Missionary Call
12 years ago
Monday, April 26, 2010
Monday, April 19, 2010
New Blog
I have gotten into couponing. It is so much fun! I've been wanting to make a new blog dedicated to the deals I find for a while, and I'm thinking I may actually do it now. I have 2 names I've been mauling around and I wanted to get everyone's opinion. They are 1) Corrina's Savings and 2) Eternity On A Budget. So let me know what you think =)
Friday, April 16, 2010
Geekdom
A couple weeks back I read an article online about a city council member somewhere in Eastern Europe was asked to resign because s/he was spending to much time playing Farmville on his/her city-provided laptop instead of paying attention in the meeting. As I read the comments, I saw comments about how stupid it was to get obsessed with their fake farm. Then someone (presumably a self-proclaimed geek) said how when non-geeks get obsessed over something, it’s usually something stupid and/or boring like fake farms, guns, or sports, etc. but when a geek gets obsessed with something, it’s something not boring (I can’t remember any examples that were enumerated). Several months back, I attempted to make fun of a friend by calling him a nerd (playfully, of course) which I was quickly corrected that he was a geek because geeks at least have a chance of getting married (he, btw, is currently married and has a couple kids). I didn’t fully understand the reasoning behind the rebuttal until I saw this Venn Diagram comparing geeks, nerds, dorks, and dweebs, at which time it made a lot more sense.
According to the diagram, a geek is defined by intelligence and obsession, while a nerd also has social ineptitude. So I got to thinking about these two, semi-unrelated events. To be a geek, you need to have a lot of intelligence and be obsessed with something. Are there any special qualifiers on the intelligence contingency? Does it have to be generalized intelligence or can it be specialized in one or two fields? If the latter is the case, then it could be debated that even “jocks” are “geeks” but sport-geeks because they are obsessed with sports and have a high level of intelligence of who’s on what team, rules, strategy, etc. for any and all sport the follow. Additionally, their could potentially be a gun-geek as well who is obsessed with fire-arms and knows a whole butt load about types, sizes, handling, etc.
On a personal note, recently I came to the realization that I, perhaps, am the only “average” person I know. All my life I have yet to find a group (“clique” if you will) with which I fully click. I have a wide range of interests from playing sports (basketball in particular) to outdoors activities (hiking, swimming, target shooting, camping, etc) to technology, video games, movies, etc. And yet I don’t feel fully comfortable among the jocks or the “cool” crowd because I don’t know that much about sports or whatever is of interest to the cool kids. i.e.: I feel to geeky to associate with the cool but likewise, sometimes I don’t feel geeky enough to fully mesh with the geeks. Yes, I like computers, video games, science, Star Wars, etc. but my knowledge of these subjects feels inferior to most of the geeks with which I hang, leaving me feel a little out of place. Therefore, I am right smack dab in the middle of both worlds; therefore, I am “average”. (This all sounded more profound and made more sense when I was ruminating about it at work). Any thoughts or advice out there? Feel free to comment and let me know.
Friday, April 9, 2010
The End of the Paci Era
We started weaning Jaron's pacifier usage after his 2nd birthday. We only let him use it for naps and bedtime. Being the smart little guy his is, he would tell us he needed a nap, get his paci and lay in his bed for a minute or two. Then he would come out of his room, hand us his paci, and continue on his business. We thought it was funny. During the summer, we went on a road trip to Wyoming and Montana. To help prevent an ear infection, we let Jaron have his paci. When we returned home, he did not want to give it up. We then realized his 2nd year molars were coming in, and he preferred his paci to medicine. So we let him keep it. We then decided that at his 3rd birthday, we would wean him again. Starting a couple weeks before, I would tell Jaron that on his birthday he would be a big boy and that meant no more paci. Then his birthday came and went and we did not force the issue (oops!).
I have heard many different methods of paci weaning, from sending them to the paci fairy, trading the paci's for a present, putting a hole in the paci and saying it's broken, giving a smaller paci and the child won't like it so he'll stop, etc. Well, one of Jaron's favorite paci's was a 3 to 6 month paci, so that last idea was a no go. With Lara still using paci's, there was a good chance he would just steal one from her. What to do?
