I’ll Teach My Kids to Count Up!

June 30, 2009 — davehultin

Oh, boy. I just had a frustrating experience at sandwich shop next door. I experienced a pet peeve first-hand. Again. Here’s the play-by-play…

  1. The cashier rings up the total for the lunch. $15.73.
  2. I hand the cashier two $10 bills and 3 pennies.
  3. Cashier thinks I handed him a $10, a $5, and assumes the rest of the change is coming to get to $15.73.
  4. He punches in the amount he things he’s getting ($15.73) and then realizes, “Wait! This person gave me $20 + 3 pennies!”
  5. Panic sets in. He’s already rung up the total and now the cash register has no way to tell him how much money he should give back.
  6. Another employee is watching over his shoulder. I get the impression that the guy that took my money is new-ish and learning the ropes, so I’m willing to cut him lots of slack. I’m not one to dispense unwarranted anger, and I’ve been “new” before too…
  7. But…basic skills are still needed! The fact is, this young man should have been able to count the change up from $15.73 to $20.03 without the assistance of a cash register or a calculator.
  8. Thankfully, the person that was watching over him can save the day. She has a calculator! I sat down and wait for her to bring over my change. $4.10.

$4.10??? How does someone using a calculator type in $20.03 minus $15.73 and get $4.10?!?!? Now I have a primary pet peeve (”Can’t count up to make change”) that carries with it a secondary pet peeve (”Can’t use a calculator to make change”). I’m sorry, but that really bothers me.

Maybe it’s part of a rite of passage. I gracefully passed over the threshold into my forties last year. Does that give me the right to talk about “kids these days!?” Am I turning into some cranky old curmudgeon without even realizing it? Doesn’t matter. All I know is I’m going to make sure my kids have the ability to count up and make change without the aid of a cash register and/or calculator!

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Take Me Out to the Ball Game!

June 24, 2009 — davehultin

What an amazing Father-Son night! It was so much fun taking Andrew to see the Redhawks play ball last night, absolutely everything was perfect! Here’s a list of all the items that contributed to perfection:

  1. The weather was perfect. The temperature at the start of the game was likely low 80’s, probably low 70’s at the end of the game.
  2. Sunmart provides two free general admission tickets in exchange for a $25 receipt for games on Monday and Tuesday, so the price was right.
  3. We were given a free plunger from Robert Gibb & Sons. (The first 1000 fans all got one.) Quirky, but Andrew sure had fun with his plunger!
  4. Andrew was given a free kids meal … kids under 12 get a free hotdog, chips, and pop. We had both eaten already, so it was the perfect snack. (The kettle corn later was tasty too!)
  5. Andrew genuinely enjoyed being there. I don’t know how much of the game he watched, but he absolutely enjoyed being there. I taught him some of the finer points all 6-year-olds should know about baseball (singles, doubles, triples, how many innings, how many outs in an inning, etc.)

We stayed for the whole game, which was well past Andrew’s bedtime. He talked non-stop … even on the ride home. It was just way too much fun, a perfect Father-Son moment!

Oh … and the Redhaws won by a score of 18-1. Considering all the other ingredients in this perfect night, I think the winning score was probably the least important. Hopefully this is one that will stick in Andrew’s memory for a very long time!

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An Inconvenient Temperature

June 5, 2009 — davehultin

So here we are on June 5, and we’re supposed to be having this overwhelming feeling that the warm days of summer are underway. What’s going wrong? We should be enjoying comfortable temperatures in the upper 70s. And according to http://www.npwrc.usgs.gov/resource/habitat/climate/temp.htm,

North Dakota’s delightful summer season is at its best in June, July and August, and is perfect for all outdoor activities. The days are warm, sometimes even hot, but nights are one-blanket cool for restful sleep.

So what’s the temperature today at 1:06 p.m.?

52 degrees.

And that’s what is in the forecastable future too.

Global warming? I’ll take one, please…

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Our House has been Dedicated to the Lord!

May 28, 2009 — davehultin

What a neat experience! I just returned from a trip to our new house with Pastor Dave Bruns. He very kindly fulfilled my request to offer a prayer of dedication for our new house. I gave him a quick tour, and then he briefly read out of Exodous 3, explaining that like the ground around the burning bush, the house has been claimed as Holy ground.

It was a quick, simple meeting and prayer … and it really meant a lot to me!

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The Cree LR6 – It Really Is That Good!

May 6, 2009 — davehultin

I have posted before on my excitement about the Cree LR6 LED light. After lots of research I became about 98% convinced that it was the right choice for beautiful energy efficient light. But I held back on the remaining 2% of excitement until I could actually see it in action in our house.

I’m happy to report I have now experienced it firsthand, and the remaining 2% of excitement that was “up for grabs” is now fulfilled. This truly is a beautiful light and should be a no-brainer for anyone building a new home (as we are) and a near-no-brainer for anyone with the intention of staying in their existing home for 3+ years. (The lights are an easy retrofit in most cases.)

The light truly is beautiful. Forget about the preconceptions you might have about the sterile LED flashlight quality. The light from the LR6 is warm and room-filling. Our electrician and builder were both very impressed. The one thing that caught their attention was the fact that when the lights were fully dimmed they appeared properly dimmed where it mattered, but when you looked at the light source itself it still seemed bright. That’s no big deal … just something different.

