Happy Penultimate Day

One of the highlights of Interstitial Week is--of course--Penultimate Day. For those of you unfamiliar with the word, "penultimate," in its adjectival form, means next to the last (dictionary.com). Hence, under our current calendar system (which has been around for awhile and is probably not going away anytime soon), December 30 is the next to the last day of the year--Penultimate Day.

How does one celebrate Penultimate Day? Well, one really doesn't. About the only time anyone notices the penultimate of anything is when there are only two beers left in the fridge (grab one, stash the other, send someone on a beer run) or when there are two pieces of pizza remaining (be sure to grab the larger one). Also, those of you who have or had infants may have noticed when you got to the penultimate diaper.

However you celebrate (or not) this Penultimate Day, be sure to make it an almost good one!

Brother Richard Gilman Retiring

For my last four years in Indianapolis, I served as public relations director for a pair of organizations, the Independent Colleges of Indiana and the Independent Colleges of Indiana Foundation. Our membership consisted of the two- and four-year nonprofit independent (private) colleges in the state.

A great privilege of working with these organizations was getting to know the terrific men and women who lead the 31 member institutions. Today's South Bend Tribune profiles one of them: the retiring president of Holy Cross College here in South Bend, Brother Richard Gilman. A soft-spoken man with a very clear vision, Br. Richard transformed Holy Cross from a college for students who didn't get into Notre Dame or Saint Mary's into a respected educational institution in its own right.

Enjoy your retirement, Br. Richard--although I have a sneaking suspicion that your idea of retirement means merely giving up an office.

Interstitial Week

One of my favorite words, which first came to my attention back in the early '90s, is interstitial. The merriam-webster.com definition of interstitial is "relating to or situated in the interstices." Taking that a step back, the same source's definition (well, one of them, anyway) of interstice is "a short space of time between events." Those events, at least in my neck of the woods, would be the religious-cum-retail holiday of Christmas and the "we need another excuse to party" holiday of New Year's.

Interstitial week has always been interesting everywhere I have worked. It's the time a lot of people take off to burn extra vacation or PTO time that they might otherwise lose--yes, I have been guilty of such an offense in the past, I freely admit. It's also a time when those coworkers who do come in seem to relax a bit and be a bit more casual in their approach to their jobs. There are always exceptions, of course--some people are just wound too tightly to ever really relax, and I do have a few of them around me in my current workplace this week.

Whether you are working or not over the next few days, I wish you a Happy Interstitial Week. Don't work too hard.

Technology Trip-Ups

I am no Luddite, but I also feel that it is possible, especially in today's world, to be "too connected." Seriously--I don't really care when and where Kim Kardashian takes a dump. Until a few short weeks ago, my cell phone did three things: made calls, took calls, and allowed me to take an occasional picture. Recently, though, I changed phone companies, upgraded my plan, and now have a phone that actually texts (send and receives, by golly) and connects to the internet so I can blog, tweet, and update my Facebook status from, like, anywhere (you may now un-friend me if you like).

One thing I have always tried to stay current on, technologically, is music. Although I never got into 8-tracks (I was always a cassette guy--hated it when songs stopped, albeit temporarily, when tracks changed), I shed no tears when vinyl gave way to CDs and likewise as CDs give way to digital music players. First of all, I like the fact that I can have more music in less space (now I just need more time to listen to more music); secondly, my ear and playback equipment is not so finely attuned that I notice any drop-off in sound quality among digital formats.

(Note: Momentum lost in blogging due to FB conversation with friend from high school. Technology does have its merits most days.)

OK, where was I? Technology and music. Awhile back, I decided I really needed to have a portable music player--you know, one of those newfangled little pocket-size gizmos that can carry the entire music collection of the campus radio station I worked at in college. So I got a Zune--yes, the evil empire Microsoft version. Not a nano or shuffle or anything like that--even though we use Macs at work, I am still a PC guy, and, really, I don't listen to it enough to justify the cost of the Apple versions. One of the reasons is I don't like sticking those buds in my ears; I prefer the outside-the-ears headphones. I never wear one when I am running (indoors or out) or working out, although it is handy when mowing the lawn.

So another thing I did was upgrade the music player in the car. The former one was 10 years old (the car itself is 12--hey, it's a Honda) and was skipping on CDs, so I got a good deal (of course) on a new Pioneer. And this one has, of all things, an input for an mp3 player. So last night I decided to load all of my Christmas music on the Zune for my drive down to the Indianapolis area for the holidays. Wouldn't you know it--no matter how much I tried, I could not get the Zune to sync up with the computer. I plugged the cable into every USB port available, went online to troubleshoot--you name it. I was confounded. Then I remembered I had another USB cable somewhere. I found it, changed it, and, lo and behold! (I love that saying), the damn thing synched perfectly. (OK, Apple lovers--you may stop laughing anytime.)

So if there is a moral anywhere to be found, I guess it would be--when technology fails, start with the little things first. In our world of nanotechnology, the fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars, but in our microcircuitry.