From the Desk 6/21/2008

This morning my intention was to get up at 6:00am, finish packing, and then leave for Knoxville at 7:00 to meet Jubin for some Frisbee golf at 10:00. That plan fell apart about the time I woke up and realized it was already 7:45 and I was very late. I managed to shower and throw together everything I needed for the weekend and hit the road in 15 minutes. I was only half an hour late for meeting Jubin, but I called first to alert him to my delay. I arrived in Knoxville at 10:30 and Jubin and I headed out to Oak Ridge to play the new Frisbee golf course appropriately named "The Mounds". It was a good course with minimal trees and only one water hazard. We ran out of time to play the entire course, but we got in a good 8 holes before returning to Knoxville.

I arrived back at my parents house with just enough time to purchase some Coldplay tickets for their concert in November (that I will go to with Christina) before I ran out briefly for a haircut. I returned and ate some lunch at my parent's house and then (unsurprisingly) fell asleep soon after. I woke up at 3:00 and took a shower and got everything ready for the wedding that dad and I were filming later. We left around 3:45 for the Tellico Yacht Club where the wedding last week was held. Luckily since I had already been to this setting, it was easier to avoid bad shooting angles and get the pre-shots necessary for a good video. We filmed the ceremony, which only lasted 25 minutes, and then sat inside the reception hall to await the next event to film. We ended up waiting for almost 2 hours before anything film worthy began to occur. We filmed the cutting of the cake, the toasts, special dances, and the band playing while the rest of the guests danced.

After getting all the footage we needed, we returned to Knoxville. On the way back we discovered that I had a headlight out and the other one was dim. That would explain why it was difficult to see on the trip home. I dropped dad off at the house and after a couple of phone calls I journeyed to the Tucker residence to stay the night. I ate a small snack and soon found that I had once again fallen asleep unplanned while we all were watching episodes of "Two and a Half Men" on DVD. I turned in for the night at 11:30 and fell asleep extremely fast.

Meditation for the day: 2 Corinthians 1:6-7 "If we are distressed, it is for your comfort and salvation; if we are comforted, it is for your comfort, which produces in you patient endurance of the same sufferings we suffer. And our hope for you is firm, because we know that just as you share in our sufferings, so also you share in our comfort."

From the desk 6/20/2008

This morning I woke up after sleeping very restfully all night. I guess a good hike will make you tired enough to sleep well. I got up and finished packing everything I could until Saturday morning before leaving to go to Knoxville for the weekend. I answered a few work emails before I left for my detour on the way to work. I arrived at the Tag Office and was the 13th person in line when I arrived about 10 minutes before they opened. Their system at this office was much like the one I found at the driver's license office: extremely efficient and expedient. I only had to wait about 2 minutes before being helped. I did manage to get the title transferred over to my name, but due to a lack of insurance data in their system, obtaining the license plate and registration would have to wait until Monday. I felt accomplished even though I only reached half of the goal. I then drove into work and shot a quick email to my Allstate agent to see if they could re-send that info into the Georgia database. He responded not too long after that and informed me that after the policy is first in effect, the information is only in the system for 25-30 days and if the tags, etc. are not obtained during that time, then they have to re-submit the info. He told me I should be good to get the plate on Monday.

I got to work and then began working on some notes before our website committee meeting began at 10:00. It only lasted about 30 minutes but during that time we set out an idea for the website header concerning the GA Classroom Giftcard. We adjourned the meeting and then each went to send emails and reminders to the appropriate people to get some of the bugs with the website fixed before BTS. I worked setting on up the printing of the new teacher letters to be distributed to each county at the end of July. Once I got all the printer settings configured and the paper trays loaded with the colored paper, it was time to go to lunch. I heated up some creamy tomato soup for lunch while watching That 70's Show. After lunch, I spent the remainder of the afternoon printing, grouping, and packing the new teacher letters up for distribution. I only printed half of the flyers needed because I didn't want to monopolize the copy machine and get yelled at by my co-workers. I spent the last hour of work compiling the 112,858 names on our customer mailing list. On Monday morning I will have to de-dupe the list and sort it for preparation to send to the mailing house. On my way out the door I got directions from Chirstina on how to get to her apartment since I was picking her up for dinner and a movie tonight.

