Sigma

News

2009-03-25T19:56:00.002-05:00

I should mention that I am actually in the Mechanical Engineering school now. It was a long and dreadful journey. The real nightmare was scheduling. A good moral for this story is: try hard your freshman year, especially if you plan on changing majors at any point in time.

So now I'm working harder than before, but it's ok. I just got back from Panama City Beach for Spring Break. I know that it's stereotypical, but I wanted to do that just once before I graduated. It was pretty crazy, but nothing TOO bad. I went with about 40 guys from my fraternity and we played a lot of sand volleyball and football and general games on the beach. It was also very relaxing and I got a lot of quiet downtime in.

But now I'm back at school and pretty stressed out already. Back to the grind!

first day

2008-08-25T16:05:00.001-05:00

first day of school. i feel pretty motivated this year. i have things set in place so that i do well. all of my classes are in the morning and the latest that i get done is 1:30, so that i have all afternoon to work.

it should be alright.

Home again, Home again, jiggity jig

2008-08-03T18:12:00.004-05:00

Not sure where the title came from. An old children's nursery rhyme, maybe?
I am in my final week of my internship. I'm staying with friends from church until Friday. Some of my other friends that I made here are throwing me a going away party on Friday, and then Saturday morning I will head home. I am definitely ready to go home. I miss my family and friends. I've enjoyed my stay here, and I spent entirely too much money on gas driving home entirely too often, but overall, it's been a fantastic summer. I've become pretty successful at budgeting and short-term financial planning. I've become more fiscally responsible, and have learned a fair amount about business. I can't say that I'd take this job again next summer or anything, but it's definitely been alright.

Home again, Home again, jiggity jig

2008-08-03T18:12:00.001-05:00

Library Posting

2008-07-17T17:10:00.002-05:00

In a last ditch effort of frugality, I canceled my cable to my apartment. It will only save me about $54.44, but hey. I heard that the Rockford Public Library had free wifi. With a stroke of very uncharacteristic luck, there's a branch .8 km from where I live. So now I just bike there whenever I need internet, like now, so that I can upload my pictures from Jackson Hole this last weekend. The internet here is unbelievably slow, so it's taking me awhile.

The trip was amazing! The rest of my family is still out there (they're there from last Friday until this Friday), where I could only be there from Friday night to Tuesday morning. It stinks, but I'm grateful that my boss let me take off any days at all. Plus, it was well worth the short amount of time that I got to spend there! We went whitewater rafting, hiking, and of course, sightseeing in Yellowstone and Grand Teton NP. I definitely want to go back someday.

If I have the patience to upload some pictures on this painfully slow connection, I will. Otherwise, you can see them on facebook (if you have one). There are some pictures of our rafting group here.

Well, some friends here are playing live at a coffee shop just outside of town. I better leave if I want to get there on time. Biking is fun, but sometimes slow in the city if you obey all traffic laws (i do.).

so soon?

2008-06-20T09:28:00.003-05:00

An unprecedented 2 posts in a month (I think)?! CRAZY!

I suppose that I should offer a little more insight into my job.
My job description says that I am a "Process Flow Analyst," though I may have made that up a little bit too. I am essentially a glorified detective. The president or production manager will assign me a production line to analyze, and then I look at the machinery, the people, and the flow of parts and such to figure out how to make it run more efficiently. Then I get cost estimates for what each project should cost and compare that with how much the company would save in variable costs (electricity, labor, downtime, etc.) Based on that, I can determine how beneficial it would be to invest in the idea.

So far, it's been pretty good. The machines are run painfully inefficiently, so I've found oppurtunities to save the company a total of over $550k with a total initial investment of $65k with no reoccuring costs. Not bad for my first time doing this stuff.

This weekend I have a wedding to go to. One of my high school classmates is getting married. People are getting married like crazy these days! Yikes! I guess that it means that I'm getting older, I suppose. Bummer.

Although, I haven't seen my family for well over a month. It will be nice to see them again. Apparently, they basically built a big deck on the back of our house in two or three days. I think that these are the dangers when you have three guys (that like to do things with their hands) get bored. There are pictures on Dad's facebook page here.

I have also rekindled my love for "How I Met Your Mother." I feel like the show has a very divided audience in that you either love it or hate it. As stupid and occasionally raunchy as it it (though never in action, only in words) it covers a lot of issues and makes for some good tv if you really get into it.

