Tuesday, April 12, 2005
San Diego City Council Strikes Again
San Diego is broke and teetering on the brink of bankruptcy. Well today they were debating whether to raise the City's minimum wage from $6.75 an hour to $10 an hour.
Back when I was in high school I started out making minimum wage. As I started switching from job to job, I started landing jobs that paid above minimum wage. That is the way it works. You start out low and start moving up.
Well of course the San Diego City Council passed it. What it means is that anyone who works for the city, or contracts with the city will pay thier workers a minimum wage of $10 with benefits or $12 an hour without benefits.
Well, happy bankruptcy San Diego. And farewell Tony Young, you have lost a constituent. These people are so stupid I can't believe they got elected.
Now the city will have to pay more for sevices, more for thier workers, and the City does not have the money. So as you bleeding heart handout folks may have a happy night, and the brainless morons I saw speaking on the news say they can now raise thier families I would like them to look back at this night in a few months.
Minimum wage increases are not free. After they are implemented, the folks having to pay the higher wages must increase thier prices to cover the loss. They are not going to give it out of the kindness of thier hearts as they are in business to make money. So now everyone pays more for the services. This means inflation which means the prices go up. Now the folks that got the raises are right back in the same boat.
There are those that say this will not affect them but I have to beg to differ. Let's take the folks that clean up the offices. If they have a contract with the city they have to raise what they pay thier workers now. These same folks provide services to other businesses. The other businesses such as you local mall now have to pay more for the services so they will charge the businesses in the mall higher prices. The shop owners will get that back by raising thier prices. So everyone is hurt and everyone pays. Within a few months these folks will not even have thier games realized and may in fact have lower spending power for thier higher wages.
As the city goes down the tubes I have to laugh. These folks are still spending like it is going out of style. The way these floks are spending would have me tossed in jail. If I wrote a check for $5,000 and only had $1,000 in my bank I would be in serious trouble, but not the San Diego City Council. Spend, spend, spend. Maybe they will also go ahead and give themselves a pay raise before the city goes broke.
All I can say is I am starting to get happy feet. It is just about time to abandon this sinking ship.
Posted at 11:20 pm by RWO
Monday, April 11, 2005
Sorry I took a few days off blogging. Wanted the house to look good when the wife got home. Can't sit next to the computer all the hours I used to anymore. I guess I am going up in age and don't have the energy that I used to have.
I went back to work this morning. The leg felt good and I had a fun but long day. I filled in for one of the Navy guys that had watch and his class was doing the Frequency Shift Keying and Phase Shift Keying Alignment labs. The labs are both very touchy as the equipment is co old, we do not use external frequency standards, and we secure all the gear over night.
I always like these labs, because this is one where you can dazzle the students with the knowledge gained over the years. It gives me a chance to show them a few tricks and amaze them when they get off track, by knowing exactly what they did. All in all it was fun. I spent the rest of the day updating and improving some of the Power Point lectures.
After that it was time to get busy with school. We are in the last five weeks of this semester and it is time to start knocking out the final projects, or at least get started with them. Thank God, there is no summer school.
I will not have much time to do anything but work and school for the next five weeks as it is getting hot and heavy in school right now as the semester winds down. As long as I don't blow it, things look as if I will get straight "A's" this semester.
I hope the dogs let me get some sleep tonight. They were very restless last night and kept barking at or with the dog next door. There was nothing out there so they must have just been discussing things in dog talk.
My oldest daughters birthday is coming up and I have to think of something cool to send her for her birthday. My youngest daughters birthday is also coming up but ma will handle that.
I haven't had time to check my usual hangouts so I am not quite up to speed with the news, other than catching Fox News on the fly. So I guess I will stay out of the political scene today. Anyway, everyone have a good week.