I picked Christina up at 7:30 and we went to the Tuscany Grille for dinner. It was a quaint little Italian restaurant with delicious food, dim lighting, and a cozy atmosphere. I had some pasta shells stuffed with ricotta and garlic seasoning while Christina had the Ziti. We talked a lot about work and past jobs, music, and friends. After dinner, which ended more quickly than I thought it would, we returned to Christina's apartment to watch some TV to pass the time until the movie started. We watched Dirty Jobs and part of The Longest Yard. We went to Cherokee Cinemas to watch The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian. It was an awesome movie with lots of new characters to enjoy and lots of battles. I walked Christina to her apartment and then headed home to grab what little sleep I could before driving up to Knoxville in the morning.

Meditation for the day: Psalm 91:1 “He who dwells in the shelter of the Most High will rest in the shadow of the Almighty.”

From the Desk 6/19/2008

This morning for some reason I woke up at 5:45 and couldn’t get back to sleep quickly so I decided to go ahead and get up. I sent out a few emails and printed some wedding package info to distribute this weekend then decided to shower and get ready for work. I packed up my hiking clothes too, as Mike, Leslie, Christina, and I were going hiking after work today. I left for work a little early to run by the post office to mail out some bills. I got to work and almost immediately began working on a printing project so I wouldn’t be occupying the copier during the busy parts of the day. I had to print 1300 flyers to be placed in bags handed out at a Home School show in Chattanooga in about 3 weeks. The copier actually behaved itself during the printing and didn’t jam or complain at all. After that I set a meeting with Dave and Chris for when they return from their trips on June 30 to sit down and talk about my “secret project” that some of you know already. I then began the tedious and mostly boring task of sorting, editing, and de-duping the customer mailing list in preparation for the mail out of the BTS flyer on July 3rd. This doesn’t sound like an especially labor-intensive project, but you have to remember that one of the lists I was pulling from contained over 25,000 names. I worked on that and finally finished around the time I was going to take lunch (12:00). I had intended to go and get my car registered and the title in my name with the state of Georgia on my lunch break, but I was cautioned by the locals here that it would be crazy at that time of day and it would be best to go first thing in the morning when they open at 8:30. So I made sure it would be ok with Mike if I came in a little late tomorrow after taking care of that and he said sure.

I was on my way out the door to lunch and while walking though the retail floor I saw Christina. I asked her if she wanted me to pick her up anything from Chick-fil-A since that’s where I was going. She said yes so I went and got me a chicken finger salad (which was huge…too much for me to eat in fact) and a bottle of water and got Christina a chicken sandwich. I returned and Sydney, the manager, was kind enough to let Christina take a break and eat some lunch with me. While we were eating, she invited me to go to church with her the next Sunday I was in town (which made me so happy to say yes to that!) She also told me about a free concert by A Fine Frenzy (one of my favorite bands) on Sunday night at 7pm. Unfortunately I will be honoring a great minister of music, Mr. Wendell Boertje, at that time in Knoxville. I wish I could go to the concert though. We finished up lunch and she returned to the sales floor as I went back to my desk. I spent a great deal of time in the afternoon searching online to find a program that we could use to map the location of our customers that shop at each store by charting their zip codes. My search was not very successful, but I will continue to search tomorrow. It was winding down towards the end of the day and I ran out to my car to grab my clothes to change into for hiking. Christina met Mike and I at the front of the store and we journeyed to Kennesaw Mountain. Mike was under a bit of a time crunch so we (Christina and I in my car, and Mike in his) drove separately. We arrived and climbed our way to the top of Kennesaw Mountain without stopping once! We took a brief rest at the top before deciding to go ahead and complete the 5.5 mile loop. Along the way we did see many signs of wildlife. We encountered 2 snakes, a rabbit, and even a deer. The deer was very tame as it almost ignored us being there about 20 feet away from it while it was eating some grass. We finished the hike and I took Christina back to her car at the Box. We chatted on the way about plans for tomorrow night and I couldn't stop smiling (I probably looked goofy....well goofier). I made my way home feeling the effects of not hiking as often as I used to. I ate some dinner and then packed some things for my weekend in Knoxville since I wouldn't have time to pack Saturday morning. I listened to a new album I bought on iTunes by Ray Lamontagne. The album is called "Trouble" and it is a smooth, slow, soulful album filled with blues chords and deep lyrics. I highly recommend it to all. After wasting some time online, I finished a load of laundry and then went to bed.

