Living In the World, Not on It

When is the last time you got to spend $170,000 - of some one else's money? I used to do it every week - when I ran the payroll. And don't kid yourself, that was the best money ever spent. Any company is only as strong as its employees. Money like that is money well spent. I'm doing it again. And like the previous five years, it is the best money I will ever spend and it will save lives. Just as paying employees saves lives. I can't say this is just my effort, but I'm a big part of it and I love every minute of it. I know more about the inner and outer workings of the rigs more than I would ever imagine. There is so much to know - the payload, the electrical load, the safety for the patient, the crew and the town. The continuity for the EMTs, so that we know where everything is. The fuel consumption curve for long standbys. Meeting Triple K requirements. Having duel Whelen sirens and now (and this is the coolest thing!) the Rumbler, a low-sonic add-on...

When I saw Patrick's post, Like Me! No, Really, Like Me!, I had to write about it. And here is the answer I got on 8 September... "Like Me. No, Really, Like Me!" http://www.patrickkphillips.com/2011/09/07/like-me-no-really-like-me/ patricksplace said @Aisl íngeKelloggdeGómez I'll admit it: it IS extra work staying active (and being useful) on multiple social media networks. In terms of referrals, of the three, Twitter brings me the most traffic. Then Facebook. Then Google+. I avoided Twitter because I saw far too much of the "having eggs for breakfast" tweets that made me wonder who could possibly care. But posting links to useful information (on my blog or elsewhere) and the occasional amusing quote can help you build a following and can, as a bonus, bring people to your site. I like Facebook a lot, and have a lot of contacts there. Many of them are people from school who wouldn't have given me the time of day when we ...

Hello, and welcome to this week’s Friday 5! Please copy these questions to your web space. Answer the questions there; then leave a comment below so we’ll all know where to check out your responses. Please don’t forget to link us from your website! What was your most memorable alarm-clock failure? Always in the spring, when clocks jump forward, although I do recall a couple of autumns where I ended up at work at 0500 instead of 0600! What item recently in the news do you find most alarming? I do my level best to ignore the news as mush as possible - it is all alarming, depressing... you get the idea. Of car alarms, burglar alarms, and smoke alarms, which do you consider most effective or useful? Oh, fire and smoke alarms by far. Many, many lives are saved that way. If the shoplifting alarm is tripped as you exit a store, what do you do? Go back to have the items in it scanned again to disarm the anti-theft device. (Every once in a while someone will say, "Don't worr...

I'm incredibly fortunate - I have a ten year old Acura with 99,400 miles on it that runs like a champion. I take excellent care of it and it takes excellent care of me. I had to take it today for inspection, which should have been a fast process (being the middle of the month and a Wednesday at 0915, but apparently everyone else had the same idea.) And then the shock of it... I'd heard that New Jersey was going to change the inspection process from checking the lamps, mirrors, brakes, undercarriage and emissions to just checking the emissions. I found that hard to believe and incredibly stupid, but it was really obvious that this was all they checked. No one walked around with a mirror to look under it and the brake check system (those long metal pieces in the floor) was not used. I passed inspection with flying colours, but no one did anything! They even gave up the pleasure of torturing me over the blue light on my dash. Unbelievable. I guess this change will make people with...

...I had my ba nk card destroyed, found out the magic stamp was worth very little (right now), paid a summons... on and on. I was sitting here, happily posting a comment on Ted the Third's blog post about quotes from the Sunday Seven meme, when I received an e-mail from my bank. It showed a $15.00 charge from cars.com. What the f--? So I called my bank and told them that is not my charge. The woman there said they would put through paperwork regarding this. She also recommended I contact cars.com and ask them about it. After perusing the Web site and not finding a phone number, I Googled them - "cars.com phone number" - and it came right up. I was transferred to three different people before I got the right person/department. By then I was just a little peeved. But Jared was very helpful and told me that yes, they caught the transaction as fraudulent. Really...? Yes, it turns out they have software that compares the transaction to past fraudulent ones as well as gauging t...

