This is another test post using ScribeFire, an application that lets me post to the blog without actually being connected to it. However, it does require you to be connected to the internet.

So the question you have to ask yourself (in your best Dirty Harry voice) is, do you feel lucky why should you bother using ScribeFire? If I must be connected to the internet to use it, why not just log in and do it directly?

On the other hand…

When at work our firewall keeps me from connecting to MZM directly, so in that sense I suppose I can prepare a post, then when I get home, make the connection and voila! it’s done.

Another thing is, it does make it easier to play with text formatting, color and size. WordPress has a hidden icon panel that lets you do the same thing, but I can never find it. Anyone out there know how to call it up? Isn’t it <control> something-or-other?

But it doesn’t let me control timing the post; it just posts immediately. Then I have to go into my dashboard and make the changes manually. So again, what’s the point?

I don’t know… it doesn’t seem worth the trouble to me. But maybe it’s just me.

This is a test post. I’m trying out ScribeFire for the first time.

Welcome, my friends, to another enlightening edition of Great Quotes, a monthly compendium of, well, great quotes collected from all over. It’s my way of celebrating the end of another exciting month here at the Zone.

Hey, who knows? Maybe they’ll even provide some inspiration for the next one! I think you’ll agree they may even impart a bit of wisdom – along with a bit of fun.

So if you find yourself searching for some encouragement, inspiration or perhaps even just a chuckle or two, you’ve come to the right place! Check these out:

• Lack of money is no obstacle. Lack of an idea is an obstacle. – Ken Hakuta
• The only reason some people get lost in thought is because it’s unfamiliar territory. – Paul Fix
• I had a monumental idea this morning, but I didn’t like it. – Samuel Goldwyn
• If at first you don’t succeed… then skydiving is not for you! – Unknown
• Communism doesn’t work because people like to own stuff. – Frank Zappa
• It is always the best policy to speak the truth – unless, of course, you are an exceptionally good liar. – Jerome K. Jerome
• A wise man will make more opportunities than he finds. – Sir Francis Bacon
• When a thing has been said and well, have no scruple. Take it and copy it. – Anatole France
• Silent gratitude isn’t much use to anyone. – Gertrude Stein
• It’s easier to belch baloney than bring home the bacon. – John Maxwell
• Silence is only frightening to people who are compulsively verbalizing. – William S. Burroughs
• The nine most terrifying words in the English language are, “I’m from the government and I’m here to help.” – Ronald Reagan
• The key to being a good manager is keeping the people who hate me away from people who are still undecided. – Casey Stengel
• The secret of success is sincerity. Once you can fake that you’ve got it made. – Jean Giraudoux
• When people are free to do as they please, they usually imitate each other. – Eric Hoffer
• Irrationally held truths may be more harmful than reasoned errors. – Thomas H. Huxley
• Preparation is the difference between and adventure and an ordeal. – Kirk Newsome
• Don’t you wish there was a knob on the TV to turn up the intelligence? There’s one marked ‘brightness’ but it doesn’t work. – Gallagher
• One never notices what has been done; one can only notice what remains to be done. – Marie Curie

And finally, for every writer’s edification, this pearl of wisdom from one of the most widely-broadcast newsmen ever:

• Just because your voice reaches halfway around the world doesn’t mean you’re wiser than when it just reached to the end of the bar. – Edward R. Murrow

While flying from one city to another in a twin-engine prop commuter plane, the pilot made a sobering announcement over the loudspeakers just as they were about to begin the approach to their destination.

“Folks,” he said, “We’re having some problems with our starboard engine. It’s nothing serious, it’s just that we can’t get it to slow down, which we need to do to land.” (Uh, for those of you who don’t know, “starboard” means “right”. So c’mon, why don’t they just say that?)

Needless to say, this caused some concern among the passengers. (A scene from the movie Airplane! comes to mind: when the pilot asks the passengers not to panic, they all jump up and start running around, screaming hysterically.)

