Notebook Blogging Season Final

Well this is the last "Notebook blogger" for a while, today was the last day of the spring semester. These past two days we had our finals which actually were a lot easier than I thought they were going be. We had one where we had to estimate the materials for a complete house and one involving building code.

I am not one of those lucky individuals who possesses a photographic memory where everything you read or see is ingrained in your subconsciouses. Rather my memory is slightly strange in that I tend to have very detailed memories of events, almost like instant replay of things that have happened in my life. Almost everyone I know has their own "instant replay" section in my mind, all I do is think of that person and it is like a list of clips starts playing. It is weird, I may have not seen someone in years and we come in contact with each other and my mind will go to the time we were playing hide-n-go-seek and they hid in the trash can!

Anyway it is sometimes hard for me to remember things the way you need to for tests, fortunately as we have built our house building code has been an ever constant topic so for the building code test lot of the questions I was just able to remember a specific event and remember the answers. Remember than guy I mentioned in an earlier post who offered to pay me to do his English homework?

Well during the estimation test, he was sitting behind me and he whispers my name. I turn around and he says, "Will, help a brother out, how many studs do we need?" I just laughed and turned back around and he continues on with "You want some money? I will buy you lunch" This was right after Mr. T. has said "and I don't want anyone sharing answers" :p

I have really enjoyed class, I know this will sound cheesy but being back in a learning environment has reminded me how much fun it is to learn new stuff. Sometimes in the daily grind we forget about learning something new and just go about our lives, which is fine, but learning new stuff is great.

At the beginning of the year, I was not sure what specifically I would doing this summer but I have reached a decision. I am going to spend the summer in Alaska as a float plane pilot. :D Wow, you might think, I did not even know you knew how to fly a float plane Will! My answer is, I am always full of surprises..........but yeah, the above line while something I think would be fun is completely false.

I do want to get my pilots certificate but that currently involves more money than I have sitting around so I am of a serious mind to just become a political lackey for the summer, try to get some people of value into the places they can do the most good. Maybe that will be the title of my Thursday posts from now on, "Ramblings of a political lackey".......has a catchy ring doesn't it?

Notebook Blogging #10

Well, after several weeks of MIA notebook blogger is back, though this might be a short post. Doesn't it seem like the year is just flying by? In one week it will be the 1st of May! The 1st of May!! 114 days into the new year and exactly 35 weeks until Christmas, which BTW, I already have some gifts for. :p While it seems the days are just flying off the calender, there is also a part of me that feels like time is just crawling along. It is a weird feeling, to know the year is moving right along but at the same time some things in life have their own timetable and all you can do is be patient and wait.

Take our house, granted, we only work on it a couple hours a day when it is not pouring rain (something that has been quite common recently) and the work ethic of some class members leaves sometime to be desired, but taking that all into consideration it is still mildly irritating that construction has been so slow, but at least if I get too frustrated there are usually plenty of things handy that need a good hammer. :p And like I said in January, while there are a lot of things I want to happen or get accomplished you just have to be patient and trust the Lord's timing even for something as minor as building a house.

One recent element of construction that I thought was great fun was dragging trusses for our roof. We had them all dropped at one end and we had to space them evenly across the top of the framework. This involved balancing on the 2x4 top-plate and walking trapeze style 48 feet to the other end of the house which is actually really easy. We were going to have three people move each truss just to get the job done faster except almost everyone chickened out of getting up there! So the few individuals, myself included who were not scared to death of a little 15' drop balanced ourselves on the 2x4, gripped the truss in the center and dragged them individually to the other end of the house.

The first time I have to admit I shuffled my way across the length of the house, this was mainly due to my feet being the size they are and the fact that I kept kicking myself in my heels. After that first run though, I was good and we got them spaced out relatively quickly considering most of the class was on the ground. Once we got the sheeting down on the roof, most of the class was a little more willing to get on the roof to put down the tar paper and shingles but that could be a post all of it's own.

Remember the I mentioned sunburn in the Earth day post a few days ago? Well, I did not follow my own advice and I actually got rather red, though not severely when we were working on getting the trusses set up and the sheeting on the roof. Since that day I have religiously been putting on sunscreen, I have vowed not to revisit lobster land!

Anyone remember the furniture I was going to build? :p Well it seems like free time we have in the shop is few and far between but I have almost finished the bookcase. I just need to stain it and put it back together. I will post pictures whenever it is fully completed.

Notebook Blogging #9

More than half the guys in my class are African American and they are all great guys but I have to say their clothing style for the most part leaves something to be desired. I just want to knock upside the head the dude who started the fashion of extremely baggy clothes and pants riding at least halfway down your waist.