Meditation for the day: Psalm 37:4 "Delight yourself in the Lord and he will give you the desires of your heart."

From the Desk 6/18/2008

I woke up feeling very tired from yesterday's information overload. I woke up at 12:55am feeling like I had slept for a whole night, so I knew when I woke up from my alarm that I would feel exhausted all day. I slowly dragged myself out of bed and got ready to go to work. This morning at work I sifted through the 13 emails I received yesterday while out of the office at Summer Training. Most of them were requests for advertising opportunities so the reply on those were fairly short. I also had an opportunity to upload a couple of new documents to the manager's page of The School Box website. I only missed one step where Mike had to step over and help me remember to change the read/write abilities of the file. Once that was done I went to the site to double check and make sure it was updated and accurate. It was, which made me very happy! I also spent some time working with the Tooya Pen Pad Mike had brought me at the end of last week. I changed the settings to work more like a mouse instead of simulating the size of the screen and it seemed to work much better. Here is an example of what I drew and then added some fill color through Photoshop. I must say that I am the first to admit that I have limited drawing abilities, but this didn't turn out too bad. It is probably one of the best drawings by hand that I have done even though I enhanced it with color on the computer. I stopped to take a lunch break around 1:00 today (later than usual, but I was really tired and simply didn't realize what time it was). I mostly ran errands during my break. I ran to the post office to mail DVDs and get stamps, went to Target to pick up a few things, and ran by the bank to deposit a wedding check, and finally got my emission test done.

The rest of the afternoon was fairly uneventful. The purchasers arrived back at the office after their lengthy meeting with Dave, Vickie, and Chris. I spent the afternoon preparing a folder for Sal, Mike's helper, to work on a couple of weeks. He is going to build the signs order portion of the manager's site so they can order what signs they need instead of waiting until I make it around to answering all the emails. I also discovered that the manager's page that I added a couple of documents to earlier, wasn't working properly so Mike and I tried several things to get it up and running. Nothing we tried worked so we will look at it tomorrow. I left work a little early (4:40) because I was yawning more than I was working and I decided to go home and take a nap before hitting the video editing.

I got home and did just as I planned; I took a nap for about an hour. After waking up and feeling much better, I ate some dinner and then began to work on the Graduate's Day service from CBCB. I worked on it until 9:00 when I had finished all the editing and had created the menus. I was hoping to then set it up to render and burn to disc so I could get the master copy to dad this weekend, but I soon realized that it would be a nice touch to add pictures and the information on each graduate as scrolling credits at the conclusion of the video. Since I didn't have that information then it will wait and be finished early next week and then mailed into Knoxville. That was one project mostly crossed off my list and that felt like a huge relief (even though after this weekend I will 3 weddings to work on). I relaxed for a little bit and then turned in for the night after talking on the phone to mom, Amy, and Hickey.

Meditation for the day: Philippians 4:6 " Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God."

From the Desk 6/17/2008

This morning my alarm rudely interrupted my sleep at 6am. I had to get earlier than normal to make it down to the Box where I was picking up Stacy, Corey, and Leslie to carpool down to Summer Training at First Baptist Atlanta. We met at 7am and departed shortly after that. We were fortunate to not run into heavy traffic before we took the 285 bypass. It took around 35 minutes for us to arrive, which was 10 minutes longer than trip yesterday. We arrived in time to grab a little bite to eat from the fruit, bagels, etc. they had set up for us. I said good morning to my Knoxville friends and then made my way over to say hello to Christina. I was lucky as I had been placed in the same color group, so we would be going to the same classes at the same time all day.

