Today I had the appliance repair man come by to fix my washing machine.  Any of you that know me, know that this is unusual for me to call a repairman for anything.  I will try to fix just about anything on my own.  There are a few things that I will avoid trying to fix, however.  I will not mess with brakes on a car, any kind of flooring, and electricity.  The washing machine is a combination of water and electricity so when it goes on the fritz, I call the professionals.  The guy came in and within about thirty minutes he had the washer washing again.  Wonderful! I was now able to enjoy the rest of my Saturday, my favorite day of the week.  I decided that I should do a little spring cleaning and organizing around the house and in my vehicle, so that is what I did.  I rummaged through everything and was able to toss a lot of needless and useless junk.  I organized all the other needless and useless junk leftover until the next round of cleaning where this stuff will make it to the trash.  I had a good day.  I will be waking up very early tomorrow to go to the beach and get a surf in.  Should be a good time for it as most people will be preparing for their Super Bowl festivities.  I am not that big of a NFL fan to begin with but I sure am not interested in who is in the big game this year.  Sunday’s are special days for me though so I am always looking forward to them.  I call my family and friends on Sunday’s.  Tomorrow I will be getting my fix of surf, sun, family, and friends.  What are you doing with your Sunday?  Go ahead, get your fix!

Today I went to work prepared for what I was going to do after work.  I brought my surfboard, wet suit, booties, towel, and a deal with myself to go straight to the beach after work.  The surf is up at the moment so I knew the day was going to end well.  When I closed up shop, I ran out of the building like it was on fire.  I jumped into my truck and took off for the beach.  I bobbed and weaved through traffic like a seasoned cab driver does in Chicago.  As I got closer and closer to the beach I could actually feel the stress melting away.  The weather in the area has been on a warming trend and is to be almost “summer-like” this weekend.  This gets me very excited because, well, its the reason I live in California.  I love the weather here.  So I got to Redondo Beach, put money in the meter, and got ready to hit the waves.  I was able to get a good hour in the water and had a few fun rides.  Strangely, I was all alone today but that is perfectly fine with me.  One thing that is almost impossible to find in CA is a surf break with nobody in the line-up.  When you are able to score this rare treat you need to take advantage, so I did.  As the sun becan to hang low on the horizon I thought to myself how wonderful it is to enjoy my view.  Yes, I claimed ownership of the view I was enjoying.  It occurred to me that really anyone can do this, and should do it more often.  Next time you are buzzing around doing things or getting somewhere because you have to do whatever, take a moment to enjoy your view.  The view changes every second after all so don’t you want to log as many views as you can into memory?  I know I do.  So here, I’m going to let you enjoy my view.  Happy Friday.

Have you ever had one of those days where it seemed that just about every person you came in contact with was just a little off?  Well, today was one of those days for me.  Right from the first customer I had to the last, some challenge, test, or strange question would be presented.  One customer asked me what the list of ingredients in a roll of roofing material is.  I chucked and said “well, a lot of things.”  She looked at me stone cold and said, “no, I am very serious, what are the ingredients?”  I have never been asked that and honestly I have no idea.  I went to my computer and asked Google.  An answer came up so I printed it and handed it to her.  “This is ridiculous,” she said before walking out the door in a huff.  Not five minutes later another customer came in and I jumped right in. His question was “Do you have anything to patch a leak?” I told him we carry many things that could possibly help him out but I need a little more information.  “Why?” he asked.  Two for two.  I asked him to give me a second and I asked my inside sales person to take care of him.  I had a funny feeling this would not go very well with me.  This went on all day long.  It must have been something with me, I mean, if everyone else on the road is a bad driver, is it really everyone else that is the bad driver?  Anyway, I felt like I had a target on me all day today or there was something in the air causing craziness.  I will say this about today, however, I’m glad I got it over with.  Days like these don’t happen too often so good riddance weird day.  Lets see what you got for me tomorrow.

I don’t know about you, but I can’t multitask my way out of a wet paper bag.  Let me clarify.  I can walk and chew gum or check email while going to the bathroom, but working on five different yet closely related things is a bit too much for me.  Today at work I had four requests for quotes come in in a thirty minute time span.  This while I was taking care of walk-in customers at the counter.  I was simultaneously trying to work out a delivery issue for another customer and get some material picked up for a separate job from a factory near San Diego.  By the time the customer I had on the phone, with one line holding for me by the way, repeated himself for the third time I realized that I was deep in the pit of multitasking.  I placed the call on hold and said out loud to nobody “Jason, you know better than to try and do all this at once.”  I picked the phone back up and focused.  Done.  I started one of the “on deck” items and a customer walked in so I put the item back “on deck.”  I am coining the new term “multimistaking” so know you heard it here first.  I am a multimistaker and hey…knowing is half the battle I hear.  I’ve realized the more tasks I take on thinking I can handle them, the more mistakes I am actually making.  The more I am forgetting to do.  The more details that are falling away only to come up down the road by someone who is relying on me to make sure those details are included.  If you are a multimistaker as well, there is a cure.  Be realistic with yourself and your friends, family, customer, coach, whoever.  Second, take your time, one at a time.  Those depending on you will thank you for it.  Multitasking = Multimistaking.

Last Friday, Amazon delivered a DVD containing one of my favorite movies “Arthur.”  On my drive home today I actually laughed out loud when I thought about one of the scenes in the movie.  In LA when you glance at the car next to you in traffic and the driver is laughing you usually want to get as far from them as possible.  I couldn’t help it.  I thought of the scene where Arthur is talking to his future father-in-law in a room filled with trophy animal heads on the walls.  His drunken focus was on a moose head.  The father-in-law was quite angry with Arthur because of his drinking and was giving him an ultimatum when Arthur pointed at the moose and said “you must have hated this moose”.  Now, don’t ask me why I find this so funny because I won’t be able to tell you.  I just do.  Isn’t it wonderful when a memory brings a smile to your face?  Isn’t it ten times better when a memory brings actual laughter?  I am so thankful that so many creative minds came together back in the 70’s and made that movie.  Thank you Entertainment industry for helping me have a laugh after another day at the grinding wheel.  Do yourself a favor and go rent or buy a favorite movie you haven’t seen in years.  Entertainment is crucial however you choose to get it.