The pilot continued. “We don’t want you to be alarmed, though. What we’re going to do is shut down our starboard engine and land with the good one. Don’t worry about a thing – our remaining engine has plenty of power for landing.”

Within a few minutes, sure enough, the right side engine started winding down, and all the passengers sortof leaned over, staring at it as it came to a complete stop. Everyone continued to watch the dead engine, but after a few minutes, one of the passengers noticed one fellow staring out the left side windows instead.

“Hey, what are you lookin’ at?” he asked him. “The dead engine’s over here.”

“I don’t care about that one,” the man replied, “I’m keepin’ an eye on the one still working. That’s the one I care about!”

Got the picture?

OK, if you’re like me (er, sorry ’bout that!), ups and downs in life are so common, you sometimes feel like a test pilot for Otis Elevators! Hey, no worries, my friends – it’s just part of life, right? The every day ebb and flow of circumstances – I mean, you gotta expect that sort of thing. Really.

Now, let’s suppose for a moment (we’ll use your imagination, because you certainly couldn’t be experiencing one now, right?) you’re smack dab in the middle of one of those low-down times. You know, when you feel like the lowest layer of whale doo-doo in the darkest part of the deepest ocean.

It’s when things just seem to have a way of going wrong, no matter what you do, and Murphy (you remember him – of Murphy’s Law fame?) is camped out in your front yard (not to mention the entire Channel 11 news team). When… well, you get the picture.

The question you need to ask yourself is this: Where’s your focus?

If you’re spending all your time focusing on the reasons why you’re feeling down, then you can’t help but… feel down, right? (Can I get an amen here?) In fact, I’ll go out on a limb here… I’ll bet the odds are pretty good that you’ve been spending an inordinate amount of time focusing on yourself and how bad you feel.

Hey, believe me, I’ve had plenty of practice with stuff like this. From personal experience, I know how easy it is for me to get caught up in the World of Me. But when I do, it’s like going into a tunnel; pretty soon, there’s nothing visible but, well, me! It’s kinda like losing my peripheral vision, or like having blinders on – all I can even see or think about is me, ME, ME! (For extra points – and as proof – count how many times I used the word me in this paragraph!)

So, what’s a person to do? Wow, am I glad you asked!

OK, first of all, stop it! (Sound of car coming to a screeching halt.) And I don’t say this lightly, either. Let’s not forget: everything you do is a result of a decision made by (c’mon, everybody say it with me now) YOU. Yep, that’s right; there’s no one else in the whole wide world that is ultimately responsible for what you do in life. So naturally it’s in your best interest to, as Sir Alec Guinness might say, “Choose wisely.”

Second, why not try this: Instead of focusing on the things that don’t seem to be working in your life, why not focus on things that ARE? If you’re down in the dumps, the surest way to get an emotional and spiritual lift is to get someplace where there’s some excitement going on.

It’s a proven fact that if you surround yourself with deadly dull people, you’ll end up just like ‘em! So surround yourself with activity and life! Take your eyes off yourself, and see what else is going on around you. Hey, there’s a world of wonder out there – take part in it!

Like in the story above, don’t focus on that old dead engine. After all, what good can it do you? Nope, the one that’s going to get you there is the engine that works!

A few years back (OK, it was more than a few), Mrs. MZM and I suffered a moment of insanity, and decided to brave what we from the southern half of Texas laughingly call “the Frozen North” (which by definition means any part of the United States farther north than Dallas – click on the picture to see the whole map). Yep, we packed up the car and headed for Kalamazoo, Michigan (most often seen T-shirt: “Yes, there really is a Kalamazoo”).

Since it was only (!) about a twenty-hour trip, we decided to drive nonstop (this was back when we were still young… and stupid), and it was quite a drive! I’ll never forget the most memorable part of the trip, though: crossing this absolutely huge bridge.

