We're in KS...
The National Park part of our trip is officially over. Now we are in KS for a family reunion for a few days before heading to OK to see my family. While much of KS is flat and boring the Flint Hills are beautiful.
Friday, July 27, 2007
Wednesday, July 25, 2007
You know you're from SoCal when...
- You have such a moderate temperature comfort-zone that anything cooler than 60 or hotter than 85 and everyone complains about the "miserable weather!"
- Your children who have largely grown-up in SoCal are terrified of "evil-blood-sucking-bugs"...things like mosquitos scare the pedudy (pe-doo'-dee) out of one of our children in particular.
- You are essentially urbanized to such an extent that things like natural stream-water are perceived as disgusting and unnatural (as compared to say, Dasani).
Labels: Vacation
Day Five - Rocky Mountain National Park
I think this was our favorite day so far. We drove up to RMNP and spent the day hiking, playing in the meadows, and driving across the tundra. It was truly amazing.
The highlight was spending a few hours splashing and dam building in the Colorado River. We've been following the Colorado River since near Las Vegas a few days ago. It flows through or beside Zion, Bryce, and Arches NP. We'll see it again in a couple of weeks at the Grand Canyon and, of course, it is the border between CA and AZ.
What a perfect day.
Monday, July 23, 2007
Highlights from Day Three
We were in Moab, UT today. It was stinkin' HOT! We drove through Arches National Park to take in some amazing scenery. One of the highlights was the drive out of the park and towards CO. We took a local highway that ran along the Colorado River for about 30 miles. It was amazing. We drove through another thunderstorm in Western CO. We finally checked into the Winter Park Resort at about midnight. It seems like a nice place.
Saturday, July 21, 2007
Highlights from Day Two
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| From 2007-Q3-Zion ... |
We started the morning with a drive to Zion from St. George. Along the way we saw this terrific old ghost town playland (photos at http://www.flickr.com/photos/m5williams/865604776/). Then on to Zion. We rode the Zion Shuttle for about two hours taking in all the beautiful scenery. The kids took hundreds of photos of the Canyon (check the flickr site, or my Picasaweb site for them).
Zion was so beautiful! It's like the Grand Canyon on a small scale with easier access. Bryce was AMAZING! The Hoodoo were so incredible. Unfortunately, we only spent about one hour there because it was raining. Also, the temperature lowered dramatically! It was 114 degrees in St. George, UT and 58 at Bryce Canyon (about 2.5 hours away).
One of the highlights for everyone was the rain. We haven't seen a real rainstorm in a couple of years (we've had about three inches of rain in LA in the past 13 months).
After Bryce it was a long drive to Moab. We slept in today and are en route Arches National Park and to Winter Park, CO tonight then on to Rocky Mountain National Park tomorrow.
Friday, July 20, 2007
Highlights of Day One
Lots of memories today. We crossed through four states (CA, NV, AZ, UT) and are in St. George, Utah at the Holiday Inn tonight. We spent a few hours in Vegas and walked through the Venetian and Ceasar's Palace and drove down the strip to see NY, NY, the Luxor, and Excalibur. Lots of fun for all of us. I think the highlights would be...
- Matthew - 2.5 hours of DS without interruption
- Madison - swimming at the hotel pool
- Marcus - The living statue at Ceasar's Palace
- Michelle - Dinner at Cracker Barrel (they don't exist in LA)
- Me - Nothing going wrong all day!
From now on, I'll just post up-to-the-minute photos at Flickr (http://www.flickr.com/photos/m5williams/) rather than here. You can see best shots there throughout the day or here at night if I have time.
Labels: Vacation
The second thing we did on our vacation was head to Target to get last-minute stuff. Unfortunately, we were rear-ended! Here's a photo of our rental car (that we had for only an hour!). The other driver didn't see us, nor did she hear us honking to get her attention.
Labels: Vacation
Thursday, July 19, 2007
Wednesday, July 18, 2007
Monday, July 16, 2007
Why War is Hell...
I can think of nothing worse than war. I suppose there is theoretically such a thing as a "just" war, however, even they are "hell" to experience.
Two of the worst aspects of war are 1) the senseless killing of civilians and 2) the institutionalized hatred of different races/ethnicities that war creates.
