My Ethics Quiz

Today is "Ethics Day" at the company I work for. They left on our desks a wrist-bracelet-rubber-band that says so. They have an ethics quiz you can take also.

Questions are things like:

1) One of your team managers has had a few too many drinks at your team's holiday party at a local restaurant—she’s loudly telling the group an inappropriate story. Is her behavior just fine because she’s at an off-site, non-Company event?
a. Yes, since the party is outside of work, the Code of Conduct doesn't apply.
b. No, because your manager’s behavior should set an example for the team.

2) Your bank account shows that your payroll deposit from [your company] is unusually large. It’s probably best to:
a. Use the extra money for your upcoming vacation.
b. Send a note to your manager asking her to look into your monthly statements.
c. Call the [Company] Ethics hotline.
d. Give the money to charity.

Answers:
1)b
2)b or c


But I've been thinking about the ethical questions that I really have to deal with and I decided to write my own Ethics quiz. Here it is:

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Ethics Quiz (real issues that i struggle with daily)

1. A lady in a few cubicles down from me has a big bowl of Hershey's kisses on her desk next to her opening. It looks like they're available for anyone. I've never met her or talked to her face-to-face. She's not in her cubicle and i walk by and really want a piece of chocolate.

Is it right or wrong of me to reach in there and grab one? What if she came around the corner and saw me?

2. There's a nice litte poster notice on the bulletin board in main hall that says something like: "Kickboxing: A few of us get together for excercise and kickboxing fun in room 242 every Wednesday at 9:00. Anyone is welcome to join us."

I'm real tempted to scribble on there when no one is looking: "Yeah, and we'll kick the shit out of you too."

It would be funny. But would that be the right thing to do?

3. I am supposed to work 8 hours a day and I'm scheduled for 8 and a half (to take a half hour lunch.) Most always I eat at my desk and kinda do work at the same time. I've been leaving earlier (and earlier) each day since i figure i probably can knock off that half-hour. But now its starting to get a little fuzzy whether i'm now actually working a full 8 hours or not.

Should I:
A. Let it be fuzzy and leave as early as I can each day?
B. Count only the time that I'm actually chewing food as time when i'm not working?
C. Stay here a full 8 and half hours, and look like i'm working the whole time? (eat and do other things as much as i want)

Answers:
1)a.right b.don't make eye-contact
2)Yes
3)A, B, or C

Typical Austin Thursday

... already did have a good weekend really.

... picked up the wife and a bottle of Arrogant Bastard Ale after work and drank it outside at Whole Foods, walked to Waterloo Records and picked up the new Black Angels CD (a local band popular at least in Seattle - they played in the store two days earlier), caught the tail end of a Matt Costa show and drank some free Saint Arnold's beer (the patron saint of beer brewers - really), went on over to South Austin Music and saw some cool banjos and guitars and lap steels and old Stevie Ray photos (picked up some strings and a glass slide), went on down to the Shady Grove, ate and drank and saw a free show (good too!) put on by James McMurtry (son of the Pulitzer Prize/Academy Award winning Texan Larry McMurtry) and went on home from there.

... all and all a pretty fun weekend (weekday?).

...even if it was typical for a Thursday in Austin.

Is it New Age or New Science?

If you wanna go and reconsider all your basic assumptions of reality this is a good reading list to start from. I got the best explanation I've ever had of Einstein's theory of relativity and the nature of light in this one, a reaquaintence with authors Karl Pribam and David Bohm (premier original scientists if nothing else) from this ariticle, and good general reminders of some the great thinkers of our time such as Grof and Koestler.

And by the way... if a tree falls in the woods and nobody is around to hear it - it does NOT make a sound. (as science understands it today)

I just learned that too.

Go figure.

Grandmothers and Bulldogs

My American Bulldog was named after my G-G-Grandmother who's maiden name was Phoebe Dove. My Grandmother smoked a corncob pipe and used to earn money fortune-telling to local people and railroad men passing through town. She lived to a ripe old age and got to see many great-grandchildren born. Once the local doctor used her kitchen table to amputate a boy's leg who got hit by a train.

She was a tough ole' lady and for that I named my female American Bulldog after her in hopes that she might live long and be strong.

My dog's registered name is actually "Mitch's Lona-Girt-Pearl" which is a combination of the names of the grandmothers who were exceptionally gritty in my life.

