The Morning After …
The 2009 NFL season is finally over. The ‘72 Dolphins are still the only team in NFL history to have run the table on a perfect season. The Saints won, the Colts lost. Damn. I was pulling for the Colts because I’m a Peyton Manning fan. I firmly believe that he is the best player in the game today, and will retire as the greatest QB to have played the game. OK, let me pause for a second while devotees of Brett Favre, Tom Brady, Dan Marino, Adrian Peterson, and the New Orleans Saints go into collective apoplexy and sputter their objections. I’ll be back in a moment.
All done? Good. If you watched the game last night, there was a surreal inevitability about the fact that Manning threw an interception towards the end of the game that sealed the victory for the Saints. Let’s face it – we generally don’t expect Peyton Manning to make mistakes. After all, he is a four-time NFL MVP and routinely dismantles opposing defenses with ruthless precision. Oh well, guess he’s only 99% machine. Fate it seems is not without a sense of irony.
Speaking of fate, can all those people blathering on about how the Saints are a “team of destiny”, or how we were “witnessing history being made” last night, please put the crack pipe down and go play in rush hour traffic on the freeway for a while? After a while, all this waxing rhapsodic about Hurricane Katrina and “destiny” simply makes me want to vomit … all over the person spewing such unintelligent babble. Following their logic, does that mean that we should expect the Haitian soccer team to win the World Cup in 2014? Seriously? After all – what makes them any less deserving to be a “team of destiny” than the Saints? By the way, if your answer to that question comes within ten city blocks of regurgitating Pat Robertson, then please take my earlier suggestion to heart and go find a busy highway on which to play. Seriously.
Now, as a somewhat neutral observer, the game itself wasn’t all that much of a spectacle. Come to think of it, neither was the halftime show. Since CBS was broadcasting the Super Bowl, was the halftime show meant to be a plug for their CSI franchises? All three shows feature theme music written by The Who. If so, well then, mission halfway accomplished. On second thought, no – just fire whoever came up with the idea. Roger Daltrey looked (and sounded) like he’d been recently exhumed from a sarcophagus, and Pete Townshend was about as energetic as a coma patient. Oh, and for the record, adding spectacular lighting effects doesn’t make your music sound any better.
I don’t see the Saints repeating as champions. Too many free agents in a league dominated by parity. They should make the playoffs at the very least though. Either way, the fewer times I have to hear the mindless masses repeating “Who Dat” as if it were some sort of mystical mantra, the better. I also don’t see the Colts making a return trip to the Super Bowl next year either. That’s a pity. Since the Super Bowl will be played at the Jerry-bowl next year, I would certainly love to see the Cowboys and the Colts square off. I guess I can hope. Let the planning for next year begin …
February 8, 2010
Posted in: Dallas Cowboys, Sports 
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Are you kidding me? Bedlam DL3 … again?!?
Say “Bedlam DL3” around Microsoft folks, and you’ll be able to tell the true old-timers. If they reply, “Me Too!”, or try to stab you in the eye with a nearby implement, then they’ve been around for quite a while. A quick disclaimer – I wasn’t at Microsoft when Bedlam occurred the first time, so I was spared the nightmare … once.
Anyways, some quick history on Bedlam – way back in the day, the Microsoft IT department were working on a new tool to manage communications and they created a whole bunch of Distribution Lists (DL) named Bedlam DL <number> with upwards of 10,000 users on each one. Well, someone sent an email to the DL saying, “Why am I on this list? Please remove me from it.” which started the nightmare. Almost everyone on the list used the Reply All command and replied, “Me Too!” If you want more technical details, check out the post from 2004 on the Microsoft Exchange Team Blog.
Well boys and girls, the joys of the Bedlam DL are back – different alias, same effect. We’re nearing the release of Office 2010, and as with all new software, when people have questions (especially if they’re beta testing it) they want to ask an expert. Well … someone unwisely posed a question to the entire population of the Office 2010 Dogfood DL inside Microsoft. Oops. Bedlam DL has been reborn.
One thread has become many. What I find particularly ironic is that people are using “Reply All” to tell people to stop Replying All. Thankfully Outlook 2010 has a wonderful new feature that allows you to ignore email threads in which you have no interest.
It’s called the “Ignore” button (shown below). Learn it, use it, love it. And stop Replying All to several thousand people … please!
