Edmunds Members - Cars and Conversations (Archived)

suydam · July 2018

xwesx said:
I had a bit of an interesting day as well. Not nearly as intense or amusing as the @graphicguy and @henryn stories, though!

I received a call from a previous supervisor who now lives in Tennessee, and he offered me a job down there. I'm trying to take him seriously, but I am just not the type of person who takes anything seriously enough to want to move many thousands of miles for a job.

I was looking at cost of living information, though, and his offer basically doubles my current salary. I need to research this more in terms of taxes, property values, etc. Honestly, I don't see myself fitting in down south. I'm too independent-minded.... The first thing I did was take a look at land for sale in the area to see where might be a nice place to start building a small house. Hahahah

Depends on where in Tennessee it is.

xwesx · July 2018

Memphis

The state is so small, I didn't figure it really mattered.

suydam · July 2018

If you are talking progressive and/or independent minded, the bigger southern cities will always be more diverse than smaller areas.

abacomike · July 2018

xwesx said:

Anyway, I’m drinking Delta’s libations in the Sky Club for another 4 hours as consolation.
Well, I guess it isn't the worst possible way to spend a Friday night.

Oh, yeah, he could be spending it with me!

nyccarguy · July 2018

@graphicguy - NOTHING bothers me in business more than someone who COMPLETELY has ZERO regard for another’s person’s time. Safe trip home!

laurasdada · July 2018

GG: Sorry about your day in the life. But, it could have been worse, you could have ended up like George Costanza after he met the young lady in the subway...

tjc78 · July 2018

@graphicguy
Hope you make it home safe. Crazy story, I don’t blame you for being ticked off. Not quite to the level of what happened to you but I had a pretty nasty phone call with a persistent sales rep the other day. Same type of deal, new to the business and looking for a big fish. He and his company had nothing new to offer me but still insisted on a meeting.

snakeweasel · July 2018

jmonroe said:

graphicguy said:

Just dropped $11 on this dog last weekend.

I hope you were able to pick that $11 back up. You would think that for $11 they could afford better plates. At my favorite hot dog place for $11 you get two fully loaded Chicago style hot dogs, hugh helping of fries a drink and $3 in change.
@Snake, I remember seeing a show on TV years ago where they were rating hot dogs across the country. They went to a famous hot dog place in Chicago that had a Neon sign hot dog on the roof of the building. I can't remember the name of the place (again) even though you posted a pic of the place when we last critiqued hot dogs in here. The part I liked best is when they interviewed the elderly couple that owned the place and they said they refuse to apply ketchup to their hot dogs. If the customer wanted ketchup, they would provide ketchup packs but they would not deface their hot dogs by applying it themselves and I agree with them. There otta be a law about doing that to hot dogs. :@ jmonroe

It might have been Superdawg, there are a multiple number of explanations why no ketchup but it is verboten in chicago. Some places won't even stock ketchup for people to apply it themselves. No true Chicagoan will admit to using it even if they do.

snakeweasel · July 2018

abacomike said:

tjc78 said:

Sometimes.. you just have to do happy hour! Dropped off the boss to get his car and bailed out a little early. Car related he is about to dump his Passat. Wife is meeting me for a quick one before heading home to the kids and grandma! I got a jump on her though!

I

That’s how I like my martini’s - as many olives as will fit in the glass - usually 4-5 depending on the glass. By the way, I hate martini’s - it’s the olives I like!

Then here is a money saving tip, just buy a jar of olives.

Here is my ultimate martini recipe, take gin and vermouth and pour them down the drain where they belong and pour yourself a whiskey.

snakeweasel · July 2018

ab348 said:

I thought you were going to tell us that she was pestering you on LinkedIn because she was interested in a relationship or at least a few dates. I hear that is its main use these days. I have been on it since near the beginning. It was useful back then but now I get requests from strangers in Mumbai and other places I cannot pronounce to "connect". I might just delete my account there because it is approaching joke status.

I deleted mine simply because I wasn't using it and I started to get a lot of spam at work which I strongly suggest is from LinkedIn as I only us my work email internally and cannot do anything not work related on the net (yes they monitor it).

oldfarmer50 · July 2018

graphicguy said:
Hope you guys will indulge me for a bit, but we’re all friends here, right?

For a little over a month, there’s been this lady trying to connect with me on Linked IN. For those of you not familiar with Linked In, it’s a business web site that allows other business people to connect with you.

Anyway, I usually turn down requests to connect to people that I don’t have at least a passing interest that aligns with my business (tech). She was persistent, so I connected with her. Next think I know, she’s emailing me wanting to talk about how our companies can work together. I hope I’m humble, but my company has a long history in the tech field (as long as HP, INTEL, etc). We have ~$5B in annual revenues. If there’s something we don’t know how to do in our field (which ain’t much), we sometimes listen to outside sources for some tech we can synch with. But, we don’t normally buy what we can create.

I explained all this to her.

She was persistent, to the point where she contacted my boss stating she just wanted to talk, but I was being dismissive (I wasn’t very interested, but far from dismissive....I listened to her intently).

My boss, wanting to push her off his plate back onto mine, states I should have one meeting with her. If it isn’t worth our time by my estimation, he said he’d consider the issue dead.

Well, her office is in CA, so maybe it won’t be too bad. But, she can only meet today (Friday) before she jets off to somewhere in Europe. Not wanting this to linger, I flew to CA today to meet. Took an early flight that got me in to LA just before noon for a luncheon.

I land and turn on my phone to hear a voice mail from her stating something came up and she couldn’t make lunch, but could meet mid afternoon. I’m not feeling good about this.

She wants to meet at her office which is above a florist shop in Westwood. But this isn’t in an area that speaks to me how she’s successful.

