Well I went up to do a little hiking with Lauren on Sunday, nothing too tuff, so I decided the hike to the Bogs would be a great time. truth be told I just wanted to see her jump up and down, so that was a good excuse. No seriously though, it was a great time and I gave the driving tour of the camp, too bad Jon wasn’t there to do the 2-track tour. After taking in some of the natural beauty surrounding us at OSR, we drove around a bit to Whithall and somewhere alone the way, I decided I needed a photo of this.

Well as most of you know, there is the ongoing problem of the fact that Chicago Area Council wants to sell off all of thier assets so that the mission of the Boy Scouts of American becomes that much harder without one of its proven and foundation methods. Without the land to camp on, I don’t know where the local youth will go to do their thing. I know there are still areas, but there is no longer the tradition of these camps and the programs that have been offered at these locations. It is very encouraging to see that the local residents of Blue Lake Township and other surrounding areas of Owasippe do not want to see this land sold off to developers. They want this to stay as native land and it does not necessarily have to stay a scout camp, but it would be such a loss to everyone to have this beautiful woodland transformed into some architect’s sick vision of a sub-division. Anyhow, I was amused and I would like to hear some opinions on the matter.

Well obviously this post has needed to go up for a while. I have been upto some pretty fun things lately. It seems that gone are the days where I jsut sit around on my arse all day, evening and weekend and feel sorry for myself. The job is going well, there are so many nice people around and they are so very accomodating. I hope they don’t mind that I am terrible with names, and it is nothing personal.

I have been taking on projects here and there and, well, official work projects are actually a bit of fun. I know that might sound odd to some, but workign for a smaller organization like this causes me to actually be a bit more involved than I might otherwise be in a large corporate environment. This is much better than a simple “Helpdesk, this is Brian” that I have been doing over the last few jobs. I have been able to step into much more of an active role, hopefully that does not change too terribly much, though I know it will. Hopefully Bill doesn’t start publishing my phone number, I am having problems with the phone for one, and we all know how much I dislike phones. But in anycase I like the job, I really do. Sometimes I wish I had more to do, but I’m sure that will change with time, it is a good way to ease into the position. I have moved into my new office this week and that is nice for sure. I actually have 4 walls, a door and a window, its almost like they expect me to stay around for a little while. To be perfectly honest I would like to stick here for a little while.

Outside work, I have been having fun with friends. Unfortunately this week has been the time to say adios to Jason, check the gallery for those photos. It was a sad night truly, but the best of luck to him in his new role working down in Chi-town, living the big pimpin’ lifestyle. I have received that first paycheck so now I can start to pay off that bar tab, as well as a few other things needing monetary attention. I have been going out and hanging out, chillin for dinners and drinks, and just generally enjoying life for the first time in a while. I have plenty of people to count on and hat are genuine friends, which is why I am so disappointed to see Jason go. I still have Darrin, Deanna and well Abby for a while. To add to the mix, why dont we find an amazing person get to know them and then realize that this is just a short blink of an eye in the grand scheme of things. But in that blink of an eye we need to grasp what is presented to us and just experience and grow to appreciate all the subtle nuiances of everything.

I went for a little walk in the woods with Lauren last week. That was great, it has been a while since I have had the occasion and opportunity to go and just truly enjoy the wonders of nature. It was actually a bit of a brisk walk, but it was just so amazing. The flowers the trees, the water. The trillium was looking quite lovely and I wish I had with me the bag of photographic equipment. Now with the new job I can get back into actually being able to afford that hobby, but still not well enough off to truly indulge myself into the passion of photography.

I went to the BOB for “Beer and Cigar” night with my co-workers. That was a great time, first the fact that they invited me so soon after I had started. I feel like I truly am appreciated and respected here. They welcomed me and invited me into all of the dirty little gossip about the people we work with and I just got to know the people that showed up a little bit better. It wasn’t even that odd to be having beer with so many ordained ministers.

The new Star Wars film, it was excellent, now that I have seen the first 3 episodes, I believe that I can actually go home and watch the original Trilogy. I don’t know if its the original or the remastered Trilogy. This was a gift at one point from Jessi’s parents, thanks again, and I now feel that I can finally view them. I do find it interesting that so many people ha just assumed because I’m a computer nerd that I had actually watched and been an absolutely devout Star Wars fanatic. I have the basic story down, but I guess now with the final installment finally out there I should be able to piece together everything that I didn’t know I was missing.

