Kris T Parker's Open Salon Blog

When is it time to kill your avatar?

Thu, 4 Feb 2010 14:02:21 -0500

I thought I had finally finished my book. The premise is that these are true, funny short stories that have happened to me over the past 20+ years of work. I don't name anyone, wrote under a pen name, and didn't name any of the real companies. I thought it was time to talk to an attorney friend and asked the question: "If you were a litigious person and you read my story about you, what would prevent you from suing me?"

Read some of my stories on the topic of "Those FN People at Work" and you'll see why I'm concerned. These are funny and true, but not necessarily pleasing views.

The advice I received is that the person shouldn't be able to recognize themselves. Or, if I want to defend the work on the basis of it being true - then I need someone to corroborate that the incident happened. Or I need to stretch the truth into parody. Or change the names so the fake name doesn't accidentally happen to belong to another FN person with the same personality traits.

Mark Twain never had such problems. If Samuel chose my topic, would he kill off Mark?

Now I'm thinking that I should write under my real name. Certainly, anything published under my real name would be something that I'd have to be open about, confident about, and willing to promote as my own work. Perhaps that's the real lesson.

So, do I kill the avatar? Do I kill the story about the sales woman jumping ont he back of the gay SVP of sales and humping him like a bunny rabbit? I don't think I could get either one to corroborate that one - so that funny little story will have to stay out of print and remain as part of my verbal-stories-over-drinks repertoire.

A baby shower for the senior set

Tue, 26 Jan 2010 21:01:05 -0500

My husband comes from a youthful and fruitful family. They have babies on that side of the family as often as my side of the family breaks hips reaching for painkillers. So, you can imagine the excitement when we found out that a cousin's wife is pregnant.

At first she thought she was going through an early menopause. After 12 years of marriage and hitting her 40th birthday she was truly shocked at the news. The baby shower was this Sunday. It wasn't like a typical baby shower.

I've been to my share of "typical" baby showers (see the first sentence of this post above). At THOSE baby showers, the majority of party goers are young women in their 20s. There is a large representation of children under the age of five running, hanging, or toddling around.

THIS baby shower had people with walkers but they were over 60 years old, not under the age of two. The over-80 crowd was represented, although my aunts in that age group couldn't make it. My 95-year old aunt now lives in Las Vegas and couldn't put down her chips long enough to catch a flight. Hopefully, the new little one will benefit from the longevity genes of his elders, which may bring him into the next century. Heck, he'll only be 90 by then and tossing back a few drinks in Las Vegas, no doubt.

Good News Sunday

Sun, 17 Jan 2010 01:01:11 -0500

I'm generally a "Bloom where you're planted" girl.

While employed, I enjoyed my work, my lunch buddies and my life. Being unemployed for more than a year, I've enjoyed making new friendships on OS, finishing up my book, and the relaxed, stress-free life of a late sleeper.

The tide seems to be turning and tugging me along. In this past week I've had a job interview for one job and received an inquiry about a second job.

Is it possible to have it all?

Metal ankle replacement (or Suzie's suggested title below)

Thu, 14 Jan 2010 14:01:02 -0500

Metal ankle replacement

Nick was given the Catholic last rights only a couple of months after his birth. He rarely stopped crying from the moment that he was born. If in-utero cameras were available in the 1950s we probably would have found him screaming with mouthfuls of natal fluid. He was born with an ulcer, back in the days when ulcers were blamed on stress. No one expected an infant to be stressed out by the job of being born, yet here he was bitterly complaining about this business of life.

All in all Nick survived the voodoo medicine of the 1950s and grew into an active child, playing the unsupervised games of boys in those days. These games included jumping across building roofs; riding bicycles directly at buses that were connected by electrical overhead lines in games of “chicken;” and going “rat hunting” with the other eight-year olds armed with ice picks found in the underground elevators where neighborhood grocery stores received their stocked goods.

The neighborhood clinic knew Nick well. He was rushed there when a game of chicken ended badly and a car clipped into him. He survived childhood broken legs and knocks to his head, brushing off the injuries and laughing about death’s slippery grip on him.

Hip and knee replacements have a long history of success. However, ankle replacements until the 1980s were experiments in failure. The ankle has a special job in the body. It must support the bodies weight, yet be nimble enough to pivot up, down and around. Think of a running stallion and the fact that the humble ankle propels the motion in a race.

In the early 1980s a doctor ( that did not approve this article) began working on a solution that would bring strength and relief to people who have chronic ankle pain from injuries or arthritis.

Nick survived military service during the Viet Nam War and returned to civilian life. Laughing with friends and taking a bet, he jumped from a balcony along with a friend who was a good decade younger them himself. The guy in his mid 20s made it to the bottom and cheered on the old guy in his mid 30s to do the same. Ok, drinks were involved. An ego was involved. An ankle was shattered.

The ankle replacement was perfected and tested. It was still considered experimental, but had gained in successful outcome. Classes for orthopedic surgeons were conducted locally so Nick’s sister, with a researcher’s background attended the class to seek out a solution to her brother’s chronic pain.

The design is a titanium tibial piece and a cobalt-chrome talar component, which are both cushioned with a polyethylene piece between them. The metal parts come in six different sizes to ensure that a proper fit is established for the patient.

Nick went through the surgery and had his bone ankle removed and replaced with a metal alloy to do the work of his natural joint. The surgery went better than the recovery. The area became infected resulting in yet another surgery to remove the artificial ankle.

Nick now walks well, needing a cane only when fatigued. However, nothing seems to come easily for him so surgery was needed for the tried and true method of fusing bones together to support his frame. Bone beats metal as the moral to this story; and a positive spirits wins over all.

The hiring manager could be my child

Mon, 11 Jan 2010 13:01:48 -0500

I have a job interview tomorrow. The first "real" one in the year and a half that I've been unemployed. Yes, the first "real" one, since the one where I competed against an "exotic dancer" for a marketing job just doesn't count at all. It was a group interview and I got to hear her answer to the question "Tell me about your marketing experience?" She actually answered, "I market myself. I'm an exotic dancer...and a female wrestler." As my brother said when I told him the story, "you know that she got the job - right there."

Thanks to the Internet, I get to research the job, the hiring manger, the company, et. al. Research is, after all, half the job of a marketer. Results is the other half. My research shows that the hiring manager is 20 years younger than me and has barely begun marketing herself. (She has only two people connected to her on LinkedIn.)

Ok, I'd better continue getting ready for tomorrow's interview. Now that I've read her age, I'd better pluck out those two grey eyebrows over my left eye.