It seems that pants are no longer there to cover your rear, rather they are just there to cover your legs. I am dead serious here, there are several of my class mates who literally wear their pants on their upper thighs, as in below their rears, as in they have to walk funny to keep their pants from just falling to the floor.

Maybe pants are much more comfortable riding on your upper thighs but I doubt it. It seems they are all just succumbing to some weird fashion trend. The lowness of the pants actually explains the overly large shirts and when I say overly large I mean just that. These shirts reach almost to their knees. But then since their pants are on their thighs, they have an excuse for such large shirts, they don't want to be exposing their undergarments or worse to the world.
At least I think that is the idea, it works relatively well while standing, but sitting down is another issue :o :red:

Yeah, I think this is one style that seriously needs to go. Another one has to do with baseball hats or lids as they are now called. It seems when you buy a hat you keep the size sticker on. Why? You might ask, for the world to know what size you wear of course! Also make sure you buy several sizes too large and definitely wear it at a jaunty angle. Whatever you do, do not bend the brim it, needs to be as flat as possible so as to offer a clear view of your size sticker.

To illustrate the hat style popular today, I went into the "Sarah and William crazy picture archive" and present to you a rather bad example.

If you notice, the "do not bend the brim" law was broken, but we tried to make up for it by placing our hats at an even more jaunty angle than is normally seen.

Notebook Blogging #8

The state of morality in our nation and the world is appalling. Everyday people do not have principles they are willing to stick to and the leaders of the various forms of government are sadly not much better. I don't get frustrated very easily but honestly, the state of morality, or lack of it, in the world's population really gets me hot. For that matter, the leadership in government and even the church for the most part is ridiculously depressing. Rather than go into a rant, which happens often when I am on the above subjects, I am just going to say the morality and overall attitude of my classmates leaves something to be desired.

Technically we have 15 students in the class. I say technically because only on a handful of occasions has the full 15 member class been present. There is a core group of about 10 people who regularly are in class, of those 7 or 8 are for the most part on time. The rest come and go like the wind, one day they will be there for 2 hours, the next they will not show up and the day after that they will stay for the entire class! There is no method to their scheduling, it is almost like they come when they really want to show up.

This attitude to class attendance and the apparent reflection of laziness on their part is mildly irritating to say the least. I guess I should not care about it, but I just don't understand how people can have such a lackadaisical attitude. I am an action type person, sure, I enjoy laying around watching 4 days worth of basketball games once a year, but if I have a job that needs to get done, especially one that involves manual labor, I am going to bust my tail and get the job done.

It is just very frustrating when we are trying to get things done and 1/3 of the class is usually absent and of the 2/3rds who do show up, about half of them would be content to sit around and talk on their cell phones when we need to be sticking headers in the openings! Do you just feel the frustration dripping off my words? :p It is a good group of guys, they just sometimes remind me of chickens in a pen, content to stand around with their mouths open on a hot day and the only way you are going to move them is if you start yelling and moving the pen and even then they sometimes don't move....Chickens, especially ones you raise to eat are some of the dumbest birds but I digress, I'll save that subject for another post.

My classmate's laziness does not just extend to our class as I found out the other day. As part of the requirements for our class you also have to take a math and English class, unless you test out, which I easily did. You don't have to be a mathematician or an English major, of which I am neither, to be in construction, imagine that! Not everyone in my class tested out of the math and/or English classes so some people are taking those in addition in construction/building code.

Anyway two of my classmates were talking about an English assignment they had to do, one classmate could not understand what they were supposed to do and the other was saying he was just going to pay someone to do it for him! Curious, I asked what they had to do and they showed me the assignment. It involved pretending you had your own business and were presenting a proposal for services to the government. Sounds easy right? It is the type of assignment you can hit right out of the park. Instant A+

I asked the guy who said he was going to pay someone to do it for him if he did not understand it. I was like "Dude that is a cupcake assignment" His reply was yes he knew how to do it, he just did not want to! I asked why not and he said he would rather pay someone to do the work because he just did not want to take the time to do it. He then offered to pay me to do the assignment! I told him $100 bucks, he said sure, paid me and I did it.... :p J/K!

I have to admit I was slightly tempted to, not because I wanted to help him cheat or because I wanted the easy money, rather, because of past work experiance, I seriously can write proposals like the assignment called for in my sleep. My competitive nature was already thinking how I could make this the greatest proposal the teacher had ever seen....

Even though my classmate's attitudes can sometimes be a pain, at the same time it is sad and I feel sorry for the guys. That type of mentality is just so foreign to me, I honestly can't comprehend it. I also feel their mentality is a reflection of us as a nation. No one wants to work hard and accomplish something with a feeling of satisfaction at a job well done. We want instant gratification, and we are willing to do whatever we can, even compromising our principles to get it.