February 3, 2010
Posted in: Funnies, Life At Microsoft No Comments
Is it possible to grant Forgiveness on behalf of a Group?
Module 2, Week 2 of Leadership, Justice & Forgiveness (aka ORGL532). The material for this may have been the most disturbing in terms of content – Holocaust literature is never a "fun" read. Just a quick reminder, here are the books for this module:
Last week, I wrote about Elie Wiesel, despair, and recognizing real suffering all around us, as opposed to what we see on television. This week, I read Simon Wiesenthal’s book. Forgiveness is an intensely personal experience. Wiesenthal was asked to forgive a dying Nazi soldier on behalf of the Jewish people. From my own viewpoint, I don’t believe that Wiesenthal should have struggled with the question of whether or not to forgive the soldier. As his fellow prisoners pointed out, Wiesenthal did not speak on behalf of the Jewish people. Where, therefore, was his authority to grant absolution to a single soldier on behalf of all Jews, who were still being persecuted and murdered? Although the Jewish people as a whole endured terrible suffering, each person suffered in their own way. That suffering cannot simply be rolled up into a neat package and then forgiven as part of a blanket amnesty. Or can it?
However, Bolek (the almost-priest) raises an interesting question. When all the people that you have wronged are dead, to whom can you turn for forgiveness? Although your repentance may be sincere, is there any real way to perform any acts of contrition? Turning specifically to Wiesenthal’s situation, how can a single individual, regardless of whether or not he is recognized as an authority, grant forgiveness to another individual (or even a group) on behalf of a group? Would the leaders of the Israeli and Palestinian people be morally capable of granting the other side blanket absolution? Would a single Native American tribal leader really be able to grant general forgiveness for the suffering of his own tribe, let alone all of the other tribes?
Wiesenthal’s book raises more questions than answers. I will admit, I set aside the forty or so responses in the second half of the book, because I believe that we each have to reach our own conclusions – based on our own ethical, moral and spiritual baseline, colored by our experiences and worldview. Rather than try to pose a single question this week, I’ll just open it up for the group to let the discussion develop in its own way – without trying to direct or guide it in a specific fashion … after all, there are plenty of questions above to choose from.
February 2, 2010
Tags: forgiveness, organizational leadership, simon wiesenthal Posted in: Gonzaga No Comments
Human Suffering and Evil in the World
Going into Module 2 for my Leadership, Justice & Forgiveness (aka ORGL532) class, I have to admit, I was intrigued – especially when I saw the topic for our first posting:
Talk about human suffering, describe its influence in your life and describe the understandings that are influencing you in this class regarding human suffering. Human evil exists, this is definitive, what remains to be explored more fully is our response to this evil, in ourselves, in our organizations, and in the world. Give a hopeful response to the depth of learning you are experiencing in this regard. As you read the texts and view the film, and engage the ideas of leadership practitioners and theorists post at least one "annotated" question: i.e., a question you ask that elicits dialogue from your fellow classmates, and is based upon your readings as well as your own experience in personal, organizational, or global facets of community life.
Let me preface my post with a disclaimer. This is a long post, because of events of the last week. I felt obliged to share them with you as part of our learnings because it moved my experiences from the abstract to the real. Our texts for this module are below. I read Elie Wiesel’s book in less than two hours. I promise you it will move you.
Most of us live sheltered lives. We have a roof over our heads, food on the table, and clothes on our backs. We live in relative comfort and ease. We don’t really know what true suffering is. We occasionally mouth formulaic phrases about the latest global tragedy, or perhaps even donate some time and money. Then, with our social duty done in this regard, we go back to watching "American Idol" and "Lost", and our comfortable lives. In the last couple of weeks, the world’s humanitarian focus has been on the earthquake victims in Haiti. Pat Robertson’s idiotic comments aside, the consensus response has been that the Haitians are the victims of geography – somewhat similar to San Francisco in that regard. Until we are personally affected, our involvement is almost surreal. I grew up in the MidEast during the 70’s and early 80’s. We visited Iran and Iraq before they were torn apart by war. My mother was in Washington DC on 9/11, and on the beaches of Sri Lanka when the tsunami struck in 2004. And to me, despite that, those events still seems surreal. We talk about the horrors of Somalia, the plight of the Kurds, and the conflicts in Darfur, Chad and Kivu in abstractions – we cannot possibly relate to, nor intelligently discuss and understand the true depths of human suffering.
