Middle America's Worldview

Wednesday was a good day. We had a meeting with the CIO discussing our status of projects ect. Normally this meeting is dreaded due to the unexpected, but this one was good.

During the meeting the unexpected did happen. We were given a 'quiz' that was about 3 pages long. Basically a quick questionaire of applications, and then two pages of matching certain analyst with their apps as well as the IS Directors to their respective facilities. Yeah, I sucked at it. I am terrible with names.

Later that day, we also had dinner with the CIO. It was nice to be able to sit at a table and openly talk with one of the nation's largest and most respected health care management companies. I do not know of any other facility willing to do that. It's rare the whole team gets together in one room, so this was a nice touch while I was up here.

Monday the weather was really nice. However, by Tuesday morning it went to a scene off of 'The day after tomorrow'. Man it got cold. I had to literally scrape the ice of the windshield when I finally came out of the office. I went to TGI Friday's on the way to the hotel picking up some hotwings and a jalepeno burger to get warm.

The whole team was in the same room on mid-level yesterday. I think the boss lady wanted us to get more time together, since most of us are remote now. I found it rather interesting. Those that are more open on IM seem nervous in person. One peer actually kept fidgeting, stretching when she talked, indicating insecurity. Another guy seemed bored, and couldn't wait to get the hell out. I found the whole thing interesting.

Only today and tomorrow and I get to fly back home. I can't wait.

It's interesting. When I go on these trips away from home and family, I normally think of all the 'cool' stuff I can do without the kids, ect. That's what I think, but in reality after the second night, I am ready to go home. First night, yeah, it's nice to be away. Second night with nothing on TV, nor no-one to do anything with. I am not a bar hopper so I normally walk the mall to window shop. I enjoyed Sunday by just relaxing, but by end day, I was ready to play with the kids and hold my wife at night. sigh.

Today at work we get to have the whole interface team together in a room to sing Ku-by-Ya. The boss held a mid-level conference room for us to work together off a hub. This is an opportunity for everyone to gather and share work ideas, ect. Some are looking forward to it, others could care less. Me? I guess it will be different, I don't really lean either way.

I met the newest member of the group yesterday. She seems really nice, but quite a talker.

My highlight yesterday was watching The Contender. I enjoyed it and finally have found something cool to watch on tv.

Last night, once I arrived back to the hotel. I watched 2 of the dvds I brought along, Collateral and The Terror. I figured I can sleep in, no kids no wife, so I stayed up. Yeah, right. Once the body is use to getting up, it gets up. I was up early as usual.

I ate some yogurt for breakfast like a good little boy. I ironed the clothes for the week, put everything in it's proper spot and headed out to Barnes and Noble for the great Pokemon quest. Was I doing this for the kids or myself? Probably a little of each. It was a mission by now. I couldn't believe how hard it would be to find something like this.

I hit Barnes and Noble and find I have to wait till it opens, 10 a.m. So I am on the phone with my dad getting his updates ect. till then. Once inside, I begin looking around. Not finding much, so I asked for Pokemon stuff. The lady was helpfull and I ended up buying a mag, "Pokemon unofficial collection" and "Beginner's Manga A step-by-step guide" that was on sale. At least I know what Manga is now. I then thought to hit Borders once again. I left yesterday without looking and thought surely they would have something.

I was in luck. Note only did they have "Pojo's unofficial Total Pokemon" mag that described a lot of cards ect. I ended up buying the kids Pokemon dvd box set. They will love it. The asexual helper was there and helped me find the mag. Seems it was probably too busy to think last night. Now don't get offended on the "asexual" part. It's purely descriptive. I was always raised and continue to say "Sir" and "Maam" in respect of others. So I was hesistant at first but blurtered out "Thank you sir" without thinking. Then I thought Oh crap, what if its a chick with a deep voice? So I attempted recovery by quickly adding "Uh." which the whatever said. "yes?" "You have been very helpfull, thank you." I then moved onto the other side of the store, very quickly.

I flew in to Philadelphia Saturaday evening. Not a bad trip, didn't get stuck waiting for the plane through Dallas. So no complaints. Not that it would help anyway.