OK, if I told you, “it was, um, real high”, somehow that phrase just doesn’t truly convey the depth of feeling; the sense of amazement; the… je ne sais quois we felt while crossing this thing – because I left out one important detail: we passed over it at night. It was a bit spooky, to say the least.

So as I said, we came upon this bridge (it was similar in construction to the one in this photo – all supporting structure was below the roadbed), and started going up… and up… and, er, still going up…. Gee, this sure seems like an unusually long bridge! After a few more minutes of continuous climbing, it wouldn’t have surprised me to see a Sputnik go by. Sheesh, I could imagine St. Peter standing up, getting ready to welcome us into the Pearly Gates….

Along about here is when that inevitable nasty little thought crossed my mind, “Hmm – I sure hope the bridge isn’t out. If we fell off, would they ever find us?” I mean, the headlights were basically pointing into empty space, and (because it was an overcast night) there was literally nothing in sight in any direction – no lights, stars; nothin’!

Well, finally we reached the top (and the only way I knew it was because the sound of the car’s engine changed), and as far as the eye could see, there was absolutely nothing but darkness in every direction. To add to the weirdness, the gentle curve on top of the bridge made it seem like the only thing in existence was that part of the bridge we could see by our own headlights; the rest of it disappeared into the inky blackness below.

In fact… we could’ve been floating off into space for all I could tell – if it weren’t for the solidity of the roadbed below us.

By now I’ll bet you’re wondering where I’m going with this. Well so am I.

OK, let’s talk about… authenticity.

Thanks to folks like Joanna Young, Rosa Say, Jon Swanson – and quite a few others for that matter, of late I’ve been thinking (that grinding noise you hear) about authenticity. In case you missed it (and exactly where have you been?) Joanna even kindly allowed me to guest post on the subject over at Confident Writing just last week.

Okay, so let’s take it as a given that writing with authenticity is important. No, come to think of it – it’s absolutely critical. But (and that’s definitely a BIG “but”) shouldn’t the real goal be, well, bigger than that? OK, why not try this one on for size: The goal should really be living an authentic life, don’t you think?

I mean let’s face it, life is fraught (hey, that word-a-day toilet paper really comes in handy, don’t you think?) with challenges, and knowing who you are is key to your success in life.

The fact remains that without that knowledge, you’ll never make it through the inevitable, well, let’s call it testing you’re bound to experience. So my question for you, my fine feathered friends, is this:

Even when you feel like you’re completely alone and on your own, what is it that provides you that feeling of being solidly grounded?

And for a bonus question: Does it work for you… all the time?

After my post last week about our trip to Kalamazoo, Michigan, Mark Goodyear asked me (see the comments) “You did hate the winters in Michigan, though, right?” To which my reply would be:

Interesting question!

See, whenever we moved to a new place (I’ve worked a lot of contract projects over the years), there’s a process we go through to in order to locate and settle into our new digs.

Before we even leave town, I first locate the job site (man, this Internet thing is pretty cool, eh?), then find a decent hotel nearby for our initial few days. (By that I mean safe and, well, appropriate. Once, we were assigned to a hotel that turned out to be located between two strip joints! Needless to say we, uh, didn’t stay there.)

Then we’d load up the car (we had a Mercury Marquis station wagon; a land yacht if there ever was one) and drive to wherever it was. You might be wondering, What on earth did they take with them? Well, our philosophy was, if it didn’t fit in the car, we didn’t need it, which actually worked pretty well…

After arriving at the new town, we purchased newspapers and a map for our apartment search, which normally took no more than a week (Mrs. MZM would drop me off at work and do this during the day.) Usually there was a decent selection of “Corporate” (which is a fancy-dancy name for “furnished”) apartments, so choosing one wasn’t a big deal.

THEN… we could begin exploring the new town and start seeing the sights.

OK, got the picture? Believe me, once you’ve done this a few times, it becomes pretty much routine. (At least, as routine as it could be. Uh, did I mention – we’ve moved 62 times in the last 25 years? Seriously, Mrs. MZM is a Saint, lemme tell ya!)

