Make-Up Wednesday
Make-up Wednesday
This blog is a make-up for yesterday’s missing blog.
Yesterday, I was too tired to post the blog. I had not slept well on Sunday and Monday evenings. I like to get around six to seven hours of sleep a night. The prior two days I had picked up barely five hours of sleep each night.
I had thought about taking a nap when I got home from school and my job interview. I decided against doing that because it would have really made a mess of my normal sleep schedule.
I did sleep well last night. I had just over nine hours of sleep. I was tired.
Site Meter
Site Meter appears to have solved the problem with the visitor tracking program. It is in the process of updating all of the traffic logs. When I looked at it this morning, Site Meter was working on March 13th. At the rate they are progressing, I expect that the traffic logging will be back to normal by the end of the day.
Excellent.
The traffic recovery work means the Visitors section of the Weekend Update will be inflated because I don’t plan to go back and correct the March 11th Weekend Update posting. I think the monthly traffic count will be around 300 by the end of the day. That will be very nice.
My Amber Alert
I think I have decided on a non-time sensitive or critical event for Amber and me. I think that having and cooking dinner at my house will work out just fine. We don’t have to worry about being somewhere at a specific time.
Dinner is usually in the early evening. We all have a built in reminder for dinner, our hunger. Growling stomachs are a noisy reminded that we need to eat.
Of course, this all leads to the next and really obvious question. What do I cook? Right now, I am leaning towards fish because Amber likes fish. I also like fish so we are compatible in a food sense, at least for this meal. I feel like cooking an eclectic meal instead of a bland, regular one that consists of a lettuce and tomato salad, sautéed fish and pasta maybe, a shared dessert, and wine.
I want to have some sautéed asparagus with an olive oil, mustard, and hard boiled egg sauce or dressing. It is really colorful on the plate with the green asparagus covered with a yellowish sauce that has chopped egg whites in it. It also tastes good as well. I’ll be sure to have some fresh garlic bread on hand to wipe up the leftover sauce on the plates. Then, I think I want to have some rice instead of pasta or potato. I will add some black beans to the white rice to give the meal a Cuban Caribbean theme. I won’t know what kind of fish I will be serving until I go to the fish market and see what is really fresh. Having a fish market about two miles / three kilometers from the house is very convenient for me.
Our shared dessert will be easy. That will come from Giuliano’s. Sharing dessert is beginning to make a lot of sense for me. I eat less of the food that is fundamentally not good for me and I get to play with it while Amber and I talk and eat.
Of course, all good things and events have their downsides. Dinner with Amber at my house has its. I will have to give the place a really good, clean sweep down this weekend so that I just need to do a simple touch up on next weekend.
Job Searching and Interviewing
I had a job interview yesterday afternoon.
I was interviewing for president of a small credit union. It is a challenging position since the organization is not large enough to hire a number of skilled supervisors. The president wears a lot of hats. This may be a negative factor for me because I have never led a small credit union before and the Board of Directors may want someone with some more direct experience.
I think I did well during the interview. But, you never really know how well you did until the hiring party makes a decision. The board chairman said the credit union planned to make a decision by the end of the month. This is what I would expect to happen. Their monthly board of directors meeting will be on March 27th. If they decide to hire me, I could start in April and have a month to go over all of the major functions with the retiring president.
I guess I now just have to sit and wait. I am good at sitting and waiting. In the military, you learn, early on, how to sit and wait for things to happen. Exercises and events that were scheduled for 9:00 AM were often shifted to much later in the day or postponed for a day or more and then cancelled.
This morning, I received a phone call from a recruiter in Boston who was looking for a lead to a senior level call center manager. The position was with an equipment leasing company that only deals with businesses. The recruiter wanted to know if I could recommend anyone for the position that was probably going to pay around USD$200,000 or more a year plus bonuses.
Unfortunately for the caller, I don’t know anyone who would be qualified for the position or have the necessary skill set to succeed. I did suggest that the recruiter try contacting someone at the vice presidental level at New Century Financial. This company has a large call center function and is regularly being mentioned in the newspapers and on television as being on the edge of bankruptcy. It should be easy to convince someone at New Century to talk to another company that seems to be in much better financial condition.
