“The Empire Proactively Strategizes Back”: The Life of a Corporate Peon in the Empire

For those that are new here, I currently work for a large corporation on a government contract, as I did in my prior jobs going back to 2005.  In my final months here before I strike out on my own next summer, I've tended to do a lot of random pondering and look a little more closely at the quiet desperation that exists in some of my coworkers.  One such thought took an odd turn to a comparison with Star Wars.  As US foreign policy continues to get more aggressive and more revelations come out about the terrible things being done here and abroad by the US government, I can’t help but think, “Is this what the office peons working for the Empire in Star Wars felt like?”.  Granted we're not blowing up entire planets, but our government's complete lack of scruples when it comes to its near-total indifference to civilian collateral damage, its treatment of its own citizens as tools to be monitored and controlled, and its destabilization of foreign nations for short-sighted policy objectives is still pretty malevolent, even if on a lesser scale.

Would the underlings in that fictional universe, like myself and some of my coworkers, question one’s place in working (even indirectly) for an organization whose primary motivation is constant growth and the acquisition of power by any means?  For that matter, would they experience the same combination of mind-numbing tedium, BS bureaucracy, and idiotic and/or selfishly scheming management?  Wouldn’t most of them simply be regular people like us trying to get by in the day-to-day office grind?  

Before one dismisses this as absurd, just think about all the types of jobs and skills required to support a massively powerful government like the Empire.  As Randal from the movie Clerks points out, the Empire’s entire workforce can’t all be storm troopers…

Taking Randal’s argument and applying it to the entire Imperial government, one would expect the number of bureaucrats, support personnel, and other civilian workers would be massive in order to support the Empire’s government and war machine.  To paraphrase Randal, what would a storm trooper know about server administration, setting up a LAN, or configuring firewalls?  So I figure there would have to be office drones much like us.  Not evil people who believe in galactic domination, but simply regular people who just want a decent job and paycheck.  People that are too busy and distracted by the bureaucracy and the daily grind to sit up and object to the Empire’s enslavement… er, ‘extraordinary rendition’… of the Wookies, or the complete destruction of Alderaan (“but wait, the Empire said Alderaan was behind 9/11 so it’s ok, right?…”).  Millions, if not billions, of regular people just trying to hold down a job, support their families, and make it through life.  Heck, Luke himself pretty much echoed that sentiment to Obi Wan Kenobi early in Episode IV: "I can't get involved! I've got work to do! It's not that I like the Empire. I hate it! But there's nothing I can do about it right now."

How many of us feel that way about the NSA domestic spying revelations, or the unreasonable level of civilian casualties due to our drone programs, or the arming of any rebel group in Syria that can say the word “moderate”, or big banks and big government working together in committing & covering up crimes that would get any one of us little people life sentences?  How many feel that sense of hopelessness in their ability to change anything, and in the end just keep their mouth shut and cross their fingers hoping they won’t be the next in line to be screwed.  In the Empire, the peons desperately toe the line hoping to get through life without falling on the wrong side of the internal power struggles or getting force-choked by Darth Vader.  In the USA, the peons desperately toe the line hoping to get through life without losing their job or retirement funds & 401k’s or ending up a target of the government bureaucracy through no fault of their own.  Either way, the decision to remain a peon is up to you.  Find your way to independence and take control of your life, or end up like this guy...

Link of the Week

This Link of the Week is an interview with one Dmitry Orlov, a Russian-American engineer and blogger who’s probably most known for his comparisons of the situation the USSR was in shortly before and after its collapse and the situation that America faces now and (in his view) is likely to see in its own near future.  I have my own thoughts and opinions when it comes to his analysis and conclusions on that, but I’ll save those for later and simply say that his point of view is worth reading and/or listening to (you can find that comparison “Closing the Collapse Gap” here).  At any rate, this podcast interview is excellent and offers a perspective into the Russia-Ukraine situation that isn't really touched in the American mainstream media.  My take is that while Dmitry has some slight bias towards Russia (understandable given his background), it’s not nearly as bad or blatant as the pro-West bias seen in what passes for American news.  I expect somewhere in the middle lies the truth, and in my opinion it's closer to Dmitry Orlov's take than what the US (and European) mainstream media is telling us. 

Link:  Dmitry Orlov: Russia's Patience Is Wearing Thin

Escaping the Herd's Bacon-Wrapped Turkey Recipe

With all the bad s**t going down in Ferguson, I think a lighter post is needed to help balance me out.  So with that in mind, I present my Bacon-Wrapped Turkey recipe.  It's a variation on an existing recipe I found somewhere online years ago, but over time I've added to and modified it so much it's practically it's own recipe now.