We meet. She’s 26, newly minted Harvard grad (so she says). She immediately went into how she just closed $20M in funding (so she says) to develop an app that has little, if anything, that would interest us.

I politely dig a little to see why she thinks we would be interested and why she contacted me. Somehow or another, she knows someone I know on Linked in. Followed his contacts and got to me. Long and short of this, she’s calling as many people she can, to try to drum up money.

Perturbed, I let her know, nicely but firmly that this was a collassal waste of my time. I felt she was deceptive. And it cost my company a $500 flight, a day of my time, $50 in food, $20 parking.

Huffily, She reminded me of her Harvard grad status and that she had $20M in the bank (neither of which passes the smell test). Not saying another word, I left. Got an Uber.

I just got to the airport, only to find out my flight home is cancelled
And 11 p.m. is the next flight out, which means it’s a red-eye.

I’m livid!

Sounds like she has a lot to learn about doing business long term..

tjc78 · July 2018

snakeweasel said:

abacomike said:

tjc78 said:

Sometimes.. you just have to do happy hour! Dropped off the boss to get his car and bailed out a little early. Car related he is about to dump his Passat. Wife is meeting me for a quick one before heading home to the kids and grandma! I got a jump on her though!

I

That’s how I like my martini’s - as many olives as will fit in the glass - usually 4-5 depending on the glass. By the way, I hate martini’s - it’s the olives I like!

Then here is a money saving tip, just buy a jar of olives.

Here is my ultimate martini recipe, take gin and vermouth and pour them down the drain where they belong and pour yourself a whiskey.

Ha ha . I only do Vodka dirty martinis. Can’t stand a gin martini, so I’ll agree there.

tjc78 · July 2018

snakeweasel said:

ab348 said:

I thought you were going to tell us that she was pestering you on LinkedIn because she was interested in a relationship or at least a few dates. I hear that is its main use these days. I have been on it since near the beginning. It was useful back then but now I get requests from strangers in Mumbai and other places I cannot pronounce to "connect". I might just delete my account there because it is approaching joke status.

I deleted mine simply because I wasn't using it and I started to get a lot of spam at work which I strongly suggest is from LinkedIn as I only us my work email internally and cannot do anything not work related on the net (yes they monitor it).

Our place has the capability to monitor anything and has a pretty large blocked sites list, but based on how much I see on people’s screens big brother (IT) can’t be doing too “monitoring”

I stream Pandora at work and login here a few times during the day if I can. I’ve always said that if anyone ever questioned it, I would start logging the smoke break abusers and demand they are called out for it. My office is the last door before the hallway to the lounge/outdoor smoking area and there are some that I see 5 and 6 times a day...

In my last position I had one of the “abusers”. I was able to keep it in check. My replacement, not so much. She is back up to her old tricks. Someone came to me about it the other day, I said she doesn’t work for me any longer.

ab348 · July 2018

tjc78 said:
I’ve always said that if anyone ever questioned it, I would start logging the smoke break abusers and demand they are called out for it. My office is the last door before the hallway to the lounge/outdoor smoking area and there are some that I see 5 and 6 times a day...

In my last position I had one of the “abusers”. I was able to keep it in check. My replacement, not so much. She is back up to her old tricks. Someone came to me about it the other day, I said she doesn’t work for me any longer.

Ah, the joys of management. In my last job I had several people I was ultimately responsible for, some direct reports and others a layer or two down, who seemingly found every possible way to not do their job but still collect their paychecks. It was just mind-boggling, and even worse, if they were using medical reasons, whether legit or not, I was unable to even inquire what was wrong with them or what the prognosis on return might be due to either company HR policy or provincial law, not sure which. So frustrating, and so glad I don't have to deal with that any more.

houdini1 · July 2018

tjc78 said:

abacomike said:

Just spoke with my brother - he sold his 2017 S Coupe. And you guys thought I was bad. One of the most gorgeous cars built in this world and he sells it with 4800 miles on it. He’s worse than me!

What is the replacement??

Maybe he'll get that Genny he's been dreaming about !

houdini1 · July 2018

graphicguy said:

driver100 said:

My favorite.....eviscerated cows lips on a huge piece of white bread!

It reminds me of Homer Simpson, his favorite dessert.....canned peaches in heavy syrup!
Actually, that was my date’s dog. Mine was a proper peppers and onions italian sausage on a bun.

Pretty darned tasty.....

Now you're talking...but how much, $30. or so?

abacomike · July 2018

snakeweasel said:

abacomike said:

tjc78 said:

Sometimes.. you just have to do happy hour! Dropped off the boss to get his car and bailed out a little early. Car related he is about to dump his Passat. Wife is meeting me for a quick one before heading home to the kids and grandma! I got a jump on her though!

I

That’s how I like my martini’s - as many olives as will fit in the glass - usually 4-5 depending on the glass. By the way, I hate martini’s - it’s the olives I like!

Then here is a money saving tip, just buy a jar of olives.

Here is my ultimate martini recipe, take gin and vermouth and pour them down the drain where they belong and pour yourself a whiskey.

Won’t work for me snake. The olives need to rest in the martini for at least 10 minutes in order to absorb some of the alcohol - otherwise they taste just like olives out of the jar.

houdini1 · July 2018

graphicguy said:
Hope you guys will indulge me for a bit, but we’re all friends here, right?

For a little over a month, there’s been this lady trying to connect with me on Linked IN. For those of you not familiar with Linked In, it’s a business web site that allows other business people to connect with you.

Anyway, I usually turn down requests to connect to people that I don’t have at least a passing interest that aligns with my business (tech). She was persistent, so I connected with her. Next think I know, she’s emailing me wanting to talk about how our companies can work together. I hope I’m humble, but my company has a long history in the tech field (as long as HP, INTEL, etc). We have ~$5B in annual revenues. If there’s something we don’t know how to do in our field (which ain’t much), we sometimes listen to outside sources for some tech we can synch with. But, we don’t normally buy what we can create.

