Why should everyone seek more lucrative jobs

There is no doubt that Steve Jobs was a great engineer and a great businessman but a few weeks ago, just a few days after his death, I linked on my facebook to an article saying he was a bad role model. At the time I didn’t know quite whether I agreed or thought it was BS. The article on forbes.com said basically that he was arrogant for not following his doctors’ recommendations and that he gave bad advice for people to follow what they love, not settle, and keep looking for what they love until they find it, quoting him from a famous Stanford commencement speech.

 

I’m all for making kids feel good about themselves and encouraging people to try hard but in a way this is giving false hope to the masses. For Jobs, yes, he was successful and found a job he loved, but for the vast majority of people, even Stanford grads, we won’t find the ideal job or ideal spouse, and looking tirelessly for it would cause most of us frustration and unhappiness.

 

It’s one thing to tell a 6 year old that he can grow up to be a professional baseball player if he wants to and works hard at it. It’s another thing to tell a 16 year old C student that he can become a doctor or to tell engineers as a whole that they should get a master’s degree and pursue a promotion to management. We shouldn’t be encouraging people so much to work highly skilled positions, thereby making the laborers and even the engineers who have held the same decent position for 20 years feel like second class citizens.

 

I’ve always felt that Americans encourage people to get higher education and strive to get promotions entirely too much to the point that it is unrealistic for many people. Many people are better off not going to college or not going to grad school or not pressuring themselves to get a promotion – after all, along with more money, promotions mean more responsibility and more headaches and the majority of us would not be happier or couldn’t handle those jobs.

 

In Jobs’ famous commencement speech, Jobs says “the only way to be truly satisfied is to do what you believe is great work. And the only way to do great work is to love what you do” but if we are telling people they need to keep striving for bigger things and searching for their ideal job, only a small fraction of the people will love what they do. People need to be happy with their job so I think we should focus more on encouraging people to learn to like what they do rather than striving for the ideal – how to be satisfied with your current job as a salesman or engineer or clerk rather than being told time and time again that in order to be successful and happy, you have to be a manager or executive. There are relatively few managers in the world.

 

I’ll leave you with a line from a Sheryl Crow song: “It’s not having what you want, it’s wanting what you’ve got.”

That 6-0 start seems like such a distant past

Georgia Tech has lost 2 in a row and has Clemson and Virginia Tech next. They looked pretty terrible yesterday but I think we all knew they weren't a top 10 team. Today, however, was a good day as the Falcons beat the Lions and Matt Stafford. And Calvin Johnson still had a good game, which makes me happy.

Apparently my computer rankings are much more in line with the BCS computers than with the voters with Oklahoma State #1, Oregon and Stanford significantly lower than the polls. I really don't see how Boise State could have the 45th toughest schedule but I'm pretty sure all the kinks of that are gone. the other strength of schedules seem about right, so maybe it'll improve as Boise plays more weak teams.

So, since plans to go to GT homecoming against Clemson fell through, I'll be at a bridge tournament and probably will get to see the last quarter of the game - hopefully it will still be a game.

For the 4th straight week, Wake Forest is expected to win.

Clemson 37, @Georgia Tech 27
@Florida State 31, NC State 27
Wake Forest 28, @North Carolina 27
Georgia 28, Florida 20
South Carolina 33, @Tennessee 17
@Kansas State 31, Oklahoma 30
@Oklahoma State 47, Baylor 30
Michigan State 28, @Nebraska 26
Wisconsin 30, @Ohio State 24
Virginia Tech 31, Duke 17
@Miami 31, Virginia 18

Who would win today: UGA or GT?

On the drive up to Athens Saturday morning, I was listening to 790 the Zone and they were having an informal poll of callers guessing who would win between the Bulldogs and Yellow Jackets if they played today on a neutral field. I was quite surprised that nearly everyone picked the Yellow Jackets. I didn't even agree with that. Yes, I thought, and still think, that UGA would and will beat Tech. Both teams struggled a bit this weekend but Georgia managed to survive with a win while Tech couldn't muster up quite enough offense against the Wahoos. Teams who have a bye week before playing Tech continue to have significantly more success than teams who only have 1 week to prepare. It's no coincidence - the extra week helps more against Paul Johnson's abnormal offense than it does against other teams.

Anyway, here are the new rankings, including half of the SEC in the top 25. Oklahoma State is at the top, way ahead of #2 Oklahoma. Michigan State (5-1) beat my previous #1 Michigan but still is at only #31.

My computer doesn't think there will be many good games next week - out of all of the top 25 teams, my computer's spread is at least 6 in every game. But after my tennis league and a nap, I'll be watching Clemson-UNC and then GT-Miami and Auburn-LSU.