I woke up late today.  During the work week I have to wake before the sun.  On the weekends, I choose to wake with the sun.  Today, I woke up after the sun.  He fooled me.  Today was one of the rare days in Southern California where cloud cover and rain were in the forecast.  It was a bit blustery and cool with mist and rain blowing around.  It is winter, so I guess I can deal with the odd day out of three sixty five of crummy weather.  My only full day off in two weeks I was determined to enjoy the day no matter what.  Every idea taking place outside and most requiring me to drive somewhere fell flat.  You see, in Southern California the weather is usually perfect, so when it gets even the slightest bit sketchy it’s best to stay off the roads.  I wanted to go to the store for a couple things but knew that getting in the car would be nothing short of aggravating.  I spied my pair of neglected hiking boots and my all weather jacket and decided that today, I would walk.  I grabbed my backpack and headed out the door.  The wind was blowing and there was some moisture in the air just like the weatherman said.  I had to think to myself, “when did you become such a pansy-ass?”  Sometimes you just need to take a walk.  Things come to the surface of your mind to think through.  Things come through your other senses that you haven’t thought about in a while.  Some of those things will make you sad and others will make you happy.  I thought about the difficult walks I have taken that left my heels blistered and bloody.  I thought about the walks along the many beaches I have been to and the footprints I have left in the many miles of sand.  Erased, all of them.  None of them will show their face until you take that walk.  It feels so good to just walk around and see, smell, and just plain ol dredge up things in your mind that need to be seen and smelt again.  Take a walk and leave the excuses on the mat.

I had to work a four hour shift today.  Definitely one of the items at the top of my “things I don’t like to do on Saturday” list.  I deal with a lot of people who have come to Los Angeles from all over the world.  I mean, if you want to visit a place where you could hear every language and the many different dialects, LA is your town.  In fact, I think I only had three customers today who spoke English as their primary language.  I didn’t get upset, or impatient, or aggravated, quite the opposite.  I think it is really amazing that some people are able to learn more than one language.  My amazement stems from my own difficulty in trying to learn a second language, Spanish.  I have heard it said that Spanish is one of the easier languages to learn, unfortunately not for me.  I met a customer from Ukraine, one from Thailand, a few from Mexico, a couple from Brazil and a guy from El Salvador.  How crazy to meet all these people in one four hour shift.  I read a statement somewhere that said “Never make fun of someone speaking broken English because that means they know another language.”  I don’t know who said it but it really makes sense to me.  Especially here in LA where, as I’ve described already, there is a lot of people here that know several languages.  I think I am going to push myself a little harder this year to learn Spanish.  Hell, it can’t hurt.  

Working on Saturday is tough!

Today a customer walked in at the worst possible time.  I was all hung up with internal BS. A bunch of stuff that has nothing to do with conducting actual business, but all the menuticha you must comply with to legally do business, at least in CA.  I looked up from my counter holding three empty, unused and un-manned computers and said”Hey, what can I do for you?” My signature greeting if I don’t know you.  This customer said “Yeah, My name is Ken.”  He stuck his hand out and I shook it.  We talked for a bit about his house and a few other things.  By the time he and I had figured out what he was happy with we had cemented a relationship. The business he hired for the job didn’t happen to do a whole lot of business with us.  It happens.  I told him they ran a good, solid business.  All I could do.  The rub is this…The handshake sealed the deal. He said he would tell his contractor that he wanted them to purchase from my location.  It made me think… Phisical contact these days is like hugging a lepper in the sixties.  Why? What happened?  When did people become so weird about contact with other people?  We really need to scratch this fear of contact. As long as we’re washing our hands…I mean, ya never know… Wink..wink.

A good friend flew to Arizona today to attend a big classic car auction.  He has worked really hard and put in the hours earning him this time off.  Am I jealous. Yes! Thankfully, he is rubbing it in by sending pictures and texting me cool things he is seeing.  I am really excited to hear all about his trip and glad he is taking a little time to decompress.  I’ve been talking all week about how important taking time to decompress is especially when you routinely put in twelve plus hour days.  I am thankful for my job and thankful for my life.  I think we all could use a little balance and would all be better for it.  Friday is here.  Let’s all have a safe weekend.

(Disclaimer: The following is for the truly deserving that have earned the time to take for whatever their little heart desired.  Professional, do not attempt without consulting significant other or your employer.)

So today I woke up knowing I had some things to deal with at work left over from yesterday and even the day before.  Not the best way to start the day.  I thought about it for a second and decided that today would be a good day to exercise a little entitlement.  Don’t worry, I’ve earned it.  I got to work and notified my boss that I would be leaving a bit early today.  All he had to say was that he was home sick so “whatever.”  I left after a half day like I was late for an appointment at the White House.  I was off to the beach again, only this time for some much needed time in the water.  I scooped up my amazing girlfriend, partner, sunrise and sunset and we headed to El Porto where the report said the surf was good.  The report was right.  I had a few good rides and the last one was the best.  I headed in with a smile from ear to ear and promised myself outloud to make this as regular a thing as feasible.  A stop at a Manhattan Beach local taco joint for a quick dinner and then home, two smiling faces, happy.  Hooky, if you can, without hurting yourself or anyone else I highly recommend it.