I explained all this to her.

She was persistent, to the point where she contacted my boss stating she just wanted to talk, but I was being dismissive (I wasn’t very interested, but far from dismissive....I listened to her intently).

My boss, wanting to push her off his plate back onto mine, states I should have one meeting with her. If it isn’t worth our time by my estimation, he said he’d consider the issue dead.

Well, her office is in CA, so maybe it won’t be too bad. But, she can only meet today (Friday) before she jets off to somewhere in Europe. Not wanting this to linger, I flew to CA today to meet. Took an early flight that got me in to LA just before noon for a luncheon.

I land and turn on my phone to hear a voice mail from her stating something came up and she couldn’t make lunch, but could meet mid afternoon. I’m not feeling good about this.

She wants to meet at her office which is above a florist shop in Westwood. But this isn’t in an area that speaks to me how she’s successful.

We meet. She’s 26, newly minted Harvard grad (so she says). She immediately went into how she just closed $20M in funding (so she says) to develop an app that has little, if anything, that would interest us.

I politely dig a little to see why she thinks we would be interested and why she contacted me. Somehow or another, she knows someone I know on Linked in. Followed his contacts and got to me. Long and short of this, she’s calling as many people she can, to try to drum up money.

Perturbed, I let her know, nicely but firmly that this was a collassal waste of my time. I felt she was deceptive. And it cost my company a $500 flight, a day of my time, $50 in food, $20 parking.

Huffily, She reminded me of her Harvard grad status and that she had $20M in the bank (neither of which passes the smell test). Not saying another word, I left. Got an Uber.

I just got to the airport, only to find out my flight home is cancelled
And 11 p.m. is the next flight out, which means it’s a red-eye.

I’m livid!

Don't be surprised if she complains to your boss that you insulted her !!

abacomike · July 2018

houdini1 said:

abacomike said:

Just spoke with my brother - he sold his 2017 S Coupe. And you guys thought I was bad. One of the most gorgeous cars built in this world and he sells it with 4800 miles on it. He’s worse than me!

What is the replacement??
Maybe he'll get that Genny he's been dreaming about !

Not a chance. If it doesn’t have a star at the front or a blue/white propeller, he won’t even look at it.

abacomike · July 2018

ab348 said:

I’ve always said that if anyone ever questioned it, I would start logging the smoke break abusers and demand they are called out for it. My office is the last door before the hallway to the lounge/outdoor smoking area and there are some that I see 5 and 6 times a day...

In my last position I had one of the “abusers”. I was able to keep it in check. My replacement, not so much. She is back up to her old tricks. Someone came to me about it the other day, I said she doesn’t work for me any longer.
Ah, the joys of management. In my last job I had several people I was ultimately responsible for, some direct reports and others a layer or two down, who seemingly found every possible way to not do their job but still collect their paychecks. It was just mind-boggling, and even worse, if they were using medical reasons, whether legit or not, I was unable to even inquire what was wrong with them or what the prognosis on return might be due to either company HR policy or provincial law, not sure which. So frustrating, and so glad I don't have to deal with that any more.

As a school principal, I had 45 teachers reporting directly to me. I had to observe each teacher for 2-3 days and then write up a comprehensive evaluation and then meet to discuss my findings an areas in need of improvement. My Assistant Principal would evaluate non- certified staff (aides, custodians, kitchen staff) and was responsible for building maintenance and security. I don’t miss that part of the job.

I did enjoy budgeting, expenditures, and the kids. Dealing with most teachers is a battle of egos and perceptions.

And don’t forget about discipline issues or dealing with 700-900 sets of parents. Selling cars and managing a sales force was easy compared to principaling, not to mention more financially lucrative.

tjc78 · July 2018

ab348 said:

tjc78 said:
I’ve always said that if anyone ever questioned it, I would start logging the smoke break abusers and demand they are called out for it. My office is the last door before the hallway to the lounge/outdoor smoking area and there are some that I see 5 and 6 times a day...

In my last position I had one of the “abusers”. I was able to keep it in check. My replacement, not so much. She is back up to her old tricks. Someone came to me about it the other day, I said she doesn’t work for me any longer.
Ah, the joys of management. In my last job I had several people I was ultimately responsible for, some direct reports and others a layer or two down, who seemingly found every possible way to not do their job but still collect their paychecks. It was just mind-boggling, and even worse, if they were using medical reasons, whether legit or not, I was unable to even inquire what was wrong with them or what the prognosis on return might be due to either company HR policy or provincial law, not sure which. So frustrating, and so glad I don't have to deal with that any more.

I’m pretty lucky now. My four in field are all excellent, hard workers. My two directs inside are also pretty good. I’ve got one more (who doesn’t directly report to me) who had a rough time with the transition to her new leadership and was on thin ice for awhile. We were able to work through the rough patch, switch up her duties a bit (some clerical for me) and she is like a whole new team member.

houdini1 · July 2018

xwesx said:

graphicguy said:
I just got to the airport, only to find out my flight home is cancelled. And 11 p.m. is the next flight out, which means it’s a red-eye.

I’m livid!
Ugh. That's horrible. I don't fault your boss for his take on the situation, but I am really surprised that a flight to CA was the way to go on this one. Maybe Facetime or a Google Hangout? If she's 26, then it sounds like she's about the right age to be absolutely entitled to wasting your time in this way. :@

She must have had a pretty good spiel. I never had the balls to ask a cold prospect to fly across the country to meet with me.

tjc78 · July 2018

abacomike said:

ab348 said:

I’ve always said that if anyone ever questioned it, I would start logging the smoke break abusers and demand they are called out for it. My office is the last door before the hallway to the lounge/outdoor smoking area and there are some that I see 5 and 6 times a day...

