Thanks to Pfitz for this site!

Sites Visited in the last 12 months. create your own visited states map
or check out these Google Hacks.

Countries visited in my lifecreate your own visited countries map
or vertaling Duits Nederlands

Also check out the Google News Map and Collective Proza,

I got out of work a bit after 5:00 on Wednesday and left for Sebewaing. The roads weren’t too bad but the 2.5 hour trip took about 3.5 hours because of a couple backups and idiot drivers.

Aaron(brother #2) left North Carolina 7:00pm Tuesday night, drove straight, and arrived home at 5:30am. Nathan(brother #4) got home from IWU late Tuesday. Troy (brother #3) spent the weekend in Tx.

Mom’s sister and my two cousins flew “home” from Norway to surprise Grandma and Grandpa. It worked very well. They were well pleased. It also explained why Grandpa wasn’t allowed to talk to Karsen on the phone for the last couple weeks.

We had lunch in Unionville with Mom’s family and then went to Pigeon for the tail end of their Thanksgiving dinner and early Christmas. I spent a “while” doing Tech Support for Grandpa, played some cards, and then we watched some old family videos.(Picture: Clockwise from bottom left: Nathan, Dad, Aaron, dad’s other brother Daryl.)

I planned to spend Friday being productive and doing some work on my car, building some carts, and homework. Instead I went with Aaron to drop some fixtures off at a company Detroit Speed uses to make some parts. The owner gave us a tour of the factory. These parts are just a side venture for Rogers Athletics Company, Stage Right, and the packaging plant for all the SaranWrap in the world. There were lots of cool and expensive equipment such as laser cutters which cut ¾” steel and presses which 6” pipe and 4” solid rods, and a powder coating system which can handle pices 4’ x 5’ x 30’.

Friday night Dad, Aaron, and I made some carts to move and store the stage at church. Aaron is a really good welder and detailed person. His job was to make sure the carts were square and wouldn’t break. My job was to make sure it didn’t take all weekend. Dad was supposed to make sure we didn’t kill each other. We got them done in a couple hours and managed to both survive even though we had a little incident figuring angles out… It was a pretty funny site. I think they turned out really well. They should make setup and teardown a little easier. Aaron is a really good welder so I don’t think they will break anytime soon.

Saturday we went to lunch and Dad’s parents with his brother and a sister. I got to do some more tech support. I got to play with Grandpa’s Christmas present – a VCR to DVD recorder. I copied some old video clips to DVD and will edit and upload some clips later. Some of you will get a kick out of them. It will either help to explain me or just make me a candidate for a mental health thesis.

Sunday was church. I got a couple of “cute” (Am I allowed to use that word?) pics of the pastor’s daughter. She figured out how to reach the drinking fountain. Aaron left at 2:00am(have I mentioned he is insane?), Nathan left in the early afternoon and I left mid afternoon.

Back to the homework I didn’t get done this weekend. Coming up soon - archival pictures from the shoeboxes and old family videos. I know you just can’t wait!!!!

Are we there yet?,
originally uploaded by endofnow.

Driving home. Average speed 41 mph. Currently 15 Mph. Must be an accident. At least i can blog and think about what to do with the time off. update: pickup in median.

THIS JUST IN!!!! Oh Happy Day!!!!

From time to time the question is raised, “Why doesn’t the university just shut down during the week between Christmas and New Years? It is very slow and we’d all like the extra time off.” Well, for a variety of reasons, the decision was always made to keep the university open while allowing many (might I even say ‘most’) employees to take vacation days during that time.

The question surfaced again in both the Best Christian Workplace survey and the Stamats survey and, as a result, we decided to review the idea one more time. This time, however, we’ve come to a different answer.

I’m pleased to announce to you that this year the university will be closed for the week of December 26-30. Merry Christmas!!