Our little miss Lara likes to bite. Who knows if she is teething, she has all of her baby teeth in except her 2nd year molars (she not even 17 months and they were all in before 15 months)...but she cut teeth early so she could get those early too. One night last week, Dave went to give Jaron a paci. Dave realized the nipple was ripped through on one side. Dave grabbed another one, same thing. Then he took Lara's and sure enough it was ripped through too. We figured out that Lara had bit through all the paci's! Seeing as Dave had bought 2 just a few days prior and they were both ruined, Dave announced that there would be no more paci's. He put Jaron to bed and Jaron went to sleep no problem. Lara slept fine without a paci that night too.
Since then, we have not heard one word about wanting a paci from either of our children. That was easy! I guess the "it's broken you're both going to quit cold turkey" method worked for us. Bye Bye Paci's!
I have heard many different methods of paci weaning, from sending them to the paci fairy, trading the paci's for a present, putting a hole in the paci and saying it's broken, giving a smaller paci and the child won't like it so he'll stop, etc. Well, one of Jaron's favorite paci's was a 3 to 6 month paci, so that last idea was a no go. With Lara still using paci's, there was a good chance he would just steal one from her. What to do?
Our little miss Lara likes to bite. Who knows if she is teething, she has all of her baby teeth in except her 2nd year molars (she not even 17 months and they were all in before 15 months)...but she cut teeth early so she could get those early too. One night last week, Dave went to give Jaron a paci. Dave realized the nipple was ripped through on one side. Dave grabbed another one, same thing. Then he took Lara's and sure enough it was ripped through too. We figured out that Lara had bit through all the paci's! Seeing as Dave had bought 2 just a few days prior and they were both ruined, Dave announced that there would be no more paci's. He put Jaron to bed and Jaron went to sleep no problem. Lara slept fine without a paci that night too.
Since then, we have not heard one word about wanting a paci from either of our children. That was easy! I guess the "it's broken you're both going to quit cold turkey" method worked for us. Bye Bye Paci's!
Wednesday, March 31, 2010
USN Interview and visit
Yesterday I flew out to Las Vegas for orientation, campus tour, and interview at the University of Southern Nevada College of Pharmacy to see a few pictures (taken on my cell phone) of the trip you can follow this link. Corrina, the kids and I left Chico @ 7am and drove down to Sacramento to drop me off at the airport. (Corrina then had fun with my siblings and their kids, you'll have to ask her for the details). There was a little bit of turbulence coming into Las Vegas but it wasn't bad, felt like a roller coaster :-). I caught a taxi cab over to the pharmacy school, did my thing there, and caught a cab back to the airport. I got to the airport @ 5:15 and my flight didn't leave til 8 so I was glad I brought reading material. Corrina picked me up @ SMF and then we drove straight home to Chico, arriving after 11pm. It was a long day and went well.
Oh, wait...You probably want details about how the interview went. :-)
First we had an orientation explaining tuition, how the program works, and all that. Then we had campus tours by current students while we waited for our interview, after our interview, we could leave.
This school runs on a block system so you study only one subject at a time, 6 hours a day 4-5 days a week. From 8am - 3pm you have lecture for an hour then a group project/assignment for an hour, etc. In your 1st year, one Friday you work in a community pharmacy while the next Friday is assessment day (individual and group) This school works on a pass/fail system and you have to get 90% to pass. If you pass your individual assessment on Friday you don't have to come on Monday to redo it. If your group gets a 95% on your group assessment, you get 5 extra % points on your individual assessment. the first 6 weeks of summer after your first year, you do a community pharmacy rotation then the next 6 weeks you have a break unless you have to redo a block because you didn't pass the re-assessment on Monday. P2 year is a lot like P1 but then after that, you don't get any break and you immediately start your P3 year, which is entirely 6-week rotations. There are 8 sets of 6 weeks and you only have to do 7 rotations, the 8th is a break unless you have to redo any blocks from your P2 year. There are 4 required rotations and 3 elective that you kind of get to choose.
