Sean is just some guy who lives in the Twin Cities. Updates to this blog are at random intervals.

20 November 1998 - So the other day we got our weekly e-mail from our department secretary asking us to please, please, actually submit our project timesheets on time this week. We're supposed to fill out these forms so management can track the amount of resources that are being spent on various programming projects. So every Friday morning I find myself putting the several hours I discussed the pathetic state of Green Bay's running game under "Server Development", marking down the few dozen times during the week I read Babylon 5 web pages as "Y2K testing", and recording the countless occasions I wandered over to my friend Randy's cube where he was forced to listen interestedly at the current minutiae of my life. That goes under my personal favorite, "General Administration". To any readers of this who just happen to be my manager, I'd like to note that I'm joking about all of this, of course. Ha, ha! Anyway, in reading her last message I noticed that the secretary had recently added a signature file to her e-mails. In addition to her name, phone extension and e-mail address, now there appeared a little poetic quotation at the end: "Work like you don't need the money, Love like you have never been hurt, and Dance like no one is looking." And I was fascinated by that little quote. Mostly because I personally try to adhere to a philosophy very similar to that. Except, I try to dance as if I've never been hurt, work as if no one is looking, and love like I don't need the money. But that's just me. 29 October 1998 - It finally happened. I was in my cubicle, typing away at my workstation, when a co-worker of mine wandered in to ask me a question. "Hang on a sec," I said, as I was just finshing up composing the e-mail I was working on. In response, she just patiently stood there in my cube, waiting for me to finish. Her eyes wandered over to my cube walls, where I've got various trivial materials pinned up: this year's Packers schedule, an art picture of the Mandlebrot set, half a dozen months-old Post-Its containing notes long since irrelevant, a bunch of photographs, including a recent one of my parents and their new dog. That last caught her attention. "Is this your dad?" she asked, pointing to the fiftyish man in the picture. I glanced over. "Yep," I answered. "Oh." She spent another moment peering at the photo. "So, how come he's got more hair than you do?" 18 October 1998 - So I joined an athletic club last week. I'm not sure why, since I don't like exercise all that much. Furthermore, paying somebody an exorbitant amount of money just so I can be able to do something I don't like all that much isn't an idea that I like all that much, either. But for some reason it made sense at the time. Anyway, Sunday morning it occurred to me that instead of just sitting on my couch all day watching my fantasy football players perform, I could just as easily watch the games while working out in front of the televisions that they have at the club. So I spent part of the day there on the treadmills and stationary bicycles,watching my star quarterback Erik Kramer not pass the ball to my star wide receiver Curtis Conway. At least one of the three of us accomplished something that afternoon. But anyway, I worked out pretty hard, and I was pretty tired out after the session,especially since I'm new at this and my body just isn't used to any kind of rigorous exercise, other than say, eating. In addition, it was the first time I tried what I now call the Dread Climbing Machine of Evil, and those particular leg muscles,unused to that form of exertion ever before, were pretty sore. As a result, whenleaving the club and walkingacross the parking lot towards my car, I was going at a very measured pace. And as I put my gym bag into my back seat, slowly, and lowered myself into the driver's seat, slowly, I noticed that a woman had pulled up behind my parking spot. She had come for her afternoon exercise regimen as well, and with turn signal blinking, she had been patiently waiting for me to hurry up, start my car, and get going so she could have my spot. After a minute or so, I finally did back out and leave, and she pulled in. But as I left, I saw that three spots behind me was another open parking spot. And another. And another. And another...actually the facility hadn't been too busy that day and the lot was mostly vacant. Yet she had sat there in her car for a minute, enginerunning, waiting for me. At an athletic club. Apparently walking that extra ten yards wasn't part of her workout. 1 October 1998 - So I'm standing in the lunch line at work, not thinking about much other than the fact that I probably really don't need those three slices of bacon on the burger that I'm ordering. And suddenly the server, who had just had his back turned to the line of customers, turns around and repeats to the guy in the line in front of me, "I said, did you want fries with that?" "I'm sorry," the guy in front of me says. "Yes, I do. I shook my head yes, but you didn't see it." "Well," I casually remark to the guy in front of me, just to make conversation. "Technically, that's a contradiction in terms. It's not possible to 'shake one's head yes'. The phrase 'to shake your head' implies moving your head from side to side which obviously means a negative answer." The guy is staring at me, but I'm unable to resist the urge to continue explaining. "Now, if you're trying to describe your head movement when you're indicating the affirmative, the correct verb is to 'nod' your head. Of course, everybody knows that, that's obvious. And you would never say that you were 'nodding your head no' would you? The whole point is, to say 'shake your head yes' is just wrong." Having by now gotten his French fries from the server, there are several moments of silence as the guy gives me a long, withering look. And then he growls, "Why don't you quit bothering me, you annoying little smart ass, and just shut up?!" Grabbing his tray, he stalks off. To tell you the truth, I made up that last part about what the guy said. He just gave me that look, and left silently. We were in the public area of my workplace cafeteria, after all. But that's what he was thinking. 