I normally always do the same routine when I arrive in Philadelphia. I get my bags (obviously) and then a shuttle to National Rental cars. Once I pick up the small car (I like the small ones due to good on the gas and easy to get around up here), I drive my way to King of Prussia. The route is the same, 202 South to 476 North, Valley Forge exit, then Mall Blvd. Easy enough to get to. The snow wasn't nearly as bad as I had feared. I see it in spots on the side of the highways but nothing like I was told and none on the roads. Once I make it into town, I normally pick up all my grocery items at ACME (for the week), something to eat and then register in the hotel to plot my lazy butt down for the night. This time I hit ACME first and then register and unload in the hotel. Once that was accomplished I went to the mall to get something to eat. Yes, the mall is very large and they have a Court as well as a Plaza there.

I figured I would get some excercise by walking through the mall to the Court. There was a brochure in the hotel's lobby showing a discount for travelers at Borders. Cool, I had planned to go there looking for some Pokemon books or mags for my kiddos.

I pulled in the parking lot near TGIF, going in placing my order to go. I then proceed to walk through the Plaza into the Court for Borders. Being Saturday night, TGIF was busy anyway. Hey, it will take them time to get my tostada nacho's ready.

I go for it. I walked the mall many times, but rarely purposefully literally through it to the other side. I make it all the way to the end and outside. I messed up by going around the side, not over to the court. OK, I then proceeded back around outside and then through the crosswalk into the court. OK, now I begin to make it through the Court. "There's Disney, where the hell is Borders." I don't think it's this far. I asked a guy standing around in the middle of the mall where is Borders. He gets this look of confusion then says "Oh yeah, it's around the corner to the left." Thanks man. So I am going the right way. I make it to Borders finally and I am already out of breath. Yeah, out of shape. I then peruse around until I find someone with a store tag on and ask about the sale. "That's for real estate agents ect. " Real Estate agents? Bummer man. "So do you have anything for Pokemon, cards, mags, ect?" A silent look. "No, the only thing we have is a one manga." As the asexual helper walks away with another nagging customer. "One manga? Whatever that is." So a bust on both ends. sigh.
I then make my way outside the store and hit a game shop on the way back. I asked the guys in there for any type of book ect that shows what cards are availible ect. They only had a price card list. Some guy there was asking me about the Pokemon card game and I ended up answering more of his questions then getting answers for myself. Seems the Deoxys theme decks were selling like crazy. Oh well. I gotta make it back to the other end of the other mall.

I managed to make it back to TGIF. But on the way back, I started to get sick of my stomach, out of breath and feeling dizzy. Geez this sucks. My bottom part of my legs were now from sore to just there. I was thinking 'what the hell, I hope I don't pass out. That would be embarrasing.' I grabbed my nachos (which they didn't give me extra jalepeno's as requested) and went back to the hotel. I found out later, it was the fact I hadn't ate anything in nearly 7 hours. Once I ate something, I felt better.

That was my Saturday. All day in the plane and then a bust at Borders.

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Supreme Court to Hear Arguments in Ten Commandments Cases

More than 15 months after Alabama Supreme Court Chief Justice Roy Moore lost his job for disobeying a federal court order to remove a Ten Commandments monument from the
state courthouse, the larger issue involved is about to be argued in front of the U.S. Supreme Court.
Read full Story here.

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I guess this will be one of the main stories today in the news. Personally I think it's a no-brainer,but who said Liberals had brains.

If you clearly read the argument, you will see posting the Ten Commandments in public does nothave the Government supporting a specific religion. Ironically it will be held in a court depicting Moses holding the Ten Commandments in the background. Yeah, want to tear that wall down too? The argument is a war of ideology. We are a Judeo Christian based Nation. Get over it. The problem is many view ideology itself has become religion and our judges are pushing that non-
religious ideology onto us. You can’t explain that to the deaf though.

The core statement is the following.

"Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free
exercise thereof."

So does displaying the Ten Commandments represent Congress making a law establishing a religion? No of course not. Is Congress attempting to prohibit free speech of? Yes, I believe they are.