In my last position I had one of the “abusers”. I was able to keep it in check. My replacement, not so much. She is back up to her old tricks. Someone came to me about it the other day, I said she doesn’t work for me any longer.
Ah, the joys of management. In my last job I had several people I was ultimately responsible for, some direct reports and others a layer or two down, who seemingly found every possible way to not do their job but still collect their paychecks. It was just mind-boggling, and even worse, if they were using medical reasons, whether legit or not, I was unable to even inquire what was wrong with them or what the prognosis on return might be due to either company HR policy or provincial law, not sure which. So frustrating, and so glad I don't have to deal with that any more.

As a school principal, I had 45 teachers reporting directly to me. I had to observe each teacher for 2-3 days and then write up a comprehensive evaluation and then meet to discuss my findings an areas in need of improvement. My Assistant Principal would evaluate non- certified staff (aides, custodians, kitchen staff) and was responsible for building maintenance and security. I don’t miss that part of the job.

I did enjoy budgeting, expenditures, and the kids. Dealing with most teachers is a battle of egos and perceptions.

And don’t forget about discipline issues or dealing with 700-900 sets of parents. Selling cars and managing a sales force was easy compared to principaling, not to mention more financially lucrative.

Review time is the worst for a manager. I’ve always told anyone who worked for me that you won’t have to wait for review time to know how your performance is!

abacomike · July 2018

tjc78 said:

ab348 said:

I’ve always said that if anyone ever questioned it, I would start logging the smoke break abusers and demand they are called out for it. My office is the last door before the hallway to the lounge/outdoor smoking area and there are some that I see 5 and 6 times a day...

In my last position I had one of the “abusers”. I was able to keep it in check. My replacement, not so much. She is back up to her old tricks. Someone came to me about it the other day, I said she doesn’t work for me any longer.
Ah, the joys of management. In my last job I had several people I was ultimately responsible for, some direct reports and others a layer or two down, who seemingly found every possible way to not do their job but still collect their paychecks. It was just mind-boggling, and even worse, if they were using medical reasons, whether legit or not, I was unable to even inquire what was wrong with them or what the prognosis on return might be due to either company HR policy or provincial law, not sure which. So frustrating, and so glad I don't have to deal with that any more.

As a school principal, I had 45 teachers reporting directly to me. I had to observe each teacher for 2-3 days and then write up a comprehensive evaluation and then meet to discuss my findings an areas in need of improvement. My Assistant Principal would evaluate non- certified staff (aides, custodians, kitchen staff) and was responsible for building maintenance and security. I don’t miss that part of the job.

I did enjoy budgeting, expenditures, and the kids. Dealing with most teachers is a battle of egos and perceptions.

And don’t forget about discipline issues or dealing with 700-900 sets of parents. Selling cars and managing a sales force was easy compared to principaling, not to mention more financially lucrative.
Review time is the worst for a manager. I’ve always told anyone who worked for me that you won’t have to wait for review time to know how your performance is!

Well, I was a proponent of MBWA (management by walking around). My secretaries disliked this approach to managing a large school because I was rarely in my office. So when important phone calls came in from the Superintendent’s office or Asst. Superintendent’s office, they were always taking messages or explaining I was unavailable because I was visiting classrooms, which I did every day. That kept staff on their toes - they never knew when I would stop into their classroom and observe instruction.

Finally, Central office (supt.’s offices) got me a pager so I was notified of an urgent call or situation somewhere in the building. Hated that pager - but that’s what they required for an exceedingly ambulatory administrator.

sda · July 2018

Very few managers provide ongoing feedback which prevents any negative surprises and enables continuous positive development, and team satisfaction. Most do the obligatory semiannual review or less, which can lead to great disappointment and resentment. At my current job of 18 months I have only been told my annual raise and told when I may have made a mistake or done something differently. As our office is closing in the foreseeable future and we are all in job search mode, this isn't overly surprising.

ab348 · July 2018

houdini1 said:

Don't be surprised if she complains to your boss that you insulted her !!

Hopefully that would be all she does. In today's climate, all sorts of career-limiting complaints are possible.

driver100 · July 2018

xwesx said:
I had a bit of an interesting day as well. Not nearly as intense or amusing as the @graphicguy and @henryn stories, though!

I received a call from a previous supervisor who now lives in Tennessee, and he offered me a job down there. I'm trying to take him seriously, but I am just not the type of person who takes anything seriously enough to want to move many thousands of miles for a job.

I was looking at cost of living information, though, and his offer basically doubles my current salary. I need to research this more in terms of taxes, property values, etc. Honestly, I don't see myself fitting in down south. I'm too independent-minded.... The first thing I did was take a look at land for sale in the area to see where might be a nice place to start building a small house. Hahahah

Wow....a chance to escape Alaska and you are dithering

benjaminh · July 2018

@xwesx : Come on down!++ Nice living in TN/KY area imho. And I say that as a former Californian.

driver100 · July 2018

houdini1 said:

xwesx said:

graphicguy said:
I just got to the airport, only to find out my flight home is cancelled. And 11 p.m. is the next flight out, which means it’s a red-eye.

I’m livid!
Ugh. That's horrible. I don't fault your boss for his take on the situation, but I am really surprised that a flight to CA was the way to go on this one. Maybe Facetime or a Google Hangout? If she's 26, then it sounds like she's about the right age to be absolutely entitled to wasting your time in this way. :@

She must have had a pretty good spiel. I never had the balls to ask a cold prospect to fly across the country to meet with me.

Is "spiel" a German word for body.

suydam · July 2018

No.

Mr_Shiftright · July 2018

xwesx said:
Memphis

The state is so small, I didn't figure it really mattered.

