alvars.us

Why Not Post?

I mean I have nothing new to offer, not really… but why not post? Why should I wait for some “special” moment to add a post? huh?

I looked back at September and you can tell we’re getting into life in Vegas. 2 posts and both without news or content. I think there is more news in the comments for the posts than the actual posts themselves.

The weather is getting better… finally! It’s like October. You know, just a couple of weeks until Halloween? In North Dakota for almost 4 years, it snowed BEFORE halloween each year. In Las Vegas the temperature today was 96°. I don’t think it will snow this year before Halloween, in Las Vegas.

We have been busy this last month. School started of course, so Nicholas and Melanie are both in school and Heather is in Valley City ND. I work, A LOT, and Tira has started subbing. On Monday Nicholas has Boy Scouts, on Tuesday Melanie has Band practice, on Thursday I bowl, every other Friday Melanie has to play at the football games. 2 or 3 weekends a month Nicholas and I do Boy Scout stuff. Last weekend nothing, before that a clean up project at a local park. Before that Nicholas did a campout at Mormon Wells. An area just north of Las Vegas, across I-95 and east of Mt. Charleston (if you’re familiar with the area, Ken).

Tomorrow Nicholas and I sell popcorn, next weekend he has an Order of the Arrow camping trip to Arizona. Next month he is in Life Saving merit badge class every Saturday in Nov.

Tira has interviewed for 3 jobs in the last month. They are finally hiring teachers here, I mean school started a month ago and they pay hundreds and hundreds of “subs” every day to teach classes, and they’re finally hiring “teachers”. There is a difference…. a sub has to have some college, a teacher has to have a degree with at least 4 years of education, and many hours of classroom study and practice in lessons and classroom management. A sub gets a half day orientation on classroom management and lesson plans. A teacher takes a test to certify they meet federally mandated standards of skill and knowledge. A sub doesn’t. A teacher has to be licensed to practice, to teach our children. A sub doesn’t. A teacher is a trained professional who is entrusted by the state to teach today’s children to be tomorrow’s leaders… a sub walks in off the street and tells his class ‘I didn’t really understand this stuff when I was in school, but just read page XXX and answer the questions at the bottom.”

idiot.

I’m having trouble at work. I don’t meet “standards” of what they expect in a chief. I don’t yell enough or salute enough or stand straight enough when I’m being yelled at. But I’m working at it.

It doesn’t help that one of my subordinates is now officially the topic of conversation all across the air force. And I do mean that literally. She was removed from a very prestigious training class and it is being discussed by some of the very highest ranking Chief Master Sergeants in the Air Force.

I’ve instituted a mandatory fitness regiment for my flight. We meet at 1600 (4pm) on Friday for fitness training, but somehow a Major in my flight got 6am stuck in his head and he ordered a couple of the guys to show up this morning for 6am PT. Well they sat there alone for a little while. When I came in at 7 this morning I explained mandatory PT was at 1600 not 0600! Poor guys! I didn’t let them off the hook though, made them run again with the rest of the flight at 4pm. 🙂

I have a bunch of stuff to sell and get out of my garage if I can get off my ass and advertise them!

Was waiting at the light on my way home today (Vegas!) and thought about my truck. I’ve been driving the last few days because I’m sitting in for the Group Chief and I have some extra work to do each day. So I’m sitting in my truck waiting for the light to change and I was practicing math. What? I know you practice math in your head when you have a few moments too, right? So I looked at my odometer and noticed I had put almost 200 miles on my truck this week. In my head, that means 200 miles at 15 mpg or about 15 gallons of gas a week, or about $50 bucks. Times 4 that’s over $200 for gas in my truck per month just to get to work. And I only drive 14 miles or so each way to work. Tira drives like 100 miles to the grocery store. Not really of course, but her gas bill is as high as mine! That is a lot of money each month for gas in the cars.

It’s 11pm and in the last 3 minutes both kids have been up in the hallway and I’ve had to yell at them “Go to bed!”.

I said “both of them”. I sure miss my Heather.

I took Chloe for a drive tonight (our fat beagle) to the hardware store. I needed some doweling so that I could cut it down to hold up a shelf in my stereo cabinet that I lost the pins for. So anyway, Chloe is a beagle and of course that means she’s not all that bright. So I’m driving around town doing like 40 or 45 and her head is out the window and her ears are flapping and all that beagle stuff. The wind is blowing and the dust is flying and she starts sneezing. So she sits inside the car and sneezes until she is done, then sticks her head out the window until the dust makes her sneeze again. I wonder how long this vicious cycle would have gone on if I had kept driving around and around without stopping?

So how about that? no pictures, just chatting (or brain meandering). But it’s 11pm and Tira finally went to bed like the kids and so I suppose that since Nicholas and I have to be up at 6am I should join them.

buh-bye,

-scott