Ingredients:

• 1 Turkey, 14-22 pounds (I tend towards the 20+ pound birds because I cook for two families)
• 2 pounds of bacon, uncooked (if you have a smaller bird you may only need half that)
• 5 or so apples, chopped in medium-large chunks
• 2 onions, also chopped in medium-large chunks
• 5 or 6 stalks of celery, chopped in 3-4 inch chunks
• 1 bulb of garlic, all cloves separated and peeled
• 4 tablespoons of extra virgin olive oil (what the hell, regular olive oil works fine too)
• Sage, 1 small bunch chopped (if you don’t have fresh sage, dried sage is an ok substitute)
• Kosher Salt & Pepper, whatever you feel is a modest amount
• Wooden Toothpicks

Instructions:

1. Heat the oven to about 400 F.
2. Take out the giblets bag and neck, rinse the turkey with lukewarm water (or cold water if it will be a little while until you put the bird in the oven), and dry with a paper towel.  Put the bird in the roasting pan
3. Mix the olive oil, chopped sage, and salt & pepper in a small bowl.  Then give that bird a good rubdown of that mixture on the outside and then the inside of the turkey cavity.  I usually leave any of that extra fat and skin around the cavity on the bird so it can add to the drippings (fat adds to the flavor).
4. Stuff that bird full of the chopped apples, onion, garlic cloves, and celery.  Any remainder that won’t fit inside you can put on the bottom of the pan under the turkey where it will cook and mix with the drippings.  Tie up the turkey’s legs/drumsticks together with twine, or that turkey leg-cuffs metal doohickey that sometimes comes with the bird.  The turkey should be breast-side up, with the wings tucked underneath the turkey.
5. Drape the bacon slices across the turkey.  I lay the bacon strips more or less in a parallel fashion, but I’ve seen other recipes where they lay the bacon criss-cross fashion on the bird.  I’m sure either way works equally well, so feel free to go nuts and do what feels right.  I try to concentrate more of the bacon around the breast of the bird, but wrap the bacon around the legs, wings and sides of the bird too, using the wooden toothpicks to secure it as necessary.  Basically try to cover the whole bird except for the parts resting on the roasting pan rack.
6. Put your meat thermometer in the inner thigh (that sounds like something Family Guy's Quagmire would say).  It should be good and deep in the inner thigh, but shouldn’t be touching bone.
7. Cover the bird loosely with aluminum foil, so loosely that it barely touches only a few parts of the turkey.  You can leave a little space so you can see the thermometer, but since the foil won’t be on the whole time it’s not really an issue.
8. Put the turkey in the oven, and then lower the oven temperature to 350 degrees F.  Now I don’t baste my turkeys and they turn out great, but if you want to do it feel free.  I just think it’s better to maintain a more constant temperature in the oven, that’s all.  As for cooking time, the 20-21 pound birds I get usually are done in a little bit more than 4 hours, but there are many cooking time charts like this one (http://www.epicurious.com/articlesguides/howtocook/primers/turkey_stuffingandroasting) where you can get a reasonable estimate based on your bird's weight.  These times are just guidelines though, and it's the internal temperature that will tell you when it's done.
9. I take the foil cover off about 2/3 of the way through the anticipated cooking time (about an hour and a half before the estimated cooking time ends).  This is just so the turkey and the bacon can get some color.  If the bacon or turkey skin already looks pretty dark, keep the foil on longer.
10. When both the thigh meat and the breast meat reaches about 160 degrees Fahrenheit, take it out of the oven and put it on a platter or grooved cutting board that won't let the juices leak over the side.  Take that foil you removed earlier and loosely cover the turkey with it, and let it sit for 20-30 minutes while you make the gravy or attend to any other cooking tasks that need doing.  The internal temperature will continue to rise well above the 165 degree threshold of safety.  Meanwhile you can use the pan drippings to make your gravy.  
11. Take the apples, vegetables, and garlic out of the turkey cavity.  In the past I've tended to just throw them in the garbage because of uncertainty about insufficiently cooked turkey juices, but this year I think I'll try to simmer them and strain out the liquid for use in the gravy. 
12. Remove the bacon and the toothpicks.  The bacon will be really crispy, almost crumbly in texture.  I usually use the crumbled up bits to mix into the mashed potatoes, and put the rest on the side of the turkey for people to snack on as they like.  Prepare to see some competition for who gets the pieces of turkey skin, because that bacon grease just does something wonderful to the taste of it.

