sounds quite reasonable.
I can answer with a story. The other day I left home at 5:30 a.m. to start at the DZ around 7. Two buddies doing their student program together; I got the one who was finding it a little easier - for now. We blasted through about 3 jumps and it was all good. Number 2 was experiencing a few challenges with his own jumps. We all get them - uncontrolled turns, some instability, nervous jitters. Everybody faces their own demons.
Randomness had it that I jumped next with number 2. He was a wreck. I just got him to calm down and have fun on the jump. I didn't do anything special - I just did another skydive - but for this guy we changed the path of his training.
When people ask me why I am so caught up in skydiving this is but one of the reasons. Perhaps I'm not creating world peace but I am making the world a tiny bit different - one piece of confidence at a time. More skydiving mindsets in the world can't be a bad thing.