Both of these challenges were brought home by a weekend editorial in the LA Times...Iraq, the vets' view . In case you don't have time to read this article I will summarize it. The author interviews vets who served in Iraq from 2004-2006. One of the basic themes that repeats throughout his interviews is how fear of IEDs, suicide bombers and such leads many US military personnel to distrust and overreact towards Iraqi civilians. This creates an environment where US soldiers and marines pre-emptively kill civilians of all ages out of fear that they may be a suicide bomber. The article repeats numerous narratives of entire families gunned down by nervous young soldiers out of fear (or hatred). Those who support the war may argue that the author selects stories that reinforce his own beliefs. That may be true, yet the following study from the Pentagon is also telling.
The antipathy toward Iraqis was confirmed in a survey released in May by the Pentagon. Just 47% of soldiers and 38% of Marines agreed that civilians should be treated with dignity and respect. Only 55% of soldiers and 40% of Marines said they would report a unit member who had killed or injured "an innocent noncombatant." (emphasis mine)
That does not sound like a recipe for building allies and destroying "evil" in a sovereign nation.
Today's LAT reports a different, yet related problem...the gradual loss of experienced mid-level officers in the Army. Given the recruiting problems the Army is having, and the multiple tours-of-duty (some soldiers and reservists have been sent more than four times since the war began!) being assigned to our troops, as well retirements being denied or postponed and the general impact on ones life of being called up, one can hardly blame these officers from leaving the military at their first opportunity. However, their departure may have grave consequences for our efforts because it leaves a higher ratio of young, scared, inexpensive, and potentially trigger-happy soldiers and marines without the stabilizing effect of mid-level officers.
Despite some of my colleagues' views, I believe it is time to exit Iraq and put a permanent conclusion to the "Bush Doctrine" of pre-emptive war.
Friday, July 13, 2007
Back on course...
After about a six-year hiatus from golf I finally got back out this week. Several colleagues invited me to join them for a round on Thursday. I played pretty well considering it's been 72-months since my last round. I shot a 96 at Los Robles and most of my big mistakes were on the green. I definitely left 15 putts on the green. It was a great day and it reminded me of how much I enjoy this simple game.
iD Tech Camp is done...
Matt finished iD Tech Camp today. He had a terrific week learning to use Multimedia Fusion 2. He had a terrific time, met some new friends, and learned a thing or two about thinking programmatically. Fusion is a fairly robust IDE so he didn't learn any "old school" programming. However, I'm not sure how much code modern programmers are writing. At first I thought "what a rip! I should have just bought the software and saved $500 from the price of the camp. But overall the experience was terrific for him. I highly recommend it for kids with a technical bent. It wasn't much more than a sports camp would have been and Matt enjoyed it much more than he would have enjoyed playing soccer or basketball all week.
Tuesday, July 10, 2007
Monday, July 09, 2007
Profit and Healthcare
Michael Moore's newest movie, Sicko, opened recently to good reviews. I've not seen it (yet), but am interested in his take on the state of healthcare in the US. The realities of the insurance/healthcare industry came home to me last week in a personal way.
I had a minor 1-day surgery at a local hospital here in LA. It wasn't technically "out-patient", but I was out of the hospital within 12-hours from the time I first reported in. (The surgery went very well BTW).
A few weeks later I received a statement from the hospital with a bill for $39,000. That bill was separate from those provided by the surgeon and anesthesiologist (each over $5,000). I was amazed that 12-hours of care at a hospital could possibly cost that much.
The next week I received my "Explanation of Benefit" and the insurance company apparently has a contractual rate of app. $4,000 for the 12-hour stay in the hospital. That is 1/10 of the cost they billed me. Since the insurance company pays for a theoretical 90% of the cost, my co-pay was $400. That is 1% of the bill the hospital originally sent me (and what I assume would have been the total due if I did not have private insurance). Amazing.
Given this recent experience my curiosity was piqued by a story in Sunday's LA Times. This story reports a local physician who bought a hospital and discovered that the contractual rates allowed by the insurers were insufficient to cover his costs. So he canceled all standing insurance contracts and modified his business model to take a larger portion of the healthcare expense (rather than it all going to the insurance companies).
At first the article gives the impression that "this greedy physician is charging more than other local hospitals!". It even describes the value of his two local homes, and the expensive decor within them. However, by the end of the article, I came to the conclusion that the physician was merely turning the tables on the insurance companies. I suspect that the CEO of Blue Cross or WellPoint is worth much more than this physician. And somehow I think most of us are OK with that.
