17 December 2017

12 December 2017

Last night Jessica and I finally had a Family Home Evening that Jessica appreciated. We are still working on reading Alma 36 from the sister missionaries' commitment weeks ago. We spoke deeply about parts of the verses that we read just as I write deeply about verses that impress me. I would ask her questions following her responses, and her input would guide the discussion.

One thing that I forgot to write that happened on Sunday is that I home teach the Campbell family, and the mother has been giving Reed Chavez the run around. I met this family during the Christmas party. It seems that Reed was able to connect with the last family, and I was able to connect with this family. The son loves reading and other normal things like sleep, and the mother loves art. I look forward to asking her about her projects. The father was at the party, but he came late, and I was unable to get to know him well. We thought that Wednesday might be a good day, and I suggested 6:30 PM for a quick meeting, which was agreed upon.

Today I seem to have a full day of work, but I finished my report last week two hours early. It seems like it will be the new daily routine. I am thinking that I could help coordinate the countertop installation because it has been very inefficient, but they finished most everything. Brad told me to start tracking the countertop progress, but that did not require much work to figure out.

13 December 2017

Yesterday I said that I was going to look into the activity that I planned to do for the last two hours of the day, but our superintendent said that he was going to do it. I spoke to Brad about my idea to help the countertop crews. I started working on it, trying to figure out what is going on, asking the general contractor to copy me in all the countertop emails. I asked Steve Franckiewicz our superintendent what I can do, and he said to report delays to the general contractor. I asked around to learn of the issues in the stone installation. I spoke to the crews working on the counters, and they explained to me what is going on. I also spoke to the general foreman.

During lunch I got a text, saying that I can come witness what happened when the countertop crews are called. They were rushed for a meeting at 12. I got the message about 11:50 during lunch. I decided to run out to start my participation in the countertop meetings. I am writing the experience in my Columbia Stone Inc journal to report to the general contractor. I think that I saved the company some money because our crew was summoned, but they were not ready. They waited for more than thirty minutes.

14 December 2017

I have been able to jump in helping the countertop installation well. The general contractor's stone superintendent is hooking me up with contacts, and my crew is great.

My home teaching appointment fell through last night. The family was sick.

We did our Christmas shopping instead because the website Package Free was concluding their discount, saying unless you shop today, your gifts will not arrive on time. Package Free is a zero waste online store. We have been getting into eliminating our waste more. We have practiced a lot of the basics for a while, but slowly we are getting to do it universally.

15 December 2017

I think that running to the field may have trigger shin splints. I was walking early back to the office today, and my feet started hurting.

17 December 2017

I missed writing in my journal yesterday because I was resting and transcribing my grandfather's StoryWorth recordings. We watched Guardians of the Galaxy vol. 2 last night too. Jessica asked me concerning my thoughts of the movie, and I said that the message about family does not justify how messed up the story is. The themes are very deep into the Marvel universe.

On Friday I finally got the contact information for the assistant superintendents that I need to work with. I called one. I have been exploring the possibilities of coordinating the installation of the countertops, asking the general foreman, if I could have some stone delivered, when the situation is ideal. He ran with the idea, asking when it needs to be prepared. I called the assistant superintendent. At first it was confusing because a girl answered. I met the superintendent, and he is a guy. She turned out to be his secretary. We spoke, and Nick, the assistant superintendent, said that they will work on getting the floors ready on Monday. I proposed that we can start setting the counters on Wednesday. Afterwards I emailed two other assistant superintendent, my project manager warned me that general contractors will keep us to what we say that we can do, if we talk dates.

Another thing that we did is have the sister missionaries over for dinner on Friday. Jessica also had a movie night with the young women, so things were tight. I did waste my night watching YouTube videos while Jessica was at the movie night.

I was riding my bike home Friday evening, and I got a call from the sister missionaries. It is a good thing that I bought the Bluetooth headset. They said that they need a ride, since they share their car, or we need to reschedule the dinner appointment. We had an appointment at 5:30, and we picked them up at 5:30, purchasing a couple pizzas along the way. Our conversation over dinner was good. They didn't follow up on their previous commitment.

I finished listening to the audio book "When Panic Attacks" for the third time. Anxiety limits our life. Some people, who are shy, may think that there is a wonderful life reserved for the beautiful people, and they are different leagues of people that people cannot be associated with. I have felt this before; however, this is not true. Any person with a refined personality can associate with any class of people, if there are classes of people. Rich people can be poorer than people with low income. Beautiful successful people can have debilitating anxiety, fears, obsessions, and depression. No one is out of your league, if you want to associate with a type of people. A shy person would need to overcome their self-defeating beliefs and practice people skills; then, they can associate with any type of people that they desire.
At Apollo Mechanical, "lessons learned" emails are usually about injuries, but in my correspondence, working with the general contractors, I pointed out two common errors preparing the counters. I was surprised that my email was labeled a "lessons learned" email for the other assistant superintendents.