Week 8 computer predictions:
@LSU 34, Auburn 17
@Oklahoma 43, Texas Tech 26
Wisconsin 28, @Michigan State 21
@Clemson 33, North Carolina 23
Georgia Tech 33, @Miami 27
Wake Forest 31, @Duke 24
Arkansas 37, @Mississippi 17
@Florida State 34, Maryland 21

Modern dating: texting and online dating

Dating is really annoying.  But it’s kind of exciting. We all know there are tons of people out there who are looking for someone not unlike us but the trick is finding said person. For those of us in college or working in the service industry, there are plenty of opportunities to meet people. I am only imagine how often a decent-looking bartender gets asked out. But for those of us with office jobs that are predominantly male and hobbies that tend to not attract many potential mates, it’s difficult.

Every time I see a commercial for eHarmony.com or match.com, they say that 1 in 5 or so relationships now starts online. Despite being an engineer and addicted to facebook, the idea of meeting someone online has never really appealed to me. Nonetheless, I have an eharmony account. In the first couple months of 2009, I met 2 young ladies through there and had 3 or 4 dates with each. I wasn’t actually all that interested in either of them and discontinued using eharmony after 3 months, in favor of attempting to go out to bars and meet ladies there more often. 2 months ago I renewed my eHarmony account and 3 people have survived the multiple choice and short answer part only for me to then close but one I chose to actually send a personal message to. She was a recently graduated law student and had tons in common and after exchanging several emails (through eharmony), she suddenly closed the match –immediately after sending me a nice long message about how she is obsessed with Asian cultures and wants to play tennis. So, that’s it. I can’t respond anymore and I’ll never know what she was thinking or what she suddenly realized unless she re-opens the match. I actually had high hopes for this one. I hope she accidentally hit the wrong button and realizes it soon when she starts wondering why she hasn’t gotten a reply from me.

It also is a weird feeling to see someone you know in person on an online dating site. Eharmony only shows you people that it thinks are good matches so you only see a small percentage of the people registered. Last week, 2 people I know from church showed up as matches for me. Laura has since closed the match, not unexpectedly, and the other one has had no action. It’s somehow weird, but then again, so is this whole texting culture. When I see an article about texting to ask out a girl and they aren’t totally turned off by this, it makes me realize that the culture of dating in America really has changed – even in the last 10 years. Isn’t texting pretty much analogous to email or facebook message, and aren’t both of those still taboo as well?

Pick Six and Michigan still atop the Asbury college football rankings

This year, the phrase "pick six" has been used a lot more than I have noticed previously. I hadn't really heard anyone use it until a couple of years ago but it has become the standard way to refer to an interception that is taken back for a touchdown. I don't think I like this phrase but maybe it'll grow on me.

Of the 25 games I put into my computer predictor (all top 25 teams plus all ACC and SEC games), my computer only got two wrong and beat the spread on 15 out of 25. The two my computer got wrong were Arkansas over Auburn and Texas A&M over Texas Tech. My computer has always liked Auburn a lot and I guess it was down on A&M after their loss to Arkansas. I'm glad my computer got the WF win over FSU. People don't respect the Demon Deacons football program. I'm not sure I do either.

Georgia comes in at #31, Virginia Tech #34, and Wake Forest #39.

Next week doesn't appear to have many interesting games, which suits me just fine since I will be playing bridge all day Saturday at the Athens sectional, but here are my computer predictions. Something must be wrong - the computer is picking Wake to beat another perennial power in the ACC.

LSU 33, @Tennessee 14
@Oregon 34, Arizona State 29
Michigan 24, @Michigan State 16
Georgia Tech 37, @Virginia 24
@Wake Forest 27, Virginia Tech 26
Georgia 28, @Vanderbilt 17
@Duke 30, Florida State 26
@Auburn 28, Florida 26

Week 5 Rankings have Michigan at the Top

So, my new rankings for this week have Michigan at the top and initially they had unranked Texas Tech at the top, with Alabama and LSU #17 and 18. That all looked really wrong so I spent the last hour and a half looking for glaring errors and I found one - not in the algorithm but a typo or misaligned column. That resulted mostly in the strength of schedule numbers being way off. Anyway, these new rankings for week 5 look pretty good, with the exception of Michigan at the top. Just in time to watch the new episode of Pan Am.

I like that my computer ranks Clemson #4, more respect than the poll voters give them. The one team that my computer seems to have way off is Wisconsin, fresh off a good beating of Nebraska. And of course, I like that Georgia Tech is ranked so high. They seem to now be on a collision course to go into homecoming on October 29 against Clemson, both with 8-0 records. Both the Yellow Jackets and Tigers will be bog favorites in their next 3 games - GT vs. Maryland, Virginia, and Miami; Clemson vs. Boston College, Maryland, and North Carolina). Hopefully College Gameday will be in Atlanta that day.

Some computer predictions for week 6 games:
@LSU 34, Florida 16
Oklahoma 31, @Texas 23
Auburn 31, @Arkansas 30
@Georgia Tech 40, Maryland 23
@Virginia Tech 24, Miami 21
@Wake Forest 28, Florida State 26
Georgia 30, @Tennessee 28
@South Carolina 31, Kentucky 14
@Clemson 35, Boston College 13