Anyway, one day we were driving around Kalamazoo, just checking things out when we noticed something really odd. Attached to every fire hydrant was a tall metal rod, about six or eight feet tall. What the heck?

Then suddenly it dawned on us (sound of heart sinking) – they were so the fire department could find their hydrants when buried in deep snow (sound of terrified scream)! Yikes! What kind of crazy frozen wasteland had we gotten ourselves into?

We had visions of frigid winds blowing snowdrifts as high as a house, people bundled up like Eskimos, frostbite… (Brrrr! I’m gettin’ chilly just thinkin’ about it!) Well, needless to say, it put a real damper on our spirits for awhile, and I remember thinking, “Hey, maybe those guys were right!”

Well, here’s the thing…

In an ironic twist of fate (ironic, as you know, is an ancient Chinese expression that means made entirely of iron), it turned out all our worrying had been for naught. The job ended much earlier than anyone expected, and we made it back to the sunny skies of Texas about early September.

So Mark, I guess we DID enjoy the winter after all. It just happened to be in Houston instead of Kalamazoo!

Whew, dodged a bullet that time!

BOB: You know, I treat people as if they were telephones; if I meet somebody I think doesn’t likes me I say I’m Bob, this one is temporarily out of order. You know, don’t break the connection, just hang up and try again!

ANNA: Does it work?

BOB: Well, it seems to…

A remarkably poignant scene from the movie “What About Bob?” as Bob (Bill Murray) and Anna (Katherine Erbe) discuss how Bob (the world’s most hilariously dysfunctional psychiatric patient) handles relationships.

(p.s. Sorry about the poor quality photo! Best I could find of the two of them in the same picture…)

First impressions can be pretty important, don’t you think? For instance, when you meet someone for the first time, those initial opinions can have a dramatic effect on any and all future relations. (Hey, Sally, how did your blind date go tonight? Oh, he’s OK, but I just couldn’t get past that third eye in the middle of his forehead! Ewww – you mean he had a big zit on his forehead? No – it was an actual third eye!)

You know the old saying that it only takes one “uh-oh” to offset one thousand “attaboys”? Well, making a bad first impression is like that saying in reverse – once it happens, it may take 1,000 good things to offset it! Sure, it may not be fair - but there it is.

Anyhoo -

I think moving to a new town is the same way. Have you ever had an occasion when you were, well, really put off by your first impressions of a new place?

A while back (during a brief moment of insanity) I agreed to take a job in Kalamazoo, Michigan. If you’re like me (and if you are, I’m truly sorry about that!), you probably thought Kalamazoo was a made-up name. But no, there really is such a place; it’s actually quite nice, too…

But I gotta tell you about my first impression of the place…

We’d just arrived in town after driving over 1200 miles non-stop (almost twenty hours). We were tired, hungry (it was about lunchtime), and in desperately in need of a place to clean up and catch some sleep.

Naturally, our first task when moving to any town (after locating an appropriate hotel, of course!) is to buy a map. Anyway, as we pulled into the parking lot of a convenience store, we could see these two older gentlemen, one tall and one short, standing there watching us. I could tell they were eyeing the front of the car (where the license plate proudly proclaimed we were from “Texas, the Lone Star State”).

It was really strange, but they continued to stare at us as I got out of the car, so I’m thinkin’ to myself, OK, one or the other is about to say something. Will it be “Welcome to Michigan?” Or what about “You’re a long way from home!” Perhaps even the old stand by, “Been here long?” I mean, it’s what I’d do.

Wrong! (Sound of buzzer, and hey, thanks for playing; have a few lovely parting gifts…) Nope, the tall one looked me right in the eye and said, “You’re gonna hate the winters here!”

Oh, well – just like Bob in that movie scene above, I guess you could say we definitely had a bad connection! Mrs. MZM and I decided it might be best if we hung up and tried again – but maybe this time with, uh, someone else!