Slow Day At Work - Blog

Who are they studying?

noreply@blogger.com (Just a Blogger) — Thu, 09 Feb 2012 16:56:00 +0000

OK, it's been WAY too long since I have had fun posting to this blog. I just read an article on Yahoo claiming that people with easy to pronounce names end up getting the promotions. http://shine.yahoo.com/work-money/want-promotion-change-name-213400665.html

I think this study was done by someone who skewed the data. The guy gathering the data thought to himself, "I don't know how to spell that name, so I won't include it in my study." Here's a list of names of people who have received promotions I have worked with:

Reinhert
Mulberry
Rindlisbacher
Ray <- Hey there's an easy one!
Healander

and who is at the top of the ladder around here?

Jugganaikloo

Bad World Cup Referee

noreply@blogger.com (Just a Blogger) — Wed, 23 Jun 2010 17:01:00 +0000

OK it's been long enough since I have posted something on here. I am a huge USA Soccer fan. When World Cup comes around, let's just say everything else is put on hold for a couple hours that day. I am so glad that we were able to pull off an AMAZING victory today in the extra minutes! What a game. In the mean time, I saw a picture of the referee from our last game and instantly this is what I saw.

Original:

My perception:

"Obama Tags" A message from Rex Rammell's web designer

noreply@blogger.com (Just a Blogger) — Mon, 31 Aug 2009 17:39:00 +0000

Enough harassment already.

I can brush off behavior like Eugene Krasnoff's (but I did talk to a lawyer this morning about his recent behavior), but the harassment I'm tired of receiving is political backlash from something I wasn't even a part of. Last week a client I designed a web site for made a comment about purchasing or selling hunting tags for President Obama. (Read the whole story here) He then refused to apologize for making such a crude statement.

When the story went national his email box was FLOODED with hate mail in a matter of minutes. I've never seen anything like it. He also said that his voice mail was filled up rather quickly. I can understand why! You just don't say things like that about ANYONE, let alone the President of the United States.

The harassment towards me started when a few people decided they would find out who owned the domain name for his web site. I normally purchase all domains for my clients because it saves a lot of head ache with renewals and site setup.

I'm keeping names out of this story to protect the identities of those involved (Something I wish could be done for me). First I received this email from someone who is a domain lawyer and holds a Ph. D.:

Hey that Rex is a real funny guy.
That joke about "Obama tags" for killing the #!&%$ president was just a side-splitting funny thing to say.
I hope your kind stays the $@(# in Idaho.

At this point I was thinking, "Wow, I would think someone with a Ph. D. would be able to express their opinion without using cuss words, but this shouldn't go to far for me"

Then the next e-mail came:

"How come the Rex Rammell web site you made isn't selling the Obama tags? Shouldn't all you @%!@#& be in the same mudpit together?
I think it would be funny if we started selling 'Rammell' tags and tags for people like you that help him promote his message. Now that would be funny..."

A few of them were a little more threatening than this, but after receiving these e-mails, I do not know if I believe any longer that democrats are peace promoting people. (OK, so really I do, and I understand that there are "Radicals" - the likes of Rex Rammell - in both parties.)

Then the phone calls started coming in because you legally have to list your phone number with a purchased domain name. I pick up the phone and just get an ear full of cuss words. I immediately hung up.

The next call came in and went along the lines of this:

Caller: Since your name is listed as the domain owner, that makes you a racist pig.
Me: (I couldn't just hold my tongue.) Do you shop at Wal-mart.
Caller: Yes.
Me: I guess that makes you a communist then. Wal-mart buys products from China and since you support Wal-mart, you support communism. Just because someone purchased a web site from me, does not mean I support them or there political aspirations. I've done plenty of sites for politicians that I did not vote for."
Caller: (Dead silence.....)

Lastly, someone decided they would go through my entire web design portfolio and contact all of my clients asking if I would like for me to post something on their web sites about the "Obama" tags. So Saturday night I stayed up late sending out emails to all my clients explaining that I did not send the e-mails. I also explained the Eugene situation to them as well.