As a society our attention is drawn to the most sensational tragedies, what makes the biggest splash in the news headlines. Today, it’s Haiti. Two weeks from now, who knows which corner of the earth will hold our attention. And yet, in the midst of all of this global suffering, we somehow remain largely oblivious to conditions much closer to home. I’m certainly not going to compare some of the things I’ve seen, or my experiences to those of Elie Wiesel – to do so would be both glib and disrespectful. However, there are certainly parallels that can be drawn between the abstract way in which we regard human suffering and how the people in Wiesel’s hometown of Sighet mentally walled themselves off from Moishe the Beadle’s accounts of what he had witnessed.
Realistically though, to really understand human suffering, we have to look much closer to home. This week, while doing groceries, I had occasion to visit two different grocery stores. The first was a Wal-Mart near my home. It is a "Super Wal-Mart" that services the southern part of Irving. Set aside for the moment any preconceived notions you might have of Wal-Mart as the epitome of the evil and exploitive retailer, as well as any stereotypes you hold about the Wal-Mart patrons. I prefer not to shop at peak times (especially Saturdays), because I do not enjoy waiting in long lines. In addition, peak shopping times is when the shelves (especially in the produce section) tend to be bare. Instead, I stopped in very early on a Sunday morning. The first thing that struck me about many of the patrons was that this was not a typical group of shoppers. Many appeared unkempt. Even though grocery shopping is a chore for many, there is still some semblance of energy, in the activity of anticipation of putting food on the table – the decision-making process. Not so in this case. So many seemed to be living dead. There was no light in their eyes. Instead, there was almost a sense of hopelessness. Clearly they were shopping within a constrained budget – bargain foods, and bulk items filled their carts. You could clearly see both the frustration and sadness at not being able to get "that little bit extra" for their kids, having to say "No" every time one of the children asked for candy, a treat, a soda, or a special dessert. As I watched them anxiously watching the total add up as they checked out (and in some cases, paid with food stamps), I was reminded of a quote from one of my favorite TV shows, The West Wing, "If fidelity to freedom and democracy is the code of our civic religion then surely, the code of our humanity is faithful service to that unwritten commandment that says, ‘We shall give our children better than we ourselves had’". One in five children (19%) live in families that are considered officially "poor". One in twelve children (8%) live in families that we would consider extremely poor. (Source: National Center for Children in Poverty). In other words – as a society – where is our faithful service to that commandment today?
Now contrast that experience, with what I witnessed at a Tom Thumb store, less than ten minutes drive away, in an affluent area of North Irving. As I entered that store, I saw mostly happy, energetic faces. The quality of products was markedly higher, people were smiling. No sense of hopelessness, despite our current economic climate. Fresh fruits and vegetables, plenty of proteins, whole grains – the hallmarks of a healthy diet – were the order of the day. Interspersed with these were the extras – a special candy bar, box of donuts, or a tub of ice cream. Clearly, although these shoppers may have had financial concerns of their own, their ability to put food on the table was nowhere near as severely impacted as those shoppers that I had observed less than an hour ago.
I’ve rambled on quite a bit here, so I guess I should pose my annotated question – what is it that makes the concept of human suffering and evil in the world "real" for you? None of us can relate to Wiesel’s experience – so what is it that makes you question the motives of your fellow man, and the society you live in?
January 27, 2010
Tags: elie wiesel, organizational leadership Posted in: Gonzaga No Comments
Friday funnies from the bar
Friday afternoon at LC4. There are many people here at the bar. And that means that there will invariably be plenty of socially questionable and inappropriate comments and behavior. So let’s go around the room …
The 20-something Asian gentleman wearing a shirt that looks like it was stolen out of Dale Evans wardrobe who has been checking out his waitresses legs with undisguised lust. He’s praying for mirrrored floors so he can see up her very short skirt …
His wingman is no better, since he took hairstyling tips from Justin Guarini (of Justin and Kelly fame).
There are two women sitting at the bar smoking. Unusually, they are the only two people at the bar who are working on committing suicide in public. you have to admire their generosity though as they are very courteous to one another and are blowing their smoke on other patrons. Etiquette tip girls … the two of you chose to be friends with one another. The rest of us could care less about you. Blow your smoke on each other, or better yet – just do the world a favor and go play in traffic.
