I Need An Analogy

Last evening I was measuring doors at a hospital for a 2nd shift customer.  When walking these types of facilities I always look for door educational opportunities to share with my customer.  I know doors isn't exactly on the top of  most folks list of what they want to learn about.


My customer walked me up to a restroom wood door and said we need to replace this.  I recognized this door and knew we had replaced it within the last 2 years so I asked why.  He opened the door and it was evident, the door was split on the door edge by the top hinge.  I knew exactly what happened.  The door has a closer on it and the cleaning crew used a broom handle or some object to prop the door open time and time again.  While that may be good for my sales it is definitely not good for my customer.  As I was measuring the door I offered several suggestions on ways to educate the staff to treat the doors and hardware properly in order to get full use out of the material.  My customer shook his head and said nothing will work. 


As I was driving home I wondered how could I reach an employee who probably makes minimum wage at a thankless job.  Ultimately the replacement door or any other material that doesn't last its normal lifetime comes out of an employees paycheck by not receiving raises due to ever escalating operating costs.  I wondered if an analogy would work but so far haven't been able to come up with one.


Thoughts, comments and suggestions are welcome in the comment section below.


Thanks very much for reading!
Ginny

Red White and Blue

I have learned how to celebrate Fourth of July differently since my current two dogs joined my household.  I have never had dogs afraid of loud noises before but these two are and my heart just broke the first July 4th they spent at my house seven years ago.  They trembled, panted and barked for hours.  So today my sole job is to keep them happy and exercised in order that tonight they will sleep (with some help) through all the noise makers who live in my neighborhood as I watch Sherlock Holmes on my DVD turned up to full volume.  


I did buy some red white and blue food today however for my quiet celebration.

www.pinkberry.com

www.drozfans.com

  

www.bartlettsblueberryfarm.com

With some stars thrown in! 

natureisawesome.net

Thank you to all the men and women, past and present, who with their families keep this country and it's citizens safe and more importantly free.  


Happy Fourth of July!


Ginny

Wimbeldon 2012

longislandtennismagazine.com

In America we celebrate our country's birth next week.  Red, white and blue is prevalent throughout the neighborhood.  I am very grateful to have been born in this country.  

However there is something I am not grateful for this year and that is for the first time in over 30 years I am unable to watch Wimbeldon.  I am a huge tennis fan.  I have always watched the 4 major tournaments on TV and attend matches as I can.  To me it is better than a golf tournament.  

NBC lost out to ESPN in the bidding for the exclusive rights to Wimbeldon last year.  I remember hearing this and thinking surely there will be a way for me to watch via internet.  Nope or if there is I haven't figured it out yet.  

I gave up "basic cable" three years ago because my means didn't meet any longer.  I currently pay 90.00 for a land line, internet & 24 TV stations, 6 of those stations I never watch.  Giving up basic cable was difficult at the time.  I was heavily invested in dramas and dvr'd them to watch on the weekend.  Surprisingly I don't miss it.  The quiet was more of an adjustment.  The past few months I have gotten even better about rarely turning the TV on.  Case in point I had no idea Tropical Storm Debby was at my door.  Probably should watch the news at least ;)  

Yesterday morning while driving into work I hear that Rafael Nadal lost to Lukas Rosol in his second round match.  WHAT! How could that have happened?  This morning I wake up to find Roger Federer was two points away from the same fate though pulled it out in a "thrilling fightback".  Wonderful!  I would have loved to see it.

Part of what makes America great is free enterprise and ESPN, fair and square (I hope), beat NBC out.  Wimbeldon has the right to take the highest bidder.  

Shouldn't I, as a consumer, have the ability to choose the 24 channels I want to watch from the local cable provider for a service I PAY for?  

Just saying.....

Composing a Life

On my wish list for any town I live in is that there is a university or college nearby.  I am lucky enough to have two in Tampa, the University of South Florida (go Bulls!) and the University of Tampa.


It was through the University of South Florida that I heard Maya Angelou speak several years ago, an experience I won't forget.  


This last April I had the pleasure to hear Mary Catherine Bateson speak, also at the University of South Florida.  To be honest I had not heard of Ms. Bateson before my friend and yoga instructor asked if I would be interested in going to the lecture so I did some research. Ms. Bateson is the daughter of Margaret Mead and Gregory Bateson - that alone made me sit up and take notice.  What a fascinating life her early years must have been.  