So after receiving all of this political backlash for something I did not do I'm left wondering, "Should I run for Governor of Idaho?" At least then the backlash I'll receive is for stuff I've done.
CLOSING NOTE: I DO NOT support Rex Rammell nor his views towards President Obama. I first met Rex when I did a web site for his elk business before he was ever labelled as having any of these, what I call, "Radical Issues". When he decided to run for office he had me develop him a campaign web site. I have personally contacted him and asked him to apologize for his statements.

Eugene Krasnoff. He's back!

noreply@blogger.com (Just a Blogger) — Wed, 26 Aug 2009 16:38:00 +0000

If you've followed me for a few months, you'll remember Eugene - the guy that lied to me while trying to sell me a domain name. As a web conscious person, I figured others out there may be looking for feedback about Eugene Krasnoff so I posted about him and his business style.

Well I guess Eugene Krasnoff googled his own name and found my blog. He contacted me recently and here's what he had to say:

First of I don't appreciate personal attack on my reputation
throughout the internet community. http://blog.slowdayatwork.com/2009/03/domain-squatting.html
Now, was that really necessary to post personal e-mail correspondence on you
blog? I suggest to remove that post immediately. If you decide to keep it, then
do so. But expect some feedback.
All the Best, Eugene

Now what I want to know is, when does SPAM become personal e-mail? I wonder what kind of "feedback" I'll be getting. I guess if I come up missing, Eugene's contact info is listed on my blog. Maybe it's a good thing that I work with the cops on a weekly basis. He'd be the first person I'd look into.

Or maybe even better, Eugene is going to go and post negative information about me on the internet. I love how negative reviews on other websites can drive good traffic to a website. It's a trick that a lot of companies use to get more traffic to their website. Why else would celebrities do all the dumb things they do? It drives ratings!

"It's called planning"

noreply@blogger.com (Just a Blogger) — Wed, 22 Jul 2009 19:25:00 +0000

Last Friday one of my co-workers was laid off. The reason given was, "Financial Reasons." Sure financial reasons were part of it, but I believe this issue goes A LOT deeper. He was the planning and zoning administrator for our city so obviously there were going to be disagreements between he and others.

Now that he is no longer working here, we do not have a planning and zoning administrator. Does it worry me that no more planning will happen around here? A little. The whole reason for my post though was to point out a somewhat funny letter to the editor in the local paper this morning. The guy basically pointed out it was a mistake to fire this guy and that the local finance leader, mayor and city council should have been setting aside money for a rainy day. Then he made this perfect comment, "It's called planning."

If you want to read the whole story and some funny comments to the story visit: http://www.rexburgstandardjournal.com/articles/2009/07/22/news/48.txt

What is this lump?

noreply@blogger.com (Just a Blogger) — Mon, 22 Jun 2009 14:25:00 +0000

Friday night I went to a program with some old friends. While catching up with one guy he started telling me about his job. He owns a fitness center. I commented that he probably sees quite a few crazy people. He started laughing and said, "Yeah."

He told me about this old man who is about 80 years old that started lifting weights about 4 weeks ago. One day this old man came over to him and said, "I'm a little worried. After I started lifting, I got this lump in my right arm. My wife thinks I need to go to the doctor, but will you just feel it and tell me what you think." My friend said, "Sure. Let me feel it." So he feels this guys right arm and then asked if he could feel the guys other arm. He felt the two arms a couple of times and then started to chuckle a little bit.

He said to the guy, "I don't think you need to see the doctor. This lump in your arm is a bicep." The old guy hand been doing curls with both arms, but was only lifting with his right arm. Just goes to show that you are never too old to pump iron.

Who's is this?

noreply@blogger.com (Just a Blogger) — Fri, 05 Jun 2009 14:10:00 +0000

Three days a week I get up early to play basketball with about 8-10 other guys in the church gymnasium. The other morning right after we started there was a fast break and someone scored. We went back down to the other end of the gym. As we were all standing there, one of the guys who plays, holds up something black and says, "Who's is this?"

We all looked down the court to see him holding a black thong. No one claimed it. I can just see it on Sunday when the bishop gets up to the pulpit and announces, "We found this in the gym this week so if it's your please claim it."

