Choice Mindsets

06 Feb Lucky 13

“Tony, your meeting was so long that when it began I only had 12 grandkids, and when it ended I had 13!”
– Nick Sanders

Congratulations to 13-time Grandpa Nick Sanders. And to 13-hour meeting producer Tony.

Ok, it wasn’t that long. But if Nick can add a whole new person to his family during a company meeting, we can surely hope for a few things to miraculously appear at the meeting’s conclusion. For instance: a third restroom. Because, let’s face it, after that company-wide meeting ends (and as a consequence of lots of coffee and Mt. Dew), getting 33 people through two bathrooms is a traumatic event, to say the least. Or maybe we could add another Brian, Michael or Jeff. We keep trying to find decent ones, but clearly, after acquiring three of each, we haven’t succeeded*.

While another restroom and a shiny, brand new Jeff may not be in the immediate future, we all did enjoy a photo of Nick’s new granddaughter Alice after that long January company meeting. If nothing else, we can rely on the upcoming February company meeting to supply another Choice Mindset.

23 Jan Craig No. 2

“Tony, didn’t I ride my bike to the Loveland office before you did? Slacker.”
– Craig Eley

    

Two points of recent Choice One Engineering bravery:

09 Jan E=MC2

Nick Sanders: “Do you have all the formulas in that spreadsheet cell-protected?”

Matt Hoying: “I have six copies hidden around the world.”

26 Dec Of Mouses and Men

Matt Hoying: “Megan, remember our disagreement over the correct term for more than one computer mouse? Steve Caddell with the City of Mason emailed me a link that says that both MOUSES [Megan’s vote] or MICE [Matt’s vote] is correct.”

Kecia Flaute: “So EVERYBODY is right! But, Megan,
it sounds like the term “mice” is MOSTLY right!”

Matt: “Why will no one ever acknowledge that I am
right and Megan is wrong?”

12 Dec Stocking Stuffers

“I will leave it up to you if you want to file this photo under ‘Francis being efficient,’ or ‘Francis with multiple opportunities for bad luck.'”
-Wes Goubeaux

There was once a time when we thought having more than one monitor might be excessive (and a time when smartphones were unessential and dial-up internet was fast). But to work efficiently in 2014, Ryan Francis needs four monitors for the computer to keep up with his breakneck speed.

We have a few others here who would like to be more efficient in this day and age. So if anyone is shopping for clever Christmas gifts for Choice One, here’s a few ideas:

• Jeff Puthoff would like someone to drive him around so that he could work while traveling between meetings; truthfully, he wants to nap while someone else drives.
• Brian Schmidt would like someone (or something) to hold his parking spot outside the door of the Loveland office–every time he leaves for lunch or a site visit he loses it and has to park behind the Choice One office (you know, like 100 yards away).
• Nick Selhorst would like someone to change the paper in the full-size plotter for him. If he kept score it would be Plotter: 7, Nick: 0.
• Wes Goubeaux would like lighted restroom sign (like on airplanes) so that he doesn’t walk all the way to the front of the office only to find both restrooms occupied.
• Michael Seeger would like someone to make sure there’s always fresh coffee in the break room. Because pushing the “brew” button and waiting three minutes is SO hard sometimes.

While Jeff Puthoff may not get his chauffeur any time soon and Nick will have to keep fighting the plotter, perhaps four monitors will be standard in the not-so-distant future–Wes already has three monitors for his computer. Perhaps Wes shouldn’t be giving Ryan a hard time for “being efficient;” but he can absolutely continue to give Ryan a hard time about being unlucky.

28 Nov #christmas

“What’s a hashtag? Something on Tweeter?”
– Brian Barhorst

 

It’s Christmastime here at Choice One, and that means preparing holiday gifts, putting up the office Christmas tree, and legendary Signing of the Christmas Cards. You see, all six hundred-some cards require an original signature from each of the 32 Choice Oners. Per person, this amounts to about 30 minutes of actual signing and about 30 hours analyzing the signing.

This year’s card includes a few festive hashtags. Clearly, Brian Barhorst is not overly familiar with the hashtag phenomenon, nor is he familiar with that new-fangled “Tweeter” social networking service. It might not be a surprise, then, that we have a few other technology-unaware people around here. For instance, Tony likes to get on his “texting machine” to send messages. Sometimes he’s even adept enough to (accidentally?) include an emoji*.

Thankfully, it only takes a simple Sharpie for Tony and everyone else to sign the Christmas cards. But even without technology, we still find ways to lovingly give each other a hard time during the Signing of the Christmas Cards. Like when someone doesn’t sign the card per the instructions (ahem… Dan Perreira). As Greg remarked: “Perhaps Dan’s hashtag should have been ‘does not follow directions.'” But don’t worry Dan, Brian Barhorst will have no idea how to find ANY hashtags referring to you on “Tweeter.”