And that is pretty much that.  Being immigrants, my wife and in-laws didn't grow up with the Thanksgiving holiday and so they see this whole turkey cooking business as rather intimidating, but as you can see it's really quite easy.  They don't believe me when I say how easy it is, but I don't argue the point too much.  After all, I get to stay in the kitchen and read a book or play games on the tablet while THEY have to watch the kids.  Oh yes, poor little me....   :-)

Link of the Week

“The world is always ending for someone.”

― Neil Gaiman, Signal to Noise

This Link of the Week is a podcast I thought might be of interest to those who are concerned about the fragile nature of our economy, society, and lifestyles, but are put off by the ‘Doomsday’ association to anything related to “preppers”.  The podcast that follows is a very common sense breakdown of what’s really important, what’s much less important (even though we sometimes think otherwise), and some of the basic measures that are the most practical for us people who are NOT obsessed with bugging out to the wilderness to fight the rampaging hordes of Mutant Zombie Bikers….

The World Won’t End but Your World Could

Random Musing on a Movie "What If" Scenario

(Because not every post has to be super serious...)


I recently watched the movie "Predator 2" again, which I had last seen probably 15 years ago.  And one thing struck me this time, and I wonder if anyone else had this notion: other than causing the death of one of the alien Predators, the cop Harrigan (played by Danny Glover) and his team didn't affect the overall outcome for the better.  In fact, I think his involvement actually ended up causing more harm than good.  Let me explain.

So in the beginning after Harrigan and the cops find most of the Colombian Scorpion drug gang dead at the beginning of the movie, we find out from his conversation with his chief he was supposed to stay out of the building.  And after that, he was told to stay out of the penthouse where the Jamaican gang was slaughtered.  So what would have likely happened if he had actually obeyed orders, at least when it came to the penthouse? 

The alien Predator most likely would have left the cops alone, as its active interest in them appeared to have begun when they poked around in the penthouse.  With so many more active threats worth hunting like the rest of the drug gangs, it seems unlikely it would have bothered with the cops if they hadn't kept trying to investigate the Predator's activities.  So Harrigan's team would have likely all lived, and that scene in the subway probably wouldn't have happened since it was only the Predator's later interest in them that brought him to the subway in the first place.  Therefor all those armed subway commuters would still be alive, or at least SOME of them assuming there might have been a minor shootout anyway between the commuters and the street punks trying to rob that one commuter.  The Feds would still probably try to capture the Predator in the meat warehouse, presumably with the same tragic results for the government's capture team (in the movie Harrigan was not in the warehouse until practically all the team was dead, so his total absence probably wouldn't have affected that outcome).  The Predator would have likely then escaped the warehouse and the Feds.  Assuming the Predator is at least as intelligent as we are, and most likely significantly more intelligent, it would recognize the capture team as part of a larger coordinated operation by the resident authorities.  The most logical course of action would be to pick up stakes and leave, as its "hunting" would continue to be interfered with and there would be at least some possibility that it might be captured.

So if the protagonist had let the matter drop, the government team would still be dead and the Predator ship would still have escaped, but no cops or commuters would have been slaughtered by the Predator.  If anything, the Predator would have killed even more violent criminals and drug dealers if it hadn't been preoccupied with Harrigan and his team.  Harrigan didn't manage to save any lives, and the ONLY thing in the movie he changed for the better was killing ONE alien Predator.  But even that's of questionable benefit.  At the end of the movie Harrigan himself said he figured that the aliens would be coming back, so what difference did killing one really make in the grand scheme of things?  Perhaps the government ended up retrieving a few bits of their technology... the severed hand with part of the Predator's (now nonfunctional) wristband, its spear, and the dart found in the penthouse... but that's small potatoes.  The forensics doctor admitted that none of the materials in the dart corresponded to known elements (absurd I know but it's their story so I'll take it at face value), so material science couldn't advance much if they couldn't even identify what the alloys were made of much less how they were combined.  And it would be extremely difficult at best to reverse engineer much of use from a piece of an alien wrist-computer and a spear that, despite its alien nature, is pretty basic and non-complicated in what it does.

Anyway that's just my thought.  No moral or grand lesson here, just a random bit of 'what-if' fun.  Well maybe there's one takeaway from it... I could accept Harrigan's decision to barge in to the penthouse if he had a logical reason for disobeying orders.  But the way it plays out, it appears he does it out of stubbornness, territoriality, and pride.  I'm all for spirited insubordination to authority (or at least authority that is evil, sociopathic, or utterly clueless), but one should be smart about it and have good justification for it.  Reasons like 'because I feel like it' doesn't quite cut it.