What's your name?

noreply@blogger.com (Just a Blogger) — Fri, 29 May 2009 20:42:00 +0000

I just got off the phone with technical support. Most of the time the issues I raise with technical support can be answered rather quickly and don't require the "big dogs" help, but this time my technical issue was a little more than just a quick answer.

I was transferred from the first department to a more specialized department. When the second department answered the guy on the phone said, "Eh low, dis is Chad from ______. I will be hepping jew wit dis issue." (I'm trying to portray a very thick Indian accent here bare with me) I immediately thought to myself, "Obviously this is not your real name. Why do you all have such generic names? Early I spoke with Sean and then Bob." I didn't say anything though because I needed "Chad's" help.

Well Chad wasn't able to help me over the phone and needed me to send him an email attachment. So he sent me an email to reply to. Here's what it read:

Hi,

I am Gaurav from _____ Support Services and I will be working with you on this incident. As discussed, please send me the web application for reproducing and debugging this issue.

Regards,

Gaurav M.

Wait a minute Gaurav! Which cell phone company do you work for and what have you done with Chad?!?!?

Right out of Napoleon Dynamite

noreply@blogger.com (Just a Blogger) — Fri, 08 May 2009 15:46:00 +0000

If you are an animal lover, stop reading now. MOM, this means you.

My friend was telling me about a time he was taking a pig to the slaughter house a few days ago. He said as he was driving down the road he saw his pig trying to climb out of the trailer. He looked in the rear view mirror just in time to see the escaping pig flop over the top of the trailer wall. As he watched out the rear view mirror all he could think was, "Oh....there goes my bacon.....Oh there goes my ham....my bacon......my ham......my bacon.....my ham."

So he hurried out of the truck and grabbed his rope to lasso the pig. At this point the pig was squealing REALLY loudly. All the kids in the neighborhood started coming out of there houses to see what was going on with the screaming pig. They all watched in horror as he tied up the pig and shoved it back in the trailer and drove a block down to the meat market.

I'm guessing that night some of the parents had to explain to there children why the man was taking that screaming pig to the meat shop down the street.

I shared this story with my co-worker and he said, "I had an experience like that once. One night I was driving home from work and saw something really big in the middle of the road in front of my house. As I got there I realized it was a horse that had fallen out of a horse trailer. The people that were driving the trailer were down the street headed back. The horse had broken it's back and so it couldn't move."

When the guy in the trailer got back he said, "The worst part is that this is not my horse. I was just hauling him for someone else." Then he asked my friend if my friend had a gun. My friend said, "Yeah, let me go get it." When my friend got back, the guy asked him if he'd be willing to put the horse out of it's misery. So my friend shot the horse.

About this time, a group of young men and young women were leaving the church just down the street. Of course they had to drive as slow as they could right past my friend holding a rifle, standing over a bloody dead horse.

I just couldn't help but think of Napoleon Dynamite when the farmer shoots the cow behind the school bus. Oh, you've got to love Idaho!

FlorIDA

noreply@blogger.com (Just a Blogger) — Mon, 20 Apr 2009 15:07:00 +0000

Last week we attended the Northern Rockies URISA conference for GIS Users. At the conference there was a guest keynote speaker named Patrick McGaughey. He was a fun "enter-trainer". He was giving away prizes for people who participated in his classes. Anyway, this picture is of a shirt that he was giving away and I was lucky enough to receive one of them:

His reasoning for creating the shirt is, "If Florida is the number #1 state for tourism, why not turn around and visit Idaho next time?!? We won't mind being #2 and you will love the lakes, the mountains, the deserts and most of all, the People!"

April Fools Joke

noreply@blogger.com (Just a Blogger) — Sat, 04 Apr 2009 04:52:00 +0000

One of my co-workers just had a new baby last week. This put him out of the office for 4 days leading up to April Fools day. The day before April Fools I realized he was going to be back the next day. We had to do something to welcome him back.

