Communication

I spoke in sacrament meeting yesterday, but let me back up and lay out the entire story, as that's the part that is really worth talking about.
As the ward mission leader, the 2nd counselor in our bishopric asked me back towards the end of February if I would talk with the full time elders in the area and if the three of us would speak on the 5th Sunday of March. I agreed and talked with one of the elders a couple of days later. He said they were open and would be happy to do it.
A few weeks later when I was with both of the elders, I asked if they were all set to talk, but they couldn't remember having been asked and said they had already committed to speak in another ward that same day. Luckily, the elder I had spoken with had written it down in his book, so even though he didn't remember having been asked, it was indeed on their schedule. But, the still had the other commitment and said they'd check on the time.
After they did that, they found the other ward met ta 9AM (we meet at 1PM) so it was no problem.
On Saturday, I conducted another baptism and the 2nd counselor was there. Afterwards, I asked him a question about the Sunday program and he didn't remember having asked me to talk in Sacrament meeting and that a member from the stake high council would be speaking. At this point, I was starting to get concerned that I'd completely lost my mind.
Later in the day he (the 2nd counselor) called me up to say that the high councilman had just told him the speaker that was going to come with him fell through and he needed another speaker. So, I was back on the program.
I talked with the music director about it and she too had been told by the second counselor that I would speaking that week back in February and to get with me about the music (we had done that several weeks ago) So, the good news is I haven't lost my mind. The bad news is that perhaps the 2nd counselor has.
I had prepared to talk for 20 minutes and had to end up cutting that in half, but all in all it went well and everyone involved was able to find the humor in the situation.
I stated that I'd rather be prepared and not have to speak than the other way around.

There's no place like home

I just got back from a business trip to Alabama. The weather was nice (low to mid 60s) and I met some new people, established some new relationships and strengthened others. All in all, it was a good trip.

This morning it snowed here and there's a cold wind. It doesn't feel much like spring at the moment like it did further south (and east). But despite that, it's great to be back home.

There seem to be a lot of places that are nice to visit, but I wouldn't want to live there.

Be it ever so humble, there's no place like home. (Wherever that might be)

Baptism

I conducted a convert baptism yesterday, my first this year. The man is in his mid-30's and I've seen such a big change in him during the past 6 months.

Growing up in a particular faith, it seems to be much easier to hold on to those beliefs and traditions. But when, after already having reached adulthood, if you can still have an open mind to hear things out and have the spirituality to pray to know the truth of new information, I think that is something very special.

I have seen so often people who refuse to have an open mind. They think that what they have been taught is the way things are and nothing else could possibly have any merit. And I must admit, I myself when through a time when I was that way and did not have an open mind.

Even so, I'm not sure that I would have guts to do what some of these people I've known and worked with have done, nor am I confident that I'd have enough faith to pray about the new things I'd learned to find out if they were true. I admire these fine people, their faith and conviction is inspiring.

Is the customer always right?

Today was a long day... 12 and a half hours to be exact (not counting commute time). I got a lot done, so that's good, but some people can be hard to work with for one reason or another.
One particular customer is the type who is always right and easily annoyed by anyone who disagrees with him or doesn't want to do things his way. He also wants things delivered ASAP, even if he just changed his mind and is having you redo work that had previously been done and approved.
It can be frustrating, but you can't always pick your customers.

On a lighter side, my little girl had a birthday earlier in the week and we had fun singing to her, watching her open presents and of course having cake and ice cream. Kids are great. Or at least they can be when not throwing a fit for whatever reason.

The struggles of a small company

Going through this process myself now, I have a renewed respect for anyone who has built their own company. You start off just by yourself, if you don't log hours you can't invoice and if you can't invoice you don't get paid.
But, you need to keep new working coming in. So, a portion of your time has to be spend on non-billable activities, such reading and responding to RFPs and otherwise trying to figure out where your next project will come from. I have a few different pokers in the fire right now, if all of them bare fruit, I'll be so busy I won't know what to do. If none bare fruit, I'll still be okay, but that'll mean the business isn't growing any.
So, do you get all of the work and then hope you can hire to get it all done? Or do you turn work away and hope that later (when the current work slows down) you'll be able to find more?
It is an interesting challenge. The next few months should indicate how I've been able to handle that challenge.

It did get better, eventually

Okay, so after going back to the game, I took a risk on shorting some stock because it was at a real high price. So, I go for broke and short more than I can afford, but with the potential to make 250K, figured that should get me back into the game. However, the next card for that stock had it splitting rather than going down, so I went bankrupt a second time (that's a new record for our group). One of my friends, his wife and my wife all got out of the rate race and just me and another friend were left in it, but then I was finally able to get some traction, got a couple business opportunities that worked out, a duplex and an 8-plex and finally was able to get out of the rat race. Then after running around on the fast track for awhile without anyone finally winning, my wife finally won (she usually does when we play that game, I think I only one once).
So, even if your luck just seems terrible, you can always turn things around. This may have been just a game, but the same is true for real life. Never give up.

CashFlow

So, today is game night. We went out with some friends to our favorite Chinese place and came back to my place to play CashFlow, a very fun game that teaches you about investing. I'm writing now as the game is being played because I'm getting my teeth kicked in at the moment. I couldn't get any deals on my draws, then I draw a doodad card (means I have to buy something). Sometimes the doodad isn't bad, like a coffee maker or something for 50 bucks. But no, I have to draw the vacation home doodad card. 25K down plus 500 per month. Anyway, I didn't have the money so had to go bankrupt. Which, among other things, means I lose three turns. (Thus the time I have to write this entry in my blog) Then, I get a chance to buy stock due to another card at a great deal, which normally I couldn't take, but due to the nature of the card I could. So, I put almost all of my cash into the stock because the price was so good. And then on the next round, that stock goes bankrupt. Okay, well it's finally my turn again, so I'm going to go try to climb out of the gutter and get back into the game.
More later.

Ah, spring

First a quick update on my friend (the one I collided with at ramming speed while skiing around the middle of February). He's on the mend and doing better, it would appear that now serious harm was done and he hasn't sued me for whiplash or anything like that, so it would seem no real damage came out of the incident.

I haven't written in a couple of weeks, been allowing myself to get too busy, but I have something write about now. We got a fair amount of snow this season, but it has been melting pretty good of late and this morning our basement flooded. Nothing too bad, but it's the third time in 6 years that it has happened, so we've decided to give up on carpet in that part of the basement. The good thing is we have some great neighbors and they helped us get things cleaned up and had us over for dinner this evening, so all of that was good.

It's a beautiful thing when neighbors help each other out and look out for each other. Can you imagine what the world would be like if everyone did that? I mean, just imagine if certain parts of the world that just can't seem to get along could adopt that kind of an attitude. I'm confident they would get much more enjoyment out of helping each other than fighting each other if they could just give it a chance.