How they decide who to accept:
First they look at your application/grades/etc. and assign you a score that determines if you are even offered an interview. Then your interview is scored and the two scores are added together to get a total score. That total score goes into a spreadsheet of everyone from highest score to lowest and they start at the top and work their way down until all spots are filled in both campuses (There's one in Henderson Nevada and one in South Jordan, Utah but they are the exact same policies and same curriculum, sometimes they even fly faculty back and forth to teach their specialty on both campuses) If you are accepted and space is available on both campuses, you can choose which one you want to go to.
So to explain the poll at the top of the right hand column: (if you are reading this as a note on Facebook, follow this link to get to my blog)
(*disclaimer: I'm not saying its a sure thing I will have a choice if I'm accepted, this is more for curiosity sake, although as of yesterday, they did have seats available on both campuses)
If you were accepted and were given the choice as to which campus to attend, which would you choose: Henderson, NV (a suburb of Las Vegas) or South Jordan, UT (A suburb of SLC). Feel free to give your reasoning as well. I think I can predict what the outcome will be, but I am going to keep that to myself so as not to affect the poll.
Oh yeah, one more interesting thing: In the orientation he said, if you are put on the wait list, never give up hope! He shared two instances where they accepted someone either a few days before or the day classes started. One student was sitting on a plane waiting for it to pull back from the gate to fly to a different school when he got the call asking if he still wanted to go to USN. He yelled at the flight attendant to not let the plane leave, he had to get off. He then went to the ticket counter and bought the first ticket to Las Vegas he could get. Another student was driving on his way to UNLV the first day of class when he got the call asking if he still wanted in. He immediately turned around and drove straight to USN and started class. Crazy!
Oh, wait...You probably want details about how the interview went. :-)
First we had an orientation explaining tuition, how the program works, and all that. Then we had campus tours by current students while we waited for our interview, after our interview, we could leave.
This school runs on a block system so you study only one subject at a time, 6 hours a day 4-5 days a week. From 8am - 3pm you have lecture for an hour then a group project/assignment for an hour, etc. In your 1st year, one Friday you work in a community pharmacy while the next Friday is assessment day (individual and group) This school works on a pass/fail system and you have to get 90% to pass. If you pass your individual assessment on Friday you don't have to come on Monday to redo it. If your group gets a 95% on your group assessment, you get 5 extra % points on your individual assessment. the first 6 weeks of summer after your first year, you do a community pharmacy rotation then the next 6 weeks you have a break unless you have to redo a block because you didn't pass the re-assessment on Monday. P2 year is a lot like P1 but then after that, you don't get any break and you immediately start your P3 year, which is entirely 6-week rotations. There are 8 sets of 6 weeks and you only have to do 7 rotations, the 8th is a break unless you have to redo any blocks from your P2 year. There are 4 required rotations and 3 elective that you kind of get to choose.
How they decide who to accept:
First they look at your application/grades/etc. and assign you a score that determines if you are even offered an interview. Then your interview is scored and the two scores are added together to get a total score. That total score goes into a spreadsheet of everyone from highest score to lowest and they start at the top and work their way down until all spots are filled in both campuses (There's one in Henderson Nevada and one in South Jordan, Utah but they are the exact same policies and same curriculum, sometimes they even fly faculty back and forth to teach their specialty on both campuses) If you are accepted and space is available on both campuses, you can choose which one you want to go to.
So to explain the poll at the top of the right hand column: (if you are reading this as a note on Facebook, follow this link to get to my blog)
(*disclaimer: I'm not saying its a sure thing I will have a choice if I'm accepted, this is more for curiosity sake, although as of yesterday, they did have seats available on both campuses)
If you were accepted and were given the choice as to which campus to attend, which would you choose: Henderson, NV (a suburb of Las Vegas) or South Jordan, UT (A suburb of SLC). Feel free to give your reasoning as well. I think I can predict what the outcome will be, but I am going to keep that to myself so as not to affect the poll.