We thought about switching his cubicle around in reverse, but didn't think it would get much of a reaction. Then we thought about turning his desk in his cube so that it was blocking the entrance. Too much work. Then I thought, "Why don't we use part of his desk and make it look like someone else has a computer set up in his cubicle with him."

For the past few months one of the other departments at work has been hiring interns like crazy. It's to the point that they have run out of room to place them. This situation made it so our prank was somewhat believable.

We stole half of his desk and put it in the opposite corner from his computer. Setup a computer, placed a notepad on the desk and filled out a time sheet for the past two days. Then waited for him to come back to work on Wednesday.

Wednesday morning we heard our boss' phone ring. It was him saying he was going to be in later that day. Finally he came in. The first thing he asked was, "What is this, some kind of April Fools?" Of course we had to tell him no. We all just went back to work like it was nothing big.

He never really fell for the prank totally, but we had him a little nervous. It probably would have been better to pull this prank on a day that wasn't April Fools. I've definately pulled better ones, but it was still fun.

Domain Squatting

noreply@blogger.com (Just a Blogger) — Thu, 26 Mar 2009 22:29:00 +0000

I haven't posted for awhile. I've been somewhat backed up at work after taking nearly two weeks off. I've been saving this post for a few days now, and figured I have a few minutes so I better share.

For those of you who are not familiar with domain name squatting, basically it is the process of buying a domain name, sitting on it, and hoping to make some money from it. I do web design as a side hobby and last week I had a very fun exchange with someone who was doing just this. The email exchanges follow:

Eugene:
Hello, I am Eugene Krassnoff, owner of the web domain: WebDesignerIdaho.com I am currently offering this domain "for sale". Should your organization, have interest in acquiring this domain, please feel free to contact me within 24 hours. Kind Regards, -Eugene 954 709-2937 (I left his contact info in here in case you need
it.)

Me (9:01 AM): (Purely out of curiousity) What is your asking price?

Eugene (9:03 AM): Thank you for your email. My asking price is $199 (paypal). I'm looking forward to hearing from you soon. Kind Regards, Eugene.

Me (9:04 AM): Do you have an appraisal I can see? (Just to test him. This is where it gets good.)

Eugene (9:19 AM): That domain is one of a kind and it is priceless. Only one person can own WebDesignerIdaho.com which gives you instant credabillity. (Yes INSTANT CREDIBILITY!) The domain gets 2,990,000 searches for that exact term on Google. $199 would be a small price to pay for someone who is serious to start a web design business in Idaho.

Me (9:30 AM): I'll take that as a no.

Eugene (1:52 PM): (Obviously no one else responded now that he is coming back to me 4.5 hours later) I'm willing to reduce the price up to $125 for quick sale. If interested, simpy reply within 24 hours.

Me (2:04 PM): Eugene,

You'll be lucky to get $30 for this domain.

1. You lie about the searches for the domain. There are barely 1 million people in Idaho. There is no way this term gets than many searches.
2. This domain is VERY young. A simple whois search does not even show you as the owner on some whois searches as of this morning.
3. There are 100's of other domains that a business would rather use than a long domain like this.

Please study up domain name trades, before trying to make a quick buck. Had you offered this domain to me originally for $40-$50 I may have been interested, but judging your ethics I don't trust you.
By the way, webdesignerutah.com is available. Do you want to buy it from me? It's worth atleast $399. Utah has twice as many people as Idaho.

So today I was thinking, "I wonder if Eugene actually bought that domain." A quick visit to http://www.who.is/ and looky, looky:

Domain Name: webdesignerutah.com
Registrar: Name.com LLC
Expiration
Date: 2010-03-19 20:11:54
Creation Date: 2009-03-19 20:11:54

Name
Servers:
ns1.parked.com
ns2.parked.com

REGISTRANT CONTACT INFO
Eugene Krassnoff
Eugene Krassnoff
4 north fed hwy
Dania, FL
33004
USPhone: +1.9547092937
Email Address: krassnoff@yahoo.com

All I have to say is TOO FUNNY.