The classes were about the same as last year. Some were really exciting and helpful while others were filled with too much information to absorb and not enough energy to remember what was said. We also visited booths that vendors had set up in the hallways to demo new products and hand out information on how to better push/sell their products. There were a total of 12 classes and 15 vendor booths that we visited throughout the day. We had a lunch break at 12:10 where we had a motivational speaker come talk to us. As we walked through the lunch line and found tables to eat at, we were serenaded by Brad Caudle from Rock 'n Learn as he had written a song special for The School Box Summer Training. We also got to hear a brief word from Carol Marsh, founder of Gallopade Publishing, Inc. It was neat to meet one of the authors of several thousand books that we have carried over the years. The keynote speaker was from Tupallo, Mississippi and was very funny. She had a strong southern drawl that made you pay attention to every word she said. She was pretty good as far as inspiring each of us to be passionate about whatever we are doing and to find what makes us passionate and work in that field. It was different form last year's as the magician's speech from last year focused on customer service and this year's focused on the individual. I chose the Grilled Talapia with some sauce with rice and veggies for my lunch. It was really good as was the lemon bar dessert. After lunch we finished out the remainder of the day with classes. At the conclusion of the seminar, we all gathered in the large room and people were presented with 5, 10, and 15 year service awards. The door prizes provided by the vendors were also given away through drawings. Much like the past two years, I won nothing. I helped man the table where we gave out the new School Box T-shirts to employees as they filtered outside to go home after a full day. After everyone had received their t-shirts, I helped Dave and Kenny pack up the extras for tomorrow's groups.

Then Stacy, Corey, Leslie, and I piled back into my car to drive to Leland's house for a "fiesta" dinner for the managers, purchasers, and vendor reps. The drive there was filled with laughter and some unexpected dancing from the backseat. (Note:His house is enormous and extravagantly decorated including a laundry room (complete with washer and dryer) on each floor. He has 3 roommates that were also there to serve people drinks and appetizers. The dinner was catered by La Parilla Mexican Restaurant and the food was delicious, as expected. Leland had even hired an actual Mariachi Band to play at the dinner tables on the back lawn. The weather was perfect for eating outside as there was a slight breeze and the back yard was masked in the shadows of several tall trees. After dinner we were treated to a game show spoof "Are you smarter than a Mexican 5th grader?" involving several vendor reps and school box employees. Thankfully, I was spared form involvement in this oddly named game show. After that was over, my group decided it was time to make our way back home seeing as how it was nearing 9:00 and the day had started very early for all of us. Before we left I called Christina since I was in charge of handing out t-shirts and didn't get a chance to talk to her before she left. We made plans to go see The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian Friday night after she gets off work. Needless to say, I smiled all the way home.

We drove back to the Box where I dropped off Corey, Stacy, and Leslie and then made my way back to my apartment. I arrived, very tired and decided that video editing for even an hour would prove to be useless and frustrating so I glanced at a few things to clear off my desk and checked facebook and myspace before calling it a night around 10:15pm. I don't think sleep will be a problem tonight.

Meditation for the day: 1 Corinthians 1:8 "He will keep you strong to the end, so that you will be blameless on the day of our Lord Jesus Christ."

From the Dek 6/16/2008

This morning I went into work around 8:45 because I had to make some final adjustments on the video for the Summer Training to make the presentation go smoother. I finished that, burned it off to disc, and then headed into work. I got there and found that Mike had brought me a "toy" to play with. He brought a writing pad that converts your drawing strokes onto an graphics program such as Adobe Illustrator. It also acts as a mouse, which I tried using briefly, but found that it would take longer than I had to get used to it at a functional level. You can see an example of my artistic abilities by the picture to the left. (There is a reason why I manipulate graphics that already exist instead of drawing them...cause I can't really draw well at all). I soon gave up on playing with the new tool and abandoned it to get some real work done. I had a long list of emails to send to the mailing house, the catalog printers, a local printer, and Chris to keep her in the loop with everything that was going on. It took me almost until 12:00 to communicate everything with everybody. I took a short lunch break and then finished working on the logistics of picking up the leftover catalogs and BTS flyers that would remain at the mail house after we mail out the quantities needed. Once I got everything that had to be done today wrapped up it was almost 3:00.

