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e recall suddenly we felt the thwack of mr smith s ruler hitting across all our butts with a single stroke we returned sheepishly to our seats as the other students roared with laughter later we figured out that mr smith must have used something longer than a yardstick because we measured our butts with a yardstick and the width was way more than 36 inches another memorable seventh grade episode came during the month or so when i became very skilled in the production of spitballs i experimented by chewing many different paper types including notebook paper brown bags and glossy magazine pages and eventually developed an arsenal of short medium and long range spitball projectiles i didn t use a straw and instead would lob my soggy projectiles at the classroom walls and more often than not they would stick with an audible splat naturally since i wasn t paying attention to mr smith s grammar lessons i had plenty of time to devote to spitball research and development though i did have to be careful not to get caught chewing mr smith did actually see me chewing paper once but mistakenly thought it was gum as luck would have it there was a large five foot tall relief map of africa on the classroom wall near my desk and i figured out that i could easily hit just about any country on it a majority of the spitballs ended up landing on northern libya and egypt which soon became decorated with more than a dozen little dots after a while i recruited my classmates to join the fun and other countries on the map became similarly adorned the best part about all of this was that mr smith seemed completely oblivious he wore thick eyeglasses and i suspected that they were not of sufficient strength to allow him to see what was happening to the map but eventually mr smith did catch on he always caught on no matter what subversive activity i was engaging in in classic mr smith fashion he approached the situation like a move in a chess game he asked me to stay after class one day and then began questioning me mr mclaughlin can you tell me does libya have mountains um yes it has some i think where are the mountains located show me on the map with a familiar feeling of impending punishment washing over me i walked over to the map and pointed to the mountains in the central part of the country are there any mountains in northern libya and egypt uh no it s pretty flat i think at this point his voice rose becoming edged with irritation dear child then why are there mountains on this map needless to say i spent the next couple of recess periods removing the crusted and surprisingly adhesive spitballs from the map of africa mr smith was a tough no nonsense teacher alright but when your work met with his high bar of approval you could rightly feel proud this was especially true of his grammar class in which he required students to memorize a series of poems over the course of the school year including robert frost s the road not taken and the pirate don durk of dowdee by mildred plew meigs it is important to note that we didn t just have to memorize the poems we were also required to recite them aloud to mr smith at his desk if you didn t demonstrate an acceptable mastery of the poem that day or hesitated between verses mr smith would send you away to study some more you really had to nail it perfectly to receive his stamp of approval some poems were short and easy others long and difficult but at the end of the school year when you came to the last one the task of memorization made more difficult by spring breezes wafting through the window you felt an indescribable surge of accomplishment the most important thing to remember about mr smith is that he was much more than just a teacher he played piano in the weekly school assembly he ran the weekly soft pretzel sale he dressed up for school halloween costume parties he whacked our butts with a ruler when we got out of line and it was his voice you heard on the school public address system at the end of the day announcing the arrival of your bus he was quite simply everywhere in our lives as students more than any other teacher it was mr smith s caring spirit that made newtown friends school feel like a family which is why many of us were moved to tears on graduation day when we realized that he would no longer be part of our everyday lives no longer would we be able to snicker among ourselves about his plaid pants or see the twinkle in his eyes when we pleased him with our hard work that was a tough realization for all of us when you were on his good side mr smith s demeanor was more kindly uncle than imperious disciplinarian he really was a good man though i was a perennial thorn in mr smith s side i always felt that he and i had a certain kinship like that which exists between a warden and inmate after all it was his job to maintain order in the classroom and i saw it as my duty to disrupt it his main problem with me was that i was lazy and could be a much better student if only i would apply myself every teacher has students like this but mr smith cared enough not to let any of his fall by the wayside in 1988 while home from college on break i went back to newtown friends school dropping by unannounced to see if mr smith was still there i wanted to let him know that i was doing better that i had stopped slacking and was on the right path also that i still remembered him and appreciated what he d done for me i hoped that he would remember me too and not as the borderline sociopath who had once taken up so much of his energies and attention mr smith was there and he did remember me we chatted for a half hour and his face lit up when i told him i was majoring in english despite the irony of one of his all time worst grammar students having chosen such a path mr smith seemed genuinely happy that i had come back to see him and deliver this news and perhaps a bit proud as well before leaving for old times sake i gave mr smith a recital of the road not taken which i somehow still remembered word for word nailed it on the first try posted by kevin mclaughlin at 6 00 am 2 comments email this blogthis share to x share to facebook share to pinterest thursday february 16 2012 entering hp s world my meeting with meg whitman monday morning 6 45 a m and its pouring rain and still very dark as i m pulling into the parking lot at hp s corporate headquarters suddenly i hear the sound of a baby wailing it s the radio the san francisco 49ers lost the nfc championship game last night in overtime and a local sports talk show is playing a loop of baby tantrum sound clips to match the mood of the depressed fan base i switch off the radio i m bummed about the game too but there s no crying in the national football league there s no crying at hp and there s definitely no crying when you re about to meet meg whitman i m here to interview whitman who joined hp last september as its ceo she s best known to people outside the tech world for her unsuccessful run for california governor in 2010 during which she reportedly spent 144 million of her own personal fortune whitman was also ceo of ebay for a decade transforming it from a startup with 19 employees into an ecommerce powerhouse that had 8 billion in revenue when she left in 2008 and during her time as an executive at hasbro whitman also managed the mr potato head brand after meeting up with my hp hosts i m led to a front desk and given a badge with my name on it i m wearing a suit