Sunshine State
Back from Florida, where I was working on a quickie job for an old buddy. As it happens, we were about 15 miles down the road from the Schiavo circus, which was, needless to say, big news. We did not have time to go have a gawk in person, however.
First, flying to Florida from Seattle is no small thing. The flights, including the stopover in Newark, were 12 hours each way. In 12 hours from Seattle, I could be in Hong Kong, Fiji, Istanbul, Vladivostok, Copehagen… Really far places. Instead, I was in Florida – still technically part of my own country. Essentially for a two-hour meeting. I can’t wait till they perfect the teleporter.
Potential visitors to Sarasota are hereby warned to avoid the Marriot Spring Hill Suites by the airport, especially room 214. This, I am sad to sad, was the site of the most revolting hospitality-related plumbing problem I have ever encountered in the Western world (the outhouse across the rat-infested garbage dump at the guesthouse in Sumatra will hopefully always remain unsurpassed). And since the hotel was being paid by the client, there would have been no satisfaction in getting the rate comped, even if such had been offered by the management (it wasn't.) If you must stay in this part of town, there is a Motel 6 down the road that looked perfectly sanitary by comparison.
There was also an unexpectedly amusing moment in the job itself. I was there to help coordinate an event for a regionally-based human resources company. Usually, part of my job is to sort through the material that the client wants to communicate and suggest a good framework for the message. In this case, that work had already been done by another consulting firm, who produced an elaborate “brand book” of concepts and messaging that was given to us to study.
As I paged through the book, I noted that each section was introduced by a quote. At first, the sources of the quotes were the standard businessmen and politicians – Lee Iacoca, John F. Kennedy, Ross Perot. However, as I got deeper into the document, I noticed that they started getting more and more esoteric. First Sun Tzu, the Chinese philosopher lately reincarnated as a font of business wisdom for his treatise on “The Art of War.” Still fairly standard. Then the German physicist Heisenberg. Then Eugene V. Debs, the early 20th century labor leader and candidate for President on the Socialist ticket, who polled over 1 million votes in 1912. Surely an interesting choice in a report generated for a human-resources outsourcing firm. I had to put the book down before I got to the final pages, which probably included words of wisdom from Marie Antoinette (on employee benefits) or the Marquis de Sade (on workplace safety).
I don’t usually think much of the work of competing firms, but in this case, I tip my hat. There were clearly some creative minds at work there.
Also, Pedro, if you’re out there – I know I was in your back yard, but I was only down there for a day. If I have to go back, I’ll look you up.
8:53:39 AM 
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