Teaching
I found out why the Monday morning class I was supposed to teach was changed yesterday. The course was not cancelled. It was given to a full time teacher at the school. At first, I was hurt and I felt a little bitter. Then, I thought about the decision and I realized that the school’s actions made sense.
The school was going to be paying the full time teacher whether she taught the class or not. From looking at the schedule, she had the time for the class. It didn’t make any sense to have her sitting in her thumbs and then pay me to teach the class.
I do not know that much about the other teacher’s qualifications. She seems like she would be good in the classroom. I think I would have been a better teacher for the class on supervision and leadership. I do not believe she has been the head of a company like I was for eight plus years and worried whether or not the company would have enough cash in the bank to cover payroll on Friday or whether we would have to borrow to cover the payroll cash needs.
It is one thing to talk about how to face and manage these business challenges and a very different thing to have actually successfully done them.
Anyway.
I had my first class of the new term yesterday. It was Microeconomics.
This should be a good class. There are only eight students in the class and most of them seem interested. I did have one student nod off and sleep in class. He is unlikely to do well and will probably fail the class.
It is difficult to pass this class if you don’t stat alert and learn.
I also have one student who likes to hear his own voice. He likes to make comments regardless of whether they are appropriate or make sense or contribute to the class. I could tell that the rest of class hates this student already and would not be willing to work with him if there was a group project.
Fortunately, there are no group projects in Microeconomics.
I have eight students in my Thursday class. I have had them all in one of the classes from the last term so we all know each other. They will have to work but it ought to be a fun class. I think I have twelve students in my Saturday afternoon class. These are all new to me students so it remains to be seen how things will develop with them.
When I got home from the job interview, I had a voice message on the answering machine from the human resources manager at school.
I returned his call.
He wanted to know if I could come in and substitute for a class last night. I told that I would have to pass because of the late notice. I could not get to school in time for the class start at 6:00PM plus the fact that I had made plans, with Doug, for the night.
He understood that. Then, he asked if I had any interest in possibly teaching a class, as a replacement instructor, for the Criminal Justice program on Modern Policing that would be on Wednesday mornings. I thought for a moment and told him; that while I could provide a creditable, dry, from the textbook, set of class sessions, I felt that the students would be short changed because I could not provide any of the life experiences that can make a class a success or failure.
I also told him that I had made a commitment to a new client that would require me to work mornings at their offices. This would make it very difficult for me to accept the class.
The human resources manager understood my reluctance to teach a course where I had some doubts about my ability to provide a first rate level of instruction. He then asked if I would be interested in possibly teaching a course on Criminology for the Criminal Justice program. He explained the program to me. It seemed like it would be one that I could teach since it won’t necessarily require those life experiences to add to the course.
The Criminology course would be on Tuesday evenings so I would have a reduced level of conflict with the possible new job at the credit union. This course would be more of an intellectual approach to criminal justice that would include legal, sociological, and remedial approaches.
I won’t know until tomorrow when I am in class whether the school is going to have me teach the course. This makes going to school tomorrow interesting.
The Princess
I finally caught up with the Princess yesterday.
The Princess has been very busy with the new job and the wedding plans. I called to wish her a happy birthday. I know that she loves to celebrate so I needed to get my greeting in early. I couldn’t really wait to the weekend to call her because she is part Irish so she will be celebrating St. Patrick’s Day and the start of March Madness.
The wedding plans seem to be in good order. At least, I will not be hungry after the ceremony and reception. The Princess told me about one of the appetizers for the reception. You have to remember that the wedding is in Atlanta, in the heart of the South. She will be serving grits in a martini glass.
Cool.
The Princess was disappointed that we will have to postpone the traditional birthday dinner until Memorial Day Weekend or the first weekend in June. She understood that Dad had to teach. Besides, the weather is likely to be better in the late Spring than in the late Winter.
Woman of the Moment
We are down to only three more days of Vivian Hsu. I am working on a new Woman of the Moment for next week. She will come from the Speed Options magazine model of the month feature.
Be well and stay happy.