Oh, Memphis. Yeah, it matters a LOT. Crime rates are measured in percentiles from high (1) to low (100). Memphis is rated.....1 percentile.

Of course, Anchorage is pretty high, too. New York City is 16.

In terms of odds, that translates in Memphis as about a 1 in 13 chance of getting robbed or worse.

fintail · July 2018

LOL and there's our one liner of the day.

Hilarious chutzpah to be so active on a cold call with virtually no verifiable credentials, and to complain to a boss. I'd be asking for auditable proof of her education and money right there. I can't imagine my employer flying someone out to visit an unknown entity like that, either

driver100 said:

Is "spiel" a German word for body.

fintail · July 2018

I started with my employer a month after graduation in 2001, and I have lived in the same shoebox since 2005. I kind of get comfortable too. I've had a few promotions and I'd find it much more difficult to afford my place now at a similar place in my career/income than 13 years ago, so that helps I guess.

I have a friend who moved to suburban Atlanta in 2010, lured in by cheap housing and a good looking job. He ended up hating both where he lived and where he worked. Lasted less than 5 years, moved back,

xwesx said:

Plus, he's been sort of prodding at me every since he left to come help him out, yet he first went to southern TX from here only two years ago. We certainly have a synergistic working relationship, but I have no interest in making a career out of following him around the country.

graphicguy · July 2018

houdini1 said:

xwesx said:

graphicguy said:
I just got to the airport, only to find out my flight home is cancelled. And 11 p.m. is the next flight out, which means it’s a red-eye.

I’m livid!
Ugh. That's horrible. I don't fault your boss for his take on the situation, but I am really surprised that a flight to CA was the way to go on this one. Maybe Facetime or a Google Hangout? If she's 26, then it sounds like she's about the right age to be absolutely entitled to wasting your time in this way. :@

She must have had a pretty good spiel. I never had the balls to ask a cold prospect to fly across the country to meet with me.

My boss is great. He really is. He’s smart. He’s fair. If he believes in you, he’ll go to bat for you. I’ve worked for him for over 20 years. If he changes positions or companies, he usually drags me with him with a nice pay bump as a reward.

After all these years, sometimes we don’t agree. This is one of those cases. I explained to him what I thought. He believed there might be something we could perhaps license from this lady and her company. He just asked that I go into the meeting with an open mind.

Not sure I did that, but I gave her the opportunity to make her case. She wanted to try to bully me (who has twice the experience than she has age). That wasn’t the correct way to do that.

I wrote the report of the trip on the plane last night while flying home. I assessed that the concept wasn’t a bad one. It’s nowhere near our focus, though. I wrote that IF her claim of $20M in funding is true (which she failed to provide proof of after repeated requests to do so), and given what I guesstimate the current run rate of salary and expenses (she says she has 20 employees, even though I only counted 7) her funding runway will end somewhere around 2021.

She probably needs more $$$$ to complete her project and was turned down by the funding community. And, is now looking to the tech companies (I doubt I was the only one she contacted) to continue funding.

She has interest from some companies (again hard to quantify), but no significant revenue to speak of. She does show some revenue from some mid-level companies, but it’s not very much and not repeatable.

We look at these types of companies all the time....startups who have complementary technology and need investment or want to sign a licensing agreement from us. I don’t usually get involved with this type of activity. But, I’m called in from time to time to assess the possible potential.

She’s pretty slick gathering tech contacts. If she was funded, she would have proudly announced who her partners were. Couldn’t get that info from her.

I don’t think my boss knew of any of this. All her heard was she had some interesting tech (after a brief elevator pitch) and wanted to engage us about it.

I’ve probably heard a dozen pitches from outside of the company. Only one was worthwhile and we did invest some money (not millions, though). The rest either weren’t viable, were not managed well, or like this case, not aligned with what we do as a company.

Knowing my boss, I’ve spent 3X the time telling you guys about it than he’ll allow me to expend with him. I’ll bring it up from time-to-time with him and he’ll half kiddingly dismiss this whole thing with...”shall we talk about the dogs you were all hot and bothered about?”. That will be the end of the conversation.

Thanks for letting me whine. Got home around 7 a.m. Dropped into bed for about 3 hours of sleep and feel better already.

PS....my hot dog was $11, too. I liked it. Was it worth $11? Nah! But add in the duck fat fries and it became more palatable. Their “bitter” beer was pretty good, though.

snakeweasel · July 2018

tjc78 said:

snakeweasel said:

ab348 said:

I thought you were going to tell us that she was pestering you on LinkedIn because she was interested in a relationship or at least a few dates. I hear that is its main use these days. I have been on it since near the beginning. It was useful back then but now I get requests from strangers in Mumbai and other places I cannot pronounce to "connect". I might just delete my account there because it is approaching joke status.

I deleted mine simply because I wasn't using it and I started to get a lot of spam at work which I strongly suggest is from LinkedIn as I only us my work email internally and cannot do anything not work related on the net (yes they monitor it).

Our place has the capability to monitor anything and has a pretty large blocked sites list, but based on how much I see on people’s screens big brother (IT) can’t be doing too “monitoring”

I stream Pandora at work and login here a few times during the day if I can. I’ve always said that if anyone ever questioned it, I would start logging the smoke break abusers and demand they are called out for it. My office is the last door before the hallway to the lounge/outdoor smoking area and there are some that I see 5 and 6 times a day...

In my last position I had one of the “abusers”. I was able to keep it in check. My replacement, not so much. She is back up to her old tricks. Someone came to me about it the other day, I said she doesn’t work for me any longer.

