Echos of a start-up
Six-degrees, or so we are told, is all that separates any one of us. I am just now wondering if that maxim holds true for companies as well, even late 90’s software flame-outs.
A few minutes ago, while researching a possible competitor to my business with a customer (Plusmo — a disastrous branding mistake if I could ever recognize one), I realized that I have an unwitting connection to that competitor. We share the same silicon valley business address as my very first technology company, Aveo Inc.
Aveo Inc. is long gone now, a victim of the Valley implosion, a board of directors that believed in the “Gotta Keep Spending” unlaughable joke business model and some executive management that was asleep at the wheel. Still, it’s more than a bit freaky to think this company is using the conference room I once slept in while pulling all-nighters.
I wonder if they still have all my shit I left behind in my cube? I want that stuff back!
Wha?
I hate, hate, hate people who create blog posts consisting entirely of “You are a (insert an attempt-to-be-clever-term-here)” quiz results. I fear the day where it is a proud thing to be the human embodiment of Superman, an eagle, the state of Georgia or the color mauve. That is, until I found out that I was actually a despicable, monomaniacal sentient alien robot that is more-than-meets-the-eye:
I AM
69%
MEGATRONTake the Transformers Quiz
I shall endeavor not to crush my enemies, see them driven before me, and hear the lamentation of the women. I’m quoting from the masterpiece of western culture, Conan the Barbarian, but I think you get the point.
Curry to go
Getting to Chicago
The Most Expensive Pizza
Getting To India
- After 22 hours of Travel Pictures
The Hotel
- Hotel Room 1
- Hotel Room 2
- Foyer Ceiling
Getting to the Taj Mahal
At The Taj Mahal
At The Summer Palace & King’s Mosque
Drive Straight To The Airport
Long Flight Home
CNG cars / immolation danger
People walking up the middle of off ramps in the dark, wearing black. People carrying bundles of cloth on their bikes, up a bridge.
Lanes a suggestion, 4 cars in 3 lanes. Pass into oncoming traffic? you bet.
Dropped off at hotel, opposite side of the street. “it’s right there” to rushing traffic
Tour bus as a luxury car.
The whole cow story is true. same from camels, elephants, dogs and to a lesser extent, monkeys.
The most expensive monkey picture ever.
Cherished ruins smell like a litter box … avoid the goat turds
Everything costs a dollar (tipping is strict requirement). Think in units, rather than value.
The latest model of Lihosit is now one year old
Hurray hurray! The kid has turned one!
Just this September 1st my baby nephew, Caleb James Lihosit, celebrated his first birthday. Or rather, the Lihosit/Rittenburg clan celebrated the event, as I am quite certain that one year-olds are blissfully ignorant of anything not involving food time, grandma visits and tupperware. (Any parent can tell you that — clever marketing notwithstanding — an infant will readily opt for a non-toy over anything developmental at the first opportunity. Give the kid a wooden spoon, a length of string and tupperware and watch him go to town. Save your bucks when it comes to the Baby Einstein / Fisher Price young years stuff. Apparently teaching kids with kaleidoscopic animation is not particularly effective. The Mouse(tm) is pissed.)
I guess the thing to do on these occasions is to set a chocolate cake before the child and wait for the gross motor control hilarity to ensue. Not one to play to the demands of tradition, Caleb steadfastly maintained a healthy, respectful distance from the cake. The cake, which I should add, was about the size of his head, liberally covered with frosting and had a good dose of candy bits sprinkled about. Were I 19 inches tall I would be daunted by it too.
Mommy got the party started by putting his hands on his cake and then touching his hands to his face. Aghast, Caleb tried to wipe the sticky stuff from his hands off onto his clothes and bib. The importance of hygiene cannot be stressed in these formative years. While the audience of 20 people loomed over him with bated breath, he bowed the the performance pressure and delivered a crowd pleasing performance with gusto. Infants on a sugar rush are funny.
Caleb is special in terms of the Lihosit family. And I don’t mean that in a proud uncle way. My father came from a family of four boys: Stanley, Robert, James and August Joseph (my dad). Each of those boys themselves had boys. I have cousins Anthony, David, Doug, Steven, Robbie and Michael, and my dad had yours truly and my brother Matt. My sister Kara and my uncle James’ daughter Judith were the only girls born, which made them celebs in their own right at the time. However, the bell curve finally caught up with the all boy streak. The most recent generation has been exclusively female, a whole gaggle of girls. That is, until Caleb James came along. So unbeknownst to him, he gets to carry on the Lihosit name.
I say this because while I would love to be a father, the likelihood of that happening is beyond remote. That is, unless I can somehow figure out reproduction by parthenogenesis or budding or something. So Matt and Marie had better be fruitful and multiply, multiply, multiply, cuz it ain’t coming from me nohow.
Being the first — and currently only — grandchild for my parents, the media coverage has been heavy. Even in the womb, Paparazzi were dispatched to get the first public images of the child:
And again, at his grand coming out party, despite security measures to the contrary, he could not avoid the flash of the camera:
