Since I’m obviously not getting a lot of work done this afternoon (clearing out some stuff I’ve been meaning to post but haven’t gotten around to yet while waiting for people to return my calls—like that’s going to happen), here’s something that cracked me up when my dad sent it to me earlier this week: New dog breeds.

The following breeds are now recognized by the AKC:
Collie + Lhasa Apso = Collapso, a dog that folds up easy for transporting
Spitz + Chow Chow = Spitz-Chow, a dog that throws up alot
Pointer + Setter = Poinsetter, a traditional Christmas pet
Great Pyrenees + Dachshund = Pyradachs, a puzzling breed
Pekingnese + Lhasa Apso = Peekasso, an abstract dog
Irish Water Spaniel + English Springer Spaniel = Irish Springer, a dog fresh and clean as a whistle
Labrador Retriever + Curly Coated Retriever = Lab Coat Retriever, the choice of research scientists
Newfoundland + Basset Hound = Newfound Asset Hound, a dog for financial advisors
Terrier + Bulldog = Terribull, a dog that makes awful mistakes
Bloodhound + Labrador = Blabador, not a popular dog with CIA agents
Malamute + Pointer = Moot Point, owned by… oh, well, it doesn’t matter anyway
Collie + Malamute = Commute, a dog that travels to work
Deerhound + Terrier = Derriere, a dog that’s true to the end

OK, back to work.

I just couldn’t resist sharing this one with you. If you like this sort of thing, there are lots more over at Worth 1000’s visual pun Photoshopping contest.

This site is too hilarious: Dumb things said in, and by, restaurants. A couple of my favorites:

Eat Here - Get Gas” — A sign at a gas station.
Just the chicken.” — The response a waitress gave when asked if there were any dairy products in a soup.
“Parking for drive-through customers only.” — A sign at a McDonald’s in California.

The tourism follies are pretty funny, too. And don’t miss this one: Why Americans Should Not Be Allowed to Travel

(Via UNLV professor Patti Shock.)

If you or your attendees suffer from “Blackberry hand,” help is on the way. According to a press release I just got, The Spa at Camelback Inn has added a 30-Minute “Berry” Thumb Conditioning treatment that “It focuses on pressure points and has a learning component. Guests are taught thumb exercises and thumb stretches to prevent and treat aches from overusing the BlackBerry (something almost impossible not to do!)” The Hashani spa at the JW Marriott Starr Pass Resort also is offering a
30-Minute “Berry Break” hand massage that “begins with the guest holding a warm stone in each hand while their hands are wrapped in warm towels infused with blackberry or other seasonal scent” and goes on from there, ending with a cup of blackberry tea.

Groups can order the latter, but they have to leave their PDAs behind.

When it’s coming from meetings displaced from New Orleans, it is, according to this article in the Atlanta Journal Constitution:

Mark Vaughan doesn’t normally try to talk convention planners out of bringing their business to Atlanta, but that’s exactly what he’s been doing lately with groups committed to holding meetings in rival New Orleans.

Atlanta has gotten a boost from the 10 conventions with about 122,000 attendees that will relocate here over the next two years because of Hurricane Katrina. Yet when groups approach Vaughan and other Atlanta officials about moving a show, the first thing they do is encourage organizers to keep the event in New Orleans.

“We tell them we would prefer they respect their contract and honor their agreement with New Orleans,” said Vaughan, executive vice president of sales and marketing for the Atlanta Convention & Visitors Bureau, an agency that recruits meetings to Georgia’s capital. “We are trying to be a good neighbor.”

Atlanta also is a partner with New Orleans in promoting the region, along with Nashville. While I applaud the sentiment, if the meeting is leaving NOLA no matter what, it makes sense for another Southern city to pick it up and keep the region humming. I’m hoping for the best when conventions start heading back to the Big Easy this spring, but I still have reservations on how prepared the city will be to handle a large convention. I hope I’m wrong.

P.S. Here’s an interesting article on measuring the cost of hotel interruption from Katrina, from hotel-online.