The Advantage of Mobility and Flexibility

“You buy furniture. You tell yourself, this is the last sofa I will ever need in my life. Buy the sofa, then for a couple years you're satisfied that no matter what goes wrong, at least you've got your sofa issue handled. Then the right set of dishes. Then the perfect bed. The drapes. The rug. Then you're trapped in your lovely nest, and the things you used to own, now they own you.”    ― Chuck Palahniuk, Fight Club

If there’s been one constant in how I’ve lived my life, it has been a focus on mobility and being flexible in life.  Through the majority of my adult life I’ve been able to fit the possessions I care most about in a small car, and I’ve made many moves and relocations doing just that.  In fact twice in my life I’ve lived between 3-8 months on simply what I was able to bring in two suitcases and a carry-on bag, and one of those being at an overseas location.  Now that I’m married and have a family the number of possessions has certainly grown, but even so the possessions that our family considers most precious would still fit in two suitcases a piece.  Even if extending that list of stuff to the ‘really-nice-to-haves’, it all would still fit in a mid-sized SUV (which coincidentally is our family vehicle).  Part of the reason I do this is because of my interest in travel and experiencing new places, but the other part is because early on I noticed how I was able to take advantage of various opportunities that more ‘rooted’ people have a difficult time of doing.  And while it has never come down to this for myself (at least yet), mobility and flexibility is a handy tactic for survival.

How Does One Define a Life that is Flexible and Mobile?

1) Keeping one’s material possessions to a modest level.  As with the Fight Club quote that started this post, the obsession with ‘stuff’ can get to the point where the stuff you own becomes more of a burden than a benefit.  Whenever making a significant purchase, try to avoid purchases that you will either be unwilling to lug it wherever you go or unwilling to sell and leave it behind.  

2) Limiting one’s attachment to material possessions.  This is just as, if not more important, than limiting the amount of one’s possessions.  Seeing your stuff as ‘just stuff’ is critical in staying mobile and flexible in life.  And when you truly grasp the truth that the majority of your stuff is easily replaceable with a little cash and/or time, you free your mind of being ‘owned’ by your stuff.

3) Having little or no debt.  Debt is the anchor that chains the majority of us to jobs we don’t like or situations we can’t stand.  The less debt you have the more flexible you are, so think very hard before taking any debt on.   

4) Having a healthy savings with a slight emphasis on liquidity.  Money is extremely useful when it comes to relocating or simply dealing with a changing situation.  Money helps you buy new furniture at a new residence after you move, or able to stay in the black when between jobs, or able to pay the bills when something unexpected comes up.  

5) Keeping expenses reasonably low and being frugal (but not cheap).  This goes hand-in-hand with the previous point (saving money), as keeping expenses to reasonable levels helps accomplish the other goal of maintaining a healthy savings.  As for frugal vs. cheap, I think it is best defined as follows: frugal is about knowing one’s priorities and appreciating value, whereas being cheap is only about finding the cheapest price period.  A frugal person is able to splurge when it comes to something important, but a cheap person is not.  I may be willing to accept mediocre quality for something I don’t care much about, but you won’t find me pinching pennies when it comes to buying a computer, a car, or a firearm.  

6) Embracing the information age.  It is wonderful being alive at a time when your movie and book collections can fit on one external hard drive, and that you can do most, if not all, of your banking, bill-paying, business, and communications from anyplace with an internet connection.  The ability to keep in touch with family and friends with Skype, Google Hangouts, and other such things is an immense help in staving off homesickness and preventing the drifting apart that so often happens when situated far from the people you care about.  

7) Keeping one’s eyes, and mind, open to new opportunities.  Simply put, being flexible and mobile isn’t of much use if you never see a reason to change your circumstances.  You have to spend a little of your time looking to see what’s out there.

The Disadvantages

Now all that being said, there are disadvantages with this lifestyle.  In exchange for mobility and the ability to quickly chase opportunities, one has to give up or severely limit some things that are dependent on staying in one place.  If you like gardening or other hobbies of a long-term and land-dependent nature, this won’t work well for you.  Likewise if your hobbies, work, or interests that take up a lot of space, like working on cars, carpentry & woodworking, fine arts, etc.  Also, this lifestyle pretty much requires one to rent vs. own when it comes to your residence.  As much as I find home ownership to be over-hyped, I do understand its benefits and the appeal.  So this lifestyle isn’t for anyone whose top priorities include owning their own home.  Lastly, it doesn’t really allow for putting down roots and being part of a community, which honestly does have advantages of its own that CAN outweigh the advantages of mobility.  This is best articulated by a recent podcast I happened to catch from thesurvivalpodcast.com; if you are interested you can find the podcast link here at The Case for Putting Down Roots.