Some facts supporting the United States having a base in Judeo-Christian heritage.

Again, not a bad day. Yes, it was busy and yes, it went by quick.

Today, I noticed how much other's depend on my wife. I at times gripe at her for saying "yes" to everything and for everybody. Recently, she has become better in curtailing her quick replies. Today, however, all hell broke loose. I received some calls for work during dinner, but I noticed my wife on her cell phone for longer than expected. Then the home phone rings (rarely for me) and she is now on it, then her cell phone rings again. Back and forth like this. Next thing you know its after 6 p.m. and I find out what is going on.

Seems the other paralegal (only my wife and she works for the lawyer) has quite today. She gave her 2 weeks notice and does not plan on staying. This is a big deal, because the lawyer doesn't know what is going on (with scheduling, ect.) without this other paralegal. In addition my wife does not know all the jobs she does. This will bring more stress on her. Note she hasn't even caught up from our trip to Arizona yet.

Then her brother calls the cell to inform her, he has lost his license (again) from a failed drug test. I won't go into detail but let's say he gets into trouble and her parents continue to bail him out. Sure enough, a few minutes later, another call to her saying "appeal the lost license issue" as she had feared. Another token for her todo.

Then her Aunt calls (the actual stable one in her family) and we find out why she is so troubled financially. I can't say, but it's just another weight for her to bear.

This all happened this afternoon. Prior to all this, she is also trying to help a neighbor with a legal issue. She is trying to pull together to train two others to do paralegal work under her. She can't find the time to get organized enough to train them correctly. She is workning on our son's upcoming IEP for school. All this and having to deal with me. sigh.

I really, really need to do something for her.

I must admit, Monday wasn't that bad. Yes, I am knocking on wood. I continue to be on-call and I am on support tomorrow. Yippee.

We found out today our son feeling sick is actually a good sign. Yeah, that's what I said. I thought for sure he was having a UTI (urinary tract infection) Friday and Saturday due to having to go pee, having to go pee, ect. Yet, when he did go, it wasn't much. Sorry if too much info. Well, I took him to the doc in the box and it showed cleared. The doctor from Arizona is telling us that it's a good sign because he is trying to pass the metals and he feels bad because he is doing too much detoxification, or too fast. So we hold off on certain meds and up others. Yes, it's seems to be a juggling act, but hey, we are getting better.

I found a new means to make money online. No, not rich but hey any little bit will help. It is called Surf Junky and basically you scroll through their pages. It suppose to start off with 45 cents an hour. I purused around and already acquried a dollar. Like I said, won't make you rich but every little bit helps. You can also have them pay your paypal directly. So if you want to check it out, click here.

Sunday already? The weekend just flew by. I had to go to a wedding Saturday that pretty much shot that day. You can read that story in Busy Mommy’s blog.

Not much to speak of for this weekend. I was able to play the Pokemon card game with the kids. I have to say, it was pretty fun. My daughter really got into it and the game seem to flow easy enough. I can see us playing this one for quite some time.

I started on-call today as opposed to tomorrow. I will be flying into PA toward Corp. next Saturday. I have switched today for that Saturday, since I will be traveling all that day.

Over this busy, trying week, I had some reflection this morning. With everything going on with our son, compounded having to take my wife to ER for a found cyst on her ovary, it topped off today at work by losing access to my desktop. I rebooted the PC due to it being slow, in hopes to speed up the process only to find my normal password to my desktop is inaccessible. How stupid is that?

Regardless of me not having access to work email nor work IM, I continued to work with my projects today getting them accomplished. I still have access to my interfaces using my home pc, but not my Lotus Notes. I and the vendor were still able to successfully get a new interface up and running today.

This action of me not having contact with work by normal means, yet I continued to work on those things that needed to be made had me think of something.

Reflecting on everything going on in my life, I find most would think perhaps God is not listening or even there. Today I did not have a direct line of communication today with work, yet I continued to work for them. In respect to God, it sometimes seem we do not have a direct or constant communication with Him, yet we must realize God is still there and working for us.

Just a thought, today.

