Tip: Always assume the microphone's ON

Oh, my. First, it was Jesse Jackson whispering about snipping off parts of Barack Obama's anatomy. Today, Republican talking heads Mike Murphy and Peggy Noonan were caught on open mikes on MSNBC, saying the presidential race is "over" because of John McCain's "cynical" selection of running mate Sarah Palin.

Murphy and Noonan, who are veteran Republican pundits, were caught talking during a commercial break about McCain's campaign falling for the "narrative" of a working mom on the ticket, but picking the wrong one. Republicans at the national convention are described as being "bummed" over the selection of Palin.

See/hear it for yourself here.

Cane fu

A 60-year-old man in Gateshead, England, fended off a sword-wielding wingnut by clocking him over the head with his walking stick.

David Fawcett said he was walking with two friends when they spotted a man urinating outdoors. When the woman in the group chided the pisser, he attacked the trio with a beer bottle, then said he was going to get his sword and would be back to kill them all.

They didn't take the threat seriously until the assailant showed up a few minutes later, samurai sword in hand, and chased them into a takeout restaurant. When the man tried to break down the door, Fawcett whammed him one with the walking stick. Police arrested the reeling man a short time later.

Full story here.

Flaming balls

And you thought the Burning Man festival was weird.

In Nejapa, El Salvador, residents have an annual festival in which they throw fireballs at each other. The Aug. 31 festival commemorates the eruption of a nearby volcano in 1922. Participants take to the streets, throwing palm-sized balls of fire at each other and celebrating wildly as their fellow citizens go up in flames. Dozens of people were hospitalized with severe burns this year, and people have died in past years.

"Nejapa" is apparently local vernacular for "idiot."

Full story (with photos) here.

Mismanagement the easy way: Act like a parent

Any boss who goes home at the end of a hard workday, muttering about how employees act like children, won't be surprised to learn that parenting skills and management abilities are more or less interchangeable.

That's the point made by former New York Times reporter Ann Crittenden in her book, "If You've Raised Kids, You Can Manage Anything," (Gotham Books).

Crittenden interviewed 100 people and found that the best parenting skills -- negotiation, multitasking, mentoring, setting priorities -- translate directly to the workplace. Taking the long view has benefits at both home and the office. Letting children or employees take risks helps them grow. It's important not to play favorites, and to respect each person's individuality.

All very nice. If you're a parent or a manager or both, do yourself a favor and consider Crittenden's thesis. It might make you perform better on all fronts.

However, the advice gathered by the author mostly reflects the lessons learned from good parenting. Bad parenting produces just as many guidelines. Some examples follow.

--Yelling alone will never get peanut butter out of upholstery.

--Conversely, the "silent treatment" rarely works. Kids assume you've dozed off.

--Even a really good juggler occasionally drops a ball. Blaming the bystanders won't keep the rest of the balls in the air.

--The problem with ultimatums such as, "Don't make me stop this car!" is you've got to be willing to actually stop the car.

--Cursing by the parent leads children to believe that tossing around a few cusswords is appropriate. Such locker-room behavior is kind of cute, until the minister stops by to visit.

--You can lead a boy to water, but you can't make him bathe. Not properly, anyway.

--Children will get their revenge, no matter how long it takes. You've got to sleep sometime.

--Want to stifle creativity and playfulness? Say, "Don't be silly."

--Impatience leads to learned helplessness. If you jump in to show your children "the right way" to do a chore, they will forever after do it the wrong way first. They're betting that you'll jump in again, and they won't ever have to do the work.

--Never get drunk in front of your children (or your co-workers). They'll never forget it, and they won't let you forget it, either.

--Gossip will be repeated. A child often will take the gossip directly to the person you were bad-mouthing. So will an employee.

--If you begin a sentence with, "When I was your age . . .", you should expect a certain amount of sighing and eye-rolling.

--If you supply Crayons and blank walls, you've got to expect "artwork."

--Children/employees see through lies, unless the lies are about something they really want to believe in, such as the tooth fairy or cheaper health care coverage. When they inevitably learn the truth, they'll never look at you the same.

--Kids learn by example. If your children see you spending all your time on the sofa, watching TV and drinking beer, they'll end up doing the same, right beside you. And you'll have to buy a bigger sofa.

--Act underappreciated. Tell your children, "You'll miss me when I'm gone." It makes them want you "gone" sooner.

--Spanking hurts your hand a lot more than it hurts the offender's bottom.

--Remember the Soccer Dad Principle: You can be a blustery jerk who demands too much and blames the referee, or you can shout encouragement from the sidelines. Which one gets better results?

How do you mend a broken hard drive?

Modern career couples often rely on service-industry personnel -- gardeners, caterers, house cleaners -- to make their lives easier, but what most of us really need are computer technicians.

This is especially true for those of us who work in home offices. We depend on our computers, but we're out here all alone, far from the assistance of any tech services department that could bail us out when things get dicey.

We have a tenuous, love-hate relationship with our computers. We love how easy they make some jobs. We love the instant access to information. We love e-mail and that sense of connectedness to the world. We hate, hate, hate our computers when they go wrong.

Owning a computer is like being married to a felon. They make life exciting at times, but you just know you'll wind up with a broken heart.

They lie to you. ("This download will take 12 minutes . . . 47 minutes … 2 hours, 36 minutes . . . 14 days.") They cheat on you (adware, spyware) and try to dip into your money (spam). They bring home the occasional virus. When you need them most, they lock themselves up and throw away the key.

We try to salvage the relationship. We lose many man-hours (not to mention a lot of hair) attempting to repair our own computers.

We don't really understand how these machines work, so we're afraid to go poking too deeply into their twisted bowels. Our answer to every glitch is to reboot and pray.

When that doesn't work, we inch along through System Restore and various other lifesaving programs, only to end up back where we started -- with all our important data frozen inside a block of plastic on our desks.

When all else fails, we call a toll-free number, where we reach a technician who directs us through the very same steps we just tried. Since this technician can't actually see our computers, s/he is simply running through corporate protocols -- educated guesses about what might be wrong. In the end, all the customer gets out of this interaction is a bill.

After going through this rigmarole a time or two, home computer users recognize we're simply lucky whenever our computers function properly, and we don't want to do anything to disturb that.

We treat them so gently, you'd think they were teetering on the corners of our desks, ready to commit suicide. We don't want to do anything that might push them over the edge. We don't want to download anything, ever. We don't even want to perform routine maintenance for fear something will go wrong and we'll end up in that most dreaded place of all -- The Frozen Blue Screen of Death.

Since we clearly can't manage our computers ourselves, what we home-office workers need is someone who's always on standby to fix or maintain them -- a Household Nerd (trademark registration pending). When a computer acts up, we could call in the nerd, who would correct the problem while we go out to a relaxing three-martini lunch.

We could designate a spare bedroom for the nerd -- sort of like a maid's quarters -- and arrange for his care and feeding. Pay him a regular allowance. Provide him with his own computer to keep him busy between repairs.

It would be exactly like having a teen-ager in the house. But unlike the typical smart-aleck teen, the Household Nerd really would have the skills to remedy computer woes.

And mend our broken hearts.


(Editor's note: Since I originally published this column, services like Geek Squad and Nerds on Call have become commonplace. I am a regular client. Sigh.)