"It's gonna be LEGEN -- wait for it -- and I hope you're not lactose intolerant because the second half of that word is DAIRY!"
-Barney Stinson (Neil Patrick Harris)

Summer Lovin' or lack thereof

2008-06-16T12:56:00.004-05:00

So I accepted an internship with the Testor Corporation located in Rockford, IL this summer. For the most part, it's been great. The people are mostly friendly and easy to work with. The workload is tolerable, and the city isn't THAT bad, so it all works out.

I'm finding that sticking to a budget is annoying, at best. When I'm at school, I just don't spend money because I don't have it. When I'm working and living at home for the summer, I never have to worry about food, rent, electric, cable, etc. I realize that this probably seems childish to all of you older than me who have been doing this for quite some time (see also: everyone I know that blogs.), but I'm just finding out quantitatively HOW much it stinks, so cut me some slack.

That being said, I've been toying with Google Calendar trying to figure out how to make a public calendar viewable so that my parents can see where I'm going to be. I may just embed it in this if I have time.
[edit: I got it to work, but it's at the bottom of the page. Sorry.]

I just got back from a weekend in White Pidgeon, MI with a good friend I meet through Greek InterVarsity. His family owns a lakehouse and so we went tubing and hung out for the week. It was incredibly relaxing and fun. It makes me want to buy a lake house when I get older. At least I have something to hope for now, I suppose...

Last week, I found someone who's going to let me borrow their bicycle for the summer. I may try to buy it off of him at the end of the summer if he doesn't want it. I need to run to Wal-Mart and buy a bike pump tonight, so I'll let you know how that goes. It's an older road bike, but after playing with the deraileurs some, it shifts like a dream, so hopefully the tires hold air.

In the meantime though, I should probably get back to work. They don't pay me to sit here and blog. (Though I guess technically they are right now...)

p.s. - I'm not just exactly where the title of this post came from. I think it may be because I miss everyone from back home a lot, mainly my family and Tori (gf). I mean, I've made friends here, but it's not the same.

It All Starts Again

2008-01-25T16:56:00.000-05:00

Well, I forgot my password to this thing for awhile, so it's probably time to start using it more often.

School started roughly a month ago and I can't say that I missed it much. I did miss the comradery and the friendships, but being home has its perks. My big decision I have to make soon is whether or not I want to stay here over the summer and get some classes out of the way, or whether I should go home and try to get some money. Should I just apply for jobs and enroll in summer school? It would be easy to withdraw from summer school and take an internship, but I feel that it would be much more difficult to explain to a company that I would rather take classes instead of work for them. I guess maybe we'll cross that bridge when we get there, eh?

Sad Day...

2007-12-15T23:33:00.001-05:00

After going to Grandma's memorial service, it hits me how much it sucks that Grandma died. In a sense, I feel like I can't really say enough about her. But Bridget wrote a great bit about her here. It sums up a lot of things quite well. Also, Rachael gave a great speech(?) at the service which was very nice and touching.

Fearing slight re-iteration, it is slightly comforting that she's not in pain anymore. It's nice to remember her as the feisty, independent woman that she was.

All in all, I'm glad that I got to see all of the family, if only for a short while. I have such a great family, and it's too bad that we don't get to meet more often. Hopefully once I get out of college, I can take a month or so to just travel around and see everyone. Don't hold your breath on that whole getting out of college thing. Finals were brutal this semester: They were really hard classes, and I couldn't focus with Grandma dieing three hours before my first final. Ah well.

once more into the breach, dear friends

2007-08-12T10:08:00.000-05:00

back to school, back to school, to prove to daddy that I'm not a fool.

this is a big semester for me, and with all of the anxiety over wanting to do well, i really want it to get here. odd that i want it to hurry up and get here, and then in the middle of it i'll want it to slow down. se la vie, i suppose.

I once robbed the second largest bank in Paris with a ball point pen

2007-07-15T16:20:00.000-05:00

I think that if they had drive-in movie theaters in California, I would not be so tired right now. Am I allowed to blame the Governator for that?