Do you recognize the symbol here? It lights up in your instrument panel and looks like a U-shaped pictograph with treads and an exclamation point in the middle. Do you understand what it means now? If you guessed a low tire-pressure warning, you are right. If you didn’t recognize the symbol, that’s also understandable because one out of three drivers do not, according to Schrader, a compa ny that makes tire pressure monitoring systems. The warning for the TPMS lights up when one or more of your vehicle’s tires is 25% below the manufacturer’s recommended pressure. The system is now required on all vehicles starting with the 2008 model year. The issue here seems to be that the public hasn’t been properly educated on the warning symbol, which is supposed to be “idiot proof” and understandable across a wide variety of cultures and languages. Yet 46% of drivers couldn’t figure out that the icon represents a tire and 14% thought the symbol represented another problem with the veh...

NEW YORK (AP) -- It's a fermented, pungent tea, but it's the alcohol that can lurk inside of kombucha that's causing a stink. Regulators and retailers are concerned that the ancient and trendy tea may need to be regulated as an alcoholic drink. That's because some bottles have more than 0.5 percent alcohol -- the legal limit for a drink not to be considered alcoholic. The drink dates back thousands of years and across cultures, though its actual country of origin is unclear. But it has gained popularity in the past few years in the U.S., partly because of claimed health benefits, though there's little science behind them. And it doesn't hurt when stars like Lindsay Lohan are photographed drinking kombucha. Since last month, the government has been testing kombucha to determine if it should be labeled like beer or wine. Distributors and retailers like Whole Foods Inc. have removed the most popular form, raw kombucha, from stores, saying they won'...

Granted that People Magazine has its interest in sleaze, it also has its interest in public issues and affairs (outside of the famous people and their affairs) and one subject that has been getting more and more notice is school bullying. When I lived in Wallington, NJ, I didn't love school, but it was okay. It was an onerous task with boring teachers and some wretched kids but it was just there. I prayed for snow days but in those ancient days (I sound the grandparents of any age, at 42) we had to go to school even when there were measurable inches of snow. But as much as I wasn't crazy about it, I usually had a couple of friends and did poorly in subjects I wasn't interested in and flew through the few that I was. Teachers loved to say I wasn't attentive and this and that, but I have discovered that adults lie as much as children and when put to the wall, even more. When we moved from Wallington to Wayne in 1981, I discovered what every kid dreaded - moving to a new ...

This phrase was at the bottom of the Webpage for Patrick's Place ( http://www.patrickkphillips.com/ ): Bad Behavior has blocked 1389 access attempts in the last 7 days. What does this mean? What exactly is bad behaviour? It's a blog - when did free speech become bad behaviour? I'll have to check out the link part... now I'm curious. I need to know what that means. And what 1,389 attempts to be bad was... Oh, look at this: Welcome to a whole new way of keeping your blog, forum, guestbook, wiki or content management system free of link spam. Bad Behavior is a PHP-based solution for blocking link spam and the robots which deliver it. Bad Behavior complements other link spam solutions by acting as a gatekeeper, preventing spammers from ever delivering their junk, and in many cases, from ever reading your site in the first place. This keeps your site’s load down, makes your site logs cleaner, and can help prevent denial of service conditions caused by spammers. Read More on ...

I wrote back and asked this person if s/he thinks we are all this stupid... "The Chambers of Richard Gilbert QC and Associates 2 Bedford Row London WC1R 4BU United Kingdom Tel: +44 (0)703 190 1802 Fax +44 (0)700 606 6349 DX LDE 17 Email: richardgilbertqc@yahoo.com.hk Attorney at Law Faegre & Benson LLP, UK. Office Hours: Monday - Friday 9:00a.m. - 5:00p.m. Evening Appointments Available On behalf of the Trustees and Executor of the estate of Late Engr. Jurge Krugger. I once again try to notify you as my earlier letter was returned undelivered. I wish to notify you that late Engr. J?rge Kr?gger made you a beneficiary to his WILL. He left the sum of Thirty Million, One Hundred Thousand Dollars ($ 30,100.000 .00) to you in the Codicil and last testament to his WILL.This may sound strange and unbelievable to you, but it is real and true. Being a widely traveled man, he must have been in contact with you in the past or simply you were nominated to him by one of his numerous friend...