Oh and sorry this is so long guys, like I have said before, sometimes I sit down to write and it just keeps on going on and on... :p

Notebook Blogging #7

Sorry "notebook blogging" is getting out late today, after class I decided I wanted to have some fun with drywall so I went to my apartment and fixed some holes in the walls and ceiling. This could be a whole topic in itself, but the quick version is, the apartment above me had some pipe issues and they had to go through my apartment's ceiling to get them, which of course left holes that I figured should be fixed. In case you have not experienced fixing holes in walls I recommend you "accidentally" slam a door open and fix the resulting hole, it is great fun. Or you could just use duct tape like a good friend of my does ;)

Because of the weather our house has been moving right along, no one has gotten injured except a guy named Steve who hit his pinkie with a hammer...everyone kids him about that. I was in charge of cutting all the joists for one side of the house and I have to say good tools really do make a difference. The circular saws we have in class are simply amazing. Even though we have a circular saw as soon as I can, I am buying the one we use in class.

When we finished the sub-floor Mr. T. got up on it and did a little dance number, oh the times I wish I had a video camera! This past week we actually had this thing called the "cultural fair" which I guess is supposed to introduce us to different cultures....All I did was eat great food :p Oh and watched Mr. T. dance. Turns out his little dance move he did on the sub-floor was just a warm up for the dancing he did with his group, "The Crazy eights".

Next week I have spring break, which means I will have an amazing amount of time on my hands. Back in December when I was looking at the schedule the thought crossed my mind that I would go on a road trip up north on spring break but that is not an option at the moment. My grandmother actually has been wanting to go to Boston to visit her sister but she is going to be flying up. Stuck in a car with me did not interest her too much, besides she got her plane ticket free. I have a feeling my mother has plans to use my "skills" around the house, if that is the case, just a heads up, there may or may not be any blog posts next week. :p

Notebook Blogging #6

I have a feeling this is going to be short. :p Because of the weather we have not been able to put our floor system in the house. It will be too cold one day and the next day it will rain! Crazy weather. Anyway the only blog worthy thing to occur in class was building a playhouse for a guy in class named Joy. Yes, that is his real name, my sisters did not believe me at first. Joy wanted a playhouse for his son so Mr. T. decided it would be a good chance for everyone to practice swinging a hammer or something like that.

We built the playhouse in the shop just like you would a real house, framed up the walls, floor, roof all following code as if it was a real house. Then we covered the whole thing with OSB and tar papered and shingled the roof! It has got to be the nicest playhouse I have ever seen and it weighs over a ton, literally! The only trouble is now Joy has to figure out how to get the monstrosity home.

Our teacher Mr. T. is a very funny guy, he went through the class 30 some years ago and then ended up back teaching the class. He also has a great sense of humor, a few days ago a phone went off in class and the ring tone was the William Tell Overture. Mr. T. looked up from what he was doing and started prancing in place like he was riding a horse with this cheesy grin on his face, oh the times I wish I had a video camera. :D He also has a habit of making some pretty funny quotes, three of the best have been:

"Doing a song and dance number with a truss in your hand is no fun"

"Treat that level like a woman, gentle like"

"Believe you me, when you finish with this class, you will be tight with your ruler"

The third one was in response to a guy who when asked, said he could read a ruler but he was not that "tight" with it. Most importantly Mr. T. is a wealth of information when it comes to building anything you can imagine, including furniture, (which is what he wants to do someday, build custom furniture) When I learn something new I am the type of person who wants to get out and put that knowledge to practice or tell people about what I learned, I have learned so much I did not know before that it sometimes bugs me that it is winter, (and I love winter) because I can't get out and work on things like I will be able to do once it warms a bit. I actually can't wait for summer which I think is really funny since as those who know me can attest to, I have never been a great fan of summer. :p

Notebook Blogging #5

I woke up this morning to a lovely Valentine's day surprise of about 3 inches of snow. Yes 3 inches is barely more than a dusting and most of it has already melted as I type this but hey, it is snow. I love snow, plus on the way to class I got to yell at people driving like we were in a blizzard or something that is always fun.

Something rather funny happened in class this week, or maybe I should say before class. Like I have said in past posts, even though I usually wake up when I need to, as a precaution when I need to be somewhere on time in the early morning I set my alarm. Sometimes because of Sleepy Rufus even that does not work. :p Well one day this week I woke up and rolled over to see what time it was. My brain, still in it's somewhat foggy state from the adventure I was having in one of the seven levels of the candy cane forest, only noticed the minute hands were at :49 and my alarm was set for :50. Choosing to avoid some needless noise I turned off the alarm and went about getting ready to leave.