Ms. Bateson is also an author of several books, two of which specifically called to me:  Composing a Life and Peripheral Visions.  I have mentioned before that I turned 50 this year and it seems a good time to pause and take stock of my life.    I have been asking myself the typical question: am I happy both in my personal and professional lives?  What could I change to make my life more fulfilling?  I have always said there is no such thing as a mid life crisis, to me a person has many crisis's throughout their life - it is a means to grow and learn.  In researching Ms. Bateson I found this quote on her webpage: "We are not what we know but what we are willing to learn."   Bingo!  I definitely wanted to hear this woman speak!


Ms. Bateson specifically was lecturing on inter-generational communication, aging and the life cycle.  The audience was diverse in age which is always a good sign.  My notes on the lecture are such: 
      
Active wisdom
Listen to the wisdom of others
Good observers
Process of communication must complete the loop
Participate and learn
Don't be spiritually deaf

I have these notes written on a piece of paper stuck on my wall at home.  I am curious what your thoughts are on them?  Where are you at in your life journey? 

As a final note in case anyone at USF reads this post - the parking for this lecture was terrible.  I ended up at a metered parking spot that cost .25 per 10 mins and the maximum time was 1 hour.  I constantly worried I was going to get a ticket.  

Crating - It's Important

It doesn't matter how fabulous a wood door manufacturer is if, during transit, one or more doors are damaged.  All the hard work from getting the door swings correct, reviewing the acknowledgement & having the doors ship on time go out the window with door damage.  Since wood doors are typically one of the last items to be installed on a job it can cause a real issue on a jobsite.  


We have a system here that as soon as a truck pulls up and the guys in the shop realize  wood doors are being delivered they come and get me.  It doesn't matter what I am doing I grab my iPhone (w/camera) and head outside.   We off load via forklift and I watch every single move.  After the forklift has picked up the door load and it has cleared the truck the crate is raised so I can see underneath. In this case the door manufacturer put two sheets of thick cardboard between the pallet and the finished door not hardboard and this is what often happens.

Material can be loaded and unloaded 4-5 times between the time it leaves the door manufacturer and arrives in my shop.  Speed not care is often the driving motion with freight companies.  As you can see the cardboard didn't stop a forklift tine from putting a nice big scrape in the door.  This damage was done at some point along the travel route.  The customer for this particular order paid extra for a 3 day quick ship so he wasn't happy when I called to inform him the door came in damaged.  Before I placed that call I had already talked to the door manufacturer and sent pictures.  A replacement door was in the works but, in my opinion, we failed the customer.


I had had several freight damage issues with this door manufacturer over the past several months and it was agreed upon that a note would be attached to my account so that every quote included an extra crating charge to prevent damage.   Because of this I had been documenting each delivery with photos and even a video of unwrapping a single crated door.   


I typically work with smaller manufacturers that provide great products and even better customer service.  At this point I was very frustrated that no hardboard was being used and expressed this to my inside sales rep. on several occasions.  I have a 2nd door manufacturer whose doors were not getting damaged in transit and was seriously considering my options.  This is what their crating looked like.

You can see the hardboard used on top and there was also a piece on the bottom.  The sides are fully crated - not cardboard corners and stretch wrap.  This is a good crate and what I expect from all my wood door manufacturers. 


I have to say my inside sales rep. came through for me.  She took all my emails, pictures and the video to management and kept the conversation going.  To their credit after much discussion within the company the president emailed me apologizing and thanking me for my input and documentation.  Their policies and crating have changed and so far (knocking on wood doors) I haven't received anymore damaged doors. 


As a lead lined wood door manufacturer we also ship out wood doors and my Production Manager gave me a tip: don't use nails to build a pallet use screws.  Because of the rise and fall of a trailer through the course of travel a pallet made with nails can come loose and separate.  That won't happen with screws.


Of course this is just my take if you have further suggestions please feel free to leave them in the comment section.


Thanks for reading!

Women's Health

This last week was National Women's Health Week and my first thought was why is it just a week?  My friend's Alexandra and Kymberly who's life mission is to get people healthy and have fun while you are doing it, hosted a Tweet Chat about Women's Health and while I watched and learned I really didn't participate. I was encouraged to write a blog post by May 19th but my thought was I don't take care of myself at all how could I write a post about health?

