Archive for December, 2005
One of my favorite classes this past semester was Financial Accounting. What’s ironic is that my interest wasn’t exactly for the subject matter. (Quite honestly, if I don’t have to analyze another deferred tax asset situation, I’m fine with it.) On the contrary, it was really the professor that taught the course — Dr Eric Hirst — who made the classroom a fun place to be on a Tuesday evening.
Eric has very likeable qualities in a professor — honest, funny and sarcastic, but most importantly, a strong moral compass. He was constantly questioning the desire for some managers to manage earnings in financial statements. Most managers play it straight, he would say, but the small percentage of those that don’t are asking for it. A little bit here, a little bit there, what’s the big deal? Well, these things add up. And you will eventually get called on it, one way or another.
What really drove his point home, though, was when he brought up Richard Causey. Causey was a former graduate of McCombs (CPA ‘82), and used to attend the same classes we do now, sitting in the same seat we sit in now. And Causey made a mistake at his old job. He went along with Andrew Fastow’s schemes at Enron, presumably after he went through the same exercise in ethics we all received over the semester.
That fact really dove home the point for me. As a manager, it is imperative that you guide financial decisions using that moral compass. You can’t ignore it just because you think you won’t get caught. No, I definitely get it now.
At the very least, I am happy to see Causey admit wrongdoing to the courts the other day. In his lawyer’s words, “it was the right thing to do.” Damn straight.
December 29th, 2005
Some great video links floating out there on the ’sphere. Here are three of my favorite:
The Dan Band – “I want To Rock You Hard This Christmas”
Not going to their Austin show this past year was a huge regret of mine.
Chronicles of Narnia Rap (SNL)
I watched this live last Saturday, and had a pretty good idea it’d be on the net.
Family Guy – Stewie’s “Electric Company” morning
Takes me way back to shows I watched as a kid, like “Mr Wizard’s World” and “You Can’t Do That On Television.”
December 22nd, 2005
McLane follows through on vow, gets Oswalt a bulldozer
Roy deserves it too. Game 6 of the NLCS was epic.
My favorite quote:
“Each year, with our players, I ask them what their goals are,” McLane said. “I said, ‘Roy, what is one of your goals?’ He said, ‘To own a bulldozer.’ That kind of took me back a little bit. I had never heard that before.”
December 20th, 2005
It’s been a long time since I’ve built a website. With work and school going on, I really don’t have the time to screw around with pet projects. With finals wrapping up 2 weeks ago, it really gave me a chance to work on some ideas rattling around in my head.
First and foremost, an entertainment guide. I live in the fine fine city of Austin, Texas. And from time to time, my wife and I do like to hit the town — catch a movie, watch a live music show, or take in a sporting event. Problem is, I don’t always know what’s going on when I make that decision to go out. It’d be nice to get a very quick run down of the things going on that night that I might like. If something looks good, then I’ll set plans in motion. If not, that’s cool too – less money to pay the babysitter.
The key for me was to build something simple. A site that not only shows what’s going on today, but also is clean and easy to read. It’s not rocket science…just list events that don’t suck. What’s playing at the Alamo, who’s headlining at Antone’s, which teams are in town.
Of course, I can’t pull this information out of thin air. I have to rely on major entertainment sites to tell me what’s going on. And I certainly can’t report everything from their sites word for word – that would not be cool. What I do want to do, however, is use that information as a starting point. As in, how would I use that information to plan my night? Say I wanted to go to the Alamo Drafthouse downtown, and felt like taking in some live music later that night. Who’s playing nearby? That’s the kind of information I need to know.
For me, the best way to present this stuff would be in the form of a map. Seems like that’s the latest trend these days. (Ultimately, I went with Yahoo Maps – I’ve found their API to be more developer-friendly than Google’s.)
Enough nerd spout. Without further ado, my entertainment guide for Austin, Texas:
A quick rundown of the guides:
- Locations of live music clubs, with Austin Chronicle listings
- Locations of Alamo Drafthouse theaters, with showtimes via Austin 360
- Locations of sports home games
Weather guide – overkill!RSS feeds for everything (I’m big on RSS) – axed b/c it’s verbatim from the Chronicle website (not cool by my standards)
I plan on getting lots of use out of the site, and I hope others do. I’m big on simple. (Who isn’t these days) As usual, I’m going to keep comments open for people to give some feedback.
December 18th, 2005
There was a great piece on NPR this morning about John Fogerty, the man behind Creedence Clearwater Revival. I’m a big fan of his stuff (both CCR and solo work), and knew of his struggles with his former record company, which held the rights to the CCR music catalog.
Naturally, I was happy to hear they finally settled the 35-year-old lawsuit, and even more so about the album that’s coming out of that arrangement – The Long Road Home.
There is a fantasic quote in this piece where Forgerty talks about the commercial possibilities of CCR:
I had dreamed my whole life about a career in music, and when the door finally opened, I went running through. I can remember thinking in terms of, “well the Beatles are number one, that’s cool. It doesn’t mean that number two will be all that bad.”
It’s funny how easy it is to forget the successful players who aren’t at the top of the heap. I think of this a lot when I consider the future career possibilities after business school. While it might be nice to start the next Google or Wal*Mart, there’s a lot of money to be made in the Alexa’s and Whole Foods of the world. You just have to go in with some perspective.
December 16th, 2005
Sushi ettiquette
It starts out a little slow, but there are lots of subtle jokes in here. Watch for the sushi made out of deer and Matchbox.
December 13th, 2005
I’d heard about The Chronicles of Narnia coming out for some time. I’d read the book as a kid — once. And apparently it’s getting positive reviews, so I might actually go see it.
Until recently, though, I had no idea the protagonist in Narnia — Aslan — was supposed to be Jesus. Not a clue. I only realized it when the mainstream media started reporting the allegory.
Not that it’s a big deal to me. There are a ton of stories I grew up with — read or watched — that were based on religious references. I’m just fascinated by the attention the overtone in this flick is getting now. As if millions of Christians need to keep hearing that Jesus is in this movie, and we should, like, totally go watch him kick some ass. I’m pretty sure the 11-year-old in me doesn’t need the moral boost though. You say Narnia, and you’ve got my money.
December 12th, 2005