9 September 1998 - My friend Randy, his wife, and I were hanging out, and for some reason the subject came up about the causes for the recent fighting in Kosovo that had been occurring for the past few months. Since the issue was largely regionalism, one of us expressed gratitude that the United States didn't experience the same kind of problems. There was a pause, and my friend Randy absently said, "You know, even so, some Americans can be pretty regionalistic. Wisconsin people, for example. Everybody I've met from there seem to be pretty obsessed with the state they're from. And they really do talk about cheese and stuff all the time. And when it comes to their sports teams, especially the Packers, they're really, really psychotic. It's pretty unbelievable." I sat there thoughtfully for a moment, and then said, "Randy, just out of curiosity, how many people from Wisconsin do you actually know? I mean, other than me?" There was another pause. "Well," he finally admitted, "no one." But still, he's probably right anyway. Wisconsin people, not just myself, tend to get pretty passionate when it comes to the Packers. For example, last season, during the Tampa Bay and Minnesota away games, the stadiums were more filled with cheeseheads than they were with Bucs or Vikings fans. Trent Dilfer, the Tampa Bay quarterback, whined that in the future they shouldn't allow Wisconsin residents to obtain tickets for Buccaneer home games (and this was actually done this year), and I remember that during the Metrodome game, which I attended, we Packer fans were actually able to drown out and disrupt the Vikings' offensive play calling. Not only opposing stadiums, but sports bars around the country are often invaded by the green-and-gold, especially when the Green Bay game isn't televised locally. The sports bar in the Mall of America always has a whole section cordoned off just for the Packer game, and I can tell you that it can get pretty loud and obnoxious in there. I myself got dangerously close to getting into a bar fight with some Detroit fans last weekend. And that's the embarrassing kind of thing I really try to avoid becoming involved in, especially when it's my mom who starts it. The Packers had jumped to an early lead, and when they had scored it became clear that the group of guys at the table in front of us were among the extremely small minority of Lions fans. Once my mother discovered this fact, she started making loud comments meant for them to overhear. Sitting beside her, my father and I looked at each other and started fervently hoping that these guys were of the dish-it-out-but-can-also-take-it variety. The Lions eventually came back with a kickoff return TD, and my mother was extremely chagrined as the guys in front of us jumped up and cheered wildly. However, on the very next play, Roell Preston returned Detroit's kickoff for a touchdown, and my mom, feeling very retaliatory, jumped up yelling and cheering, waving and clapping her hands right in the faces of the Detroit guys, and started really talking trash. As this spectacle occurred, my dad and I were already starting to edge away from her bar stool, and I personally was wondering how honorable it would be to let a bunch of guys beat up your mother while you tried to get away in the resulting confusion. Fortunately these guys stayed calm and suppressed whatever initial instincts they had, perhaps remembering that even in Minnesota, it's still at least a misdemeanor to kill an obnoxious Packer fan. And how politic it would really appear for a bunch of young guys to leap over a table and simultaneously start punching a fifty-year-old woman. No matter how much she probably deserved it. 26 August 1998 - It's the week before I'm moving into my new townhouse, and I call up the phone company to arrange for them to hook up my new number. "And your name, sir?" the guy from the phone company asks. I carefully spell it for him, both first and last, which you have to do with a name like mine. I had just called the gas company a few minutes previously, and the woman there had actually guessed S-A-N-K-W-I-S-T before I corrected her. Anyway, the guy from the phone company gets my new address from me as well, and then asks, "How would you like it listed in the directory, sir?" And for some reason, when he asks it, the question just completely baffles me. In retrospect, it was obvious; maybe I had a spouse or a roommate that I also wanted listed, or maybe I wanted just my first initial "S" instead of "Sean", anything like that. But at the time, I was mystified. I just couldn't imagine what he needed other than my name and new address, which I had just meticulously spelled out for him. Nevertheless, I try to answer the guy anyway. "Uh, I don't know...alphabetically, I guess." 