Such an announcement probably raises a few questions:

First, why the different answer this year? Actually, there are a couple of reasons for the different answer. First, we recognize that everyone here works hard to meet the needs of students and we desire for our staff to experience a ‘Sabbath rest’ from their labors. Students are with us nearly all the time from late August to early May and so this mid-year break seems like the right time to offer everyone a rest. Second, since many people do take all or part of that week as vacation, there are natural restrictions on the amount of work that is being completed during that week. So, it was decided to close the institution for the week

Second, who does this include? With the exception of critical functions such as campus safety or switchboard or broadcasting, this week of closure will be for all staff. The vice president of your area will help you determine if you are performing a critical function and, if you are, we will provide for you appropriately. In the end, it will be the decision of your vice president and the Human Resources office to determine the criticality of your function and the appropriate benefit for your work that week.

Third, can I count on this for future years? Right now I have to say ‘no.’ We will assess the impact of the week’s closing early in 2006 and then make a determination for the future. We are open to the possibility of making this a regular vacation for all staff but we will have to wait to see how it works this year.
…trim….
I trust that you find this news encouraging and that you will find the Christmas week to be restful and restorative to both body and spirit. We appreciate all that you do to make Cornerstone University a better place and we are pleased to offer you this time away from work at this very significant time of the year.

Blessings.

Bob

Robert W. Nienhuis, Ph.D.
Executive Vice President
and Chief Academic Officer

I’m not normally a Christmas lights guy. Don’t get me wrong, I like the season and I like looking at creative light setup, but I’m not huge on doing lights myself. After seeing this video my opinion is wavering. Do I have any volunteers?

Guess What? It’s OK to look the Salvation Army bell ringers in the eye when you walk by. He won’t think of you as an evil person if you just give a friendly hello. Sneaking around behind him isn’t isn’t very effective either. Just give up, look at him, smile, and maybe even say hello.

I learned this though being one of the bell ringers for an hour on Saturday. It was an interesting and new experience outside of my comfort zone. I was surprised by traffic flow of people in and out of the Wallgreens and even more so by the percentage of people who actually put money into the kettle.

A quiet, short kid in baggy closhes and looked to be about 13 dug into his pocket and dropped some change in on his way in. After leaving he walked past me, turned around, put some more change in, and started walking away. After walking about 10 steps he turned around, dug a little deeper and dropped some more in. Finally, he walked about 2 steps away, turned, and emptied his pockets. I was curious at this point so I tried to strike up a conversation. He wasn’t much for that idea but asked if the money was going to a shelter. I said it was going to the Salvation Army and they do a lot of things. I didn’t get to talk to him for long but I wonder what his story is.

Cornerstone committed to manning two stations for 9 days –about 180 shifts. The Fulton Heights Citadel has 26 stations and raises about $250,000 through the kettles.

About The Red Kettle Christmas Campaign
The Red Kettle Christmas Campaign enables the Army to provide food, toys and clothing to over 6 million people during the Christmas season and helps more than 34 million Americans recovering from all kinds of personal disasters nationwide.

The Red Kettle campaign, first started in San Francisco in 1891, has traditionally been The Salvation Army’s most prominent fund-raiser. In 2004, the campaign raised over $100 million in communities nationwide, with the nickels, dimes, quarters and dollars all remaining in the towns where the money was deposited into the kettles. The funds raised help support many of the 37 million people in poverty who turn to the Army for food and toys at Christmas, utility and homeless assistance, senior and child care, drug abuse treatment and many other social service needs.
http://www.ringbells.org/

If you you like the opportunity to ring a bell go over here.

Check out this video.

Ok, time for a semi-serious post.

I start my last PGS class tonight: Philosophy of Leadership. One of my assignments is to interview three leaders asking their answers to the following questions “Do you believe leaders are made or born?” and “Is leadership an art or a science?”

I interviewed Brian Rienhardt, Denise Grinnell, and Dr. Rogers. What is your opinion? I’ve already completed the interviews so this question is for discussion and to satisfy my curiosity.

By looking at a picture of a person, you have to decide if he is a computer geek or a serial killer. Go with your gut geeling and click on your choice. There are 10 photos. Your score will be given at the end.

I got 7 out of 10 correct.

http://www.malevole.com/mv/misc/killerquiz/

Close only counts in hand grenades and pregnancy tests….
~Tom Bosscher