I was actually off yesterday, so today was a Monday. A Monday it was indeed. I spent nearly half the day on the phone with conference calls and the other half trying to resolve those issues the calls were for. sigh.

My poor wife is sick to her stomach and the docs suspect an ulcer. Considering all we have undergone I am not surprised. I had actually read in the past where ulcers were created from bacteria rather than stress, but who knows. What I do know is she has difficulty keeping anything down.

I ran our son to speech therapy again today after their school. Yesterday, she commented he was doing much better in his 3 consonant words then before we left for Arizona in addition to the time we missed with her. This tickled me to no end.

I also ran our daughter to basketball practice this evening and I have to tell you; I never get tired of watching those kids running around the half-court trying to get that ball in the basket. Rather than spreading out they always tend to group in together in a cluster. LOL

I haven't blogged in some time. Not for a lack of discussion, but a lack of dedicated time.

I have to say this is a 3 day weekend for me and my family. None of us have to go to school nor work tomorrow. I been on-call all week, but that ends tomorrow morning. I don't wish to say I will be glad it will be here, because it would take away more precious time from my family.

Tonight the kids will be having a sleep over in one of their rooms (not the living room). With this in play, I may play a PS2 game myself in the living room. I haven't played it since before our Arizona trip, with the exception of today, with the kids.

Did I mention I am running for School Board? I have a run-off April 5th. Wish me luck. The vote Feb. 7th occured while I was in Arizona. My wife and I couldn't even vote. We had expected to be back before then. Fortunately I ran second in the race out of 4 candidates. This will be the final time I attempt, but I also will give it my all.


I will have to say Church tonight was very good. A message on burden and leadership was addressed. It touched my heart regarding my family and those I love. Just had to share that.

It is hard to believe this week is already nearly half over. I began on-call again this Monday for this week. I will be on it for 7 days and then off 6 then on again for another 7 days. Gotta make that extra buck an hour.

My brother-in-law brought a laptop to me yesterday to have me look at it. I don't know where he is getting all these, and I don't ask. This one looks like it only has DOS on it with no windows installed at all. The CD is not recognized but interesting enough, you can slide in/out the CD and Floppy as an adapter. Oh well. I will see if I can install XP on it.

My son is sick this morning. He acted fine the first day in school. Yesterday during 4-H he bounced around, but by yesterday evening he became sick. My wife has to take him to a couple of Doctor's appointments today anyway. Just makes it hard.

Took my daughter to Basketball practice last night. I can see she enjoyed being back in the game after our 2 week out of state excursion. The couch showed her how to properly pass the ball and shoot the ball. He kept looking back at the stand to me as if 'Don't you know this stuff?' I thought to myself, 'nope, that's why I bring her to you.' Oh well. She enjoys it and I think she will get there.

Since Yu-Gi-Oh is pretty dark and has as many cards to read and learn as Clinton's excuses, we will look into the Pokemon card game. The kids love Pokemon and I plan to see if it's a bit lighter than Yu-Gi-Oh. I been trying to play the online Duel Monsters that Mark introduced me to, but I basically get my butt kick on the ones I played. Oh well, it's a nice break and I am glad Mark introduced it to me.

I will be traveling to Corp the second week of March. I plan to leave Saturday the 5th and return home Friday the 11th. They are already setting up conferences, ect. while I am down there.

The last 2 nights I haven't slept worth a flip. On-call hasn't been bad, knock on wood. But I seem to have a hard time getting to sleep and finding rest.

We finally made it home Friday evening around 4 p.m. central. We made two stops near home. One was a goldmine find for organic, non-toxic store in a hole in wall place. We spent way less in this store than the stores in Amarillo (gathering organic foods, ect.) but acquired nearly double items. The other stop was to grab cat liter, I knew we would need it. Yeah, exciting stuff, eh?

Saturday I ended up running to Fort Smith for errands and such. Today, however, I refuse to go anywhere. The whole family was a-sleep by 8:30 p.m. Friday night and didn't get up till at least 8 a.m. the next morning. Total exhaustion. We spent Saturday cleaning the house, unpacking, and getting some stuff together, (the wife moreso than I). Today, we finished up some cleaning, had some friends over for lunch and I am already ready for a nap.

