spring update

for archives sake, i'll update the blog. I've been in SoCal now since last september. continuing on the MBA. I took 1 class in the fall (business law), 2 over winter (2 hrs each, workplace spirituality and social entrepreneurship. both require for the core program) and one in the spring (MGMT 691 Management Strategies / Policy Analysis). I have found that as I move from one MBA program to another (UNR) its hard to remember the classes i've taken and show proof. a transcript isn't enough these days, and i really need to be saving a copy of the syllabus for records sake. when i applied in the current program they wanted to know more than a title and grade could provide. whats wrong with stupid transcripts anyway? if schools need more, then put more in there. oh well. A's so far. employer is still paying, (up to $3k a year i think) but since jen teaches there I get 16 credits a year for free or something. not alot of time to take more than 4 credits at a time anyway. The less I care, the better the grades. its been all A's down here. I do go to class, and I do read (right before the professor calls on me) and I do prepare (the night before an assignment is due or there is a presentation), but nothing like I use to do in Engineering.

Work is work. to much work and not enough leadership. I'm now recognizing that most companies are reactionary and despite the need for true business planning and forecasting, no one has a crystal ball and NO ONE really knows what they are doing. Business is starting to turn out to be a bit of a disappointment (Written from the point of view of a scum sucking bottom of the rung operations manager) I have 4 employees. we can build a box and sell it for $25k in a little less than 1/2 a day. we spend the majority of our time looking for parts, fixing poor quality designs and fighting a paper based inventory / rework process. for the life of me i can't figure out why any company would structure itself this way? I'm stuck in the middle and i can't figure out how to fix it. an ERP system will start definition in June, but i wasn't even invited to participate. I had to remind my manager (director of operations) that yes, the test and calibration group, THE PEOPLE THAT MAKE SURE IT WORKS before it goes out the door would like to be involved. stupid.

I ran the first tank of biodiesel (B40 blend). i'm sure that will clog the filter / water seperator. hopefully it doesn't give out when i'm far from home. If I donate my labor, and we get the oil for free, the cost for methanol and Koh is amounts to around $1.50 a gallon which isn't to bad compared to the $4.50+ for diesel at the pump. i've started looking into how to pay tax on homemade biofuel. i'll check into that again when i care more.

The clutch sensor on the bike isn't working. I wish BMW would have caught that last time they serviced it. it means if you stall in traffic (happens about once every few months) that you have to peck for neutral to start the bike. it can be done, but its not the safest thing. for the non riders out there. a bike will usually start (turn the starter) when yo have the bike in neutral, OR have the clutch pulled in. typical ride speed is between 80 and 90 down here on the freeways. thats much faster than i was use to in nevada and has taken some getting use to. with all of the lane splitting and nutjob wacco drivers out there it is a little higher no the danger scale than i would like. who knows, i may have to give the bike up after kids. jens talking kids now. who was it that said 30 is the big year?!! who where you! i wish i could remember. at any rate, you were right. the negotiations (i mean discussions) have begun.

some of the utility costs are actually lower in socal than in reno, NV, so that was a nice unexpected surprise.

we are about 98% done with our painting. 3 rooms were painted. the Pink room is now a sand color with cinnamon accent wall. the purple room with hidiuos stripes is now sand color with a chocolate accent wall, and the 3rd room that was never painted is also the sand with chocolate accent. i can't say i'm super crazy about the colors, but I am really happy to have it done. My artistic taste is inversely proportional to my engineering education and experience so I try not to stall progress to much.

As was shown on nerdy, the lawn looks like its taking. we have plans for the back yard. fruit trees and what not, we just haven't made it to far yet. the next door neighbor liked to offer friendly advice on our new home and was glad to see we got our first home! I Had to kindly inform him its not our 1st home, its our 4th. that didn't slow him down on the recommendations for redoing the backyard, how to kill termites, and how to work with the neighbor behind me who didn't complete a retaining wall and now there is erosion under the fence. after my first attempt to look mildly intelligent i just gave up and let him educate me on this whole home ownership thing.

theres one thing I have learned, and that is you can't learn from somebody if your talking. even if you don't think someone has something useful to say, you'd be surprised what you can learn (or accomplish) if your just quit talking and listen.

update

I never post here any more, cause the nice folks over on nerdy tales let me post there. heres the update. I'm on my second 'leadership role', instead of assemblers, I now have 7 engineers working under me. I no longer have 3 years left on the MBA, i'm down to just over a year left.

I completed a 150k service on the TDI VW. new timing belt, new serpentine belt (i screwed up and didn't change it when i did the 80k service, so i got a whoping 150k miles out of the serpentine! it was pretty much SHREDDED when i pulled it off. yup, i got my money out of that one)

I put in a new brass impeller water pump, the orgigional had a plastic impleller. i'm still undedecided which is better, but i shelled out the high dollars for the brass (roughly twice as expensive) so i might as well use it. changing the water pump invovled a gallon of new coolant. i was smart though, and saved a little of the old stuff when I was draining it and sure enough, the gallon of new stuff wasn't quite enough, so i topped off with the stuff i saved. i'm just so proud of myself on that one to have the forethought to think before doing! (wheres some wood, i'm feeling the urge to nock on wood as i'm sure i've just seriously jinksed myself )

I advanced the timing slightly. the car revs better now, and i'm hoping my mpg will increase from 47mpg to over 50. we'll see.

that was 3-4 nights in the garage. no mishaps, just elbow grease. thanks for the help dad.