Explanation: Lindy came over last night to go to aforementioned drive-in, and hilarity ensued. The two movies for the night were Ratatouille (sp?) and Transformers. Ratatouille was hillarious, cute, and had many quoteable lines, as a good movie should. Transformers was ok. Watching Transformers growing up, I knew that it would be hard to redo it, but it was a valient effort. There were a few things that bothered me about it, but I will refrain from posting in case you are planning to see it. Also, I don't like coming off as a pesimist.

All in all, a good night. The only real downside is that we didn't get home until almost 3, and it was about 3:30 before I finished everything that I needed to get done. Then, I had to be at church at 7 this morning to play bass on worship team. Overall lesson: 2.5 hours of sleep is not condusive to looking enthusiastic or proper brain function. (Admittingly, sometimes it is hard to look enthusiastic playing one string at a time.)

asphalt, cow-tagging, & surgery

2007-07-04T17:44:00.000-05:00

last friday, i was working on an ashpalt paver (why they would send someone from the engineering department to do this i have no idea.. oh wait, "intern") and got completely burnt wearing a cutoff tshirt and i couldn't even raise my arms above shoulder height until monday afternoon. melanoma, here i come. now, it's just peeling off like crazy, and it looks like i have leprosy or something. not seriously, but it does look a little gross. (overall grossness factor: 1)

saturday i went to the farm and watched lindy maul a cow. j/k, but seriously, she is the bovine mike tyson. more on that here.
as nearly as i can tell, she's still on the positive side of her farmer merits. i think that the worst part is having a cow take a dump on the (bump, bum, ?) bar and it splashed up onto my arm and face. (overall grossness factor: 4.75)

sunday, dad and i did surgery on a kitten. it had a worm in it's neck, and so we had to hold it down, cut out the entrance hole a little bit, and then cauterized (sp?) some tweasers and pulled it out. then we had to put some antibiotics on the hole, and top it off with some menthol stuff so that the kitten wouldn't lick it off. the worm was a little over a half inch, which doesn't sound big, except for the kitten is only seven or so inches long. (overall gross-ness factor: 3)

also, i may have found a way to fix the a/c in the car. that would mean that i could hear the tape player. (explanation: since i don't have a tape player in the car, i used a power inverter, and plugged into a little personal boombox. since the windows have to be down so that i don't have a heat stroke, i can't hear that poor little stereo over the wind noise.) There is no other way to listen to all of the Prairie Home Companion tapes that my dad taped for Grandpa Maddox in 1984. (another story for another day)

right now i just got back from decorating for a luau party that the college-age group at our church is throwing. it probably took a good 3.5 hours because we had so much stuff. it should look pretty good though.

more on that later, but i have to work on some games and things for it. happy independance day everyone!

a resurfacing

2007-06-17T22:50:00.000-05:00

i haven't updated in a while. i'm been busy with this and that, or lazy. whichever you would prefer that i be. i can wear many hats, or in this instance... two.

lindy came over today for lunch and to pick up a fridge. we had a nice chat about naming kittens etc. (cat pack all the way!)

and then when dad finally got back from ohio (odd that he would leave the state on father's day, non?) we did some stuff and then went raccoon hunting. it's not so much that we wanted to, but more of that they were destroying mom's flowers, ripping down the bird feeders, terrorizing the kittens, and just being mean in general. so i covered the bird feeder pole in crisco and mineral oil (crisco for the enduring slippery-ness, and mineral oil in case they try to lick the crisco off). and so i thought that our adventure was done there. oh no. dad decides that he's had enough and so we go exploring with a flashlight and shotgun (5 rounds pheasant). essentially, i am now a glorified hunting dog, whilst dad has all of the fun. i let him, on account of it's father's day. (smooth, eh?) long story short, he shoots one the first time that we go out, and two the second time.

but (and lindy would appreciate this), right after he shoots the first one, he has an "action movie" moment, much like something that would come out of the mouth of your precious Governator. we were staking out this riverbank where they clean their food before they eat, and close to their presumed home. so i find, call it out, and shine the light on it. if takes a few steps into the river, and dad shoots it. a few of the pellets hit some of the rock around, and caused a dust cloud. so when the dusts settles, he's laying in the river twitching. dad waits until he's done, cocks the gun, and says "tonight, he sleeps with the fishes." in some sort of strange half-french, half over-dramatic accent. it was hillarious.

hopefully, i will be better about posting to this, unless it's blocked at work like every other site. (see also: facebook, myspace, youtube, etc.)

