11/9/08
11/8/08
The Storm Has Passed
Oh, what a weekend last weekend was. I had Laura, Paul and Derek come to visit me. First, the Phillies won the World Series last Thursday! Fans of any Philadelphia team (Flyers, 76ers, Eagles, etc.) are absolutely insane. Don't think it's cute to go into a crowd of people in Philadelphia and yell something like "Go Yankees!" because you will suffer a very painful death at the hands of an angry mob. The news reported that it was a relatively lawful win, since there was just a little looting and only 2 cars were flipped over. Only two.
Then on Friday, the Clemson Trio got here, just in time for me to make breakfast and head to work. That night, we drove to Philly to see Robin Williams. Before the show, people in the crowd were chanting "Phillies! Phillies!" as if that's who they were there to see. I suppose the excitement of a World Series win doesn't wear off that quickly. The show was hilarious, but too crude for my taste.
On Saturday, the boys left us to go to Boston to play in the band at the Clemson-Boston College game. Laura and I went first to the downtown market and got some pretty yummy treats including some chocolate that had printed patterns on it and some Scottish salmon. That afternoon we relaxed and watched tv, because we needed to rest up for our upcoming adventures. On Saturday night we drove back to Philly to see Coldplay in concert. It was amazing. Our seats were a little far away, but the show was so cool. I hope I have another chance to see them in concert.
Sunday was Laura's big surprise. She had no idea where we were going. I actually had her tricked into thinking we were going to go get on a plane, but instead we got up early and headed to the train station, where we hopped the train to New York. First we went to the Metropolitan Museum of Art, where we explored for a few hours and had lunch. Then we went to see Uncle David run by in the marathon. He looks like a mountain man (which is perfect for the boys' adventure today to Mt. Laconte) but he was running fast, so I guess the beard didn't slow him down. We got to spend some time with Aunt Melissa and her friend Nika while they waited for Uncle David to finish up his race. We waited for awhile with them then headed on our way to go shopping. The crowds were insane because of the race and a lot of the intersections were blocked off, so it was best to just pick a person and follow them through the crowd. Shopping was a blast. We didn't buy a lot of stuff, but we had fun just going from store to store on 5th Avenue. I was so tired on Sunday from a long week at work and late nights out, but Laura wanted to go to Times Square, and I'm glad we did. The lights were beautiful and we had a great time taking pictures and looking around. After that, we took a pedicab (attached to a bicycle) with a very handsome Italian driver back to Penn Station and headed home.
On Monday I had to go to work and then that night, the boys came and whisked Laura away.
I had to spend the week catching up on my sleep.
Have a great weekend and hopefully, I'll see you soon!
10/26/08
Only 6 weeks left!
Hello everyone! I only have 6 weeks left here and I am so very ready to come home.
Cameron came to visit this weekend. I really enjoyed just spending time with him. It's been a long time since we've been able to hang out, so this was an excellent weekend. I was very sad to have to see him go this morning :(
I'm very excited about a couple of things:
First, I have a brand new second cousin! I can't wait to meet Wendy June...I bet she's going to be my new favorite cousin.
Second, Laura and Paul are coming to visit and we have several adventures planned, including a Robin Williams show and a Coldplay concert. There's something else, but I can't tell you...it's a surprise.
I hope everyone has a great week! Don't party too hard.
10/14/08
Mid-october already!
So it's already the middle of October! When did that happen?
I don't have a ton of time to blog because I've gotta get a shower (believe me, you want me to shower more than you want to hear what I've been up to) before bed.
The past few weeks, I've been in the bindery, where we stitch, fold and generally stand around packing boxes. That is so not fun. All I do is tell myself that I need to stay in school because if I don't, I will spend the remainder of my life standing at the end of a folder picking up packs of 100 pieces of junk mail and putting them in a box. Not the way to go.
Exciting news! Cameron got back to the states last Thursday! He seems great...he can finally relax. But he's bored and doesn't know what to do because his family is CRAZY.
I'm actually getting to fly home to see everyone this weekend. I'll come in late Friday and leave again on Sunday evening.
Off to bathe! I'll try to get a more comprehensive update of what I've been up to soon.
9/30/08
Sorrysorrysorrysorry
I know, Grandma, I know. I can't say that I've been busy, because I haven't, but I have been lazy. So that's my excuse.
The weather here is changing for the better. Not that it was bad in the first place, but I really love this cool-ish light breeze kind of weather. It's been raining since Friday, which is a drag, but methinks that it will clear up by the end of the day tomorrow.
Let's catch you up with what's been going on since my last post:
I finished my two weeks in the sheetfed press room on a Thursday and headed to the Ink Systems, Inc. room. ISI is a separate company that is housed inside the plant. They're staffed by about 5 people, round-the-clock, and they serve the entire plant. We worked on matching colors to customer specs and mixing 20 lb batches of those colors-some of them by hand (with a putty knife on a counter). That lasted two days.
Next, we headed to the web press room. Web presses are huge, loud and fast. Presses are web presses when they are fed by a web (continuous stream) of paper rather than individual sheets. Some of these webs weigh over 3000 lbs. My job is to prepare the splice (get the roll ready to attach to the last roll), check ink levels and learn about the different operations.
During the first week of the web room, we had lunch with the company president like we normally do at the end of each rotation. He asks us questions and sees what we learned in the department we just left. It's pass/fail (really, it doesn't count for anything)...we always pass.
This past weekend, Mom and Dad came to visit. Unfortunately, it rained most of the time, but we still managed to have some fun. When they first got here, I gave them a tour of the plant. After that, we went and purchased some new Corell dishes. They still sell those iris plates we used to have when I was younger. Dad is super picky about plates (of all things), so we ended up with beige round plates that are so boring, but whatever. We just eat off of them.