Disneyland - The Happiest Place on Earth

noreply@blogger.com (Just a Blogger) — Mon, 16 Mar 2009 15:26:00 +0000

For the past week and a half I've been away from work at Disneyland - The Happiest Place on Earth. The place is a lot of fun especially when you take young children. The glow in their eyes as you go on rides is so much fun to see.

One thing I learned is some people have no concept of what a line is. Last Monday night we stayed "late" to watch the fireworks show. It was awesome. A few problems with staying for the end of the show is that almost everyone else at the park does the same thing and young children who are used to going to bed early don't do so well. Everyone else staying late makes it somewhat difficult to get out and back to the parking structure. Mix in crying children and Disneyland quickly becomes The Most Anxious Place on Earth.

There is a little tram that takes people from Downtown Disney to the parking structure. The lines for the tram were huge after the firework show. As we were standing in line, this young couple came and cut in front of us. I was ticked. My son that is about 8 months old was not having a good night and was crying. The guy in the couple glared at me with a look of disgust almost to say, "Get your child to stop crying." I was even more ticked. So I took my son away from my wife and stood right behind the guy, and pointed my crying child at him so he could enjoy cutting in line even more. When the line moved a little bit, I noticed him try to move up further away from us, but I made sure he didn't get away. I pointed my son's mouth right at the back of his head.

Maybe next time he'll think twice about cutting in front of a family with young tired children. Then again probably not.

The brawl that begins with prayer

noreply@blogger.com (Just a Blogger) — Fri, 27 Feb 2009 05:52:00 +0000

Every year about this time of year our church puts on a little basketball tournament. It's a lot of fun when people can keep tempers controlled, but when a lot of hacking goes on and the referees are afraid to blow the whistle, WATCH OUT!

There is a long standing joke that church basketball is the brawl that begins with prayer because we pray before each game. It's kind of ironic how the prayers often go. "...and please help us to have good sportmanship, and to be safe...."

Tonight I participated in one of these ~~ball~~ brawl games. Our team consists of some older men compared to the other teams. I'm the youngest on our team at 28 and the oldest is 42. The team we played tonight probably was all under 26. My favorite part about these games is watching all these guys who are out of shape due to desk jobs, try to relive their glory days from high school. Let's face it, your mind is still in shape and can move as well if not even faster than it could during those teen years, but your body just can't! It's part of life. You get old and slow down. That's why when you are beating a team younger than you it's funny.

These younger guys were so frustrated that we were beating them. At one point one of the young guys pretty much body checked a guy on our team after a layup. The guy on our team is used to getting hit though. He played quarterback for a college football team. So he just shrugged it off.

At the end of the game we were winning by 10 points with about 6 seconds left. The ball was passed to me and I just stood there waiting for time to run out. Then I looked up and this kid came charging at me, like he was going to pull some miracle shot that was worth 11 points by stealing the ball. I was afraid he was going to tackle me. So when he got within about 4 feet of me, I just passed the ball to him. It hit him in the chest and fell to the ground. The buzzer rang and we walked off the court. He just stood there almost like he was thinking, "What just happened?" I figured if he wanted the ball that bad, he could have it.

What am I going to do now that we won a church ball game? I'm going to Disneyland! No, really I am. I'm glad I'll be in Disneyland for the next two games. It could just save my life!

I found an image to share with you on flickr just in case you don't believe me that this is dangerous stuff: www.flickr.com/photos/blackskydawn/3054554004/

And to finish it off. A video:

Politicians Are

noreply@blogger.com (Just a Blogger) — Wed, 25 Feb 2009 22:35:00 +0000

Politicians are, well politicians. That's like saying Lawyers are liars.

I attended our "State of the City" presentation given by the local mayor today. He actually did a really good job and the state of our city is great compared to others. We have a great employment rate here, have hardly been hit by the economic storm sweeping across most of America, and it's almost 40 degrees today.

The thing that made me laugh is he presented some awards to citizens in the community who have done a lot of good work and service over the years. It's not that he gave these awards, but it's what he called them. "The Unsung Hero Award." How does an unsung hero receive an award? Once they receive the award, they are no longer unsung.

Congratulations to those who had the song taken right out of them.

The Fed's Step It Up Program

noreply@blogger.com (Just a Blogger) — Tue, 24 Feb 2009 21:00:00 +0000

Last week I was ranting about our work's step it up program and how we as Americans like life to be easy. Who doesn't? This morning I was talking to Intern 2.0, (we might upgrade to 2.1 soon) and he pointed out that the government has their own version of the step it up program. It's called the TV Converter Box Coupon Program.

This is the epitome of a Step It Up program for a few reasons. You see, the government pushed back the date of the digital conversion. Why? Well there are a few million out there who can't afford to purchase a converter box.

How does this relate to the Step It Up program? Well just like the step it up program here at work, the government is trying to make things easier for us. Since a few million people out there won't get off the couch and go make $40 to purchase a new converter box, we have to give them the money to do it. We wouldn't want to make people work for anything in this country now would we? No.

Way to encourage us to be the fat Americans that we are! Hmmm, and we wonder why we're having a credit crisis. We the people want everything hand fed to us.

Oh, and in case you didn't know, you can super size the converter box coupons and get two.

Step It Up

noreply@blogger.com (Just a Blogger) — Thu, 19 Feb 2009 23:37:00 +0000

Here is a perfect example of why there are posters like this floating around the Internet.

For the past 6 months we have had a program called the "Step It Up" program. The idea behind this program is to encourage employees to get up and get healthy. The first week we did it we had to take 5,000 steps per day, then 6,000 and eventually worked our way up to 10,000.

If we successfully walk the 10,000 steps per day in a week we receive one raffle ticket. The raffle tickets are drawn for things like a Nintendo Wii, iPods, and other cool stuff at the end of each trimester.

Overall it's a really cool program. The only problem is that those in charge have decided it was too hard to get 10,000 steps, so they lowered it back down to 9,000. Now that's the way we Americans think. "Whew, this is hard work. We better make it easier. Give me something to snack on while I think about how to make this easier." GIVE ME A BREAK! Oh wait, I get two 15 minute breaks per day.

I don't care if you think it's hard to get 10,000 steps a day. Unless you physically cannot walk, it isn't hard. Get off your couch at night and get out and do something. I mean honestly, how hard is it to get 10,000 steps a day? Especially when you get a chart like this in your work e-mail:

Here is a step conversion chart for the Wii sports package – if that is an option for you

Game - Steps per minute
baseball - 66
boxing - 232
golf - 73
bowling - 85
tennis - 184

If I use my two 15 minute breaks to walk around the block, I get my 10,000 steps per day no problem. In fact, I'm getting close to 23,000 steps per day each week because I play basketball in the morning 3 days a week.

Health is about priorities, not convenience.

How much to fix this?

noreply@blogger.com (Just a Blogger) — Wed, 18 Feb 2009 23:30:00 +0000

So yesterday morning we had about 2 inches of new snow. I got to work about about a half hour later my co-worker comes in and says, "I have to ask for your forgiveness."

I said, "Why?"

He said, "I just hit your car."

I said, "No you didn't. What do you really need?"

He said, "Just come outside."

So..........I walked out to find my car parked at a different angle than I parked it in.

Mine is on the left. The backend was slid over about 1 1/2 feet. This was the first view of the accident that I saw. I thought, "Where is the damage?"

This is all the damage that was done. $578.25 worth! Ridiculous.

Above and Beyond

noreply@blogger.com (Just a Blogger) — Fri, 13 Feb 2009 16:41:00 +0000

It seems like every office setups programs to "encourage" employees to do their jobs more fully. These things puzzle me. At our office it's called the "Above and Beyond Employee". Every month they select an above and beyond employee for "going above and beyond." The "winner" of the award gets a $25 cash and a nifty certificate.

These incentive programs are great. Well at least according to the motivational speakers that come and tell us they are (Now there's something else to blog about). The thing that kills me about our particular reward is that very few who win it actually deserve it. The write ups on the people are like this:

Winner of Above and Beyond: Janitor Bob (he didn't really win, but this will demonstrate my point well.)

Janitor Bob does a great job turning the vacuum on and pushing it back and
forth across the carpets each night. When he is done maneuvering the
vacuum, he pulls out his magic dust zapper and swiftly pushes dust off of
surfaces. Janitor Bob helps keep the bathrooms smelling nice by putting
pink things in the toilets and making sure the air freshener is always
stocked. Next time you have wet hands from washing in the bathroom, you
can thank Janitor Bob that there are towels available for drying your
hands. Each night Janitor Bob empties the trash cans and makes room for
new trash the next day.

Janitor Bob was nominated by Garbage Man Larry. Way to go Janitor
Bob!

Now I'm not saying that I don't appreciate Janitor Bob for doing his job, but did he really go above and beyond? Doesn't he already get paid for doing his job?

Memory Monday - They started it, I ended it.

noreply@blogger.com (Just a Blogger) — Tue, 10 Feb 2009 07:17:00 +0000

Who didn't love attending high school dances, or should I say going to the high school, listening to loud music and standing around staring at members of the opposite sex? I'm not talking about the dances where you get all formal and spend a ridiculous amount of money for no reason, I'm talking about the dances after the football and basketball games.

My older brother, his friend and I all went to a dance when I was about 14-15 years old. After the dance we decided it would be fun to go to McDonald's and get some fries and a shake. We were healthy teenagers after all. So about 11:30 at night we went and got some food. As we were pulling out another car full of about 6 guys started jeering at us and saying they wanted to fight. We weren't big fighters unless we absolutely had to, so we got in our suburban and drove off.

The car full of guys followed us down the main strip in town. A few intersections down we got stuck at a red light and they pulled up next to us. We just ignored them for the most part. Then I had a BRILLIANT idea. They had all the windows down on the car. And were sticking their heads out to yell obscenities at us. So I said to my brother and his friend, "Watch this." I chewed up some french fries and sucked up some vanilla shake, rolled down my window and pretended to spew all over the side of their car.

It was too funny. Two guys on the other side of their car stuck their heads out the window and started acting like they were spewing.. The other guys in the car all got back in the car and were acting like it was the most repulsive thing they'd ever seen. We just laughed and drove off.

High School Mascots

noreply@blogger.com (Just a Blogger) — Fri, 06 Feb 2009 00:28:00 +0000

This afternoon we started talking about different high school mascots and the dance team names associated with them.

I thought my high school's mascot was pretty awesome. We were the fighter bees. Our dance team was the Honeybees.

Co-worker 1's mascot was the Trojan and there dance team was the Trojanettes.
Co-worker 2's mascot was the Red Knight. He claims he doesn't remember what the dance teams name was, but honestly I think he was the head dancer.

Then my boss came in and shared with us his wife's high school name. She went to Liberty Bell High School. He told us that when he found out what her high school name was he asked her, "What was the name of your dance team? The Ding-a-lings?"

How about you? Was your high school mascot awesome or a possum?

It's the wrong kind

noreply@blogger.com (Just a Blogger) — Tue, 03 Feb 2009 23:21:00 +0000

Today my boss called us in to his office to have us a listen to an NPR broadcast clip. I guess that there has been a lot of snow in London this week that has pretty much shut the city down. They aren't running any of the buses or trains. The reason they aren't running anything is because this is, "The wrong kind of snow." During the broadcast one of the Brits was talking and said that this is the wrong kind of snow.

I'm sitting here wondering, what kind of snow is the right kind? The rain kind? I mean I know that the Eskimo's have a bunch of different words for snow, but not the British.

To make things even better at the end of the broadcast another guy said, "I don't think that it is necessarily the wrong kind of snow, just the wrong quantity of snow." Oh the good old debate of Quality vs. Quantity.

No matter what kind of snow it is, it just proves that global warming is definately occuring. I mean it's not every 15 years that London gets snow because the earth is warming up...

Memory Monday - It snowed

noreply@blogger.com (Just a Blogger) — Tue, 03 Feb 2009 07:51:00 +0000

Today's memory comes from the grand ole town of St. Joseph, Missouri.

In November of 1999, St. Joseph, Missouri had a snow storm that dropped about 8 inches overnight. Snow is not a real regular occurrence in quantities like this in St. Joe. The entire town about shut down.

