February 17, 2016
This week has been a little hectic. It took four days to get a hold of the candidate (Monday night) so I was unsure of his commitment, but once I got him on the phone he was very open about what had been going on and told me about himself I found him to be a very worthy candidate for our group. Of course I then had to drive the petition with my responses to a “brothers house” after work.
I really miss the M. meetings, which are on a Wednesday in the middle of every month. The interactions with the guys and seeing that we have a great group makes it difficult but knowing my job which is providing for my family comes first and the lodge has tried to extend an open invitation to everything that they do towards me and my family.
Anyways, back to the week….outside of the M. duties I have been without a “family doctor” for years. Every time I get sick I don’t have a month to get into a Doctor as a “new patient” so I usually just end up going to Open Door or some other walk in Clinic. Tuesday that changed. I had an actual appointment with a Doctor. She is from the Caribbean but has an Indian last name and complexion. I guess she has said that the only thing she got from her grandfather was her last name and complexion and that’s sad when I know that I have an amazing level of pride for my family past. Good and bad I see amazing things to be proud about.
It was a great doctor visit and chat. I am not a person who wants to pay for an office visit every so many months just to stay in the system and she was very accommodating of that and said if I have no issues that she doesn’t need to see me outside of once a year. I am fine with that.
Today I had to get up early for the third day in a row to meet….well the people reading this right now. I found you all as an interesting mix(I assumed it would be a focused major that you all had). I think you will all have plenty of random data that you have to sift through so I’m not sure where the project ends up but hopefully these journal entries and the surveys every week do in fact help.
I was actually surprised with the other two members who are writing for you guys. The female told me I was “brilliant” after the meeting which obviously is a wonderful compliment but like I told her….If I was brilliant, my checks would be larger. I just know that for me, most of my closest friends have all made the same comment to me that my father was the smartest man they ever met, and I would agree. I feel as though I have learned less than he forgot while he was alive, so its hard for me to feel worthy of such praises. With the other gentleman….I was surprised to learn that he lived in Morningside for a short time period as well, so that was nice but then he told me about a guy who lived there that did a lot for the community and wrote the newspaper often, etc…..he only knew his first name. Well that person was my father, so I thought that was a pretty interesting coincidence. Hearing that my dad was able to make an impact on someones life even just as a memory is a very neat thing.
My dad told me that there are only a few things that you truly hand your child and one is your LAST NAME. He took his very seriously so once he matured as a man he tried to do everything right. He never wanted someone to talk down to me or my sister because of something that he had done. That is a principle that was instilled in him from his father(not biological but the one who raised him).
It may sound weird about the last name when I tell you that my father actually had multiple names. He was raised as EF but always put EF when he wrote it)the nurse actually misspelled it on the birth certificate) and later he took the D. name when he wanted to go into the military. Now the park is dedicated to ED even though on all his web pages he would write ED. I felt it was important that my daughter and future generations would have proof that it was named after their ancestor. If we had it listed with the name he used…..someone could claim it was another person. Its a long story to get into but anyways… D. is the one he gifted me with much pride.
I jotted down the random thoughts that you read above on pieces of paper but I forgot my tablet at home so once I got home I figured it might be easier for you guys to write it on the computer and send it that way so you can have it quicker than me mailing it in handwritten. No promises the rest will be typed though….so don’t get your hopes up. *smirk*
I normally don’t have many issues at work and the first eight hours went pretty fast since I was training one guy how to run a machine and help him do a set up and helping another guy with part issues while also running my own machining cell. I may not be getting paid more for the extra work but I’m gaining experience that may make me a better asset for the company and I enjoy helping others who are willing to listen. Now the last two hours at work were weird. I ran two perfect parts…..then a tap broke(the tooling that puts a thread into a part) so I jumped around the program and got the rest of the part complete and put in an area to be fixed. Then I went back and got another tap….touched it off(so the machine knows how long it is….and computes where it needs to be for the depth)….and ran the next part just fine. The very next part broke that tap that I just replaced. so I had to start again with another tap. At that point I went and got a worker from another shift who has run those same parts before to get his input. He hadn’t run them in so long that he wasn’t able to help too much but going through old notes on the job I saw that another operator switched to another style drill because the drill was wandering(not drilling completely straight). I with that change had been made permanent because it would have saved me over 30 min of downtime and not had two parts that have to be fixed.
I know you guys contacted me about videotaping me at work but H. is very protective of their patented parts and process so that would not work out otherwise I could just explain my work a lot easier. If you need a better understanding I can do another way. It is sometimes hard on those times that I may get frustrated at work and try to tell my wife what happened(usually some some of tool issue….like tonight…. or a program not doing what its supposed to do) and my wife will just look at me, so then I realize oh yea….she doesn’t do this for a living….maybe I need to explain it another way. ha
Jumping subjects…. If you are curious and since I am on the computer…..I actually ran across an old article from 2001 about my dad. I feel it may give you some idea as to why I am the person I am or why I do the things I do. It was instilled in me over and over throughout my life.
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