DEBRIS.COMgood for a laugh, or possibly an aneurysm

As a senior in college I was recruited by the consulting division of Arthur Andersen, a company now facing criminal charges for, basically, lying. Since that time, the consulting business has split off, and even at the time of my interviews in the late 1980s, “Andersen Consulting” was beginning to divest itself of its association with what we called the “bean-counter” side of the business, even though the two groups shared a name and office space in downtown San Francisco.

So anyway, midway though my interview day, I was sent to lunch with two recent recruits — guys who had been with the company for a year or so. The idea was to give the interviewee a chance to ask “real” questions — about the work, the corporate culture, the people — without fear of being judged for asking the questions. In fact, the HR person told me to ask specifically those questions that I would be afraid to ask of the managers and partners during my interviews. “Ask whatever you want; it’s all off the record,” she enthused.

I was still a bit shy, and probably overwhelmed to pry too deeply, so I didn’t ask anything that might incriminate me. And it’s a good thing I didn’t.

Six months later I returned to the same office for my first day of work. The HR rep welcomed us to the company, and congratulated us on being offered jobs. “How did you think your interviews went?” she asked us all. “Did you expect to receive an offer?” And then: “Did you realize that the people who took you to lunch reported to me on everything you said?”

This was an object lesson in what I perceived to be Arthur Andersen’s SOP: say whatever you have to say to get people to do what is most beneficial to the company. Or in other words: lie. So although many years have passed, and most of the players have changed, I am not surprised to see this particular Big-N accounting firm sink so deeply into an abyss of accusations and corruption that its future existence is threatened.

Just for fun, you can search Andersen’s website for fraud or jail time. In an apparent failing of their indexing system, a search for destruction of evidence returns no results, which is darn ironic, don’t you think?

I think I saw my old car on 101 last night. It was driving in the other direction, far too fast for me to be certain whether it was the same Camaro my brother rebuilt while I stood around trying not to get in the way of the hammers and torches and sandblasting equipment.

(Man, I am just overdosing on nostalgia these days.)

This photo was taken on the 17 Mile Drive, near Carmel, CA.

Every time I go to Hawaii, I am so overcome with the stunning perfection of the place that I declare that I want to move there. Once I even picked up a real estate catalog at the airport. The idea of the place, all waterfalls and warm breezes and gorgeous coastline, is so inspiring that it makes me want to change my life — and I’m coming from California. I mean, it isn’t like they had to de-ice the plane before takeoff.

In the same spirit, we had a dining experience last night that was so great, so radically awesome, that it made us talk about changing our lives.

(Now that I’ve said that you probably think I want to move to Napa so I can eat at the French Laundry every night. If I could afford to eat there even once, maybe I’d consider it, but in truth I’ve never managed to plan any meal 2 months in advance, which is what’s required to get a table there.) (Erm, except that I finally did eat there.)

The food at Roxanne’s is unusual in that it’s vegan; they serve no animal products of any kind. But what is remarkable about it is that nothing is cooked. They serve “living foods:” nothing is cooked above 115° F. Practically speaking, the food is raw.

This doesn’t mean that everything is cold, and it doesn’t even mean that everything looks like a salad, although both of these are sane assumptions, and there is an element of truth in both: although nothing is cold, it’s also true that nothing is hot, and although not every dish looks like a salad, many of them do.

Still… it was awesome. This was the most memorable meal I’ve ever eaten. And as we sat there, luxuriating in 5 courses of this delicious, sensuous, healthy cuisine, flavors exploding off the plates, we talked about permanently changing our diets. The concept is that powerful.

What would it take to eat raw? I think it would be tough, and I’m already on a sort of lazy-man’s vegan diet. Eating is a primary social recreation, but unless you happen to hang with a group of vegans, you’d have to change your plans — eat at home before the dinner party, or bring your own food. Roxanne’s husband Michael admitted as much.

But the benefits are enormous. Assuming it’s true that digestion consumes most of the body’s energy, and that uncooked foods are easier to digest, it’s clear that a raw-foods diet could radically increase one’s energy level. There is anecdotal evidence that this sort of change manifests itself as a reduced need for sleep. What if, by eating only raw foods, you could get by (or even thrive) on 2 hours’ less sleep every night? Would that be worth it? What would you pay to have another 2 hours a day to play with your kids, read, write, dance, whatever?

Even if you ignore the other health issues, this for me is a compelling reason to investigate “living foods.” I’d give just about anything to have extra hours in the day.

Programmers (and their bosses) take note!

Joel Spolsky: Nothing is as Simple as it Seems

Last night I got the surprise of my life. Literally, I think I have never been this surprised.

My wife, more sneaky than previously suspected, casually suggested we spend a nostalgic night in the City, visiting old haunts. We had a fantastic dinner at our favorite Thai place (Neecha — Sutter & Steiner) and then drove to the one pub in the world where at one point in time I might have been considered a regular, or at least a familiar face, Tommy’s Joynt (Van Ness & Geary).

We walked in the front door and along the food counter, a traditional Hofbrau presentation of steaming, roasted animal parts. I followed my wife as she continued toward the stairs in the back of the room. “Why don’t we get a beer at the bar first?”

She said over he shoulder, not even slowing down, “Let’s see if there’s a table upstairs.” This struck me as an odd thing to say as there was an empty table about 10' away.

“But upstairs sucks, the waittress never goes up there. Why don’t we —”

She was ascending two steps at a time. Were we running from someone? And then it struck me: “Who are we meeting?” Her purposeful lack of response sent a chill. I don’t really like surprises.

At the top of the stairs, we looked around and saw no one familiar. I felt a small dose of relief. And then the waittress (ironically, upstairs after all) called out, “Who are you looking for?” “Nobody,” I answered firmly. But she and my wife knew something I did not, and the waittress pointed at a third room behind a closed partition. Yeesh… what was hiding behind door #1? Probably not a vacation in Tahiti.

“Are you ready?” …a last moment of sympathy before she threw the partition aside to reveal fifteen of my best friends, gathered together and drinking many beers in my honor. I was speechless. And very touched.

Maybe the reason I don’t like surprises is that I haven’t had very many good ones. But this was good, better than good — off the charts good. More like this, please!