We are closely monitored and the stories of new employees streaming music only to find themselves cut off from the internet the next day. It's the price we pay for working at a state agency that is closely watched by the press.

snakeweasel · July 2018

Got into Nashville yesterday, trip was pretty uneventful except for a bottleneck in KY due to construction and some guy in a Chevy pickup that kept passing me and being passed by me even though I was on cruise control. In the Opryland hotel right now, if any of you get near here you have to stop by and walk through it. Got tickets for the Opry later tonight and on to Orlando tomorrow.

jmonroe · July 2018

ab348 said:

houdini1 said:

Don't be surprised if she complains to your boss that you insulted her !!
Hopefully that would be all she does. In today's climate, all sorts of career-limiting complaints are possible.

Ain't that the truth. I was thinking the same thing.

Sexual harassment has always been something you had to be aware of but it is out of control today. It has gotten to the point that I sometimes think the only reason some people go to work is to see how much trouble they can create.

Here is a little story from my past that, if this was today, I'm not so sure I would have done this but I did know who I was talking with.

Back in the late 70's before I was coerced into management our group secretary, who had been recently divorced less than a year because of an unfaithful husband, came to me one day because she knew I dabbled with home maintenance and wanted some advice since she wanted to save the cost of hiring a plumber. She had come to me several times before and she was getting pretty good with things around the house from what she was telling me over the past several months. But now she wanted to know how to remove and replace a shut off valve in her basement that led to the outside hose bib. It was leaking and wouldn't shut off the water to the bib. She had already found that the screw that held the washer in place was corroded and could not be removed so that she could just replace the washer. Fall was coming and she knew she had to shut off the water so that the bib didn't freeze with winter coming. The bib was not leaking, only the shut off capability of the inside shut off valve which was about a foot from the basement concrete block wall and was connected with copper tubing. Like I said, she was getting pretty good at things around the house and knew what had to be done. OK, that's the lead-in to the story which I will tell via my conversation method:

She comes into my cube one morning and said.

Her: Hey jmonroe, I want you to tell me how to sweat.

Me: Run around the building a couple times at lunch time. That otta do it.

Her: No damn it, I'm serious.

That is when she told me what she wanted to do.

Me: I could tell you but it probably won't help you very much because that is something you have to see done a few times before you try it yourself.

Just as I'm about to tell her I can come over and do it, she said.

Her: I sorta thought that, so maybe I should take up my neighbors offer to do it. He said he's done it a couple times and has been successful sweating copper tubing but I didn't want to bother him.

Me: As long as you're confident that he can help, that might not be a bad idea.

Her: I might as well since I really can't afford a plumber right now.

I guess this is the time to say she is about my age, pretty attractive with 2 kids about my kids age. So, to have some fun I say.

Me: Are you sure he just wants to be helpful and doesn't want something else.

She is still sensitive about her divorce and says in an irritated voice.

Her: DAMN IT JMONROE, IS THAT ALL YOU GUYS EVER THINK ABOUT?

Not wanting to sound like she has intimidated me I pause to calm myself and say.

Me: Ah, ahhh...no, but it beats the hell out of everything that's in second place.

No harm done because I knew who I was talking to. FWIW, she had her neighbor replace the valve and she told me she could not have done it herself with just verbal instructions but now that she saw it done, she thinks she could do it herself. However, I never heard her say she ever did it, so not sure about that.

Again, you have to know who you are talking to.

jmonroe

Mr_Shiftright · July 2018

graphicguy said:

houdini1 said:

xwesx said:

graphicguy said:
I just got to the airport, only to find out my flight home is cancelled. And 11 p.m. is the next flight out, which means it’s a red-eye.

I’m livid!
Ugh. That's horrible. I don't fault your boss for his take on the situation, but I am really surprised that a flight to CA was the way to go on this one. Maybe Facetime or a Google Hangout? If she's 26, then it sounds like she's about the right age to be absolutely entitled to wasting your time in this way. :@

She must have had a pretty good spiel. I never had the balls to ask a cold prospect to fly across the country to meet with me.
My boss is great. He really is. He’s smart. He’s fair. If he believes in you, he’ll go to bat for you. I’ve worked for him for over 20 years. If he changes positions or companies, he usually drags me with him with a nice pay bump as a reward.

After all these years, sometimes we don’t agree. This is one of those cases. I explained to him what I thought. He believed there might be something we could perhaps license from this lady and her company. He just asked that I go into the meeting with an open mind.

Not sure I did that, but I gave her the opportunity to make her case. She wanted to try to bully me (who has twice the experience than she has age). That wasn’t the correct way to do that.

I wrote the report of the trip on the plane last night while flying home. I assessed that the concept wasn’t a bad one. It’s nowhere near our focus, though. I wrote that IF her claim of $20M in funding is true (which she failed to provide proof of after repeated requests to do so), and given what I guesstimate the current run rate of salary and expenses (she says she has 20 employees, even though I only counted 7) her funding runway will end somewhere around 2021.

She probably needs more $$$$ to complete her project and was turned down by the funding community. And, is now looking to the tech companies (I doubt I was the only one she contacted) to continue funding.

She has interest from some companies (again hard to quantify), but no significant revenue to speak of. She does show some revenue from some mid-level companies, but it’s not very much and not repeatable.

We look at these types of companies all the time....startups who have complementary technology and need investment or want to sign a licensing agreement from us. I don’t usually get involved with this type of activity. But, I’m called in from time to time to assess the possible potential.

She’s pretty slick gathering tech contacts. If she was funded, she would have proudly announced who her partners were. Couldn’t get that info from her.

I don’t think my boss knew of any of this. All her heard was she had some interesting tech (after a brief elevator pitch) and wanted to engage us about it.

I’ve probably heard a dozen pitches from outside of the company. Only one was worthwhile and we did invest some money (not millions, though). The rest either weren’t viable, were not managed well, or like this case, not aligned with what we do as a company.