So a simple question...is it any more or less ethical for a practicing physician (who also happens to be the owner and CEO of seven local hospitals) to build a personal net-worth of over $300 million (as stated in the article) than it is for the CEO of a large insurance company?
Hospital group rejects system and cashes in - Los Angeles Times
Friday, July 06, 2007
Why Toyota is the world's best car maker
Recently our 2001 Toyota "Certified Used" Sienna started smoking at start up. I didn't think much of it at first, but it was very persistent. After a couple of weeks I decided to take it in to have it checked out. At first they said it simply had a leak and the valve seals needed to be replaced.
A day or two later they called back and said we had oil sludge buildup inside the engine which is indicative of insufficient maintenance. They initially said it would cost $1200 to look into it, and possibly as much as $5000-$8000 to repair or replace the engine. Needless to say, we paniced. We still owe a ton on the van, so we couldn't believe we had a $5000 repair bill staring at us!
As we were worrying ourselves sick about what to do (fix it, trade-it-in, do nothing and hope for the best...) my beatiful bride did a little research and discovered a class-action lawsuit against Toyota for an engine design issue that infuriated many customers.
While there is some debate about the cause of the problem (and Toyota has not admitted to a bad design), Toyota has agreed to repair or replace thousands of engines that have oil sludge.
Now, we did have to deal with a bit of a run-around from Thousand Oaks Toyota but in the end, they agreed to repair/replace the engine to remedy the oil sludge problem.
We still may sell the van within a few weeks of the repair, but at least we won't have a big bill to get the engine ready to sell.
This is a classic example of how good customer service can lead to life-long customers...or furiously irritated consumers who tell everyone they know not to buy your product. For example, one of our neighbors recently had the same problem with their 1999 Camry. While the dealership ultimately fixed the engine the family had to argue for days with them. In talking with them today they said basically, "we sold the Camry within a few months of the repair (and bought a Honda Pilot) and will sell our Sienna in a few months (and will buy an Odyssey) and will never buy a Toyota again.
On the other hand, with the customer service and support I've received I am likely to be a Toyota customer for life. My next car...a hybrid Camry.
Labels: Cars, Customer Service, News
Monday, July 02, 2007
Attention all Amazon Shoppers
I found this wonderful resource in a mediocre book I read last week. The book was not great, but this website www.refundplease.com is great. It scours the Amazon database and when a price changes on an item you've bought it send you and email alerting you. You can then apply to Amazon for a refund and they will refund you the difference. Not bad!
Temptation: Conception, Gestation and Birth
In Bible class yesterday we had a wonderful discussion about temptation (thank you Jen!). It was one of those classes where the leader introduced a few ideas, then asked us to discuss in small groups a variety of scriptures. These types of classes can go either way...but this one was excellent. The key text was from James 1:...
13When tempted, no one should say, "God is tempting me." For God cannot be tempted by evil, nor does he tempt anyone; 14but each one is tempted when, by his own evil desire, he is dragged away and enticed. 15Then, after desire has conceived, it gives birth to sin; and sin, when it is full-grown, gives birth to death.
We discussed this verse and many others that deal with the source, outcome, and process of temptation. It was especially rich to me because I've thought about this a bit lately. A friend and I recently faced down a temptation and it has been on my mind since the event. This process of "my own desire" leading to being "dragged away and enticed", then giving "birth to sin" and ultimate death was easily apparent in my memory of the event. Often it is my own natural and acceptable "desires" that are the seedbed of temptation. In fact, one of the passages we discussed seems to say this same thing...
7 Woe to the world because of the things that cause people to sin! Such things must come, but woe to the man through whom they come! Matthew 18
In essence, the seedbed for sin is within our natural desires. Whether it is a desire for affirmation that leads to pride, for hunger that leads to gluttony, for justice that leads to anger, or for love that leads to lust or... you fill in the desire here. I know this isn't a new or insightful idea. We've all thought about it a dozen times in our lives. But I was touched by the simple revelation that desire preceeds conception. Then, once conception has occured, it is a long process from there to birth. May God give each of us grace to this week to deal with our desires at the pre-conception stage rather than allowing them to conceive and go through a long gestation period leading to sin.