-------------
i forgot, after watching a few episodes of mash (i got for brian on his bday) i realized that i wanted to make a still. not for gin mind you (which is illegal, i guess?) but for ethanol. if i can scrounge around for parts and build one for pretty cheap, it may be worth is. (corn $ < gas $) at least for now.

fotos de mexico

2007-03-23T20:12:00.000-05:00

self-explanatory...?

these are various pictures of the hotel, with one of a Phi Psi sign in "El Squid Roe."

and a few random pictures..

bands are detrimental to productivity

2007-02-10T19:47:00.000-05:00

we had a band party last night, and i was supposed to get up and go to the library today to get lots of stuff accomplished. instead, i slept from 5 - 11:30, and did homework, and haven't really studied much. and my two exams are on monday and tuesday.

so i should probably get on that. later.

p.s. - the band was amazing, and that homework was hard. i'm not a complete retard. ;)

titles are for wussies

2007-01-09T16:06:00.000-05:00

cmas break was good.
coming back to school was frustrating.
buying books was painful.

doing homework still sucks.

hey, at least i update more than my mom...

moving into a library

2006-11-29T12:59:00.000-05:00

so now is about the time of the semester where i move into potter. normally i come here every so often to get some work done, but now it's crunch time, so i'm here a lot. if you've ever seen the terminal with tom hanks - it's the same deal.

current annoyance - sorority girls who wear uggs with skirts. what look are they going for here? a collegiate eskimo?

andy's life as a cycloid

2006-11-14T14:54:00.000-05:00

a cycloid is a parametric equation that defines a certain curve. it basically says that if you were to put a mass at any point on the curve, it would take the same time to reach the end point, no matter what.

i feel like my life is like that right now. it seems that, even though being set back a year in engineering, i will eventually reach my goal. (yay!) that's the good part.

the bad part of this is that one of a cycloid's practical applications is in pendulums. in this case, it feels like no matter how much effort i put into something, i accomplish almost the same thing. i can basically not sleep, and still get all of my things done, while remembering x amount of material. if i sleep more like a normal person (see 7 - 8 hours) then i get the same amount of work done, and remember about x amount of material. the only difference being that the days that i get more sleep i am generally more productive per hour (more focused, get more accomplished, etc.)

so theorectically, i should just sleep a lot and then wake up only for class, hw and studying. if only it were so easy....

a legend lives on

2006-11-06T00:11:00.000-05:00

it's been a crazy week or so, and i thought that i would share.

thursday i had the amazing opportunity to go to the Engineering Advisory Council with Aunt Emily. that was so much fun, and i got to meet almost all of the deans from all of the different disciplines of engineering. that was pretty fun. i think that aunt emily said that she had taken Rachel and Bridget, so maybe you know what i'm talking about. after the dinner, i went back to grandma's and got to see aunt susan. that was good. i haven't seen her in a long time. she had some home videos of laura and kevin and i from their house in zionsville that were really funny!

friday morning i fixed (somewhat) the hydraulic clutch on the jeep. well, at least enough to run some errands and get it home, to be switched with another car until the jeep gets fixed. i also ate dinner with the all of the Aunts (a rare occasion, to say the least!) and had an amazing meal prepared by aunt susan. then i went to the GreekIV HML meeting for a few hours and talked about greek houses, the differences, the similarities, and what we could do about it.

saturday, i got up at 7:30 to go register for a 5k, only to realize that my throat feels like i swallowed a ball of razor blades. so, no running in sub-freezing weather today... so i go home to have lunch with my dad. kind of a stupid idea really, driving home for a few hours, but whatever. i traded cars so that he could take it to the local jeep dealership to get looked at. (we tried to bleed the line, but it was rusted shut. so i said forget it, and we fixed the rv instead.)

today, i woke up again at 7:30 (and i thought that weekends were for sleeping.) to go to IGLC. (Indiana Greek Leadership Conference) that was incredibly informative. we had a few main sessions, as well as some smaller, specific sessions. one of the most appalling things was that we had a formal lunch, and i was surprised how little etiquette some people knew. i mean, for the most part the the sororities did really well, but some of the guys from the other fraternities i sat with didn't know anything! the used their salad fork to spear a roll from across the table, then put it on their saucer, and put a big pat of butter on it, and devoured it all at once. absolutely insane... (world + handbasket = college kids trying to eat.)

