Dan Garwood

Dan Garwood was promoted from within our group to being our group's manager when Steve Kauder left. One event that bears mentioning is that during one project, he and I did some fancy computer graphics stuff with the HP logo for an upcoming trade show. Everyone thought it was cool, but somehow one of the corporate lawyers got wind of it, and put a stop to our "misuse" of the HP logo. This experience engendered the not-terribly-affectionate term, "logo police."

Dan was very competent yet funny and enjoyable guy, and he had an affinity for making jokes of the kind where what he said sounded almost right, but not quite. People's typical response was an auditory double-take. This was so common, they gained a status on their own: they were called "Garwoodisms." He had a whole passel of not-quite-right farewells in many foreign languages. For example, instead of "hasta mañana," he would say "hasty bananas" and instead of "auf wiedersehen" he would say "our feet are the same," and so on.

Dan had been in the Navy during the Vietnam war, and had one experience that had given him a fear of heights; hence, the double-meaning request in verse four. When Dan left our department, he went to Product Marketing to manage the procurement of computer displays and keyboards.

(back to "Farewell Poems" Table of Contents)

When consid'ring a job you're just itching to do,
Just how would you break it to others?
Maybe "There's a position I'd like to pursue. . ."?
Or maybe "If I had my druthers. . ."?
There are many appropriate ways to describe
Your plans to abandon the ship,
Like slipping a fiver to someone you've bribed
To pretend that he let something slip.
Well, Dan didn't even do one of these things,
But he casually went on vacation
To celebrate Christmas--the joy that it brings--
Saying nothing of his application,
And the fact it was already all said and done.
His people had nary a clue,
But were skiing and partying, having their fun,
With whatever they wanted to do.
But I guess that we shouldn't have been real surprised:
He'd already applied once in Greeley;
And with some reflection, we should have surmised
He was no longer happy, not really.
So vacation was over and when we came back
Into work, he announced it was over.
Some eyes opened widely, some jawbones went slack,
And I think that the air became colder.
But after the shock of his vanishing act,
We remembered that this is quite normal:
All HP departments enlarge and contract,
With these transfers, offical and formal.
Dan continues to rise in his corporate climb,
With these new opportunities found,
But don't get so high in those heights so sublime
You get nervous about looking down!
So Dan's on his way to work on displays
With amazingly high resolution;
He'll work with convergence and phosphor decay
And lessen their RF pollution.
He'll also bring in liquid-crystal displays,
And those of the field emissions,
With millions of colors and 16-bit grays,
For exceedingly faithful renditions.
And keyboards will fit in there somewhere, I'm sure--
He'll have time he won't know what to do with--
When keyboards are sick, he'll prescribe them a cure
To get rid of a stubborn snafu with.
And when tough decisions will have to be made,
He'll dictate a "go" or a "no-go,"
But remember the rules that must be obeyed,
Like "Don't mess with our dear HP logo!"

(back to "Farewell Poems" Table of Contents)