Then I started thinking about the recent weeks where, a dear friend and some family and friends of friends, have had serious health issues.   A 38 year old woman died of heart failure leaving behind an 11 year old son.  Another woman had a shunt inserted after suffering a heart attack at 37 years of age.  What the heck?

Last summer I had my own health scare and after 1 night in the hospital I thought never again.  I even took a picture of the bed and 1 slice of dry toast I was able to have for breakfast to remind me of this horrible experience.  I came home - and did nothing.  Why?

I really have been thinking about my health since the Tweet Chat and wondering why I don't take the time or energy to be healthy myself.  I don't drink soda or eat a lot of sweets but I also don't eat dinner or what one could call dinner (hello popcorn). I don't take the time to cook.  I hate exercise.  My BFF loves to exercise - I mean loves it.  I hate it.  I get bored.  Recently I was reintroduced to Ping Pong after not having played for 30 years.  I love it!  I wish I lived closer to my friend, who has the table and challenges me greatly on each shot, so we could play more often. Ok that is exercise and I like that.

I reached out to Alexandra this week because I tend to overwhelm myself with how much I need to do to get healthy.  She responded with small steps.  Small steps cover the same ground as a full outright run. Stand when I am on the phone at work instead of sitting.  That was the change this week - that is it.  I could do that. Oh and she suggested I be kind to myself too. Gulp - really? Why is that so hard?

Women tend to take care of everyone else first and put themselves last.  I tell my BFF all the time that she needs to take care of herself first so she then can take care of her family.  Hmm do as I say and not as I do comes to mind.  The last few years has brought stresses to my generation that we have not dealt with before.  These stresses weigh on us every second of every day and if we don't take care of ourselves then yes major medical issues will happen.  Women under 40 have heart attacks.

Besides eating healthy and exercise joy needs to be more prevalent in our lives. Simple joys that don't cost anything but time.  Last Monday, for many reasons, every fiber of my being said leave work and drive 2 1/2 hours to see my BFF.  For two hours I fought it but finally at 9:30 am I left the office and had lunch with my BFF.  I have never done anything like that in my life.  We had a wonderful afternoon and chatted about life.  At one point she looked at me and said remember that Winnie the Pooh quote "If you live to be 100, I hope I live to be 100 minus 1 day, so I never have to live without you"  well get with it!! Crap be kind to myself again.  That afternoon allowed me to face the rest of the week with a much better attitude.  I think it did the same for her.  It was a simple joy and we need to do it more often.  Hmm little steps.

This morning, for the first time in a long time, I got up and exercised.  Nothing all out heavy duty just got on my stepper for 13 minutes and then some yoga.  I watched commencement addresses on YouTube to get the day started off on a positive note.  And then I sat down and wrote this blog post.  I don't know where this will go but for today, these small steps, are enough.

A Requiem for Lets Blog Off

                                             

I am sadden to learn of the death of LetsBlogOff.  Born of Veronika Miller, Rufus Dogg, Rich Holschuh, and Paul Anater in June of 2010 to answer the question "what is design?"  With four parents it is no wonder the question inspired four different answers.  That, to me, is what has made LetsBlogOff so unique: a lively spirit full of varying thoughts willing to invoke discussion.   


I coo'd over all the LetsBlogOff participants for a few months but wasn't willing to personally join because the writing was so eloquent.  At least until November 2010 when the subject was too perfect. I had to high jack my BFF blog to write my very first blog post.   I am not a writer but that post was easy.  It was due to my own insecurities that it took another 5 months before the attraction became too much and my own blog was born just in order to participate in LetsBlogOff.    


The subjects have been varied.  From the serious Truth vs. Fact and Privacy Today to the funny Thumbtacks.  I believe that subject was picked on a dare :)  I have learned a lot too.  About writing.  About grace. About fun. About travel. About food.  About integrity.  Being fearless.  I also learned a lot about myself.  


I will never be a prolific writer but LetsBlogOff provided me a place to start.  I want to thank Paul, Rufus, Veronika and Rich for their inspiration, time, and generosity. I look forward to see what they conceive next!


Please take a moment and read my fellow participants posts: