Thursday: life cycle of a couch

Dusty and Laura are giving their old couch to our church's youth group, which encouraged me to think about the life cycle of a couch. I found it rather interesting...

Year 1: Brand new! My owners love me! They won't let anyone eat on me or put their stinky feet on me!

Years 2-10: Well, I've become slightly worn, but I am still in a place of honor. I have a good life.

Years 10-15: I was given to the kids. They just got their own apartment and while I don't match any of the furniture, I am the only sitting location. I get used a lot! Life is good.

Years 17-19: I was given to a college kid. The room stinks, but I'm the only piece of comfortable furniture. I am loved!

Years 20-23: I am back in an apartment with non-matching furniture. I'm getting very worn at the edges and some springs don't spring anymore, but things are going ok.

Years 24-26: I was given to the youth group. I'm in rather terrible condition, but I at least get to be with other couches in terrible condition. Life is fun, and I don't have people sitting on me very much which is good at my age.

Year 27: I was put out on the curb to die, but some college kids picked me up before it rained. Phew. They kept me for four months. And then ceremoniously buried me in the dumpster. It was a good way to go. It was a good life.

Tuesday: cereal-luck II

Today we had our second cereal-luck. This time we invited all of the church. Not many extra people came, but it was still a good time! We played frisbee golf afterward and had many laughs and many cheers. I found that I really like Reese's PB cereal...it was delicious! It is probably also a once-in-a-while treat. :)

Monday: epic dinochickens

Once upon a time there was a dinochicken named Tristan. Tristan had a very happy life, clucking with other dinochickens, and living his life at extreme temperatures.

But one day Tristan met Tyrek. Tristan went up to Tyrek, clucking away.

But Tyrek was not a very nice dinochicken. Upon seeing Tristan, Tyrek's dinosaur instincts kicked in and he started fiercely attacking.

"Never fear, the longnecks are here!" Some of Tristan's faithful dinochicken friends came to his rescue.

The three of them overcame Tyrek and made sure that he would never again give a bad name to dinochickens.

The End

Sunday: careless

"Look at the birds...[they are] careless in the care of God. And you count far more to him than birds." Matthew 6:26, The Message.

Careless in the care of God. That is the phrase that stuck out to me. I read this on Tuesday and it has come back many times since then. That's how I want to be. It doesn't mean that I don't have cares and concerns, but that I know that they are being taken care of so that I don't have to worry about them. It brings a deeper meaning to the word 'trust'.

I think that one of my life goals is to completely embody this concept.

...It might take a while.

Saturday: reactions

Woah. I was looking at a few other random blogs and found these little reaction buttons on the bottom. So now, if you don't really feel like you have a comment, you can still cheer me on!!

We'll see if anyone uses them.

Friday: corporate training videos

Today I did some of my corporate training. I understand why we need to do it. But what really makes me mad is when we are asked vague questions during the training and then told that the answer is wrong. Here are my examples:

1. You have found a problem. What do you do next?

A. Gather more information

B. Take action.

2. You have found a problem. What do you do?

A. Tell your manager immediately.

B. Validate the facts and then tell the customer within a few days.

C. Nothing.

3. You have a harassment problem with the person in the cube next to you. What do you do first?

A. Talk to the person

B. Tell your manager

C. Tell HR

D. Nothing.

Answers.

1. The answer is A. I would like to point out that gathering information is taking action. I got it wrong twice. (the question was posed in two different locations.)

2. The answer is A. I think B is an additional correct answer.

3. The answer is B. When you click on A it says "You talk to the person and they are unresponsive. Try a better answer." This answer bothers me because talking to the person is what they did first! It isn't my fault that the person is unresponsive. The question didn't ask what I would do if the person ignores what I say.

Thursday: twitter

Tonight I visited Twitter.com for the first time. Ever. I'm part of the dark ages. But I wanted real-time updates on So You Think You Can Dance and it seemed like the best place to get it. It worked rather well. Alex is gone due to an injury, but it sounds like he'll be back next year.

We went to see IronMan 2 after work because it was rather hot out to be in the house. It was good. The middle was a little long, but I enjoyed the end. I was sad that the robot didn't play a larger role.

This afternoon I spent about 2 hours measuring the thickness of some panels. It was a riot, let me tell you. Oh, and then I wrapped the panels in foam. But that's not what I want to talk about. I want to talk about Verniers. (It's a way to precisely measure something.) The first time I used a Vernier was in general physics lab. It's kind of cool - I like lining up the lines. But I think it takes way too long to read. Today I had to read 0.0 + .075 + .008 + .0001. Sure, I can do that math in my head but it takes just that split second longer. Oh, and I had to move the whole panel around to see the .0001, so that definitely took longer.