❄️ Oh the weather outside (was) frightful
Why aren't you responding to me? A very political ice cream flavor, some roulette wheel action in the hotel lobby, and a return to some very hot yoga.
We’re getting down to the wire in 2022. Just one more week of work until I’m off on holiday for the rest of the year. We’re not planning on traveling during that time, opting for some nice staycation-y things where we live, I’m sure. Hope you have some exciting plans too!
A Tip for the Modern Worker
Don't mince words. When you’re following up on something, just ask. Instead of “I’m not sure if you received my email,” try “I’m following up on my email.” When you express doubt with the first phrasing, you make yourself sound insecure and hesitant. Be bold and don’t mince words. Communicate with clarity and confidence, and balance it with tact.
I tweeted that out exactly a year ago and it’s part of my Handbook for the Modern Worker. We’re all busy, right? And we all respond to emails, texts, and voicemails at different rates and times. It’s all good, but if you need a timelier reply than what you’re getting, direct and polite is usually best. Better yet, set expectations upfront about when you need a reply.
#365DayDraw
I drew this and wrote the accompanying annotation as part of my #365DayDraw project 6 years ago today.
I hope when conditions are right, sometime in 2017, we can have my favorite ice cream fusion: peach mint. PEACH MINT. Yes.
I remember where I was when I drew this! I was waiting for one of my kids at the Community School of Music and Arts in Ithaca when the news broke that Donald Trump had received enough electoral college votes for the presidency. It had been such a contentious election and all I could think of at that moment on that night was “How can we possibly go through four years of this?” I don’t get political much, but that day I did. Impeachment was on my mind, so I drew the closest thing I could come up with: the ingredients for peach mint ice cream. I still think it’d be a good flavor, but it was a sign of things to come.
Commentary
This was a whirlwind week of travel.
For those of you who speak emoji, here’s the TL;DR:
🚌 🚃 🏨 🚃 🍺 🚃 🧘 😴
🚃 🏢 🚃 🍔 💻 🧘 😴
🧘 🎰 🚃 🏢 🚃 🍷🎉 🚃 🚆 🚖 😴
I visited my office for the last time in 2022, taking the Cornell bus down Tuesday night in time for my team’s holiday party. The work week culminated in the company’s holiday party Thursday night on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange.
Afterward, I planned to head to Albany on Amtrak to meet Amy, spend the night, and continue to Boston on Friday to get Xander from college for winter break. Due to inclement weather in Albany and back home, I changed my reservation directly to Boston instead and Amy drove all the way there. My Amtrak ride was smooth but at a late hour: I arrived in Boston shortly after midnight. We crashed at my brother’s house after Amy picked up Xander and we had a relatively smooth ride home the next day, with a few stretches of white-knuckle driving in heavy snow conditions.
The best story of the week was at the hotel checkout. I normally check out on the mobile app and just depart, but I’d read that there was a wheel Bonvoy members could spin in the lobby to win a prize. I like prizes!
I approached the pair of front desk staff and asked, “Good morning! I read that there’s a wheel I can spin before I leave?”
“Sure,” one said, gesturing to their left at a small wheel on the counter.
“Oh,” I said.
“Were you expecting something different?”
“Yeah,” I said.
“Like what?”
“Oh, something like the Price Is Right,” I replied. “I thought it’d be more prominent, you know?”
They agreed that’d be cool, but gestured nonetheless to the modest wheel on the counter. I gave it a spin. The wheel spun clockwise, then slowed, then reversed. I was clearly not fully balanced. It landed on Free Breakfast.
“Oh,” I said, “free breakfast.” I must have appeared crestfallen. I already had other plans for my breakfast and was prepared to leave just then.
“You don’t want free breakfast?”
I shook my head.
“Well, give it another spin,” they offered. “You might get something else.”
“Okay,” I replied, “but I think it’s going to land on free breakfast again. It seems weighted toward that.”
As I spun again, one of the staff walked over next to me and watched it spin. As the wheel slowed, they reached out and grabbed it, slowly rotating it until another option appeared at the very top of the wheel. They looked at me and grinned.
“Well would you look at that,” they said. “Two thousand loyalty points.”
Well, would you look at that, indeed. We all had a good laugh and I walked out two thousand points richer.
Miscellanea
🧘 Amy and I returned to hot yoga for the first time since late 2019. It was every bit as challenging as I remember, but Ithaca’s YogOdyssey is a beautiful, clean, and colorful studio. We’ve been twice on a pass for an introductory month, and it’s been so good I think we’ll make it a thing!
⛑️ Back on November 7, I wrote about having watched Thirteen Lives on Amazon Prime. We watched The Rescue on Disney+, a documentary about the same cave rescue in 2018, but this had real footage. Very well done, and very well told. We were on the edge of our seats just as we were for Amazon’s dramatization.
⛷ Watch this: Italy’s Sofia Goggia won the women’s World Cup downhill race in St Moritz on Saturday. What made this incredibly remarkable? She raced less than 24 hours after surgery for her broken hand: she raced with her hand, with two plates and nine screws, taped to her ski pole. That’s mettle.