According to an article in Promo magazine, the Society of Incentive & Travel Executives had a banner year in 2005. From the article:

For the first time in SITE’s 32-year history, more than 2,000 incentive and travel executives representing more than 82 counties belong to the Chicago-based the organization. SITE recruited more than 500 new members and retained 87% of its members in 2005.

I admit that I’ve received some strange things from CVBs, hotel chains, and other industry suppliers, but live snakes, rubber-scented candles, and umbrellas with holes in them? Not yet, thankfully! But according to Promo magazine, these are among the “most distinctive” premiums companies are sending out these days. From the Promo article on a survey conducted by The Creative Group:

Often, companies try to reach potential customers with rather unique gifts and premiums to boost awareness and instill a lasting memory about its brand.

“Typically [those gifts] are delivering some sort of message,” said Carolyn Dacey, division director, The Creative Group, Paramus, NJ. “At the end of the day, it’s got your brand on it and is getting your name front of [mind].”

For example, a rock could mean the gift-giver is a rock-solid company, Dacey said. A rubber-scented candle means the company will “burn rubber or move quickly for you,” she said. “It makes you think.”

But for some reason, respondents said that toy outhouses, bricks, plastic cockroaches, pigeons, chicken wishbone paperweights, lab coats, and miniature airlines seats weren’t as good as live snakes. Go figure.

I always thought that being successful could make you happy, but now it appears, according to a study from the American Psychological Association, it’s really the other way around:

From a review of 225 studies in the current issue of Psychological Bulletin, published by the American Psychological Association (APA), lead author Sonja Lyubomirsky, Ph.D., of the University of California, Riverside found that chronically happy people are in general more successful across many life domains than less happy people and their happiness is in large part a consequence of their positive emotions rather than vice versa. Happy people are more likely to achieve favorable life circumstances, said Dr. Lyubomirsky, and “this may be because happy people frequently experience positive moods and these positive moods prompt them to be more likely to work actively toward new goals and build new resources. When people feel happy, they tend to feel confident, optimistic, and energetic and others find them likable and sociable. Happy people are thus able to benefit from these perceptions.

Hmm, this sounds a bit to me like happiness is perceived as extroversion (i.e., likable and sociable), so maybe it’s not happiness that really leads to success, but appearing to be extroverted. Which brings me back to this post about the qualities of extroversion and introversion. If this line of reasoning follows, then introverts are perceived to be depressed, which, according to a timesonline article, means:

Another potential drawback of consistent happiness was the danger that happy people could slip into hedonism or inappropriate risk taking. The authors noted that mildly depressed people were most likely to excel in jobs such as monitoring a nuclear power plant, where constant vigilance for possible problems was essential.

So meeting planners, who also must maintain constant vigilance for potential problems, probably need to be perceived as having a mix of introversion and extroversion, happiness and mild depression, to both do the job and get ahead. Huh?? If you can make sense of all this, you’re a better person than I! Or maybe just a happier one?

For a semi-related post, check out Soulful Work Is About A Revolution from The Alchemy of Soulful Work (which is a terrific read).

On Fast Company Now, Heath Row talks about a Wall Street Journal article (subscription req’d) on peer-recognition programs that are now making a comeback. Three mentioned in the article:

* Yum Brands offers Customer Mania peer recognition cards that colleagues can use to indicate how someone exceeds in hospitality, accuracy, and speed — by giving them to a peer on the spot.
* Symantec holds quarterly conference calls to name and recognize recipients of the Serendipity award. The award doesn’t include a gift, but the public recognition is important and powerful.
* And Boeing provides an online form employees can use to nominate colleagues, print out certificates, and even send email alerts that someone’s efforts are appreciated.

I read the comments to his post, where Heath asks what programs people have at their places of work, with great interest. Then I ran across this one:

At my company they give a gold star on a departmental chart for exceptional, above and beyond service. Once you recieve 50 stars, they give you a %1 raise and a %2 bonus. After 100 stars you are then laid-off because you are making too much money.

While it’s tongue-in-cheek, I’m sure, it’s also all too true for all too many these days that monetary rewards can come back to bite employees. While we write articles on motivating and incentivizing employees all the time, I can’t help but wonder what really works. I like the idea of the “rock on jar” one Fast Co. commenter mentions.