On Saturday, we went to the downtown market and then to Kitchen Kettle Village in Intercourse. Later that day we went to church where I've been going. They had a very touching baptism service. Sunday, we went to the Strasburg railroad and museum. That was really cool. The train ride is relaxing and a great way to spend an afternoon. It was very sad to say goodbye, but time has started flying and I'll be home before mom knows it.
Great story: Went to Sonic today and ordered a large Dr. Pepper. Not only was it half-price drink time, but they were out of large cups, so I got an extra large for $.99! I can't describe how happy I was at the time.
Current tracks:
Plain White T's 1, 2, 3, 4
Casting Crowns East to West
Conor Oberst Cape Canaveral
Bye y'all! (I've been dying to say y'all. Up here, they don't get it)
9/14/08
Stop the presses!
Amy's in charge!
Not really, but I have been a press helper all of this past week. I get to press the buttons to start up the press. I also help stack paper and flip over skids of paper. I'm doing a really good job according to the other helper on my press. Apparently I learn much more quickly than the other people who go through there. I guess it's all that edumicationing I've had.
My room mate went home this weekend, so I'm all alone right now. Yesterday, I went to the downtown market and picked up a few things, including some Key Limes. I'm going to make a pie with those this afternoon. I've got a few loads of laundry to do, vacuuming and other cleaning endeavors to undertake. My roomie can't seem to do any of it herself.
Everyone get excited! Cameron's coming home sometime between the 9th and 12th of October.
Happy (late) anniversary, G-ma and G-pa!
Happy (late) birthday, Sam.
8/30/08
2 Weeks Down
I started my first week at Intelligencer Printing Company in the customer service department. Customer service is comprised of several sections, including estimating, sales service, production planning, sales and scheduling. My cubicle is located with Team 2 of production planning-Don, Hilton, Susan and Rick-but I've done work in most of the sections of CS, but not scheduling (I get to do that later), and sales (because the sales reps don't work at the plant).
Intell is working hard to ensure that we (the interns) get to see and understand every aspect of their company. The company president Mike likes to include us in meetings and likes to check up on us from time to time. Thursday morning is the "Thursday Morning Breakfast Club" at the Eden hotel next door to the plant. Don't let the name fool you, this breakfast club is nowhere as fun as the movie. A group of managers meets for breakfast at the hotel and discusses the jobs the plant loses money on and tries to figure out patterns in order to figure out why they're losing money. We had to go to that last week because our CS boss wanted us to be able to look at a job from a numbers perspective and find out what went wrong. On Friday, we were included in another meeting with all of the managers. They meet every 6 weeks or so and talk about problems within the company. Last week, they talked about what they are going to do about those problems. Each manager has a team of people from all around the plant that they've chosen to come up with solutions to problems.
This week was spent in pre-press (or prep or desktop, depending on who you talk to). A majority of the time was spent with Greg, who is the color trouble shooter. He is, according to Mike, the best at what he does. He looks at press sheets and compares them to proofs, then figures out what to do to make the press sheets look like the proofs. It's pretty interesting watching him work. We also were allowed to do jobs and prep them for printing, which was pretty cool. We have one more week in prep and then we head to the press room.
For Labor Day, we're heading over to Hilton's house for a cookout.
Have a good long weekend (for those of you who work)!
8/21/08
This is all for G-ma.
So she better read it.
I'm here in Lancaster, PA. I suppose I should start at the beginning of our trip.
On Thursday morning, mom and I got going at around 9 am and headed north. We drove through NC and VA on Thursday. We stopped in Harrisonburg, home of James Madison University and Eastern Mennonite University, on Thursday night. JMU is beautiful and has a sprawling campus with a really cool quad type of area with all of the old admin buildings and amazing grass. Really amazing grass.
On the way up on Thursday, Intell's president called me and basically told me to get to Lancaster by 11 am the next day. So on Friday, we got up early and headed to PA. The road up through there (I-81?) is funny because you go through WV for about half an hour and then MD for not much longer. It's very quick after spending so long in VA. Anyhow, we drove through PA and had dueling directions: AAA vs. GPS (sorry, GPA would NOT have been able to help us, though he would have tried). We chose to stick with AAA directions, which took us through every small town and traffic jam possible, but we got there right on time. The first thing we did was force the president of the company to walk to my apartment because he couldn't fit in my car. Fortunately, he's a good sport about just about everything (except being late), and insisted that he could carry some of my stuff inside. After that, we took a plant tour and then went to lunch at the company's restaurant.
Mom stayed the weekend and on Saturday we went to the downtown market. They have food and flowers and amish quilts and crafts and all sorts of things. Also, we went to the quilt museum. All of the quilts in the gift shop are hand quilted by local Amish women. After that we went driving toward Intercourse, where there was a community auction. One side of the road had parking for cars, while the other side had buggy parking. Honestly, you think people make up the Amish way of life, but it's the truth. That evening we went to the local farm team's game, the Lancaster "Barnstormers," who took the first inning 10-0. We didn't stay long after that.
On Sunday, mom went home.
Monday was the first day of work. We (Kirsten and I) had to go get drug screens, then we had lunch with the company's president again. That afternoon, we went to the Mailing and Fulfillment center, which is a very interesting place to see, but I got sick. I don't know what was wrong with me, and they took me home. I took a 2 hour nap, and then I slept 12 hours that night, which was excellent.
mmkay?
Here are some pictures:
My apartment
This is the Barnstormer's stadium:
And the train station:
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