23 August 1998 - So on a recent weekend, during a spare couple of hours, I wandered into a local watering hole, in search of a light amount of alcohol, a dinner of chicken wings, some interactive trivia, and also possibly the future bearer of my children. Not necessarily in that order. Anyway, much to my surprise, I ran into a friend of mine who was already there, and he invited me to his table. And who happened to be there with him, watching the Vikings football game, but his longtime girlfriend and her extremely attractive young brown-eyed brunette single friend. I don't think that italicizing that last phrase was even necessary for you to realize its importance in this situation. So of course I threw my entire reserve of Sandquist-charm on her. "Hi!" I said, introducing myself in my warmest--non-threatening--I'm-a-nice-guy manner. "I'm Sean." "Hello," she replied back, reacting to my unexpected arrival extremely warily. The four of us spent the next few hours watching the football game, playing trivia, and having a few drinks, appetizers, and quiet conversation. As I slowly exercised my quick wit, quiet charisma and irresistible masculine appeal on the young woman, she desperately sought to avoid all eye contact between the two of us. At one point, the subject came up about whether she would be free that evening after the game ended. "Well," she said nervously, "I'm busy. I really need to go home and study." Which was kind of odd, because it was the middle of summer. And she wasn't even a student. Anyway, as the evening drew to close, I got up to head home. Upon seeing my departure, she said, in a relieved tone of voice, "Good-bye, see you again sometime." And quickly adding, "Maybe not though." As I left the bar, at the door I passed my friend, who was at the cashier's box, arguing about some minor detail with the tab. He had been at the bar considerably longer than I had been, and he was, to put it in a nutshell, at least slightly sloshed. "Dude!" he said to me, abruptly stopping what he was doing to put his arm around me, "Whatreya leaving now for?! Can't you see she wants you?!" So much for my instincts when it comes to women... 9 August 1998 - My old roommate, Kevin, and I were watching Das Boot on video. If you've never heard of Das Boot, it's a flick that came out in 1981 about the crew of a German U-boat in World War Two. It's a frighteningly realistic portrayal of the the claustrophobic terror that these men went through in their service to the Fatherland. Produced in Germany and subtitled in English, it's one of the few films ever coming out that have portrayed the German side sympathetically. Anyway, this crew goes through absolute hell, defending against an enemy destroyer, attacking a convoy and suffering through a counterstrike, attempting a suicide mission going through the heavily Allied patrolled Strait of Gibraltar, it's a miracle it survives in the journey back to its home port. Basically, it makes watching in Crimson Tide and Hunt for Red October seem like that "20,000 Leagues Under the Sea" ride at Disney World. And the final irony is that right as it makes it home safe, Allied fighters attack the base, and most of the crew is killed and the boat sinks. Whereupon Kevin and I jumped out of our seats and started chanting triumphantly, "U-S-A! U-S-A! U-S-A!" So I'm not sure we really grasped the point of the movie. 28 July 1998 - So I Rollerbladed® 20 miles today. And you'd think that twenty miles is a long distance. And let me assure you, it is, it is. Especially that last nineteen miles. Now, I'm sure there are many of you fitness addicts out there who probably jog that distance every day, and are now saying to yourself, "Big deal, this bozo here's bragging about going twenty miles. And he had wheels." Or, you could be like a couple of friends of mine who live in Madison, which is a community so used to pedestrian and bicycle travel that twenty miles is probably just your basic stroll to the Dairy Queen. Which reminds me briefly of how I spent my Fourth of July with them this summer. (Before I start ranting about it, let me say in advance that the fireworks display that Madison held turned out to be very impressive, and I'm certainly glad that Leif and Rebecca took me to it.) But anyway, my friends that I was staying with suggested that they lived close enough walk to the park, and by doing that we'd be able to avoid the traffic. Now, this makes sense to them perfectly, they've lived in Madison for many years and are even used to going without a car--Leif used to ride his bike nine miles to work every day, even in winter, and Rebecca would always walk to her office downtown. I, on the other hand, have become a comfortable, not to mention slightly overweight, suburbanite with a sedentary job, and I would take my car everywhere, even to the mailbox (which is, by the way, all the way at the end of the driveway). But fool that I am, I cheerfully agreed to walk. So they were probably somewhat bothered by the remarks I started making when the distance began to take its toll on my physiology. In my own defense, however, don't you agree that it's my right to complain, just a little bit, when I start walking and two damn hours later we still haven't gotten to wherever the hell it is that we're going?! Not that I was annoyed. Well, anyway, the whole point of this story is that skating twenty miles is quite an achievement