Nixon has an interesting article regarding ramifications of bloggers in regards to posting about their jobs. When I have time, I would like to do a experiment to see how much info, I could actually acquire off of someone, via the net. Anyone have any suggestions of a good person to try it on, let me know.

Well, we survived Mesa, Arizona. Survived the Doctor's, 4 wall apartment for a week, ect. We are now at the Grand Canyon. We decided to drive here this afternoon, then off to Amarillo, Texas tomorrow. The Grand Canyon was only 45 minutes off our path and it would be a shame not to see it. So we are in a hotel nearly one mile away from it. It was cold and windy. It amazed me to see desert and 5 foot cactus in Mesa, snow covered peaks across the mountains to Flagstaff and snow on the ground here at parts of Grand Canyon. It was definitely a diverse in terrain from point to point.

Tomorrow will be the killer drive. It will be 11 hours from here to Amarillo. I am dreading it, but once we get there, only 6 hours more to home. I look forward to get home.

My thoughts on one of the 7 wonders of the world? The Canyon was indeed beautiful. Looked more like a canvas than a view. It's pretty obvious the only thing surviving out here buisiness wise is off the tourist that come. 2 restruants, 2 gas stations (2.49 per gallon), and maybe 3 gift shops? Yeah, I expected more.

The weekend was a nice break of the 4 walls. We hit the Phoenix Zoo today. I wasn't impressed. 40 bucks to get in, 12 bucks to ride the train. A lot of empty cages and there wasn't a good pathway to walk through. It seemed to be all over the field.

The kids were tired today, but should only be here 2.5 more days. We plan to leave Wednesday midday. I am taking a 1/2 day Wednesday and taking off both Thursday and Friday. We plan to go to the Grand Canyon on the way back home. It's only 45 minutes out of the way. We are so close, it would be a shame to miss the opportunity to say 'we been there'.

Yesterday we went to a 'swap mart'. I found the kids Yu-Gi-Oh starter decks for 3 bucks a deck. 2.50 if you buy two. I let them pick out a deck a piece and then went back to get me one. When we went to another mall I realized how cheap they really were. 12.95 per deck! Unreal. I was soooo tempted to go back and grab all of them to sell on E-bay.

We also did laundry here again. Should be the last time before leaving. The kids and I actually played in the outside pool today. Nearly 80 degrees here. We are just really ready to go home.

We are watching the SuperBowl here in the hotel room. So far they are tied, 7-7, half-time.

Yesterday evening, we had our first time to enjoy the trip. While my wife took a nap, the kids and I went to the Southwest Museum. I must say I was impressed. On one side was 3 stories, the other contained 2. They refer to the museum as the Dinosaur museum and rightly so. There were many Dinosaur skeletons. There was also a display of acutal dinosaur eggs. Evidently this was not a standard display for the museum rather a temporary one. It was a treat to walk around and view the ancient indian artificacts, dinosaurs, and the kids were able to pan for gold (pyrite). They found more water on themselves then gold, but they loved it. I took many pictures and absolutely loved it.

When we returned, we ended up taking the kids to Golf Land. They commercialize having more than 200 games in the arcade, but when you see 2 or 4 of the same game, it dwindles in difference. I have yet to find a holographic game in these big city arcades. Again, the kids loved it. Of course I had to play some games as well. (smiling). It was a bit pricey but a hotspot in the evenings and night. As it grew later, more and more people arrived. This place also had a laser tag arena, bumber boats, mini-golf, and a go cart racetrack.

Since my daughter seems to be getting more interested in Yu-Gi-Oh, I figured I better analyze it.

As a former Magic Card player (more than 10 years ago), I can see similarities. The Yu-Gi-Oh, has some distinct differences that, I believe, helps drive its continued success. There is an actual storyline where the kids or adults follow. This is propelled mainly in the cartoon but also in comic and books. Since I have not read any printed material on this game, I can only base my analysis on the cartoon aspect of the subject.

The creator of the Yu-Gi-Oh phenomenon was created by Kazuki Takahashi.
Some history of Kazuki Takahashi can be found here.

