Big Changes in Store

Well, it has happened. I have finally found someone I am willing to take a gamble on. I am putting all my money on red and going 100% in. I am selling my house and moving to Seattle to live with Dan.

My head is currently spinning, and my emotions are on overload to the point of shutting down. I'm happy, scared, excited, nervous all at once.

There will be more to follow, but for now I've processed all I can for one day.

New Blog Favorite - the Cupcake Project

Check out my friend Stef's new blog - the Cupcake Project. She volunteered to make cupcakes for our friends wedding. This blog is a log of her successes and failures as the big day approaches.

http://www.cupcakeproject.blogspot.com/

Happy Anniversary

This week was my Aunt Marilyn and Uncle Johnny's 50th wedding anniversary! Quite the accomplishment! Their kids threw a small party for them to celebrate. Johnny doesn't do crowds...actually Johnny doesn't do people, so the party was very small. Just their kids, the grandkids and their spouses, and the great-grandkids. I'm the long-lost daughter, so I was invited as well. :)

Saturday Marilyn and I did a bit of shopping before the party, and went to Kaldi Coffee for lunch. Sunday we went to a new winery OOVDH (oof-dah) - it's Springfield's first and not too bad. I bought some blueberry and concord grape wine. He also had the coolest garden I have ever seen - I can't describe it very well, but I'll try. He planted two long sheets of metal about 3 feet apart and filled in between them with dirt. The garden was planted there. Everything was waist high - no bending to weed or pick. It also doubled as a fence for his yard. It was very cool.

We had a wonderful time, and it was great to spend time with my cousins again.

This Is What I Do

The hardest part of my job is trying to explain what I do. I work in a manufacturing firm that manufactures something no one has heard of - or even thought about. What are conveyor and palletizer systems?

Here is a picture of our final assembly area. There are no machines showing, but you can see what our machines do. Conveyors move things from one end of a warehouse to another. Palletizers stack the products on pallets - as shown in the picture.

It actually requires a fair amount of computer electronics and programming to make sure everything stacks correctly. You want as much as possible on every pallet, but not too much so it tips over or crushes the lower boxes. Some of the palletizers also add the shrink wrap to hold everything in place. Depalletizers (which we also make) obviously do the opposite - they take the pallet stacks apart and put the product on conveyors. Palletizers and depalletizers use suction or robots or both to accomplish this. (The robots are pretty cool.)

So now you know - this is what I do. If you are interested in more, our website is www.fkilogistex.com The portal into my little world is the second tab - manufacturing systems. It has some pretty good pictures of the machines and the robot assemblies.

Yardwork

I have spent

much of the past few days working on my yard. I got a truckload of mulch, about 800 bricks, and enough flowers to plant three hanging baskets. The bricks will be used to create a tree ring and a sidewalk. My patio is brick and I'd like to have a sidewalk running from it to the driveway. Since the bricks were free (gotta love Craigslist) I decided this was a good time.

I love my backyard. Especially when the honeysuckle and peony's are in full bloom - it smells wonderful.

I'm a Genius

It finally happened - my work recognized me for the genius I am. :) We have a semi-monthly ezine called Future Flow. It's a way of communicating to the employees around the US what's going on in the company. To encourage us to read it, at the end is a quiz about some random subject. If you answer the questions correctly your name goes in for a prize drawing.

In March, it was called the Genius edition. I (with the help of Dan, Aunt Jean and Grandma) answered the questions correctly, and won! I got a $35 gift certificate to Amazon.com as my prize. Then last week, I got a box addressed to me, and inside was this lovely trophy. It's official - I now have an award that clearly states I am a genius.

You can't imagine the ribbing I took.

US Secretary of the Treasury - Henry Paulson

We had a bit of excitement here at work today. The US Secretary of Treasure, Henry Paulson, came to visit. He toured two St. Louis facilities to promote foreign investment in US companies.

It was an interesting experience. I've never met a cabinet member before. The company chose 50 employees to stand on stage with him. I put my name in, but wasn't chosen. It's ok though, because I think we had better seats on the floor.

Here's an article about the visit...

http://www.usatoday.com/money/economy/2007-05-10-foreign-invest-usat_N.htm