22 March 2012

The Fundamental Things Apply/As Time Goes By

Last Friday late afternoon and evening (16 March), my parents and I were in front of the TV watching NCAA men's basketball tournament games of particular interest to us. Missouri (Dad's alma mater) was upset by Norfolk State in the second round, but Saint Louis University (my alma mater) upset Memphis in the same round. I was over the moon with that one. Two days later, the Billikens were eliminated by Michigan State after a valiant effort, but SLU had a great run this season.

I drove to the Scott Gallagher Complex in Maryland Heights early Saturday afternoon for some games, but the weather prevented the matches from happening. Lightning touched down not far from our location, plus a major storm front was headed our way. Since USSF guidelines say for us to wait 30 minutes after the last lightning touchdown in the field's vicinity before starting or restarting play, and with the storm front passing through, the games were called off for my crew and the teams. The next afternoon (18 March), we had nicer weather for the two games we did at Scott Gallagher.

Monday afternoon, I finished up a short proofread job for the marketing communications committee of GO! Network; namely, a two-page brochure insert on Go's new veterans outreach program. I emailed the proofread copy back to the committee head late that afternoon, and seeing her the next morning at the GO! Network workshop, the committee members greatly appreciated my help on that bit. The workshop this week had speed networking, as attendees were placed up to eight at a table and given 60 seconds to state our case (the "elevator speech" approach) and exchange business cards. Then, after everyone at our table had his or her say, we were sent to other tables to interact with a new group. There were five such cycles, so we had quite a few people to give our presentations to and perhaps find someone who can be of particular help in our respective job searches.

That night, I got the fellowship hall at Calvary ready for hosting the IPMS/Gateway meeting. I have a demo on adding cockpit and landing gear areas to aircraft models lacking these details, using bits of sheet plastic. It was a nice meeting and I stayed afterward to clean up the hall and stack tables and chairs.

Last night, I was at the Great Escape Gravois Bluffs Cinema in Fenton to watch a special, one-night-only, 70th anniversary screening of "Casablanca." It's one of my all-time favorite movies, and a favorite of quite a few people. I ordered my ticket online that afternoon and it was a good thing, as they had a sell out crowd for the screening. I really enjoyed seeing the movie on a large movie screen in a dark theater with others. You can't beat that experience.

Later.