Aesthetic beauty is one thing, and certainly very important. But the beautiful part for me is the energy saving! We have 44 recessed lights in our new house, I was able to get a quantity discount (and free shipping) from wamhomecenter.com to bring the unit price down to about $80 each. Each bulb takes just 12 watts of energy (vs. the 65+ watts required for conventional recessed lights) and will last 15+ years. Putting all the math together at the current electric rates, assuming 8 hours of usage each day (my wife stays at home and I can’t trust the kids to turn off the lights!), the total cost of purchase and usage after three years is $4,079 for conventional recessed lights, and $3,867 for the Cree lights. That’s when we break even. Project that out to eight years and the conventional lights (keep in mind we’ve been replacing bulbs all the time!) come in at $7,761 versus the Cree lights at $4,445.

Now that is a beautiful light!

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3.5 Million Sandbags

April 4, 2009 — davehultin

Fighting the 2009 Fargo Flood required 3.5 million sandbags. One of my coworkers found this link which provides an amazing visualization of exactly how many sandbags that is:

http://blog.concept3d.com/?p=433

No wonder my arms were sore!!!

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Another Record Falls

March 31, 2009 — davehultin

As if the high water mark set last week wasn’t enough, we just polished off another record.

Record snowfall for the day of March 31 was 2.8 inches in 1977. Today’s snowfall? 5.8 inches.

And counting.

We’ll probably whack tomorrow’s record off the books too. April 1 record is 3.4 inches in 1962, tomorrow’s forcast calls for 7 to 14 inches.

More at http://www.inforum.com/event/article/id/235909/.

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Fargo-Moorhead Flood Watch: Secondary Concerns

March 31, 2009 — davehultin

So far so good with the flood fight. The dikes are continuing to hold, the water continues to drop. But what a wild week. Just when things look like they might be settling down (albeit not to a safe level yet) we get whacked with an all-out Winter storm. Lots of snow, probably 10+ inches, and noone to clear the roads. The city plows are giving priority to the dike areas and main traffic arteries, so it could be a while.

The main concerns are obvious. Will the dikes hold? Will the high wind degrade their integrity? But I find myself thinking a lot about secondary concerns:

  • We just haven’t been able to get the phones because the city is asking all non-essential businesses to close up and stay home (to keep traffic to a minimum should the streets need to turn into emergency routes). Will WebsitesForPrinters.com customers think we’re ignoring them when we are unable to answer the phone?
  • Our business is national (international, for that matter) so our customer base keeps on churning forward. But what about local and regional businesses? I’m concerned for them … they are losing lots of revenue right now.
  • I’m concerned for hourly employees of the local and regional businesses as well. Businesses closed = no paycheck.

But even in the middle of all of this, I know that God is still in control. I find myself thinking often of something I used to say with a laugh and a smile. Regarding the 1997 flood, I would say, “That was our practice flood.” But as I think about it, there’s probably a lot of truth in that statement. God is sovereign, I won’t try to understand His amazing ways … but I can’t help but think if He allowed 1997’s flood to happen so Fargo would be better prepared for this year’s flood.

But enough writing for now. There’s SO much work to be done … back to calling customers and prospects from home.

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Fargo-Moorhead Flood Watch: Prayer Works!

March 30, 2009 — davehultin

One of my employees just came to me and said “I think prayer works!” I think he’s right! We’re still waiting for the flood water to recede. The last thing we need right now is more moisture. We are supposed to get snow today. But … check out the big empty spot on this map!

No snow in Fargo for now!

No snow in Fargo for now!

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Fargo-Moorhead Flood Watch: We Survived Round 1

March 29, 2009 — davehultin

This has been quite a week. It feels like we have won Round 1 of this flood fight, but there is more to come so we can’t rest on a false sense of security. Fargo-Moorhead built the dikes to a 43-foot level, the river (so far) has topped out at just under 41 feet. The river may no longer be rising but we can’t let our guard down. The dikes need to hold until the water is down to a safe level.

This last week has really been filled with amazing events. Here are the memories that will be permanently etched into my mind:

  • Seeing police escorts for flatbed trailers carrying palletes of sandbags to where they are needed most.
  • Seeing Coast Guard helicopters land at the hospital across the street to drop off rescued flood victims. Keep in mind we’re in Fargo North Dakota, 300 miles away from the geographical center of North America … so seeing Coast Guard helicopters flying around town was a site in itself.
  • My first sandbagging experience placed me in the Oak Creek neighborhood. I was able to look across the area we were working at and see our old neighborhood.
  • In Oak Creek I saw a familiar face … my daughter’s orthodontist. I figured he was another volunteer, but it turns out I was helping protect his house.
  • Finishing up one project usually results in the volunteers breaking up into small packs of 2-3 people roaming around looking for the next place to help out. My pack found a house just starting to increase the height of their dike, and within 30 minutes our roaming pack was joined by many others. We had three lines of sandbag delivery going, probably 60+ people in all.
  • Sending my wife and kids out of town so they’d already be in a safe spot … just in case.

Those are some of the big memories, but there is so much more. It is truly amazing to see all the volunteers that came together to pull this off. Absolutely amazing. God has truly answered prayers by covering our cities with protection.

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