BUT, it get's better: tonight, my roomate and i had the amazing opportunity to go see B.B. King live in Elliot Hall.
i mean, the guy is 81 years old. who knows how much longer he'll be around? i'm not trying to be cynical here, just realistic.
anyways, my roomate used my smartphone to attempt to keep a set list of b.b. king's songs. trey or someone might actually care about this, maybe? now, it's not like he announced every song, so some of these are our best guesses as to what the songs may be, but they should be close.

Opening Act - Ronny Brooks

First song neither Andy nor Fiene recognizes. Oops.
It takes a smart man to play dumb.
Take me with you.
I feel good. (to ZZ Top-esque rhythm.)
- (story about Johnny Lee Hooker.) -

Main Act - B.B. King

I need you so.
Back in the love.
I'm a blues man, but a good man.
I did what I did before love came to town. (cowritten by Bono)
Better off dead.
- Black Water melody -
Ain't that just like a woman.
You are my sunshine.
Darling you know I love you.
Rock me baby.
How blue can you get? (I don’t know about this one – Toran had my phone.)
Highway blues.
The thrill is gone.
Someone cares.

one of the things that most amazed me about b.b. is that as old as he is, and as long as he's played, he hasn't lost it all. sure, he can't really stand up and play anymore. he has lost a little speed in his minor pentatonic, but that's to be expected. what i didn't expect was how amazing he still is. his voice is absolutely fantastic, his touch is unparalleled, and his foot was never once, in the 1.5+ hours he played, out of time. i guess that that's why he's the king (not elvis.)

(sorry for the novel. =D )

Hey There Delilah

2006-10-10T21:34:00.000-05:00

why is it that whenever i know that i had a lot of work to do, my brain just shuts down. it's like overloading a circuit. once it becomes too much, it just stops trying. =(
it doesn't help that i have the concentration of a two year old ADHD monkey on speed.

on the plus side, we had to switch phone carriers (that's not the good part) but now we have verizon, like most of my mom's side of the family (see also: the only people who read this) AND we all got sweet new phones. SO, now most of you can call us for free (except for overseas people, you still get to use skype)

anyways, my new number is 765.480.0268, and i'll try to update the contact list and distribute it.

but for now, back to a bold attempt and what i like to call studying.

wa

2006-08-26T21:01:00.000-05:00

i'm only taking four classes - how do i have so much homework?!?!

seriously folks, physics is gonna be real tough. i have a super-nerdy prof, and he speaks in generalities, as well as telling us that we will only need three equations for the class. is he serious? that's impossible!

on a positive note, this is making calc seem much easier.

woo hoo

2006-08-24T13:50:00.000-05:00

classes are tough. they changed phys152 to phys172, and now lab meets every week, and you have to program your labs in, etc. not fun.
also, we have to read a chapter a day for com114.
also, i need to brush up my trig for ma162.

dang you purdue for overhauling your program...

so i = busy.

hands up

2006-08-09T06:19:00.000-05:00

by a show of hands, anyone sick of hearing about gas prices?
(for those of you overseas, gas is about $3.149) thank you OPAC / U.S. Government / Refineries / who knows? for raising American's blood pressure more than it is already.
thank goodness i'm leaving for purdue soon, and don't have to deal with this crap for awhile. (however, i do get a car this year!) that's much appreciated!

but, in absense of any real news, here are pictures of the kittens. they still can't eat food yet, but they at least have their eyes open, and are fun to play with.

too many projects!!!

