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I’ve been doing work around a personal aversion to the phrase “have to”. When I hear it, and especially when said to me, I always react “I don’t have to do anything”.

I don’t think anyone “has to” do anything.

I say let’s use more descriptive “need to”, “should”, “obligated”, “would like to”. All of which are different then “have to”.

So why? Well, I believe this term is used and beaten with a stick. It’s a dead horse, so I suggest, let’s all get off.

“Have to” came around at the end of the 16th century, which is the end of the Renaissance. Is it a coincidence that for a time when everyone is running around the countryside asking “why”, that people came up with “because you have to”? They wanted a way to shut them up.

It’s used as a blanket statement for people who don’t know, or don’t want to know. It’s used for people who want compliance.

Here is an example:

Person 1: “You have to [insert task here]”

Person 2: “Why?”

Person 1: “Because, you have to.”

Wrote an interesting little piece in creative class the other day. It was a moment when you hear the characters voice crisply, and it’s more dictation. Especially this, which was an odd mix of slang. Wasn’t sure what I was writing until I looked it over again.

The telephone rang. I looked at the call display to see who it was

“Oh – My – God! Like, you totally won’t believe!”

I saw the number, I saw the name, and yet I sill picked up the phone. Why?

“So Dave went to Lisa’s and totally found her tets up and snoggin Janet. She was like shocked. And he was like, shocked!”

Why? You’d think after a lifetime of listing to your little sister dish all the latest gossip, the voice wouldn’t sound like nails on a chalkboard.

“He asked if he could play too, but she just slammed palm on his specs. I mean, It ain’t pussy foot it they tri’d. But, you need a reboot on her thoughts. I mean seriously – with out her monkey toy it ain’t banana cream; it’s just pie.”

Half the time I had no clue. Where does she get these terms?

“Turns out she’s been fakin his grades for a semester. He ain’t her localhost and she’s changed providers! Hell she’s gone from packet to ping! We are talkin, like some serious backbone overhaul.”

What did she say?

“So, like, he went from hotmail to gmail, re-proped his DNS and is looking for a new server.”

With that she hung up the phone. What did she say?

Where have I been? I’ve been sitting on my couch and doing sweet FA. Why? Because
I felt like it. To be honest, I’ve been in a funk. It’s not about earth shattering
events in life. I haven’t gone through heart shattering events. Sometimes, I think,
we all just hear a little “snap” inside. Could be burn-out, could be a string of
unfortunate events, or it could simply be the way the wind is blowing or the
weather outside. Sometimes a little sweet FA is what the doctor ordered.

Some might consider this wallowing, and they might be right. I thought it was
wallowing. At first, my reaction towards my instincts, were that is was
counter-productive. Wallowing doesn’t do any good but change my point of view to
see all the crappy things. But then the thought occurred, maybe that’s what I
needed. In the world of improvement, to ignore the bad, is the best way to build
your own little invisible brick wall that will ultimately have your journey slam
to a stop. You won’t know why, or how, or where it came from, but when you hit
it, it will hurt bad. To improve, the bad must be looked at. We need to know when
we are beating a dead horse, or even worse, riding one. I think the only way to
really know for sure, it to put on the brown goggles, and look around you.

Not only that, but it’s like the blues. It’s called the blues because it’s
…well…blue: “My baby left me”; “I’m in a broke down motel”; “I got no money”.
Admitting it all, somehow makes you appreciate the beauty of the music. For some
odd reason, realizing how much bad, makes you appreciate that a) your still
kicking around and b) that through it all, there is still good.

Is my wallowing over? maybe, maybe-not. I’ll have some more ice-cream and decide.

Last week I was on course for Advanced Server Administration for Solaris 10. The whole experience was eye opening and insightful. Some really nifty features that we covered were Zones, AutoFS, RAID and JumpStart. In the process are started to wonder if maybe there could be something here?

Lately, I’ve been in a slump. It’s not a depression but a cross roads. I’ve been trying to find ways over this little bump. I’m at a stage where I’ve gone through and figured out what I’ve been natural at. I’ve made inventory of things I like and things I’m good at. I’ve also started to work on finding new things that cause a peak in my interest. But I’m at a bit of a stop sign because I’ve come to a point where I look at my inventor and say “great….now what?” Maybe some of you are in the same phase. I look at my little lists and try and devise a path or goal or career out of it. But from my limited knowledge of jobs, I can’t figure out what applies.

Some of this could be my artistic and renaissance nature. It can cause a bit of a conflict with todays specialist society. However, I’m not thinking so.

This is where I bring in my education. This is where, I believe, the act of learning can help. Not only does education or courses break up a day or work week. Not only do they push with labs and tests and timelines. Not only do they introduce you to new people, new things. But they shine a light on what I like to call “you-don’t-know-what-you-don’y-know”. They can add a perspective or two and maybe connect a couple of the dots. Perhaps you find out about a career or job that connects a couple of dots.

This of course is not the end of the journey, but in looking at my list, I’ve finding things that connect the dots. As we search, as with all journeys, each time we find something that connects the dots, when we follow it, there is something else, followed by something else. The journey is endless. But, at least along the way, we learn a thing or two.

Like my previous project,Nick is a poet, I’m starting a new sub-blog called Nick Reviews. This blog is designed solely for my opinions on Movies. I do watch a lot of them, and might have a few words to say about them.

It all came about with a writing exercise for my creative class. We were given the task to write a review. I enjoyed the process, plus I also enjoy giving an opinion without spoiling the movie. There is no need to give the plot away. There are so many other things you can review a movie besides the plot. Acting motivations, cinematography ( if anything cool ), and general feeling.

The whole idea is to improve and tweak my writing style, plus to learn more about the industry. I hope you pop by and take a look.

Update: 2018 – ya, no link. it’s very much a dead project. Unfortunately I can’t yet find the archives for this.