Speaking of etiquette, it’s terribly inconsiderate for two people to take up a table meant for six. There are two possibilities – either they are planning to consume so much food that they will expand exponentially to fill the other four chairs or they failed restaurant etiquette 101. Looking at them … this one could go either way …
And it’s still only 5:30 pm … this promises to be quite an evening …
January 22, 2010
Posted in: Funnies, Things that Suck No Comments
Risk-Taking and Forgiveness
Going into the second week of class, we were asked to build on our questions and discussions from the previous week. Remember that our texts for the first two weeks are:
Before I get into the thoughts I shared with my fellow students, I need to pause and reflect on the events of this week.
I’ve recently moved into a new role as a Product Quality Program Manager (PQPM). Essentially, it will be my responsibility to be the “Voice of the Customer” – their advocate for issues that they run into with our products and services. There are a number of PQPM’s, and we each focus on a specific product or area of technology. Since I’m still ramping up, the exact product(s) that I will be responsible for haven’t been fully determined.
This week, we’ve had a number of PQPM’s in town for a three-day brainstorming session as a precursor to our global offsite next month. Of course, I’m new to the group, so while I can’t dive into specific pain points, or issues related to our group, I do have the opportunity to take a few steps back, and analyze what’s going on from a more detached view, and try to identify appropriate themes in the discussions. Hopefully, my contributions have been valuable! OK, getting on with this week’s post …
We’re all familiar with the old adage, "it is better to seek forgiveness than ask permission". That was certainly my mantra during my childhood (which explains a lot!). On p. 140 of Greenleaf, the opening paragraph in the "Helping Others to Take Risks" section struck me as somewhat telling:
There are many reasons that people are reluctant to take risks, including fear of failure or loss … no one likes criticism, and everyone hates looking stupid, or losing self-esteem and the good opinion of others. Some may even fear that if they do something well they will then be under pressure to do it again.
A quick disclaimer – since I’ve always been a bit of a rebel (sometimes without a clue), judicious risk-taking is second nature for me. In other words, I can’t always relate to the statement above. However – I have noticed that in previous organizations in which I have worked (my current company is all about smart risk-taking, so what follows doesn’t really apply), there has always been lip service to risk-taking, and a thin veneer of management approval of smart risk-taking, but when it comes down to it, managers and other leaders are quick to distance themselves from the person whose idea didn’t succeed.
My question to the group is twofold: first – are you a risk-taker (smart or not) and second – what has been your experience when things haven’t gone quite as well has planned?
January 21, 2010
Tags: organizational leadership, servant-leadership Posted in: Gonzaga No Comments
Literary Deathmatch – This Ain’t Your Mama’s Book Club
Last Friday night, my plans for the evening were very simple. A couple of drinks at a local watering hole, followed by a late night visit to whichever random drive through happened to grab my attention on the way home. But a funny thing happened halfway through happy hour. A couple of friends of mine that I hadn’t seen in a few months kidnapped me and dragged me along to the Dallas Museum of Art for a Literary Deathmatch. I was unfamiliar with the concept. My initial impression was that perhaps this would involve writers having to improvise a couple of paragraphs on the spot about some random topic, such as “The Sex Life of a Radiator”, or “Dealing with Boredom and Dehydration while stranded on the Desert Island of your choice”. Yes, clearly my mind had taken a walk off the map and was off exploring some exceptionally random possibilities. And no, I was definitely not befuddled by booze. I think the last time that a couple of Malibu and cranberry juice cocktails had any sort of effect on me was when I was twelve years old – but that’s a topic for another time.
The actual format of a Literary Deathmatch (or LDM to the initiated) is as follows:
Opium’s Literary Death Match is a competitive, humor-centric reading series featuring a thrilling mix of four famous and emerging authors who perform their most electric writing before a lively audience and a panel of three all-star judges.
After each pair of readings, the judges–focused on literary merit, performance and intangibles–take turns spouting hilarious, off-the-wall commentary about each story, then select their favorite to advance to the finals.
The two finalists then compete in the Literary Death Match finale, which trades in the show’s literary sensibility for an absurd and comical climax to determine who takes home the Literary Death Match crown.