Knowing my boss, I’ve spent 3X the time telling you guys about it than he’ll allow me to expend with him. I’ll bring it up from time-to-time with him and he’ll half kiddingly dismiss this whole thing with...”shall we talk about the dogs you were all hot and bothered about?”. That will be the end of the conversation.

Thanks for letting me whine. Got home around 7 a.m. Dropped into bed for about 3 hours of sleep and feel better already.

PS....my hot dog was $11, too. I liked it. Was it worth $11? Nah! But add in the duck fat fries and it became more palatable. Their “bitter” beer was pretty good, though.

This is all very typical of start-ups: "Fake it until you Make it".

cdnpinhead · July 2018

Some of us used to be important where we work(ed), some still are and others think they were or are. Keep the stories and responses coming. Each of us views them differently, but they're interesting for sure.

I've pretty much given up on retaining any self-respect, given the large corporate nature of where I work, but it's always interesting to see how the titans of industry or civil service on here see things.

jmonroe · July 2018

snakeweasel said:

jmonroe said:

snakeweasel said:

graphicguy said:

Just dropped $11 on this dog last weekend.

I hope you were able to pick that $11 back up. You would think that for $11 they could afford better plates. At my favorite hot dog place for $11 you get two fully loaded Chicago style hot dogs, hugh helping of fries a drink and $3 in change.
@Snake, I remember seeing a show on TV years ago where they were rating hot dogs across the country. They went to a famous hot dog place in Chicago that had a Neon sign hot dog on the roof of the building. I can't remember the name of the place (again) even though you posted a pic of the place when we last critiqued hot dogs in here.

The part I liked best is when they interviewed the elderly couple that owned the place and they said they refuse to apply ketchup to their hot dogs. If the customer wanted ketchup, they would provide ketchup packs but they would not deface their hot dogs by applying it themselves and I agree with them. There otta be a law about doing that to hot dogs. :@

jmonroe

It might have been Superdawg, there are a multiple number of explanations why no ketchup but it is verboten in chicago. Some places won't even stock ketchup for people to apply it themselves. No true Chicagoan will admit to using it even if they do.

Thanks @Snake, Superdawg is the name of the hot dog shop I couldn't remember.

Have a good time on your vacation.

jmonroe

oldfarmer50 · July 2018

cdnpinhead said:
Some of us used to be important where we work(ed), some still are and others think they were or are. Keep the stories and responses coming. Each of us views them differently, but they're interesting for sure.

I've pretty much given up on retaining any self-respect, given the large corporate nature of where I work, but it's always interesting to see how the titans of industry or civil service on here see things.

You don't have to be a Titan to have drama at work. The last few years before retirement a new boss took over and immeadiately began causing turmoil with staff. I had a run in with him in 2015 and nearly resigned then. As it was I decided to retire a year early just to be rid of him in 2017. In the year since I've had a few moments where I had second thoughts and considered that maybe I had overreacted and made a bad choice.

Then yesterday one of my old work associated stopped by to tell me that partially due to this boss's overbearing attitude and mind games two bus driver's had hung themselves in the year since I left.

I no longer have any second thoughts. Life is too short.

abacomike · July 2018

cdnpinhead said:

Some of us used to be important where we work(ed), some still are and others think they were or are. Keep the stories and responses coming. Each of us views them differently, but they're interesting for sure. I've pretty much given up on retaining any self-respect, given the large corporate nature of where I work, but it's always interesting to see how the titans of industry or civil service on here see things.

The only people I knew, or know, who exhibited behaviors that they were overly important suffered from delusions of grandeur. No one is irreplaceable or so important that no one else could do their job as well, if not better, than they could. Happens every day in business, government, education, religion and even marriage - whenever a vacancy occurs - kind of like survival of the fittest. Just when you think you’re too vital or important in your position, you end up on your derrière.

roadburner · July 2018

graphicguy said:
Hope you guys will indulge me for a bit, but we’re all friends here, right?

For a little over a month, there’s been this lady trying to connect with me on Linked IN. For those of you not familiar with Linked In, it’s a business web site that allows other business people to connect with you.

Anyway, I usually turn down requests to connect to people that I don’t have at least a passing interest that aligns with my business (tech). She was persistent, so I connected with her. Next think I know, she’s emailing me wanting to talk about how our companies can work together. I hope I’m humble, but my company has a long history in the tech field (as long as HP, INTEL, etc). We have ~$5B in annual revenues. If there’s something we don’t know how to do in our field (which ain’t much), we sometimes listen to outside sources for some tech we can synch with. But, we don’t normally buy what we can create.

I explained all this to her.

She was persistent, to the point where she contacted my boss stating she just wanted to talk, but I was being dismissive (I wasn’t very interested, but far from dismissive....I listened to her intently).

My boss, wanting to push her off his plate back onto mine, states I should have one meeting with her. If it isn’t worth our time by my estimation, he said he’d consider the issue dead.

Well, her office is in CA, so maybe it won’t be too bad. But, she can only meet today (Friday) before she jets off to somewhere in Europe. Not wanting this to linger, I flew to CA today to meet. Took an early flight that got me in to LA just before noon for a luncheon.

I land and turn on my phone to hear a voice mail from her stating something came up and she couldn’t make lunch, but could meet mid afternoon. I’m not feeling good about this.

She wants to meet at her office which is above a florist shop in Westwood. But this isn’t in an area that speaks to me how she’s successful.

We meet. She’s 26, newly minted Harvard grad (so she says). She immediately went into how she just closed $20M in funding (so she says) to develop an app that has little, if anything, that would interest us.

I politely dig a little to see why she thinks we would be interested and why she contacted me. Somehow or another, she knows someone I know on Linked in. Followed his contacts and got to me. Long and short of this, she’s calling as many people she can, to try to drum up money.