And the spam to scam just keeps on comin'...! The latest three, all showing up at work: "The Resolution Panel Senate Committee on Appropriation & Finance Aso Rock Villa ? FCT, Abuja This is to officially inform you that we have verified your file and found out why you have not received your overdue payment. This is occasioned due to the fact that you have not fulfilled the due obligations given to you in respect to your payment. Secondly, we have information that you are still dealing with the some officials here in an attempt to secure the release of your fund. We wish to formally advise you that such an illegal act have to stop -if you wish to receive your payment since a solution to your problem has been deliberated upon by the committee. We have arranged your payment to be made through our swift card payment center - Asia Pacific Regional office - this is the latest instruction from the presidency in conjunction with the IMF. The card center will send you an ATM card, ...

Most people like to go out and do things on Saturday. I prefer to throw in my lot with the squad on my rotation and others since we are not too social by nature. But sometimes I wonder... Oh, I don't wonder whether it is worth it or how I feel about riding as an EMT - I love it. But people are such a let-down. This Sunday morning I was finally asleep when the pager went off just before 0400. An MVC on Route 280 West, multiple injuries. We raced down there to meet another EMT onscene to find the patient with a closed break to one leg. The patient was in the back of a truck and had been asleep with two children - all unrestrained and laying on the floor. I hate that people do stupid things, but I have reached a point where if an adult wants to do something truly stupid that harms no one else, well, hey, that is up to that person. Whatever... reaching the age of consent means you can be an idiot if you'd like. However, when you knowingly endanger children, that is altogether anoth...

Oh, I do love this... If $4 gas didn't convince you to trade in that big H2 for a Mini Cooper , perhaps your friendly neighborhood police officer will. It seems that Hummer drivers get more traffic tickets than drivers of any other make of car. The data come from a survey conducted by ISO Quality Planning. The company helps insurers spot risks; or in other words, it helps insurance companies spot you, Mr. Bright Yellow Hummer. Not sure if your car attracts more cops than a donut shop? Check out the list to see if your ride is getting you unwanted attention. 10 Most Ticketed Cars 1. Hummer H2 People who love the Hummer H2 probably love its bold, imposing looks. Apparently, cops love the H2 because it helps them meet their ticket quotas. Here's a tip: If you have an H2, maybe you shouldn't drive it near then end of the month when traffic cops are scrambling to make their numbers. 2. Scion tC Seeing the tC on the most-ticketed list makes sense, given its popularity with young ...

I am the first to say that the antidiscrimination laws in the United States are a good thing. But I have to wonder - although I'm past just "I'm wondering" at this point and have now reached "I know" - that the antidiscrimination laws are a good thing that has gone too far or gotten out of hand. When did I begin living in a facist country? I find that people are more than just finding things discriminatory, but now are reaping the rewards of it. To wit: (From Yahoo! News) 'NEW YORK (AFP) – An airline passenger forced to cover his T-shirt because it displayed Arabic script has been awarded 240,000 dollars in compensation, campaigners said Monday. Raed Jarrar received the pay out on Friday from two US Transportation Security Authority officials and from JetBlue Airways following the August 2006 incident at New York's JFK Airport, the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) announced. "The outcome of this case is a victory for free speech and a blow ...

I knew about the red light on cars, but not the *77. It was about 1:00 p.m. In the afternoon, and Lauren was driving to visit a friend. An UNMARKED police car pulled up behind her and put his lights on. Lauren's parents have always told her never to pull over for an unmarked car on the side of the road, but rather to wait until they get to a gas station, etc. Lauren had actually listened to her parents advice, and promptly called *77 on her cell phone to tell the police dispatcher that she would not pull over right away. She proceeded to tell the dispatcher that there was an unmarked police car with a flashing red light on his rooftop behind her. The dispatcher checked to see if there were police cars where she was and there weren't, and he told her to keep driving, remain calm and that he had back up already on the way. Ten minutes later 4 cop cars surrounded her and the unmarked car behind her. One policeman went to her side and the others surrounded the car behind. They pull...