Worth the wear of winning
One of my favorite bits of verse is by Hilaire Belloc; apparently it's verse 22 of his "Dedicatory Ode," from Verses (1910). I've used it a lot in various contexts: .signatures for Usenet postings and email messages, a note at the end of my Wanderjahr travelogue, or just any old time it pops into my head. This is one of those pops-into-my-head times; it just occurred to me that I had never posted this verse in my journal per se, and I figured it was about time.
From quiet homes and first beginning,
Out to the undiscovered ends
There’s nothing worth the wear of winning
But laughter and the love of friends.
—Hilaire Belloc
In other news, I'm currently hiding in my room—convention big! interaction scary!—but I'll probably head down to say hi to more folks soon.
Forgot to mention last night: my checked-through duffel bag didn't make it onto the Madison flight, but the airline kindly brought it to the hotel late last night. Unfortunately, one of the ends was unzipped and all the contents of that end were missing. The contents included a little bottle of travel shampoo, a bunch of Benadryl, some NyQuil, and a little bottle of valerian; all of that is easily replaceable. Also my clip-on sunglasses, which I don't wear very often but cost at least $70, so that's kind of annoying. Also seven juggling beanbags. Three of those are fairly easily replaceable; the other four had the Platinum Technologies logo on them, and seeing as how they were only available to employees and as trade-show giveaways, and the company was subsequently bought by their biggest competitor, it seems unlikely that they can be replaced. It's not like I had any sentimental attachment to Platinum, but these were pretty much the only remaining concrete evidence that I worked there (since our whole group was laid off abruptly just as we were finally settling down to begin product development, something like six months after they hired us on, back in '98). Ah, well; not such a big deal in the greater scheme of things.
I called United to ask them to look for the stuff; even though I was doing my best to be friendly and treat him like a colleague, the guy I talked with seemed to me to be impatient and kind of surly, though I may've read too much into his tone. (There was even a mildly hostile bit where he asked for my ticket number, and I said it was an electronic ticket but I could give him my boarding pass number, and he said they would have to investigate to prove I was actually on that flight, in a tone that suggested to me that he doubted I had been. Baffling. Though again I may just have misread his tone.) At the end of the call he asked if there was anything else I wanted to add to the report, and I said, "I'd kind of like to get an apology from United," because at no time during the call had he expressed the slightest sympathy or given the impression that he considered my problem to be in any way important. But when I asked for an apology, he did provide one, so that was nice. He seemed to be convinced that someone had stolen the stuff, and he told me that there would be a full investigation; I think it's more likely that someone accidentally unzipped the end in transit and the stuff fell out.
Anyway. I imagine at worst United will send me a check and I can go buy myself some more bean bags. And I need new glasses anyway, and I didn't much like those sunglasses; they made the world look all gray, which made me gloomy. Perhaps next time I'll get rose-colored ones.
Okay. Time to brave the con again. Though I may come back to my room and do some reading and editing soon.