Perturbed, I let her know, nicely but firmly that this was a collassal waste of my time. I felt she was deceptive. And it cost my company a $500 flight, a day of my time, $50 in food, $20 parking.

Huffily, She reminded me of her Harvard grad status and that she had $20M in the bank (neither of which passes the smell test). Not saying another word, I left. Got an Uber.

I just got to the airport, only to find out my flight home is cancelled
And 11 p.m. is the next flight out, which means it’s a red-eye.

I’m livid!

What a moron.

roadburner · July 2018

Some pictures from the Keeneland Concours; despite a continuing threat of rain it remained dry for the entire event.

imidazol97 · July 2018

None of the paltry reports have pictures of the lug nut area of the wheel. One has a nice picture of the wheel sitting along the concrete median.

Here's how the wheel hit the Mustang apparently after bouncing up some when hit by the cargo van. It's now clear why it was fatal to the driver. A car going 50-65 in morning traffic and the wheel coming the other direction at maybe 30 mph after hitting the van. Makes me want to drive in the right hand lane each time I go along that stretch of I75 now.

qbrozen · July 2018

seems a bit off to me that SUVs have to survive rollovers, but a Mustang can be crushed by one errant wheel.

oldfarmer50 · July 2018

qbrozen said:
seems a bit off to me that SUVs have to survive rollovers, but a Mustang can be crushed by one errant wheel.

Looks like the tire hit right at the seam between the roof and side frame. I bet it would still survive a rollover. I doubt most SUVs would have reacted differently if hit at that same point. Vehicles aren't designed with tire hits in mind unless the government mandates it.

driver100 · July 2018

snakeweasel said:
Got into Nashville yesterday, trip was pretty uneventful except for a bottleneck in KY due to construction and some guy in a Chevy pickup that kept passing me and being passed by me even though I was on cruise control. In the Opryland hotel right now, if any of you get near here you have to stop by and walk through it. Got tickets for the Opry later tonight and on to Orlando tomorrow.

I love Opryland. Not my first favorite music, but, they put on a great show. And the performers are warm and talented. The audience is great too.....real nice people.

driver100 · July 2018

Mr_Shiftright said:

graphicguy said:

houdini1 said:

xwesx said:

graphicguy said:
I just got to the airport, only to find out my flight home is cancelled. And 11 p.m. is the next flight out, which means it’s a red-eye.

I’m livid!
Ugh. That's horrible. I don't fault your boss for his take on the situation, but I am really surprised that a flight to CA was the way to go on this one. Maybe Facetime or a Google Hangout? If she's 26, then it sounds like she's about the right age to be absolutely entitled to wasting your time in this way. :@

She must have had a pretty good spiel. I never had the balls to ask a cold prospect to fly across the country to meet with me.
My boss is great. He really is. He’s smart. He’s fair. If he believes in you, he’ll go to bat for you. I’ve worked for him for over 20 years. If he changes positions or companies, he usually drags me with him with a nice pay bump as a reward.

After all these years, sometimes we don’t agree. This is one of those cases. I explained to him what I thought. He believed there might be something we could perhaps license from this lady and her company. He just asked that I go into the meeting with an open mind.

Not sure I did that, but I gave her the opportunity to make her case. She wanted to try to bully me (who has twice the experience than she has age). That wasn’t the correct way to do that.

I wrote the report of the trip on the plane last night while flying home. I assessed that the concept wasn’t a bad one. It’s nowhere near our focus, though. I wrote that IF her claim of $20M in funding is true (which she failed to provide proof of after repeated requests to do so), and given what I guesstimate the current run rate of salary and expenses (she says she has 20 employees, even though I only counted 7) her funding runway will end somewhere around 2021.

She probably needs more $$$$ to complete her project and was turned down by the funding community. And, is now looking to the tech companies (I doubt I was the only one she contacted) to continue funding.

She has interest from some companies (again hard to quantify), but no significant revenue to speak of. She does show some revenue from some mid-level companies, but it’s not very much and not repeatable.

We look at these types of companies all the time....startups who have complementary technology and need investment or want to sign a licensing agreement from us. I don’t usually get involved with this type of activity. But, I’m called in from time to time to assess the possible potential.

She’s pretty slick gathering tech contacts. If she was funded, she would have proudly announced who her partners were. Couldn’t get that info from her.

I don’t think my boss knew of any of this. All her heard was she had some interesting tech (after a brief elevator pitch) and wanted to engage us about it.

I’ve probably heard a dozen pitches from outside of the company. Only one was worthwhile and we did invest some money (not millions, though). The rest either weren’t viable, were not managed well, or like this case, not aligned with what we do as a company.

Knowing my boss, I’ve spent 3X the time telling you guys about it than he’ll allow me to expend with him. I’ll bring it up from time-to-time with him and he’ll half kiddingly dismiss this whole thing with...”shall we talk about the dogs you were all hot and bothered about?”. That will be the end of the conversation.

Thanks for letting me whine. Got home around 7 a.m. Dropped into bed for about 3 hours of sleep and feel better already.

PS....my hot dog was $11, too. I liked it. Was it worth $11? Nah! But add in the duck fat fries and it became more palatable. Their “bitter” beer was pretty good, though.
This is all very typical of start-ups: "Fake it until you Make it".

Great way to sum it up!

driver100 · July 2018

imidazol97 said:
None of the paltry reports have pictures of the lug nut area of the wheel. One has a nice picture of the wheel sitting along the concrete median.

Here's how the wheel hit the Mustang apparently after bouncing up some when hit by the cargo van. It's now clear why it was fatal to the driver. A car going 50-65 in morning traffic and the wheel coming the other direction at maybe 30 mph after hitting the van. Makes me want to drive in the right hand lane each time I go along that stretch of I75 now.

I'd rather take my chances....flying to Florida.

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