This blog is a make-up for yesterday’s missing blog.
Yesterday, I was too tired to post the blog. I had not slept well on Sunday and Monday evenings. I like to get around six to seven hours of sleep a night. The prior two days I had picked up barely five hours of sleep each night.
I had thought about taking a nap when I got home from school and my job interview. I decided against doing that because it would have really made a mess of my normal sleep schedule.
I did sleep well last night. I had just over nine hours of sleep. I was tired.
Site Meter
Site Meter appears to have solved the problem with the visitor tracking program. It is in the process of updating all of the traffic logs. When I looked at it this morning, Site Meter was working on March 13th. At the rate they are progressing, I expect that the traffic logging will be back to normal by the end of the day.
Excellent.
The traffic recovery work means the Visitors section of the Weekend Update will be inflated because I don’t plan to go back and correct the March 11th Weekend Update posting. I think the monthly traffic count will be around 300 by the end of the day. That will be very nice.
My Amber Alert
I think I have decided on a non-time sensitive or critical event for Amber and me. I think that having and cooking dinner at my house will work out just fine. We don’t have to worry about being somewhere at a specific time. Dinner is usually in the early evening. We all have a built in reminder for dinner, our hunger. Growling stomachs are a noisy reminded that we need to eat.
Of course, this all leads to the next and really obvious question. What do I cook? Right now, I am leaning towards fish because Amber likes fish. I also like fish so we are compatible in a food sense, at least for this meal. I feel like cooking an eclectic meal instead of a bland, regular one that consists of a lettuce and tomato salad, sautéed fish and pasta maybe, a shared dessert, and wine.
I want to have some sautéed asparagus with an olive oil, mustard, and hard boiled egg sauce or dressing. It is really colorful on the plate with the green asparagus covered with a yellowish sauce that has chopped egg whites in it. It also tastes good as well. I’ll be sure to have some fresh garlic bread on hand to wipe up the leftover sauce on the plates. Then, I think I want to have some rice instead of pasta or potato. I will add some black beans to the white rice to give the meal a Cuban Caribbean theme. I won’t know what kind of fish I will be serving until I go to the fish market and see what is really fresh. Having a fish market about two miles / three kilometers from the house is very convenient for me.
Our shared dessert will be easy. That will come from Giuliano’s. Sharing dessert is beginning to make a lot of sense for me. I eat less of the food that is fundamentally not good for me and I get to play with it while Amber and I talk and eat.
Of course, all good things and events have their downsides. Dinner with Amber at my house has its. I will have to give the place a really good, clean sweep down this weekend so that I just need to do a simple touch up on next weekend.
Job Searching and Interviewing
I had a job interview yesterday afternoon.
I was interviewing for president of a small credit union. It is a challenging position since the organization is not large enough to hire a number of skilled supervisors. The president wears a lot of hats. This may be a negative factor for me because I have never led a small credit union before and the Board of Directors may want someone with some more direct experience.
I think I did well during the interview. But, you never really know how well you did until the hiring party makes a decision. The board chairman said the credit union planned to make a decision by the end of the month. This is what I would expect to happen. Their monthly board of directors meeting will be on March 27th. If they decide to hire me, I could start in April and have a month to go over all of the major functions with the retiring president.
I guess I now just have to sit and wait. I am good at sitting and waiting. In the military, you learn, early on, how to sit and wait for things to happen. Exercises and events that were scheduled for 9:00 AM were often shifted to much later in the day or postponed for a day or more and then cancelled.
This morning, I received a phone call from a recruiter in Boston who was looking for a lead to a senior level call center manager. The position was with an equipment leasing company that only deals with businesses. The recruiter wanted to know if I could recommend anyone for the position that was probably going to pay around USD$200,000 or more a year plus bonuses.
Unfortunately for the caller, I don’t know anyone who would be qualified for the position or have the necessary skill set to succeed. I did suggest that the recruiter try contacting someone at the vice presidental level at New Century Financial. This company has a large call center function and is regularly being mentioned in the newspapers and on television as being on the edge of bankruptcy. It should be easy to convince someone at New Century to talk to another company that seems to be in much better financial condition.