I ate breakfast, looked at the temperature outside (26) grabbed a warm hat and headed out the door. When I arrived at class I noticed the parking lot was not as full as it usually is but I did not give it a second thought that was until I noticed that Mr. T.'s truck was also not parked near the shop. "Hmmm" I thought to myself, I hope we have class today. It was at that moment that I thought to check my phone to see if I had somehow set a new land speed record getting to class, to my surprise I was early. An hour early! I had to look at my phone twice just to make sure I was getting the correct time.

When I thought about it I realized I looked at clocks in the house as well as the clock in my car, all of which were displaying the correct time but my brain just did not process it. What made it worse was the fact that I had taken my Bible and the book I was reading out of my backpack so I had nothing to read. Fortunately I still had my notebook and pens so I just sat there and wrote this post up. Then, since I still had quite a bit more to wait, I decided to stick it to verse...The things we do when we have time on our hands....

The alarm did not sound
still my feet hit the ground
when I jumped out of bed
thoughts of getting ready in my head.
I had a bite to eat
I brushed my teeth
put on my socks then shoes
I was on the move.
Though I did not drive fast
I arrived early to class
with nothing much to occupy my time
except composing this cheesy rhyme.

Oh yeah pretty awful I have to admit. That may be due to the subject matter or maybe just because I stink at creating verse. Anyway even after writing the above in my notebook I still had some time on my hands which was spent praying about the day. Finally it got close enough to the time when class was to start that I headed that way. When I arrived at the shop, to my dismay I discovered that class had been canceled!!!! Mr. T. had hurt his back and was unable to get to class! I spend an hour waiting for class to start and then I discover it has been canceled, what fun!

Heh, the time was not all a waste, it gave me something to write about and I actually did not leave the campus for another hour because I somehow got involved in a conversation regarding the state of our country which I am always up for. :D Since today is Valentine's Day I do have one thing to say about it. Just because you don't have a "sweetheart" does not mean you don't have people around you who you can show your love for aka, parents, brothers and sisters. Don't let commercialization of the holiday and the heavy emphasis on "doing something for that special someone" make you feel like you can't celebrate it if you happen to not have a "special someone" ;)

Notebook Blogging #4

Sorry the blog has been so quiet, it seems my sisters have forgotten that they were to keep the blog updated. :p I have decided to build the shelf/bookcase rather than the dresser because the wood for the dresser was going to cost me a little more than I really want to spend right now. I have yet to starting building it though because in true loopy NC weather this whole week has been around 75. 75 in February! It is a hard lot we in the south must endure let me tell you.

Because of the unseasonal weather we started construction this week on a 1,344 sqft house. So far all we have done is built and leveled off the foundation but on Monday if the weather holds up we should be putting the floor system in. Also to the horror of my mother I found out there is a guy in class who has had some trouble with the law. So much trouble he has a curfew of 7pm, is not able to drive and has to call his parole officer regularly....Oh and he can't get near a blade longer than 3 inches!

We also lost power during class, which was a rather interesting experience. We were all sitting in chairs as Mr. T talked about footings when all of a sudden the lights go out then come back on, then go back out. They repeat this for several minutes then they go out for good. "Hmm" Mr. T says "Looks like we get to have class in the dark" It was not that bad except for the fact that no one could see the board and it is a tad hard to see the footings being drawn. Fortunately the power was only off for about 30 minutes. Well, this "notebook blogger" post is going to be a little on the short side, I figured no one really wanted to read about footings, foundation walls, piers and making sure they are level and up to code...

Notebook Bogging #3

Class has been going well. I am the type of person who likes to "learn on the job" as in, I like to actually do what I am learning to do as I learn, if that makes any sense. :p There are so many things I have learned that I want to get out and do construction-wise it is not even funny. This past week I learned how to build kitchen cabinets and fortunately I actually got to build them. We have every tool you can imagine in class, so I was able to dovetail the drawers for the cabinets which was very cool.

This week we also had a new class member, Rosco, who happens to be a dog, a Beagle and Chihuahua mix to be exact. Mr. T got him Sunday night and since he is only a little puppy and was yapping and missing his brothers, sisters and mother, he was brought to class. The first day unless he was being held all he did was whine, but by the second day he was scampering around the class and following Mr. T everywhere. I am not the type of person who fawns over puppies but I have to say Rosco is probably the cutest puppy I have seen mainly because he is so small. His legs are no longer than my index finger and his head is only a little larger than a baseball and yet he is jumping all around people's feet like any other puppy.