My companion at the time was from Arco, Idaho about 30 minutes east of where I grew up. Snow storms were to us. We kind of thought it was silly how everything kind of shut down, but as missionaries we still went out knocking on doors and talking to people.

As we were walking down this one road we noticed a group of 5 boys about 12-14 years old. They were out playing in the snow. Then we noticed that one of them had the grand idea, "Let's through snowballs at the Mormons." As we got closer, the snow balls started flying at us. We had no clue who these kids were, but as two Idahoans would do, we bent over, picked up snow and started flinging snowballs back at them.

We pulled some of the old tricks in the book. You know, throw one snow ball really high so the other guys watch it and tried to dodge it, and then you pelt them with line drives while they are looking up. We had them running for cover. Then one of them decided he was "brave". He picked up a snowball and came running right at us. So my companion hurried and picked up a snowball too. When the kid got within about 8 feet of us he just stopped and froze, almost as if he was too afraid to throw the snowball. He had his arm cocked back and my companion did as well. They just sat there staring at each other for about 30 seconds.

Then the kid wound up like he was going to throw. Just as he turned his face to throw, SPLASH, there was a puddle on the ground right in front of my companion. He swept his foot right threw it and soaked the kid. I don't think I've ever seen a more surprised look in my life. He just stood there, with the snowball still in his hand with a look on his face like, "I can't believe what just happened."

For the next few days every time we walked down that street the kids would throw snowballs at us and then run. It was a lot of fun. I just wonder what his mom said when he told her the missionaries soaked him.

Go Cardinals

noreply@blogger.com (Just a Blogger) — Fri, 30 Jan 2009 23:05:00 +0000

Okay so I'm just going to say right up front that I'm a Dallas Cowboys fan, always have been, and probably always will be.

One of my co-workers is a Pittsburgh Steelers fan. I detest the Steelers about as much as I detest the Philadelphia Eagles. Nothing against the state of Pennslyvania, in fact I almost did a Masters at Penn State. Philly is just the Cowboys rivals and the Steelers well, they are the Steelers.

The problem with the Steelers, well there are lots of them. The refs always make calls in their favor. Don't believe me? Watch the game on Sunday. You'll see. Just like the Superbowl a few years ago when they played the Seattle Seahawks. I don't think I've seen more blown calls duck hunting.

I also don't want them to win because that would give them 6 superbowl rings. Right now Dallas, San Francisco, and Pittsburgh are all tied for the most rings with 5. I, of course, want my team to have the most. Not some Philadelphia team.

All in all, who doesn't want to see the underdog win the Superbowl. Go Cardinals! Well atleast this weekend.

Not a slow day today.

noreply@blogger.com (Just a Blogger) — Tue, 27 Jan 2009 21:25:00 +0000

Today is not a slow day, but I didn't want to leave everyone hanging with nothing so I decided I would quickly share this video I made once when it was a slow day. It has a bunch of cool things I found on Google Earth.

For those of you who are geeky enough to want to go and look at these yourself, here's the coordinates:

Coordinates of images:
Giant Stamp (41.505411573, -81.692457496)
Ketchup Bottle (38.662918939, -89.982383508)
Bow and Arrow (37.791521261, -122.389989817)
Ice Cream Cone (50.936455030, 6.948690859)
Bowling Pins (51.445331000, 5.480611000)
Big Bottle (54.574815724, -1.231978576)
Giant Spider (43.269220376, -2.932930972)
Checker Board (51.913074117, 4.472107467)
Garden Hose (47.999729921, 7.830358741)
Pickaxe (51.310555997, 9.503194892)
Button (39.952229114, -75.193698905)
Noah's Ark (37.783276752, -97.464872569)
Airplane on Road (36.109354066, -115.150417173)
Umbrella (41.587398462, -93.621451805)
Baseball Bat (41.881976590, -87.643125562)
Pool Balls (51.956976100, 7.618386775)
Giant Sundial (33.824449271, -111.921772867)
Statue of Liberty (40.688995748, -74.044564691)