Posted at 10:32 pm by RWO
Thursday, April 07, 2005
Well today was get all the homework done day. In my Project Management Class we are using Microsoft Project. It isn't a bad program and I seem to be catching on with it pretty good. The only thing I hate is that they have us doing all kinds of minor detail stuff, to get us to exercise the program. Just like all Microsoft Programs, there are several ways to do the same thing and I am always worried about doing something dumb that will cause me to make a minor mistake with the assignment. So far I have been getting everything right though.
After that it was, hit the discussion boards. In both my Facilities Design and Management Class and my Operations Management Class I have the same instructor. He loves to use discussion boards. I wiould rather do it in live chat like we do with the Industrial Safety Manager's course. Anyway in the one class we have been discussing outsourcing as well as lack of technology gains in third world countries.
We have had some very interesting discussions about that. I believe that you can outsource the easy stuff, but when we make technological gains, we have to go in and entirely retrain the workforce. I believe that this will at least slow down some of the outsourcing in the future. As the technology gains grow outsourcing decreases until they catch up, then it increases again.
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In the other class we have been discussing Six Sigma, Lean Manufacturing, and ISO certifications. Kind of boring there.
Well I wonder if I will make it until the Pope's Funeral tonight. They are going to start broadcasting it at Midnight on Fox News. I guess it actually starts at 1AM, so I hope I can stay awake that long. Since I hurtt my back I have adjusted my sleeping hours and seldom stay up late like I used to.
Ma RWO called again from Sacramento. She says she is bored. I guess she has toured just about everything she could tour there, and wants to come home. I guess she also misses her dogs. I know they miss her. Phillippe, her oldest one has been sitting on the stairs looking out the window since she left. He only leaves when he has to go out and do is nature thing and to eat. He is really depressed.
I can't believe all the crap I have been seeing about folks being upset because the President is having the flag flown at half mast, because of the death of the Pope. It makes me wonder how low can some of the people in this country go. The Pope is a Head of State, though the Vatican is a small country. When a Head of State passes on the President has the authority to have the flag raised to half mast. Get over it secularists. The more I see this stuff come out in the press, the more I see that the radical left is going to die out. Why, you might ask? It is because day after day, this stuff gets into the press and ticks off more and more people who usually are not involved in politics. Don't forget, what happened to John Kerry when the conservatives started to wake up and say, "what is happening to my country?"
Posted at 10:16 pm by RWO
Wednesday, April 06, 2005
Well today was a little busy. I went ahead and finished up a few more papers for school and then went to the dreaded dental appointment. Now my gums hurt. It always amazes me that now matter how minor the work is, it always hurts when you come home from the dentist. At least it was nothing major like last year. Just a deep cleaning.
Ma RWO has been calling me everynight since she has been gone. Tonight she was complaining that they have a little league conference or something at her motel, and that the kids are driving her nuts.
While she has the little league folks to deal with I have to deal with her dogs. They miss her and so they are hounding me for attention. They are really a pain when I go to bed because they all come to bed with me. Since she isn't here, they hang out on my side, and I don't have the heart to kick them out of the bed.
Right now she is worried about weather as she comes home either Friday or Saturday. If the weather is good she wants to come home Friday night which means she will get here Saturday morning. But they are talking rain so she might start out Saturday morning and return Saturday night. I don't think I like her driving through the night so I have recommended that she come home Saturday during the day.
It has been pretty cool watching all the ceremony happening over the death of the Pope. I will probably stay up late and watch the funeral since I took the week off. I remember seeing the funeral of Pope John the 23rd, though I was very young. And I remember the funeral of Pope John the 6th. The pure numbers of folks that are going to Rome to see this event are overwhelming and speak to the respect this man gained.
One thing I do worry about is that this funeral would be the perfect time for the terrorists to attack, and I am concerned that the police in Rome may not be able to handle the huge crowds. I hope and pray that these folks do not cause a catastrophy by attacking duiring this holy time.
Well I guess that is it for the day. Time to hit the pit. Have a great week.