for me. Ever hear what marathon runners say, after that ordeal of running all that distance? It's excruciating, but the feeling of that you get after accomplishing the feat is indescribable? Well, I know have an inkling of what that feeling is, and I'll do my best to put it into words. As I got back to where my car was parked, I looked back along that path that trailed far beyond the horizon, which I still had managed to traverse, and I thought to myself: "Well, there goes two hours of my life that I'll never get back." 13 July 1998 - I stepped into my shower yesterday after working out, and at once noticed something unusual. I use Lever 2000 soap, and usually have to spend the first few seconds in there fumbling around for the white bar on the same-colored white walls of my shower. But yesterday, for the first time I could see the bar, clear as day, sitting there on the shelf. I could reach for it and pick it up on the first try. I quickly noticed other strange things. The writing on the shampoo bottle, always having been fuzzily illegible, was now perfectly readable. There were "H" and "C" markings on the shower knob, never having been there before. Then I turned and looked back at the shower curtain. "Damn," I said to myself in astonishment, "there's flowers printed on there!" Then I realized: I had my new contact lenses in. And never before had I stepped into the shower with 20/20 vision. It suddenly occurred to me: This is what people with normal vision always see. For the past twenty years, whenever I took a shower, it was blurry in there. After that long of a period, I had just casually assumed that's what it was supposed to look like; everybody saw that way when they were taking a shower. But all along, it was just me...it's just that I never took a shower before with my eyeglasses on. Amazing! 7 July 1998 - I finally broke down and got myself fitted for contact lenses this week. Because I've finally now accepted the fact that my hairline is starting to recede. And going bald, slightly overweight, and eyeglasses is just one too many strikes against me, I think. I am single, you know. (Thanks in advance, by the way, for those of you who e-mail me saying, 'But you're not fat at all.' I appreciate it.) Anyway, the idea of poking around my eye with those little plastic things has never really appealed to me much, which explains why I've waited twenty-six years to try this. I first really realized how rough it was going to be at the eye clinic, when the woman who was supposed to teach me how to put them in was forced to finally give up and make me come back four days later. More than an hour had passed, her patients were getting backed up, I had two bloodshot eyes, and I was getting pretty tired of thrashing around. It was starting to looking like the only successful method of me getting those damn things in was going to involve duct tape and the consumption of large amounts of alcohol, probably more for her than me. Apparently four days was long enough for her to steel herself into seeing me again. And I noticed that she hadn't scheduled any other appointments for that particular morning. But recently it's been getting slightly better, now that I've gotten the hang of it a little, and I can now insert and remove the lenses all on my own. However, it's fortunate that I'm going to be moving out to my own place pretty soon. Because I've been forcing myself to wake up at six a.m. every morning, just to make sure that I have enough time to get the stupid things in before I leave for work, an hour and a half later. And the bloodcurdling screams have been waking up my roommate. 28 June 1998 - So, I just bought a townhouse for myself, in Eagan. And of course all my friends have been asking where exactly the new place is going to be, because I'll be moving a lot closer to where most of them live. "Just off of Blackhawk Avenue," I said to two of my co-workers, both of whom happened to be women. "There's a whole townhouse complex there, and mine is one of the beige ones...my patio is right next to the road." And since I pretty much live for showing off how witty I can be, I also added brightly, "That's where I'll be doing all my nude sunbathing." And waited for the inevitable laugh. Long silence. Like I said, "witty". Just kidding, of course. Though I doubt they'll take that chance... 12 June 1998 - If you're ever at Barnes & Noble looking at books, and you've collected a stack of books to look at, and you're sitting on one of those hard wooden chairs because everybody else has already taken the nice soft cushy chairs, after an hour or so of sitting there and you're ready to go home, make sure that your right foot hasn't fallen asleep from sitting on the hard chair, because what might happen is that when you stand up suddenly, your right leg won't be able to take the weight and you'll collapse there right in front of everybody at the bookstore, scattering the large stack of books you were previously carrying that you haven't even paid for. And believe me, that would be embarrassing. 9 June 1998 - There's a new display in the lobby of the office building where I work. It appears to be something the Marketing department came up with, some kind of a teaser ad, presumably for some new employee service that's going to be made available to us soon, which they're keeping secret for now. I say "presumably", because what kills me is the exact wording. All the sign says is: COMING SOON! JUNE 15, 1998! Well, of course it is...