The key here is humor-centric. That was definitely an understatement. The four authors I was privileged to hear definitely brought the funny! From Katherine Center’s discussion of boobs, and Amelia Gray’s description of basil as “fagweed”, to Willy Razavi’s hilarious account of hunting nutria as an income source, and Will Clarke’s discussion of the Pentecostal Home for Flying Children – the laughs were never in short supply. The judges – Ben Fountain, Tina Parker and Owen Egerton were no slouches in the humor department either …
Unfortunately I missed the LDM finale, but rest assured – the next time the LDM is close by – I will be there!
January 18, 2010
Tags: amelia gray, ben fountain, dallas museum of art, katherine center, literary deathmatch, owen egerton, tina parker, will clarke, william razavi Posted in: Books, Events One Comment
How ‘Bout Them Cowgirls?
Reality check. Adrian Peterson was held to 63 yards rushing … wait, that’s a bright spot for Dallas. Moving on …
Reality check. Dallas’ secondary did not play well at all, and the much vaunted pass rush … wasn’t.
Reality check. The O-Line fell apart and Romo turned the ball over three times.
Reality check. The Cowboys really need to find someone who can kick the ball through the uprights … maybe they’ll be putting a call out to Rafael Septien …
Reality check. Dallas got spanked. Bad. It was so bad that Keith Brooking was reduced to a screaming moron after Favre threw his fourth TD of the day when the Vikings were already up by 24 points.
It just wasn’t a good day for Da ‘Boys. You can be sure the knives will be out for Wade Phillips in tomorrow’s papers, and all over the airwaves. Tony Romo may have won a playoff game at last – but against the Vikings he was reduced to a quivering mass. Dallas’ FG kickers are starting to resemble those of Florida State in the 90’s – wide right, wide left, wide right … and so on.
Here’s the deal – Jerry Jones is going to demand that nothing less than a Super Bowl appearance next season will suffice. After all, the big game is being played in the Jerry Bowl next year. JJ would like nothing more than to commemorate the first Super Bowl in Jerrytown with a Cowboys win. One problem JJ – the team just isn’t consistently good enough for anyone to deliver on that promise. Seven days ago, pundits up and down the NFL scene were hailing Jason Garrett as a play-calling genius. Seven days ago, Dallas were the hottest team in the NFL – the team everyone feared, as one expert put it.
That was seven days ago. Reality has set in. It’s going to be a long offseason for Dallas (again). Wade Phillips is probably going to keep his job based on the win over the Eagles. That would be a mistake. Wade isn’t head coaching material. He’s a phenomenal defensive coordinator, today’s debacle notwithstanding, but as a head coach? Not so much. If the NFL reporters can go more than two days without mentioning Bill Cowher and the Dallas Cowboys in the same sentence, it will be a miracle. This of course is assuming that JJ hands Wade a pink slip, which is by no means a certainty.
Here’s the thing. Bill Cowher is going to want total control over football operations. That means he’s going to want JJ to stick to signing paychecks and staying in his luxury suite during games. JJ may be able to contain himself for half a season at most before he remembers that he’s the owner and starts marauding up and down the sidelines like a demented Energizer bunny with a bad facelift. JJ just wants to be one of the boys. He’s aching to be included. JJ – you’re the owner. Take a tip from the Rooney family. Or the Mara family. Or Robert Kraft. Stay off the sidelines, and let football people run the football side of the business. Your idea of a brilliant trade was to trade a first- and third-round pick for Roy Williams. Thanks a lot for that. Williams is a bust, plain and simple. Every NFL head case and castoff seems to wind up in Jerryville – Demetrius Underwood and Ryan Leaf spring to mind.
Like I said … it’s going to be a long offseason in Dallas. But that doesn’t mean it will be dull …
January 17, 2010
Tags: Dallas Cowboys, jerry jones, tony romo, wade phillips Posted in: Dallas Cowboys No Comments
Servant-Leadership, Restorative Justice and Forgiveness
A quick foreword is in order here. Grad School at Gonzaga is back in full swing as of yesterday. Over the Christmas break, I was thinking about how to capture some of the things I’ve learned from my classes, and I decided to blog them and see what happens. Now, I’m not going to go back and capture everything from the seven classes I’ve already taken – instead I’m focusing on the moment – beginning with my first class in 2010 – Leadership, Justice & Forgiveness (aka ORGL532).