Posted at 11:48 pm by RWO
Sunday, April 03, 2005
It's Sunday morning and between the change to daylight savings time and the fact that Ma RWO had to leave for Sacramento has really tapped into my sleep. I hate daylight savings time and really can't see a point in having it these days. Maybe back when they implemented it, it may have been a good idea, but I don't see a purpose of having it now.
I'm sorry and at the same time relieved at the passing of Pope John Paul II. Sorry because the world has lost a good person, an example for all to follow. Relieved, as he is no longer suffering. I am Roman Catholic, but I have been more of a non-practicing member. I try and live my life as an example for others, but I don't attend church regularly. I believe you can believe in God, but do not have to go to a special building to do so. I also do not believe that I have to have the bible interpreted for me. I can read and take my own meaning from my readings.
Anyway, it is interesting to see the fact that all religions are honoring this man. He has made his mark on history and will be remembered.
Well now that ma is on the road it is time to take a little cat nap. Have a great Sunday folks.
Posted at 08:42 am by RWO
Friday, April 01, 2005
Well I have just made it home from work to find that the Pope is on his deathbed. I hope and pray that he passes quickly and peacefully. It has been a long time since we have seen the election of a new Pope. God Bless you Pope John Paul II.
I also found out that my tag board has been getting spammed. I cleaned it out, hopefully it will stay that way.
On a lighter note, I managed to become a plushie tycoon this month on Neopets. Laila made it too. Congratulations for making it and I know we both hope to do even better next month. The new competition starts in 2 days. Join in and take us on. I have been surprized at the number of blogshares players that are now playing on Neopets.
I have been contacting National Steel and Shipbuilding right here in San Diego to get research for my final Industrial Safety Project. I figure that would be a great place to get some safety statistics amd tips from.
Well I have to check the group project to make sure no one else decided to try and fix it up. It is due this evening and just in case I had better check it out.
Posted at 01:34 pm by RWO
Thursday, March 31, 2005
Well today was a buy day again as we managed to fix that last radio today. On my way home I heard the bad news, that Terry Shiavo had passed away.
When I got home and turned on Fox News they were talking about it and then I heard that the husband and other family members managed to get in an arguement when he tossed them out of her room just before she passed. I will be very interested to see if he is charged with anything after the autopsy.
Well then as I continued to watch stories about that, I hear that the Pope has taken a turn for the worse. He has had the last rights and I have a feeling this is the end for him. I have a lot of respect for the Holy Father and all he has done. He has been a good representative of the Catholic Church. Anyway I will be praying for him.
Then of course there is the report on intelligence, or lack there of. At least is exonerates the Bush Administration over the start of the Iraq War. I do worry that they had the classified part about where the intelligence agencies stand now. The fact that we know very little about our possible enemies is really scary. The fact that it takes five years to train intelligence officers means it is not going to be fixed soon.
Gas prices are going to double? Humm, I thought that was why we had the Iraq War lefties. Sure glad I have an economy car.
And then there is Sandy Berger who pleaded guilty to removing classified documents. Wow, did they let him off light. He lost his clearance. He needs some serious jail time.
Well I guess thats enough for today.
Posted at 04:41 pm by RWO
Wednesday, March 30, 2005
Wow what a day. Work was tiring but fun. I had my annual instructor evaluation first thing this morning and got a wonderful writeup. This is done by the folks over at instructor training school so it is a very valuable evaluation.
After that we decided to work on a bad radio. Actually we have had two that are down hard. The first one is really strange. When you run BITE's 16 or 17 the radio keys up. It also keys up when data mode is selected. The only thing is, the radio is a line of sight version and doesn't handle data.
Well I think that the fact that the malfunction light also should be coming on, but isn't means we have multiple problems.
We decided to leave that one alone and concentrate instead on the easier of the two, another line of sight that wouldn't key up and had a vswr fault. Easy enough. check the antenna, TR switch, and transmit module alignment. Standard easy problem, should have been a five minute job. Well as luck would have it we checked everything and swapped the TR and it was still broke.