The Growing Trend

So why am I trying to sell this idea when I acknowledge its disadvantages and the benefits of settling down?  The reason is that I see a growing trend towards contract jobs vs permanent employment, and for many of us mobility and flexibility will be our primary competitive advantage.  I keep my job profile up at various sites just to see what’s out there, and in the past couple years I’ve seen a huge increase in the number of temporary contract positions vs. full time positions advertised for IT and other technical positions.  Most of the various emails and calls I get are from recruiters looking to fill temporary contract positions or contract-to-hire positions, with only a minority looking for permanent hires.  The majority of these contract positions seem to offer a higher (sometimes substantially higher) pay rates, but no health coverage or any other benefits.  We can point fingers all we want as to the causes of the growing temporary/contract work force (the Affordable Care Act, the changing economy, shifts in supply and demand for certain skills, etc.), but at the end of the day we have to deal with the situation as it is and adapt accordingly.  I see a future where many of us will be changing jobs and residences at an even faster pace than now just in order to make a living, and we are going to find mobility may be an advantage, or possibly even a requirement, when it comes to staying employed.  This especially applies to those of us in the younger half of the worker spectrum, where we are often at a disadvantage with our relatively lower levels of experience.  The upshot of it is that it’s younger workers that usually are less tied down to a place and more willing and able to relocate, and that will help offset some of the experience disadvantages.  And while I feel this is a lifestyle better suited for the young, I think many older workers may find this to be advantageous as well.  With industries being created and dying out, many older workers are finding themselves starting in new career fields and having to compete with workers 20 or 30 years younger than they are.  And that can present its own set of challenges for those older workers.  I’m not saying I think this is a good thing, I’m just saying we have to face the situation AS IT IS instead of what we think it SHOULD BE.

When To Say When

There is no easy answer on when the time is right to put down roots, as everyone’s personality and opportunities are different.  I would say that as long as one remains an employee and working for someone else, it will be more of a challenge to stay in place.  So if one really knows it’s time to put down roots or is already ‘rooted’, I would encourage them to go into business for themselves if they have any inclination towards it at all.  At least on a part-time basis, a little something to grow one’s skills and earn a bit of money in addition to one’s regular job.  My family does actually intend to transition to a more permanent living situation over the next 10 years.  My wife would like to be able to have a garden and plant roses, and I would certainly like to eventually be able to have things like a large workshop, a firing range, and a place to plant fruit trees among other things.  And I think it’s no coincidence that the timing of this coincides with our plans to go into business for ourselves.  Yet there is still no doubt that this lifestyle has helped me a great deal up to this point in my life, and I think it can do the same for others as the job climate continues to shift and get more challenging. 

Link of the Week

This week I've got links regarding the Philae probe's recent landing on Comet 67P...

Comet lander: Camera sees Philae's hairy landing

"By Jonathan Amos, Science correspondent, BBC News 

High-resolution pictures have now been released of the Philae probe in the act of landing on Comet 67P last Wednesday.
They were acquired by the Narrow Angle Camera on the Rosetta satellite, which had dropped the little robot towards the surface of the "ice mountain".
The images are presented as a mosaic covering the half-hour or so around the "first touchdown" - the probe then bounced to a stop about 1km away.
.....
This rebound reached hundreds of metres above the comet and lasted almost two hours.
When Philae came back down, it made another small leap, which took it into a high-walled trap.
Telemetry and pictures from the robot itself indicate this location is covered in deep shadow for most of 67P's day.
As a consequence, Philae receives insufficient solar power to re-boot and form a radio link to the orbiting Rosetta spacecraft.
Esa cannot be sure the robot will ever come back to life, but even if it does not the agency says it is "hugely happy" with what was achieved in the more than 50 hours following landing.
The probe managed to complete over 80% of its planned primary science campaign on the surface.
.....
Scientists say this shows the icy material underlying 67P's dust covering to be far harder than anyone anticipated - having the tensile strength of some rocks.
It also helps explain why Philae bounced so high on that first touchdown.
The 4km-wide comet has little gravity, so when key landing systems designed to hold the robot down failed at the crucial moment - the probe would have been relying on thick, soft, compressive layers to absorb its impact.
However much dust it did encounter at that moment, it clearly was not enough to prevent Philae making its giant rebound."

You can read the full story at the BBC link here.


And lastly a little humor for you.... you find The Oatmeal's take on the story here.