Teaching
I found out why the Monday morning class I was supposed to teach was changed yesterday. The course was not cancelled. It was given to a full time teacher at the school. At first, I was hurt and I felt a little bitter. Then, I thought about the decision and I realized that the school’s actions made sense.
The school was going to be paying the full time teacher whether she taught the class or not. From looking at the schedule, she had the time for the class. It didn’t make any sense to have her sitting in her thumbs and then pay me to teach the class.
I do not know that much about the other teacher’s qualifications. She seems like she would be good in the classroom. I think I would have been a better teacher for the class on supervision and leadership. I do not believe she has been the head of a company like I was for eight plus years and worried whether or not the company would have enough cash in the bank to cover payroll on Friday or whether we would have to borrow to cover the payroll cash needs.
It is one thing to talk about how to face and manage these business challenges and a very different thing to have actually successfully done them.
Anyway.
I had my first class of the new term yesterday. It was Microeconomics.
This should be a good class. There are only eight students in the class and most of them seem interested. I did have one student nod off and sleep in class. He is unlikely to do well and will probably fail the class.
It is difficult to pass this class if you don’t stat alert and learn.
I also have one student who likes to hear his own voice. He likes to make comments regardless of whether they are appropriate or make sense or contribute to the class. I could tell that the rest of class hates this student already and would not be willing to work with him if there was a group project.
Fortunately, there are no group projects in Microeconomics.
I have eight students in my Thursday class. I have had them all in one of the classes from the last term so we all know each other. They will have to work but it ought to be a fun class. I think I have twelve students in my Saturday afternoon class. These are all new to me students so it remains to be seen how things will develop with them.
When I got home from the job interview, I had a voice message on the answering machine from the human resources manager at school.
I returned his call.
He wanted to know if I could come in and substitute for a class last night. I told that I would have to pass because of the late notice. I could not get to school in time for the class start at 6:00PM plus the fact that I had made plans, with Doug, for the night.
He understood that. Then, he asked if I had any interest in possibly teaching a class, as a replacement instructor, for the Criminal Justice program on Modern Policing that would be on Wednesday mornings. I thought for a moment and told him; that while I could provide a creditable, dry, from the textbook, set of class sessions, I felt that the students would be short changed because I could not provide any of the life experiences that can make a class a success or failure.
I also told him that I had made a commitment to a new client that would require me to work mornings at their offices. This would make it very difficult for me to accept the class.
The human resources manager understood my reluctance to teach a course where I had some doubts about my ability to provide a first rate level of instruction. He then asked if I would be interested in possibly teaching a course on Criminology for the Criminal Justice program. He explained the program to me. It seemed like it would be one that I could teach since it won’t necessarily require those life experiences to add to the course.
The Criminology course would be on Tuesday evenings so I would have a reduced level of conflict with the possible new job at the credit union. This course would be more of an intellectual approach to criminal justice that would include legal, sociological, and remedial approaches.
I won’t know until tomorrow when I am in class whether the school is going to have me teach the course. This makes going to school tomorrow interesting.
The Princess
I finally caught up with the Princess yesterday.
The Princess has been very busy with the new job and the wedding plans. I called to wish her a happy birthday. I know that she loves to celebrate so I needed to get my greeting in early. I couldn’t really wait to the weekend to call her because she is part Irish so she will be celebrating St. Patrick’s Day and the start of March Madness.
The wedding plans seem to be in good order. At least, I will not be hungry after the ceremony and reception. The Princess told me about one of the appetizers for the reception. You have to remember that the wedding is in Atlanta, in the heart of the South. She will be serving grits in a martini glass.
Cool.
The Princess was disappointed that we will have to postpone the traditional birthday dinner until Memorial Day Weekend or the first weekend in June. She understood that Dad had to teach. Besides, the weather is likely to be better in the late Spring than in the late Winter.
Woman of the Moment
We are down to only three more days of Vivian Hsu. I am working on a new Woman of the Moment for next week. She will come from the Speed Options magazine model of the month feature.
Be well and stay happy.
posted by Chuck Reinhardt at 1:15 PM
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