365 Good Nights Later
One year ago today, Terry and I made the ninth and last trip to Taldom from Moscow, painfully aware that life as we knew was about to change dramatically. (Update: it did) `There have been moments throughout the year when we have looked across the living room at these kids and thought "Who the hell are these people and what are they doing in my house." That doesn't happen anymore because we crossed the threshold where you may briefly yearn for a resspite from the insanity but you cannot imagine your life without them.

The Sugrue kids have landed into the Sudbury school system like two Sputniks. There is now a woman whose fulltime teaching assistant position is dedicating to helping the our kids. Despite their sometimes odd, sociopathic behaviour, I am enormously proud of Aly and Jack. They are infused with some kind of special sauce that makes them survive. They would have every right to be sullen or scared but they are neither. Both kids embrace life in a big way.

Last night I discovered that I can use Russian to talk to Terry if I don't want the kids to know what I'm saying. They are becoming normal and that makes us a little sad. The incredible journey will be forgotten. Hell week at the Moscow hotel. Meeting the grandparents and cousins. The mind-boggling switch to English. Overcoming exceptionally bad behavior. Terry and I will remember these things but it will be a private matter.



Mala dyets, you guys (nice job).

There is a recurring theme these days that doesn't hit you from every angle as much as it seeps through the floorboards. Its the uneasy sensation that everyone in the world is slowly going mad and you may be the last one standing on solid ground. The bitter irony being: what good would it do to be the last sane man?
You won't see the evidence of this if you've already switched to the other side. You fellow hangers-on will know what I'm talking about. Let's start in the workplace.
Because my business involves service at the offices of many clients, we are afforded natural glimpses into the personalities and mini-cultures in those places. This is what we see
- People will do or say anything to cast a positive light on themsleves. They will tell outrageous lies, blame someone else, invent complex history to keep their reps afloat
- It really does appear that people who rise among the ranks are those who deflect responsibility, have little actual knowledge without revealing this, and know how to make themselves appear indispensible even though the whole organization would be much better off without them.
- It is amazing how even a small culture of 20-30 people can become so dysfunctional. Emails on arcane subjects thread themselves into conversatonal mushrooms as each reader assumes that adding useless input and hitting Reply All will somehow keep their credibility afloat.

The second batch of evidence for the Dwindling Sanity theory is from our currenty active political process. The real victor in this election with be Perception, who handily defeated Reality in a landslide. What's incredible is how people follow along. Just tell me something that makes me feel like American life isn't sliding into a pit. I can drive the Navigator for four more years. Iraq is Al Qaeda. Doesn't matter that 1000 of us died for nothing. We are safer.

Maybe it's not insanity but insanity's little brother: self-deception. But someday he'll grow up and then where will be be?