I left work and headed home to change into comfortable clothes before heading down the road a bit to First Baptist Atlanta to unload the truck and set-up for the Summer Training Seminar tomorrow and Wednesday. I arrived easily as I remembered how to get there from last year's sessions. I arrived and along with a couple of the workers from the warehouse we unloaded the six pallets of products and samples in just over an hour. I then played tech support for Kenny and Aimee as they were preparing to rehears their class on Customer Service. It seems that my formal training in soundboards and other AV instruments proved valuable on this day as I was able to connect the laptop to the projector and the sound board. I did a last sweep of the hallways to make sure all the boxes were in their correct place and then I headed over to the Holiday Inn to meet my Knoxville School Box friends.

They had come down earlier and were glad to see me. I picked up my bag I left in Knoxville that Bobby brought to me and we all talked for a bit catching up on what new and exciting things were going on in my life. We all decided to go over to the Perimeter Mall and walk around for a while. After traversing the two levels and what seemed like miles of stores we loaded back up in Sue's van and made a stop at Olive Garden for dinner. The service was good as was the food and company. I got caught up on how everyone in the Knoxville store was doing and then we ate to our heats' content. We drove back to the hotel where I picked up my car and headed home for the evening. I worked briefly on video editing in an attempt to prevent falling further behind, but I didn't get much accomplished. I tried to force myself to go to bed a little early tonight as I was picking up Stacy, Corey, and Leslie at the Box at 7am to ride down to the Summer Training together. I didn't fall asleep as quickly as I had hoped, but it was still earlier then usual.

Meditation for the day: "The best remedy for those who are afraid, lonely or unhappy is to go outside, somewhere where they can be quiet, alone with the heavens, nature and God. Because only then does one feel that all is as it should be and that God wishes to see people happy, amidst the simple beauty of nature." ~Anne Frank

From the Desk 6/15/2008

This morning I woke up after not sleeping very well. I woke up first around 3:00am to the sounds of children in the room above me giggling and doing gymnastics off their beds. That lasted almost until 4:30am so needless to say I woke up not feeling very rested. I also woke up at 9:30, when I had planned to go visit North Star Church again, but woke up too late to make it to worship. Instead I worked on finalizing the wedding DVD from May 10th, burning the copies, labeling, and packing them up for mailing. I got a call from Stacy around 10:30 to see if I wanted to meet her for breakfast somewhere. I said sure since I had focused on the DVDs when I got up and forgot to eat anything. We ended up at Waffle House because BLD's (Breakfast, Lunch, and Dinner) was too crowded. It was an experience as always, watching the cooks fix the food so quickly and somehow having it turn out exactly like the pictures on the menu. After we ate, Stacy went to go shopping and I returned to the apartment to continue my video work for the day. I managed to pull over to my computer footage from Graduate's Day at Central Baptist and the ceremony and reception footage from a wedding on May 31st.

I made a new playlist on itunes that brings a smile to my face when I listen to it because of the artists and the lyrics of most of the songs (the playlist is called happiness so I guess its appropriately named). I called dad to wish him a happy Father's Day since they are in Florida and I didn't see them yesterday. A little later I called Christina to make plans for hiking later this afternoon. I met her at the parking lot of the Box just before 4 o'clock and we drove to the trail head for the Burnt Hickory Rd. loop at Kennesaw Mountain. We met Stacy there as everyone else had other engagements to attend. We hiked the 3.5 mile trail at a fairly leisurely pace which was nice because it gave us a chance to converse more. We did encounter one bit of wildlife along the trail. Christina spotted it first and then I tried to take a picture of it. I don't know if you can tell what it is from the picture, but we saw a snake about 2.5 ft. long. It ran away quickly (not very photogenic I guess). I took Christina back to her car and then went home.

I continued to work on pulling over video footage until around 9:00pm. After that I decided I had stared at the computer screen long enough so I worked some more on a new song I'm trying to write/record. I am going to try and do this more often as it relaxes me and its something I love, but for some reason have just not made time for in a while. I worked on that until I felt my eye lids getting heavy then I turned in for the night. I hope that I will get more restful sleep tonight because I'll need the energy to set up for the Summer Training tomorrow from 3:30-7:30pm.

Meditation for the day: Psalm 103:13 “As a father has compassion on his children, so the LORD has compassion on those who fear him;”