2006-07-24T20:34:00.001-05:00

i'm in over my head.

besides having an antique hoosier cabinet half-finished in the garage, my motorcycle in pieces, not having my motorcycle license yet, needing to move furniture, needing to get ready for purdue, wanting to study stuff ahead of time, and trying to say goodbye to everyone before i leave again, i've been a bit swamped. now, on top of it all, i'm sick. =(

ah well, such is life, i suppose.

on the plus side, i did get to hang out with one of my best friends this last week. she was back from germany (she lives in Frankfurt) to visit for a bit. that was good. i didn't get to talk to her as much as i would've liked, but that seems to be the theme of this post, non?

well, because i am sick, i should probably try to get more than seven hours of sleep, and so, i shall bid you adieu.

june cats bring july kittens

2006-07-06T23:39:00.000-05:00

long story short this cat showed up on our doorstep. because the rest of my family exhibits no resistance to stray animals, we are now stuck with a cat, whom we have affectionatly named "Phantom." he is gray and white, with a white face except for a gray patch that covers the right side of his face in a slant pattern. this mimics that of a certain character in a certain andrew lloyd webber musical, and thus prompted the name.

and so it turns out that the cat is a pregger. oh boy. ever since i saw that cat i've thought "man, i love how whiny that cat is. i wish that i had more like it." i'm sure that God is trying to teach me something here, but i just don't see it... yet.

anywho, on a slightly happier note, it was recently the fourth of july, marking the 230th or so anniversary of our great country. pretty cool to think about all that has been accomplished in such a "short" time. but if nothing else, you get fireworks. apologies for the slightly blurred pictures - i saw a friend there and casually insulted her, and she punched me in the eye. truth be told, i should've expected it, but she's such a wimp, i didn't really think she would do it.

AND, i'm in the middle of a big, secret project that i will update about as soon as i get it done.

carb teardown

2006-06-22T21:38:00.000-05:00

because of the last post, i decided to tear into the bike to discover what is wrong with it. my first choice was the carburetors. i've ripped into those things in an attempt to discover the source of my poor gas mileage, so far to no avail. also, i learned that my bowl seals expanded, and so now i have a pretty slim chance of getting them back in. =(
at least i worked overtime all this week so that i could get tomorrow off. yeehah.

an eventful saturday

2006-06-17T21:12:00.000-05:00

so i went to get my motorcycle license today, but the computers were down, so i told them that if i got pulled over i was blaming them and left.
then, i went over to grissom afb to watch one of my pledge brothers race. i got to ride shotgun too! it was intense.
then i went to lafayette to do some landscaping at phi psi. that was pretty cool. we priced flooring and stuff at home improvement-esque stores. then i visited with gma. that was cool. she's getting along alright. she's having some difficulties with her leg i think, but she's managing really well, all things considered.

now comes the cool part. if you're wondering if my motorcycle can make it to west lafayette and back on one tank of gas, rest assured that it can't. it has roughly a 4 gallon tank, and it can go 123.4 miles. as luck would have it, i ran out of gas right by this sign:

ironic, no?
and as much as i love pushing my bike around in 90+ degree weather and fabled indiana humidity, i need to look into getting some sort of half gallon storage tank to carry around on these "long" journies.
well, you learn new stuff everyday, i guess.

fence = done.

2006-05-28T18:32:00.000-05:00

as you may or may not know, we used to have railroad tracks that went right behind our house. due to the downfall of the railroad due to ... it sucking, there are no longer railroad tracks behind our house. instead, they (they being the anonymous higher-ups) have opted to do this "trails-to-rails" thing. basically, they come and uproot all of your railroad ties, level the railroad tracks, and pave it over to make a recreational trail. it is probably the sweetest thing that i have ever seen. except for one thing - they didn't take the railroad ties with them. inconvinient? not in the least. dad thought that we should build a hand lapped split rail fence with them to keep people on the trail and away from our house. (some 40 feet away)
needless to say, this involved kevin and i working, dad supervising, brian making koolaid and doing the supportive work (moving things to make way for the fence.), and sam whining about working and then eventually coming out and contributing his *ahem* revered services.

after roughly one day of work, we constructed this:

from a pile similar to this (but obviously bigger):

i have some more pictures from back there by the river and such, so if you want some, you can have them, though i don't profess to be a photographer.

but, i need to take a shower, on account of i have cresote and tar and wood all over me.

blog switch

2006-05-14T19:22:00.000-05:00

I thought it best to get a new blog, as the old one was reminiscient of high school, and i would much rather leave that alone. i really don't have anything to report, other than we went to gma's today for mother's day and she seemed to be doing alright. although, she was extremely loopy, and so aunt lisa and mom thought it best to hide some of her pain killers for the time being. (she was taking enough to tranquilize a horse.) and it's always nice to talk with that side of the family, because they always have neat things going on, and it's interesting to hear what happens.
well, more later i suppose.