We have an air hose in the shop that is used for the nail guns and such, it is also used to clean up the sawdust after class. Yesterday everyone in class was introduced to Anthony's singing ability or lack thereof as he cleaned with the air hose. With the air hose full blast, Anthony started this rather comical song and dance number that involved shouting out lyrics to a song while spraying air in random places all tied together with some mosh pit type dance. It was hilarious to say the least even though I could not quite understand the song he was singing.

As soon as it gets warmer we are going to start construction on the first of two houses we will build and finish before the end of May. It actually is not that cold outside to me, but Mr T. is a warm weather person so until it is warm enough for him we can't start building. While we wait for warmer weather everyone has been given the assignment of building something in the shop. I really wish I had a house I could build cabinets for, but since I don't, I think I will probably just make some furniture. The two ideas I am thinking on are either this rather plain dresser:


Or this rather interesting looking bookcase/room divider:

Notebook Blogging #2

There is a guy in class named Anthony who always sits next to me. Anthony is a pretty funny guy but he has a slight issue, he always seems to be sleepy. My alter ego being as it is, I am able to notice the signs of sleepy people, it is one of my special powers you could say. Besides that, I also know Anthony is sleepy because he has fallen asleep, in class, next to me, more than once!!

The first time it happened Mr. T. our teacher, was talking about footings and estimating the amount of concrete you need, very basic stuff. Anthony had pulled his hood over his head and was just sitting on my right occasionally nodding. After a while I hear this slight humming sound to my right that keeps getting louder. It takes me a second to realize it is coming from Anthony, he has fallen asleep.

People who have been around me know I laugh a lot, I have a funky sense of humor and ordinary things will sometimes just hit me and I will start laughing. Well I am in class trying to make sure there is nothing important being said but all I can think about is silly Anthony sitting next to me snoring away. I mean he started off soft but after about a minute he was really sawing. I was seriously having a hard time keeping the laughter back and finally after five minutes it all decided to escape in this very loud half giggle half laugh.Mr. T. turns to me and says "Everything making sense?" It was all I could do to stop laughing and squeak out an "I'm good"

My loud eruption had snapped Anthony back from whatever marshmallow cloud he was on and for the rest of the class he was able to keep he eyes open. But a few days later, the same thing happened. This time, though I was prepared, as soon as he started snoring I made myself think of antique wall scones and Thai brass ashtrays. It did the trick I did not laugh, that was until Mr. T yelled for someone to slap Anthony because he had fallen asleep again. :p

Notebook Blogging #1

The day is overcast, a crowd is gathered outside a doorway. Smoke rises like a cloud above their heads. It is break time and that means it is time to kill yourself, slowly, painfully, carcinogenicity. The group is comprised of young men in their 20s, their whole life in front of them and yet daily they stand outside and slowly destroy the most unique machine they will ever control, their own bodies. I think all this as I walk past them into the building, what caused them to get hooked on tobacco? Was it the need to fit in with their friends? Maybe it is how they deal with the stress of their life, standing outside, crowded under a brick overhang, in an attempt to avoid life's trials. It does not really matter how nicotine got it's addictive hands in their life, they are hooked. Rather dismal wouldn't you say?

Classes started this week, hence the lack of blog posts. I have urged Sarah several times to post but she keeps saying her mind is like a sieve or something. During my breaks rather than join the above mentioned crowd outside I have been writing this post in my notebook. Writing out things rather than typing them has been interesting, lots of crossed out lines and little arrows as to how things should be. Also there is the whole spelling issue, I am a pretty good speller, but without the crutch of spell check I eventually just gave up trying to think of how to spell "carcinogenicity" :p I guess it does not really matter what my notebook looks like, no one will probably ever read it but it was slightly hard to read and type up, I think this had something to do with all the arrows....

Except for the fact that everyone pretends they are a chimney in the winter during breaks, the classes have been very informative and actually rather fun. Then again I can't remember a class I have ever had that I did not enjoy, hard yes, but I still enjoyed them. I always approach class situations with the mindset that you are there to learn something and you can either view it as a chore you have to get done or you can view it as an opportunity to gain knowledge that will help you become a better person in some aspect of your life, even if it is just the ability to take well organized notes.

If you did not read my 2007 post or talked with me recently there is a chance you probably have no idea why I am back at school taking classes, if you want to know go read the post or call me or chat me up on Google talk sometime. I am writing in a notebook here, I don't feel like wasting my ink and paper on something I already have talked about. Beside someone might have missed the 2007 post and while it is long and rambles, I think it is worth reading. (Not to toot my own horn) :p Some funny things worth blogging on have already happened in class but I think I will save them for another time. :)