The cartoon is 30 minutes in length. However, if you take in consideration the following it’s more of 20 minutes. The first 3-4 minutes comprise of a recapture of what happened in the prior cartoon, commercials, ect. Also I noticed a lot of verbage or talking in the cartoon. So I suspect the story line is only roughly 6 minutes per episode. The main theme is comprised of the duel. There is at least one major duel per episode (from what I have seen). This does too things; brings action to the game and introduce new cards to the audience. This is a great marketing tool for Bandai.

The card game itself is a strategic game, similar to chess. The two opposing foes battle it out by the cards in their deck (which they themselves create by buying the different cards) and how they play it. However, unlike chess, this is more of a visual battle with many many possible sentries. Note also rather than the king on the board in chess, you play the king and your life points pulls you into the game more so. There is a feeling of the player being more part of the game. One of the chief things I see where Bandai did right compared to the Magic cards is the strength of the cards. I noticed that Magic cards continued to go upwards in strength. After awhile the buyer gets tired of the race for newer and stronger cards. There is only so much you can reach. Bandai, however, limits the strength, but expands the cards horizontally. They create more cards for the buyer, but in such a way to allow more strategy in play, rather than power and strength. Note this is also a statement from Yu-Gi-Oh, in the cartoon as well. “There is more in the cards than strength and power.”

I have not played the game myself. This is only a brief synopsis of a dad trying to understand what drives my kids in this subject.

Conclusion: Yu-Gi-Oh’s drive is two fold. It has a storyline that pulls you into the subject and there is an element of power when you strategically beat an opponent in this game.

You can purchase Yu-Gi-Oh from Amazon.com here.

This is the third day for sons treatments and test. We had really good news and seeing some positive results. My poor wife has been n the Doc office nearly all day every day we been here. My poor daughter has been stuck with me most of the day in the hotel as well. Me? I been doing as I normally do, stuck on the PC working away. Unfortunately we will be here till next week. I have alreay spoken to the hotel and extended our stay. Luckily they knocked off 10 bucks a night on the extended days.

I plan to actually stop on time tomorrow night. Hopefully our family can have some quality time and enjoy some time together.

We drove into Mesa, Arizona from Flagstaff this morning. We stayed till my 11 a.m. est confernce call was over. Fortunately we made it here in Mesa safely. Our son's first apppointment was Tuesday at 3:45 Mountain time. Kelli and he was in there for 3.5 hours. My daughter and I stayed at the hotel, not knowing how long it would be. We caught up on the laundry, while she did homework, I read Wired magazine.

When my wife and son returned it was nearly 7 p.m. (felt like 8 to us) and everyone was hungry, not eating dinner yet. We drove around trying to find some kindof mall around here to no avail. Finally resolving to pulling into a 7-11 asking where is a local mall or restruant around here was told 4 miles up. So it's nearly 5 miles to a mall. At least we now know. Sitting across the table in an actual restraunt (lived on the road the past 2 days, it was a nice change), I couldn't help to see my wifes enthusiasm. It appears our son has mercury poisoning. The Doctor told her, he was a bit intimidated to know we are traveling 1600 miles to have him see her son. But after seeing our son, he said he's not worried. Our son can be fixed. Bold words from someone seeing him in less than 3 hours. I won't go into detail just yet, primarily because I simply don't have it. I will meet the Doctor myself tomorrow (now today). I was impressed he actually gave my wife his cell number and changed his next few days pt's around to see our son twice a day while we are here.

He also called us while we were out to ask if we had the chance to discuss and asked how our son was doing after the first treatments. This also impressed me. I spoke with him on the cell myself. He asked if I had any questions, ect. I will get a CD from him tomorrow with 'more information than I wanted' on some of my inquiries. Kelli already made him aware I work with computers, so he knows I am a bit analytical. I guess if he can speak my terminology, I can feel better about all this. Granted I would do anything for my family. It is just easier to understand why we will be doing it.

We have no idea how long we may be here. I reserved the hotel till Saturday morning, but we may be here next week as well. Sigh. Glad I brought the kids DVD's, wished I had brought some of mine.