new cabin air filter (kind of expensive)
new air filter (cheep)
new fuel filter (busted the nozzle off the bottom when I was admiring it, but it still works)
new stretch bolts, new seal on the vacuum pump

todo: change the glow plug harness, clean the N75 solenoid. whatever that is. decide if i'm going to change the struts or burn another set of tires (hey, 150k miles on 1.7 sets of tires isn't bad. if i burn the rest of the rubber i have, i'll be looking for new tires next spring) i'm leaning towards another set of tires, and then look at struts in the 215k mile range. i'm thinking if i do struts, i have to do alignment too, and if I gottal do all that, i might as well do a 1" lift on the front. and if i do ALL THAT, thats another $500+ into the car that I don't absolutely have to do. so i'll just wait.

wheel alignment

the alignment may be a tad off on the VW, i'll read more of alignment later

google spreadsheet

you'll have to excuse the horendous inappropriate use of the GIF format, but my paintbrush is missing the JPG filter on my 'other' machine... the one 'not at home'. anyway, I post this to point out yet another effective way of converting something to PDF, which seems to have become THE document format if you want to send info across platforms. check out google spreadsheets ohh.. wait. upone closer inspection, it looks like it has now become google docs which probably has pseudo word capabilities as well. awesome.

1150 around the world

Bunkiesadventure.com 30 countires, 21 months on an 1150GS

G 650 X Challenge

I just ran across one of BMW's next bikes for 2007, (this bike and its 2 brothers are listed under enduro, and 'urban' respectivly. I must say. it looks ALOT like jens XT225. it looks like fun, but I must ask, what are these guys thinking? it better have a price around the XT225 and i'll buy 2, but if its more than the 650GS, forget it.

dynamic DNS

its been a while since i've needed a dynamic DNS host, but next time I need one, I'll get mine from afraid.org

asian cookware

http://www.usbwifi.orcon.net.nz/ gives some interesting ideas, many passive reflectors which means i don't have to solder anything. i like that idea.

sum

from mathpages.com quotes

I do hate sums.  There is no greater mistake than to call
arithmetic an exact science.  There are hidden laws of number
which it requires a mind like mine to perceive.  For instance,
if you add a sum from the bottom up, and then again from the
top down, the result is always different.
                                 Mrs. La Touche, 19th c.

I think I get this one. I'm so proud of myself.

ok.. a few more. I do so love these

Your manuscript is both good and original.  However, that which
is good is not original, and that which is original is not good.
                                             Samuel Johnson

I have made this letter longer than usual because I lack the
time to make it shorter.
                                               Blaise Pascal

book binding

one more post before I leave the world wide web of freedom for the night. I clicked on my own advertisement on this blog (cause it looked interesting) and found that lulu.com does book binding! $5 binding fee, .02/page for BW and .15/page for color.

seems WAY REASONABLE compared to what i heard a special someone tell me their thesis cost. yeah.. its not 8.5x11, but it is a book. check it out.

spam central

I'm wondering, why is it that the email address I have on this psuedo-anonymouse blog (k2h.admin) have LESS SPAM than the email address I don't publish? compare the 55 to the ~150 I have in the other account. maybe I clicked delete and forgot or something. this just seems antiintuitive

open office solver

found an open office solver here I'm working on yet another pipe dream model for stock prediction. (think simple linear solve plus asin(wt+b)) it'll never work, but I gotta find someway to make a free dollar.

background check

for my notes, http://adpro.com/ seems to do pretty good background checks.

sarcasm

Mental note: when having a fight with a coworker, NEVER, EVER under any circumstance call the person and leave a message stating you dislike the person. probable outcome will be that the phone is brought in as evidence, the message played to a HR representative, and you will be cited with unprofessional conduct. the result? skip 3 levels of displine, and you find yourself dazed and confused wondering what happened.

better method? have a one on one argument with someone, hash it out. and then its their word against yours. no witnesses (just a little blood if the situation warrants)

is what makes this particularly painful is it happened to one of my best people.

result to business? best person gives 2 week notice.

housing blog

housing-boom.com

two equations

two unknowns
it is to save me 10seconds on homework.

gmini 120

we are prepping for our trip and pulled the Gmini 120 0ut after a prolonged sleep. we fully expected the battery to be completly dead, or worse yet not work at all due to a year of neglect, but it worked perfectly and the battery still had a charge.

should I need to work on this baby later, i'm putting a note to self that more info is available HERE

mastercard?

I got my new corporate credit card (mastercard), called to activate it, and was transferred all over the system until a person finally picked up and said the computer systems were down and they could not activate the card. they then proceeded to ask me if there was anything else they could help me with.

hmmmm....... let me think, your a technology based company, and YOUR COMPUTERS ARE DOWN.... no.. theres nothing you can help me with india.... thankyou.

On The way out

Today I had my 6 month evaluation, as if once a year isn't good enough, they break it down into 6 month intervals now.basically it boils down to the department I work for is black listed and 'officially sucks' as viewed by the upper ups, and everyone that has control over the destinies. I'm viewed as having too many HR problems (either personally, or direct-reports that have HR problems, i'm not sure) and am given a ranking of LEP, least effective performer.in GE lingo, thats you suck and need to find a new job.I'll run limited damage control before the alaska trip, and continue when I get back, but its starting to look like the smog is more appealing.

photography

i found a very good article on basic photography. I keep forgetting to keep an eye out for a very low Fstop lense, just so I can see the difference.