Oh yeah, one more interesting thing: In the orientation he said, if you are put on the wait list, never give up hope! He shared two instances where they accepted someone either a few days before or the day classes started. One student was sitting on a plane waiting for it to pull back from the gate to fly to a different school when he got the call asking if he still wanted to go to USN. He yelled at the flight attendant to not let the plane leave, he had to get off. He then went to the ticket counter and bought the first ticket to Las Vegas he could get. Another student was driving on his way to UNLV the first day of class when he got the call asking if he still wanted in. He immediately turned around and drove straight to USN and started class. Crazy!
Monday, March 29, 2010
A Thought on ObamaCare
A lot is being said, on both sides of the aisle, regarding this "landmark legislation" that was passed and signed last week. I won't even get started on all the objections that I have heard and hold personally regarding it but I did want to mention one particular part of really irks me on multiple levels:
"Coverage for kids": sounds wonderful, right? How could anyone oppose health insurance for children? Now they can't even be dropped for having a preexisting condition. But there's just a few problems:
1. The part that was supposed to be written into the bill that would make it take effect immediately was "forgotten" so now it doesn't start until 2014 like the rest of the bill. (throw your arms up in uproar, how are the kids going to survive 'til then?)
2. (and more importantly) it doesn't have anything to with children. This is talking about the sons and daughters (i.e. "children") of parents who work and cover their adult children while they are in college. instead of being dropped at the age of 24 or if your not a full time student (whichever is first), now they can't be dropped by the insurance company until they turn 26 (as far as I know, no student requisite). These aren't children. These are Boomerangers: grown adult human beings that, instead joining the real world and getting a real job, return to live in their parents basement's and mooch off of them for as long as possible. grow up and get a life! That it what college is supposed to be about. Now (in 2014), thanks to Obamacare, they can mooch for even longer!
So let me re-iterate: THIS DOES NOT HELP THE CHILDREN! but helps the boomerangers. In Spanish, little children are translated as "los ninos" while the sons and daughters ("children") of a parent are translated as "los hijos".
"Coverage for kids": sounds wonderful, right? How could anyone oppose health insurance for children? Now they can't even be dropped for having a preexisting condition. But there's just a few problems:
1. The part that was supposed to be written into the bill that would make it take effect immediately was "forgotten" so now it doesn't start until 2014 like the rest of the bill. (throw your arms up in uproar, how are the kids going to survive 'til then?)
2. (and more importantly) it doesn't have anything to with children. This is talking about the sons and daughters (i.e. "children") of parents who work and cover their adult children while they are in college. instead of being dropped at the age of 24 or if your not a full time student (whichever is first), now they can't be dropped by the insurance company until they turn 26 (as far as I know, no student requisite). These aren't children. These are Boomerangers: grown adult human beings that, instead joining the real world and getting a real job, return to live in their parents basement's and mooch off of them for as long as possible. grow up and get a life! That it what college is supposed to be about. Now (in 2014), thanks to Obamacare, they can mooch for even longer!
So let me re-iterate: THIS DOES NOT HELP THE CHILDREN! but helps the boomerangers. In Spanish, little children are translated as "los ninos" while the sons and daughters ("children") of a parent are translated as "los hijos".
Sunday, March 21, 2010
New Calling
I was extended a new calling in church today. When I met with the 1st councelor, he prefaced it by saying "Its kind of a different calling, you probably haven't had it before..." I immediately thought "He's calling me to serve in the nursery", which is funny because since we've been married, this is our third ward and I have served in the nursery in both of our other wards. (I was even the "leader" not just a worker, in our last ward). Sure enough, I am now three for three. :-) Which is fine... Most of the time I really enjoy it, maybe because I'm just a big kid. :-) I will miss the asociation with the men in the Elder's Quorum, though, but Oh well. Later, I was thinking about it and in the 6 years that I've been home from my mission, I have served in almost every organization in the ward (obviously not YW or RS) I was ward mission leader in my singles ward, Corrina & I team taught primary in our first ward, then I was shifted over to nursery. Whe nwe moved up to Chico, our first ward here called us as the nursery workers then I went from Deacon's Quorum Advisor/2nd councelor in the YM presidency to the 11year scout leader. After we moved into this ward, I was called as the Elder's Quorum secretary and then the Financial Clerk. and now back to Nursery...Where haven't I served. :-)
P.S. 90 posts!
P.S. 90 posts!
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