Lona was my father's mother. She taught me to swim in a lake and took me fishing as a boy. Girt was my wife's grandmother who had a heart of gold, but cussed like a sailer. Every kid and most every adult was scared of her in the neighborhood, but I fell in love with her and saw her deep gruffy caring spirit right off. She loved me too. Pearl is my wife's other grandmother who was just naturally classy, southern and gritty having been married to a share-cropper in Alabama and raising five boys on virturally no money and whatever crop they could raise.

My dog is of course spoiled but still gritty. She whimpers like a pup sometimes. She nags me like crazy - barking when she's outside wanting me to come out and play. Her "play" is "tug-o-war" with a rope or a basketball that she's demolished. It lasts about one minute before you're wiped out. She always wins. You can't wear her out.

Her other favorite game is tearing up trees. I'll hook up a tire and use her aggression to actually pull stumps around the property. But sometimes she quits pulling and just starts clawing and chewing the stump to death.

When I was cutting timber and using logs for building the cabin, I taught her to strip the bark of the logs by exciting her and saying, "Strip 'er down, Stip 'er down!" and she'd tear into it for an hour just gnawing and pulling bark off of them cedar logs. You had to be careful you didn't get your hand in there. She seems to go into a "zone" when she starts to get wound up. I have to be very careful and not get her too excited. I really wouldn't want to see it.

She loves to swim and fishes by herself splashing about on top of the fish she spots while wading in the water. She caught a squirrel once. We couldn't get it away from her. She carried it around proudly for a few days and eventually ate it.

Time It Never Rained

...looks like the Texas hill country drought may be over... its been over a year since we've had decent rainfall... checked the rain gauge this morning and got nearly 2 inches.

...the practical side of this for me is two years ago (fall of 2004) i planted about $40 worth of bluebonnet seed and maybe $20 or $30 worth of wild flower seed. Maybe a few dozen sprang up and a year later about the same... this year nothing but maybe a dozen bluebonnets so far.

I also planted about $60 worth of native prairie seed in the fall of 2005. I haven't seen any of it pop up yet.

It hasn't rained enough to soak the ground here since Dec/Jan of 2004/2005. (about 15 months ago)

my land looks like it was hit by a nuclear bomb after we dug up enough rock to build a 200' wall - 4' tall X 2' wide - last summer. I've been planting grass and agave and cactus waiting for things to green up some.

I've been hand watering my cactus by hauling 5 gallon buckets out to the front.

well ... the drought (i think) is over now... Praise God!

i read some history of Wimberley, TX a few months back... during the 50s there was a 5 year drought around here (7 years in West Texas) ... one of the ranches that survived was the Sites Ranch about 3 miles up the road from where i live. They did it by switching over to raising mostly goats and a few sheep... they're still around. they're about the only ones around here that survived that drought. all the other ranches folded up, sold off their cattle - cashed in and died out.

The Sites Ranch survived. Good for you guys!

Everyday I drive by and love seeing those goats in the field and every once in a while I see a cowboy or cowgirl out there movin' them between fields.

two of the lovliest longhorn cattle i've ever seen used to live up the road. I admired them every day as i passed them in the morning and evenings. their gone now. haven't seen them in a month or two.

the best cowboy story i've ever read gives you a good feel of how those days were and how men survived and didn't survive them. it is The Time It Never Rained by Elmer Kelton.

I just finished reading it yesterday... as i sat out on the porch, listening to the rain.

Sanders "Edge-of-Civilization" Ranch

We moved into the Sanders "Edge-of-Civilization" Ranch Sept. 11, 2005. I realized I never put up any pictures of the new addition. (By new addition, I mean two rooms - one of them a bathroom.) So here is a few pictures showing the beautiful woodwork done by Ike Lovvorn - the incredible "Do-it-all" man - (Adena and I helped) ... and a few pre-addition pictures too.

Ya'll come by now, hear? And bring yer pa!

I caught you a delicious bass, Ariel

I caught you a delicious bass, Ariel.

At 5 1/2 pounds and 23 inches this is the biggest bass I've ever caught. I caught him on the Sanders "Edge-of-the-Civilized-World" Ranch between Wimberley and Blanco here in the beautiful Texas Hill Country. I used my traditional black rubber worm with my own special no-weight, embedded-hook, and light-tension line technique. I caught him April 2, 2006 in the Blanco River. He's possibly a record Largemouth for this river.

He's getting stuffed to be added as another interesting fixture to my classy cabin decor.

Just more proof that I've gone completely hillbilly and am reaping the benefits. Yee haw!