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Posted by Karen Anslinger on November 06, 2009 at 4:19pm
There are few things in life more intimidating or exciting (!!) than a blank sheet of paper (or in this case, electronic MS Word doc). Oh the possibilities! The vastness! The future wide-open and ready for anything… but, oh, what to write???
And, probably one of the most intimidating things you could say to someone about a blog is: “I want you to write the first post.”
Ok, I admit that I can be easily intimidated. From the above, you can see that it really doesn’t take much. That said, I’ve faced down a lot of fears and enemies in my life. There was the rattlesnake that bit me when I was three (I know! Still somewhat shocked he didn’t just open his jaws and EAT me), yet I lived to tell about it (take that!). Then there was my uber-liberal 8th grade English teacher who tried to make me use “s/he” and had dumb posters on her wall with phrases like “No Person’s Land.” I wrote nasty things about her (or silly things like “I’M PREGNANT!”) during our daily journal time then marked them “confidential” so she wouldn’t read them (uh-huh). After enough of this, she sent me to the principal’s office. He called my dad, who obviously had heard nothing but horrid things about this teacher, and who came down to the school and proceeded to recite all the things I’d told him until my teacher started crying. Although I know I shouldn’t, I still feel strangely proud of that moment. Then, there was that instance at Girls’ State when I, as acting Chair of the Whig Party, walked on stage in front of hundreds of other chattering teenage girls, sliced my hands through the air, and received complete silence. Oh the power… (I felt a little bit like Moses.) Then, more recently, there was the hardcore gang leader who was hanging out in the Marin County Jail for a quick court hearing before heading back to San Quentin. He wouldn’t tell any other attorney what had REALLY happened, but he told me. (Nothing a wink and well-timed compliment won’t do!) And, my last example of my fierceness - the time my boss (not at MNLB) totally screwed me over with a lot of empty promises about corner offices, my name in lights, etc. only to tell me (the day after I passed the California Bar Exam) that there was no job at all. I told him where he could take all those promises.
And – what do you know? I’ve conquered the white space! You’ll note that although we are an engineering firm, this post has nothing to do with engineering or, really, the firm. Don’t worry, all that stuff will come later.
What you should garner from this welcoming note is that we are a FIERCE bunch. Our engineers seek out challenges and emerge victorious; we don’t give up; we work hard and play hard; we’re creative, curious, and have a good mix of traditional experience and fresh ideas.
We also drink a lot of wine, eat a lot cheese, play a lot of Bingo, have a lot of “meetings” (that may or may not coincide with local happy-hours), and, oh, we compost too.
Welcome to our life.
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