The texts for the first two weeks of class are:
The questions for this week are:
- How would you describe the connection between servant-leadership, restorative justice & forgiveness?
- What are the defining elements of this way of life?
- If you had to explain to someone what servant-leadership and a lifestyle of forgiveness (both asking for forgiveness and granting forgiveness) in one paragraph, what would you say?
As part of this week’s tasks, we’re also required to ask a question of our fellow students – my question to them is at the end of this post.
OK, let’s dive right in …
Servant-leadership emphasizes increased service to others, a holistic approach to work, a sense of community, and shared decision-making power (Reflections on Leadership, p.3). For someone new to Servant-leadership, that sounds like the warm & fuzzy, pie in the sky approach to running things. After all, the word servant has a negative connotation – someone subjugated to others, not a leader, right? If you think about it for a moment though, the best leaders in today’s business environment aren’t necessarily the blood and thunder types. Over the last thirty years, we’ve seen a real paradigm shift in how we view the interpersonal relationships between managers and employees (or team members and leaders). Very few organizations cling to the rigid top-down management structures of years gone by. In today’s business world, a more humanistic approach is required.
Along with this new approach, there is a need to embrace restorative justice. Restorative Justice emphasizes the resolution of injustice by means of understanding and compassion, as well as mutual resolution. We are all far more accustomed to the retributive system of justice wherein good behavior is rewarded, and bad behavior is punished. In a restorative justice model, we seek to understand what happened and move towards positive change. There is a focus on both cause and effect.
What brings servant-leadership and restorative justice together is the ability to truly forgive. Our knee-jerk reaction to being wronged in some fashion generally leads us to reject the person who has wronged us – we hold a grudge. However, as servant-leaders, we must assume the good intentions of others and also recognize that adverse situations present the opportunity to heal our relationships with others as well as both their spirits and our own(Reflections on Leadership, p.5). Without this ability to understand the transgression at a deeper level, and forgive the transgressor, we cannot truly be servant-leaders, nor can we truly practice restorative justice.
Key elements of servant-leadership is rooted in both the empathetic and the commitment to the growth of others. As servant-leaders, we may empathize and accept people – however, that does not mean that we automatically accept that person’s efforts or performance as adequate (Reflections on Leadership, p.51). As servant-leaders we are stewards, committed to serving the needs of others which includes their personal and professional growth. Deeply rooted in this commitment is the ability to forgive and striving for the greater good – namely the growth of the individual, and ultimately the community.
And now, we come to my question to my peers. A key part of servant-leadership is the ability to accept the innate goodness of people, without necessarily accepting their performance as good enough. This has been (and still is) a challenge for me as I hold myself to standards that some might consider unreasonable. How have you been able to reconcile what seems like a contradiction?
January 13, 2010
Tags: Gonzaga, organizational leadership, restorative justice, servant-leadership Posted in: Gonzaga No Comments
Sprinklers and Common Sense
It’s wintertime. Normally in Texas, that means forty degree weather and the need to wear a light jacket. This winter, things are a little different because it’s damn cold. OK, if you’re from the Midwest or Northeast, damn cold to you and damn cold to Texans are two very different things. For us, waking up to temperatures in the twenties means it’s damn cold! We’ve even had snow on three different days! This clearly isn’t your average winter.
This morning while I was feeding the dogs, I was watching a news report about a Richardson police officer who rolled his car and sheared a utility pole after he skidded on a patch of ice and lost control. Normally I wouldn’t have really given the report a second thought – after all, the temperatures were below freezing the previous night. However, in this case – the large patch of ice was the result of someone who had left their sprinklers running. The run-off from the sprinklers had created a pool of water on a busy street – that had then frozen.
Now I ask you – why on earth would you have your sprinklers running in the middle of a cold snap in winter? Yeah – I got nothing either. It’s just plain stupid to run your sprinklers when the weather’s going to be in the high 20’s. While I was driving my daughter to school this morning I noticed that one of the rocket scientists who lives just a block away from the school must have let his sprinklers run all night – because the street looked like an ice rink for about thirty yards. Brilliant. I’m sure all the people turning onto his homegrown ice rink really enjoyed their driving experience this morning.
There should be a special hell for people who do things that are so incredibly dumb and inconsiderate …
January 5, 2010
Tags: Things that Suck Posted in: Things that Suck No Comments