I should probably stop posting soon as I feel that I am rambling, but there are still come cool things that have gone on lately, like watching Jeremy hand forge weld chainsaw blades into a billet for making a knife. and jus thte general good times hangin gout with Lauren and even the random appearance of Tyler the other night at B-dubs. I am waiting on photos fromt hat night from Abby, since this was a pre-going-away-party for her before she heads intot he frozen lands of colorado, so hopefully I can get those soon. The lack of sleep and excess of coffee in myseystem has been sending me topsy-turvy lately so I should stop before I get myself into some trouble here. Until then …. enjoy and may the schwartz be with you.

For all of us who are tired of having the bun/dog discrepancy, they have finally come to a peace of sorts. This made me chuckle. Maybe its the punchy mood, maybe more. The world may never know.

An end to the hot dog wars

Herb Curbs Binge Drinking. I guess if it took me less to get drunk I would probably drink less quantity. Just an interesting tidbit to pass on.

For those of you interested, this is a short synopsis of my job description for my job with the RCA:

“The Support Specialist in the RCA’s Grand Rapids office should have demonstrated experience in most major desktop operating systems (primarily the current versions of Windows), most major word processing and spreadsheet applications (primarily Microsoft Office Suite), and experience in basic network administrative tasks in a Microsoft environment.

The Support Specialist must have excellent communication and people skills, along with demonstrated experience in supporting users on an as-needed basis, managing a helpdesk system, and providing creative desktop solutions through improvements in the staff’s ability to maximize their own capabilities with the software available to them on their desktop.”

Well it has apparently been a little while since I have had the desire to update when I have not been fallling asleep or needing to do something else. Where to start, obviously everyone knows about the sad news, the Bulls have unfortunately been eliminated from the first round of the NBA playoffs in 6 games. A bit of good news, the Sox are still white hot, and as of this writing are 4.5 games up in their division, and well even better news, the Cubs haven’t been doing so well.

Last weekend was a good time, I had some good conversations out at the bar with some people. I will say that the debates between Lauren and Brad can be quite amusing and covering a wide variety of subjects. Saturday I got to help out Nicolette with her fundraiser at the Passport to Music program they were doing in the Creston neighborhood. I was able to cover the door at the slowest bar of the evening, Club North, and listen to the music of Gruv Unit. I have heard them before Founder’s but I was not particularly impressed that night. After ducking out of that, we headed for a drink so she could relax a bit. I ended up sticking around too late talking as usual, but its all good. Sunday was Jason’s graduation party in St. Joe, which was a blast. I rode in with Nicolette and we had a good time just chillin, eating and talking. I was a bit disappointed to not have an Old Style or PBR.

Monday was the first day of the rest of my life, or however that phrase goes. I started my new job at the RCA. After filling out the pile of appropriate paperwork, I was able to settle in at a desk, which would involve moving later anyhow. But I proceeded through the week being educated on the various systems and setups of equipment. I guess I get to help implement a helpdesk system rather than just staff it. It will be an interesting change for them in their organization. It will also be great to not just be tied to a phone like I was at USF, I will handle most problems, but I will get to actually do some desktop support as well. One of the more interesting things they have asked me to do to date is to secure their wireless network. I need to do some research on their RADIUS server to figure how I need to get the WAP to associate users by that method. I feel much better about my job now knoing that everyone I work with likes to have fun and go out and have some drinks from time to time, I had a good conversation with Charlie about several of the microbreweries around, and contrary to Jason’s description, its not “a wee little beer.” I am looking forward to working with these people, it is a very friendly and very relaxed. Maybe this will finally help to alleviate the hair loss.

I had the opportunity to hang out with several people throughout the week, and well it has been a great time of just relaxing with friends. Tuesday found the trip to Allendale then down for a drink at Founders with D, Wednesday was the last games of pool I will play with Jason for a while down at the Cambridge House, and then a few beers next door after joining up with Lauren and Rachelle, then the business meeting with Jeremy down there. He was very pleased with the etching on Titanium and D2 steel, he gave me a slab of Damascus steel to see if we can work that. Thursday brought a trip to the theater with Deanna to see Hitchhiker’s guide to the galaxy, which I was pleasntly happy with followed by some Cinco de Mayo celebrations. The big capper to the week was teh marriage of Christopher House to Ashley Lettinga. It was a lovely ceremony followed by an enjoyable reception. I for some reason don’t like taking photos in the church, so I only have photos from the reception, which was really just our table. It was a good time followed by some more great chillin with friends and then a trip out to meet up with Lauren, apparently I was dressed well enough to have been called Bill Gates over at Founder’s.

I am finally slipping back into the schedule required when working 1st shift. I am getting to sleep realtively early, either that or I am getting better at functioning on less sleep, I still haven’t decided yet. Actually it must be the latter, as I didnt get to sleep before 3 tuesday. In any case. I believe this update should be plenty long for today.