Friday, February 29, 2008

The Secret to a Lasting Marriage: Embrace Imperfection

Here's to all my buddies who are married, getting married, and looking forward to getting married.....

The Secret to a Lasting Marriage: Embrace Imperfection

When I was a little girl, my mom liked to make breakfast food for dinner every now and then. And I remember one night in particular when she had made breakfast after a long, hard day at work.

On that evening so long ago, my mom placed a plate of eggs, sausage,
and extremely burned toast in front of my dad. I remember waiting to see if anyone noticed! Yet, all my dad did was reached for his toast, smiled at my mom, and asked me how my day was at school.

I don't remember what I told him that night, but I do remember
watching him smear butter and jelly on that toast and eat every bite! When I got up from the table that evening, I remember hearing my mom apologize to my dad for burning the toast. And I'll never forget what he said: "Baby, I love burned toast."

Later that night, I went to kiss Daddy good night and I asked him if
he really liked his toast burned. He wrapped me in his arms and said,"Debbie, your mommy put in a hard day at work today and she's real tired. And besides, a little burnt toast never hurt anyone!"

In bed that night, I thought about that scene at dinner...and the
kindness my daddy showed my mom. To this day, it's a cherished memory from my childhood that I'll never forget. And it's one that came to mind just recently when Jack and I sat down to eat dinner.

I had arrived home late...as usual...and decided we would have
breakfast food for dinner. Some things never change, I suppose!

To my amazement, I found the ingredients I needed, and quickly began
to cook eggs, turkey sausage, and buttered toast. Thinking I had things under control, I glanced through the mail for the day. It was only a few minutes later that I remembered that I had forgotten to take the toast out of the oven!

Now, had it been any other day -- and had we had more than two pieces
of bread in the entire house -- I would have started all over. But it had been one of those days and I had just used up the last two pieces of bread. So burnt toast it was!

As I set the plate down in front of Jack, I waited for a comment about the toast. But all I got was a "Thank you!" I watched as he ate bite
by bite, all the time waiting for some comment about the toast. But instead, all Jack said was, "Babe, this is great. Thanks for cooking tonight. I know you had a hard day."

As I took a bite of my charred toast that night, I thought about my
mom and dad...how burnt toast hadn't been a deal-breaker for them. And I quietly thanked God for giving me a marriage where burnt toast wasn't a deal-breaker either!

You know, life is full of imperfect things...and imperfect people. I'm
not the best housekeeper or cook. And you might be surprised to find out that Jack isn't the perfect husband! He likes to play his music too loud, he will always find a way to avoid yard work, and he watches far too many sports. Believe it or not, watching "Golf Academy" is not my idea of a great night at home!

But somehow in the past 37 years Jack and I have learned to accept the imperfections in each other. Over time, we have stopped trying to make
each other in our own mold and have learned to celebrate our differences.You might say that we've learned to love each other for who we really are!

For example, I like to take my time, I'm a perfectionist, and I'm
even-tempered. I tend to work too much and sleep too little. Jack, on the other hand, is disciplined, studious, an early riser, and is a marketer's dream consumer. I count pennies and Jack could care less! Where he is strong, I am weak, and vice versa.

And while you might say that Jack and I are opposites, we're also very
much alike. I can look at him and tell you what he's thinking. I can predict his actions before he finalizes his plans. On the other hand, he knows whether I'm troubled or not the moment I enter a room.

We share the same goals. We love the same things. And we are still
best friends. We've traveled through many valleys and enjoyed many mountaintops. And yet, at the same time, Jack and I must work every minute of every day to make this thing called "marriage" work!

What I've learned over the years is that learning to accept each
other's faults - and choosing to celebrate each other's differences - is the one of the most important keys to creating a healthy, growing, and lasting marriage relationship.

Have a great day! May God bless your marriage.

Sunday, February 24, 2008

Open Source Software, the real benefits

Open Source Software: The real benefits

Open source software is everywhere within user organizations. It is considered acceptable and desirable by user executives for all software categories, in all aspects of the enterprise.

Open source software is sought out, considered and evaluated for more than half of all business software acquisitions worldwide.

User organizations see significant business and competitive value from their use of open source software. Users are drawn to open source due to it's:

-Low cost of acquisition;
-Independence from vendor release and licensing requirements; and
-Ability to manipulate source code -- even by the smallest enterprises.

As a result, open source software has a large and growing, and increasingly unseen, presence within user organizations. The presence of open source is much larger than previously reported - and getting harder to audit and manage. Low cost and ability to manipulate source code means that open source software is (and will be) integrated into user environments, commercial software solutions, and software delivered as a service (SaaS).

It is this mixed-source, "hidden" presence that will change the nature of business software, the software industry itself, and user IT management, within three to five years. A lack of software standardization, increasingly varied and complex code licensing agreements, community development environments, and vendors' need to protect intellectually property (and customer bases) mean that user IT and Finance executives will have their hands full with spiralling requirements for managing technology, IT licensing, and vendor relationships. Vendors will have their own pressing issues, from new competitors to their own licensing issues - with vast changes in technology and product/service development methods and costs.