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Greenspeak

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No, You're not the same 1up.Yesterday

So, soon after posting my last entry, I decided that the best way to show my support and love for the dozens of my co-workers laid off yesterday was not to scribble on my blog, but to actually be there with them.

I rode my bike from EA up to San Francisco, where a lively and active and drunken wake was in progress at Steff's Bar, the dive bar next to the (now former) Ziff Davis offices that has served as the go-to watering hole for years now. Some of those fired--like my good friends Ryan and Anthony--were not there, and knowing both those guys, I'm sure that hanging at a bar was about the last thing they felt like doing, knowing that they no longer held the jobs that they loved so dearly. But mostly everyone was there--both the fired (who were unceremoniously shoved out the door, with security guards present) and the "saved"--as well as a bevy of alumni who also came to show their support: Karen Chu, John Davison, Dana Jongewaard, Demian Linn, and many more. It's the one thing about Ziff Davis. No matter how fucked up and ill-managed of a company it was---and, boy, was it--they always managed to hire great people who stick together even years after their departure. Alumni of that company always feel the same bond. Maybe because it was so fucked up and ill-managed. Those who get out are kind of like ex-convicts--survivors who laugh and shake their heads at their former incarceration and feel for those left behind. Or maybe that's too dramatic and unfair. It

Well, goddamn. :(January 6

A sad day for all the folks at 1up.com, the vast majority of whom lost their jobs today. I'll try to post a longer blog about this--I've been in meetings the whole time the proverbial merde hit the fan--but this is just a quick note to say that my condolences go out to all those now looking for work. The list of people they decided to lay off is just crazy. Don't ask me to make any sense of it, because I don't see any.

R.I.P. 1up.com. They may keep your URL, there, but we all know better.

Yeah. So I went back to "work" today.January 5

You know what I think? No? Well I'll tell you then. I think that the first day back from vacation should also be a day of vacation. Because it is utterly impossible, it seems to me, to get back in the groove anyway. So, for example, when the first day back is scheduled to be Monday Jan 5, it should actually just be Tuesday, Jan 6. That way I don't have to start my first day back at work, at the start of a brand new year, feeling guilty for getting nothing done. What kind of a way is that to start a year? It's totally counter-productive! Now I'm just going to feel guilty all night, which means I may sleep badly, which means tomorrow might also be non-productive because I'm too tired! See? If corporate America just listened to me, we'd all be much better workers. We'd get our vacation, then we'd get the extra day to psych up for the end of vacation, and THEN we'd go back to work. And then we'd all work super hard that day, making better products that everyone would want to buy, stimulating the economy by putting more money back in circulation, which would help scoop our country back out of the toilet and on the road to prosperity and joy again.

Or, to rephrase this blog post in a totally different way:

I'm sorry I played Bejeweled at work today. It won't happen again.

Happy New YearJanuary 2

So, it appears that I actually needed a break from this thing. Well, not really from "this thing," as this thing doesn't really require too much thought, most of the time, as anyone who's suffered through these posts can attest. But I guess I did need more of a break than I thought I did from actually thinking and processing and scribbling things down. Along with anything else remotely constructive. The wife--normally an extremely hardworking human herself--has advised me not to feel guilty about this, saying, "that's what vacation is for." And she's right.

Still, I did tell myself that I would do a few semi-productive things on this break, and it turns out I kinda did none of them. Since I last blogged on Xmas Eve, I have had a long, glorious stretch of downtime, including, but not limited to:

*epic matches of both Lost Cities and Dominion with my daughter. (Two great card games, highly recommended.)

*Three movies: Frost/Nixon (surprisingly great for a Ron Howard movie), I've Loved You So Long (French movie starring Kristin Scott Thomas, who is going to be robbed of an Oscar for a stunning performance), and, just today, Milk, featuring maybe the best performance by Sean Penn I've seen since Jeff Spicoli. Seriously, he's unreal in this movie--all beatific smiles and vulnerable openness, totally unlike any other role he's done for as long as I can remember. It's a heartb

Merry fuggin' Xmas...December 24 2008

....from my dog.