Well we were moving the radio up and down all of a sudden it keyed up. Well this meant that the ribbon cable between the drawer and case was messed up. Now we had a chore, replace the ribbon cable.
Well it took us a couple of hours to take the radio down to parade rest and install the new ribbon cable, and we got it all back together. Now the big test. We keyed it up in AM and it worked great. All the BITE's passed and then we checked FM. It keyed up and when we released the test key it stayed keyed up. :-(
Well we troubleshot it to a bad A25 card where the transmit enable was hanging up in FM and that fixed it. So I have to say it was a pretty productive day.
After that I left for the day and stopped at Ralph's supermarket on the way home. They got this one kid there that makes excellent Fried Chicken, and I had homework to do when I got home so I cheated and bought 16 pieces of chicken, so I wouldn't have to cook tonight. Now as long as David, our loving son and garbage disposal doesn't eat it all before the wife and daughter get home everything will be cool. I also had to get food for the dogs and I have had this thing for Sunkist orange soda lately so I had to stock up on that.
After that it was home to write up a paper for the IT 118 class and hit the discussion boards to make sure I am caught up with that. The paper was a review of three Industrial Technology websites. One had a busted link and so I mentioned that in my paper and off it went. I then checked my e-mail and found that the instructor repaired the busted link, but of coure I had already submitted my assignment. Oh well.
Now all I have to do is my group chat. I sure hope nobody messed up the group project again.
Posted at 05:53 pm by RWO
Tuesday, March 29, 2005
Well as I have said before, I hate group projects. We have been working on a project since the beginning of the semester. We are going to manufacture and advertise a product. So far we have been getting a good grade, probably because I was doing almost all the work.
Well one of the guys decided I was doing too much of the work and decided to pitch in. I have just spent the last three hours getting it straightened out. Oh, please Fresno State. No more group projects.
I guess Johnny Cochran died today of a brain tumor. I send his family my condolences. I know they went through a lot because my stepfather passed away from a brain tumor in 1974. I didn't really like what he did in the OJ case, but he did a lot for his community and will be missed.
I guess Indonesia got hit pretty hard with this last quake but at least there was no Tsunami this time. My heart goes out to thse folks and I hope the shaking will stop soon.
No Je$$e Jack$on had managed to get involved in the Terry Schiavo case. I don't think much will happen to change the outcome, but it does get the reverend on TV.
I thought the little clips of Kohfi Annan saying "hell no", was pretty humorous. How many more scandals will have to happen until this guy goes away? The UN has to go away. They serve no purpose any more.
Well I guess that is it for today. Back to school work.
Posted at 05:14 pm by RWO
Monday, March 28, 2005
Hope everyone had a great Easter
Well Spring Break is over, and it is time to get back to the routine again. It was a little difficult getting up for work this morning after being able to sleep in for the past week. I guess it will take me a couple of days to get back into the swing of things. It was good to get back to work though.
I am beginning to feel really bad about the folks that live in the Indian Ocean area. Another huge quake. I hope there are not many deaths in this one.
I guess the Terry Schiavo thing is over and now they are battling over cremation and autopsy. This is beginning to get a little old in the press. She is going to pass on, the legal rangling is over and while I believe she should have her feeding tube restored, it is time to let this die in the news. In the meantime I will pray for her.
And now Micheal Jackson is playing the race card. What race is he by the way?
I guess they is going to be quite a fight brewing along the Arizona border starting this weekend. The minutemen verses the MI 13 I think it is called. I have mixed feelings about this one. I am all for them helping the border patrol and patroling the border to keep the illegals out, but this seems to be turning into a possible shootout at the border and I really don't want to see that happen.
I also do not like to see the President of the United States siding with Mexico and calling these folks vigilantes. Since the Government won't protect our borders, the people should have the right to do so. At leasdt this will bring more attention to the problem.
Well I guess since Spring Break is over, it is time to get back to the school work.
Posted at 05:24 pm by RWO
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