Greg's Right FIT Newsletter #119

Techniques for FIT

• Time spent in airports is increasing as security gets even more stringent and flights get more crowded. Plan for it. Check out the restaurants, the airline clubs, and other amenities. As Disney learned in its themeparks, a timed wait, even if it's long, is better than an unknown wait. 

• Before taking on a new project, take a minute and ask yourself if a similar project has ever gone perfectly. Come up with a short list of what has knocked a project off target, and follow it with a way to prevent that. 

• Have you heard of this book, 42nd and Vanderbilt? Photographer shot the same corner, at the same time, for nine years and captured the same people again and again, often years apart. We're creatures of habit. It's the easiest way to predict the future, so take a look back at the last 2 months, plan for it next year and send "future you" a calendar note.  

• The easiest way to predict the future? Make a lot of predictions. I read somewhere that the Simpsons has predicted the future something like 20 times. It only took 634 episodes. Get crackin'.

Being Human - Are you ready?

"An ounce of prevention is worth a pnd of cure.” - B. Franklin

This week I traveled to Boston for a conference and was late in making my airline reservations, making do with whatever flight I could find. I end up on a SWA flight that has one stop, but I can't get off the plane, so I make the best of the situation and move up to one of the exit row seats that has double the legroom. 

As you know, the caveat to sitting in the exit row is that you may be called on to assist in the emergency evacuation of the plane. As the plane loads, of the 16 exit row seats for the 4 over-wing doors, I'd say 10 of them get occupied by older people. Not just any old people, at least half of this crew is frail and out of shape. Obviously retirees on vacation. I'm all for aging gracefully, but I have my doubts that at least half of these people are strong enough to open the doors.

It brings up the question, how will you know when you're past your prime and it's time to step aside? Unlike the "you must be this tall to ride" signs at the amusement park, there aren't many publicly posted notices to warn us when it's time to step aside and let younger people take our place. 

On the flight, the attendant seems to share my concern, gives me a look, then shrugs his shoulders and continues on. The flight was uneventful, everyone arrived safely, but the question sticks with me. We don't always get to choose when to step aside, so how do you want to exit? 

When it comes to telling the future, Covey's advice to begin with the end in mind is instructive. 

Random Stuff

Airbnb

Have you done this? I am meeting the eldest child in Boston at the end of my conference and we're going to traipse through the city. She's talked me into trying an Airbnb because it's an adventure and I'm here. Right now. At midnight. Sitting at a stranger's kitchen table, in their apartment, in the middle of the city. I'm not exactly comfortable, but not exactly uncomfortable either.

I figure it's good for my brain but it's weird. And it happens to be kind of cold in here. This building is in a neighborhood with teeny, tiny cobblestone streets, and has to be ancient. Definitely a pre-automobile set up. There are radiators, but the instructions say to use the the baseboard heaters spread throughout the apartment. I can't get the one in my bedroom to work the first night, but after futzing with it, I get it to kick on blowing high, hard heat. I smile to myself and then voom, the apartment goes dark. 

I know I saw a fuse box somewhere and use the light on my cell phone to root around the apartment. I only find one circuit breaker and it's painted over. It doesn't really look like it tripped but I flip it off and on while simultaneously remembering that the fuses I saw were in the hallway. I open the door, find my tripped fuse in teh box right by my door, and click it back on, heading back into my apartment. 

That's when I hear the neighbor swear and stomp down the stairs, toward the fuseboxes just outside my door. I turn my lights off and tip-toe off to bed. 

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