though so it s impossible to clip on the badge in a way that doesn t make me look like a moron after a few attempts i m able to fasten it to my lapel so that it dangles out sideways i m hoping meg won t notice my hosts lead me up a stairway to a second floor hallway and the first thing i notice are the high ceilings the walls are sparsely decorated it s quiet and no one is around at this early hour it feels kind of like walking in a museum and in some ways it is bill hewlett and dave packard hp s legendary co founders would have been up in years when this building was built i think to myself but they probably walked these hallways likewise bill gates steve jobs larry ellison and other executives whose ideas form the bedrock of silicon valley innovation i m led into a small conference room with very comfy chairs but comfort is the last thing i m looking for right now i m about to meet a big time shaper of the future of the largest it company in terms of employees on the planet and in my head i m nervously sorting through the collection of questions i ve come up with after a few minute meg and her assistant walk into the room we shake hands and the first thing i notice is that she s tall around 6 feet with a strong grip she is pressed for time and i get the sense that she s not into trivialities so i dive right in with questions it soon becomes apparent that whitman is a great interview she is actually answering the questions i m asking and she is acknowledging that her company has been through a rough patch and needs to get better you don t often get that from tech company ceos and it s refreshing the most surprising thing she tells me is that hp used to have a barbed wire fence that separated the executive parking lot from those other employees silently i m floored by this whitman has a sense of humor too and by the end of the 30 minutes i m already looking forward to going through my notes and pulling out the best quotes of which i m certain there will be many later whitman gathers her team of five executives who each run gigantic businesses with tens of billions in annual revenue for a group photo they seem to like each other and they re joking the whole time the photographer keeps them in pose for 20 minutes or so and after a while one of the execs says hurry up because another one of the execs rents his suit by the hour that sends the whole group into peals of extended laughter the photo shoot is over as i m walking back to my car i try to imagine the old parking lot barbed wire fence and i picture a low level employee gazing wistfully into the executive parking lot with its row upon row of gleaming lexuses jaguars and bmws posted by kevin mclaughlin at 8 17 pm no comments email this blogthis share to x share to facebook share to pinterest labels hewlett packard meg whitman technology tuesday january 17 2012 descent into madness my three days at ces 2012 monday 9 07 a m got in last night i have to admit i m really pumped about ces yeah the event is always pretty crowded but it s just so awesome to be here this year i can t wait to see all the latest and greatest products that are being unveiled it s my sixth straight year at the show but i still feel like a little kid on christmas morning just brimming with anticipation the ces opening press event was last night and i was blown away by the innovative products the sponsors were showing off and there s a great energy in general in vegas right now a very upbeat vibe even the vegas strip s unrepentant soullessness seems to have dissolved replaced by a glowing friendliness that s evident in the smiles of passersby there is also a pervasive sense of camaraderie from my international media brethren the weather is excellent too clear desert skies and surprisingly warm for january monday 10 33 p m went to samsung and microsoft press conferences this afternoon samsung launched about 20 products tvs monitors notebooks a tablet and a smartphone all kinds of stuff people were eating it up microsoft s steve ballmer keynote was fun he brought out ryan seacrest and they sat together and talked about all the cool stuff microsoft is doing in an informal chat type of presentation i enjoyed it heading to bed now hope i ll be able to fall asleep after all the excitement of the day can t wait to walk the show floor which opens tomorrow tuesday 9 45 a m i m standing outside south hall of the las vegas convention center in a crowd of around 5 000 people all waiting for the doors to open at 10 it s pretty chaotic for some reason people seem to think that shoving and jostling their way up to the entrance means they ll get in faster pretty irritating if you ask me there are a lot more people in vegas than yesterday huge monorail line at the venetian stop where i m staying yep ces is definitely under way i had forgotten what a mad crush of humanity the show can be now i m heading onto the show floor ok i m walking around in north hall and it s a little less crowded here problem is i haven t seen anything interesting yet what i am seeing is row after row after row of booths displaying iphone and ipad cases some are ridiculously outlandish like the ones encrusted with swarovski crystals are you kidding me hey i guess there s no accounting for taste these cases look like something you d see in a jersey shore episode tuesday 1 14 p m i ve made my way over to central hall where all the television vendors are showing off their latest models it s loud in here and by loud i mean deafening good thing there are a massive amount of people here packed into the exhibit areas like a bunch of helpless sardines powerless against their desire to see more hdtvs the hdtvs on display are truly amazing examples of humankind s ability to harness technology but though it s easy to fantasize about owning one i realize that i d never read another book or have another meaningful conversation if i did this is scary technology and after craning my neck at a few companies booths i move on tuesday 11 49 a m chaos in the lg exhibit area an impenetrable thicket of humanity i snap a quick photo and hightail it outta there tuesday 2 37 p m everywhere i turn there is bad mobile etiquette on display and frankly it s starting to piss me off literally 95 percent of the people i see walking around have their eyes glued to their devices and are paying zero attention to where they re going so of course they re constantly cutting people off while remaining completely oblivious i actually saw a guy texting while walking backwards down one of the bustling hallways the irony is that these idiots with their smartphones are rushing around so they can look at other newer smartphones on display at ces tuesday 5 12 p m i ve walked probably about three or four miles at this point although it could be a lot more still haven t seen anything all that interesting except for a couple booths here and there surrounded by useless garbage oh goodie ultrabooks oh wow more tablets e writers what regular paper doesn t work anymore there comes a point at ces when you re on the show floor and you ve been walking for hours and you just hit the wall the noise of the hucksters in the exhibit areas braying for attention is getting inside my head and it s not going away i ve seen enough and am heading back to the room tuesday 9 37 p m exhausted but still intact physically if not entirely mentally after day one on the ces show floor i ve heard the first couple of days climbing mount kilimanjaro are pretty easy but then the diffi...