Best Hot Wheels Track Ever

I spotted a news blurb on Yahoo about the world’s greatest Hot Wheels track, so I decided to take a look.  What I found was a video that showed the car running along the track.  According to the information in the video description of the YouTube video, the track is 2,000 feet long.  It travels through 14 rooms, heads outside, heads around a swimming pool, jumps a hot tub, and even travels down then back up a set of stairs.  The track is truly amazing, and so is the video.  Check it out:

At the end of the video is some important information.  I wanted to highlight it because I believe that this group deserves some donations because it is an important cause, and because it will lead to a second video!  Here is the info at the end of the video:

If you enjoyed this video, please take another 2 minutes to quickly and easily make a small tax deductable donation to our favorite and worthy charity…

www.hopeforgabe.org

Any amount would help.  $5 would be awesome, but even $1 would be appreciated..

All proceeds will go to the Hope for Gabe Foundation to raise awareness and fund research for Duchenne Muscular Dystrophy.

If we can get enough donations from the thousands of people that will likely see this video, we will try to make a second, and even more elaborate Mother of All Hot Wheels Tracks video-PART 2.

Thanks,

Aiden, Patrick, and Casey

John Stossel Thinks Occupy Wall Street is Half Right

Image via Wikipedia

Posting a topic just to share a link.  Check out this article by John Stossel on why he thinks Occupy Wall Street is half right.

Related articles

• New at Reason: John Stossel on Why Occupy Wall Street Is Half Right (reason.com)

Another Day Another Class

On Monday, I completed a class called the Fundamentals of Technical Writing, and I did not find the class to be very exciting.  Of course, I never find writing classes to be fun.  I enjoy writing when I feel like writing, hence the blog, but I struggle when it comes to writing on request.  This is why going to school has been a challenge for me because I am required to do a lot of writing.  That is one of the reasons why I decided to start a blog.  I read somewhere that writing regularly can help you with your writing assignments.  I also write in a journal every night, and I have found that writing in a blog and in a journal has helped me when I do not procrastinate my writing assignments (but that is another post for another day).

Yesterday, I started my new class called Business Systems.  I took a class earlier on Information Systems, and it seems like this class will focus more on the same stuff, but it will focus more on the business side rather than the technical side of things.  I could be wrong and time will tell.  I have 150 pages to read today, so I can start working on my first assignment and respond to the discussion questions posted by the instructor.  Instead of starting my reading, I decided to hop on my blog first and write a post about something random, so here I am.

In case you haven’t seen the graphic near the bottom of the column on the right, I am attending the University of Phoenix.  I just graduated with an Associate’s Degree in Information Technology, and I just started the program to obtain my Bachelor’s Degree.  I love taking classes through the University of Phoenix, but they can be rather challenging.  Instead of taking multiple classes at the same time, I only take one class at a time.  However, the content that I would normally expect to work on over the course of a semester in one class is squashed down into a five-week course.  I end up doing as much work in one class as I would taking a handful of classes from a traditional university.  I know because I attended Idaho State University as well in the past, and my work load is about the same.

Image via Wikipedia

My first class in the bachelor’s program was interesting because of the way the University of Phoenix implements something called Learning Teams.  Basically, each student is assigned to work in a team of three to five people and throughout the course each team is responsible for completing a team assignment.  This occurs at the same time that each student is working on his or her individual assignments.  I found that to be quite challenging at times especially when some members of the team are not as motivated as others.  According to the University of Phoenix, the purpose of the Learning Teams is to prepare the student for team-related work in a professional work environment.

My first experience with a learning team was interesting.  I had some good team members, and our final team project looked much nicer than the other learning teams in the class.  I was able to note a few areas that I plan to address on my next learning team to avoid some of the problems that came up in my last one.  I get to find out who my team members are on Saturday of this week.  I am nervous because no one from my last learning team is in the new class with me, so I am going to get an entirely new team.  I hope that I can get hooked up with some good, motivated students.

Well, I guess that is enough procrastinating for me.  I need to start reading my textbooks and begin to learn about Business systems.

Been Quiet Around Here

Hi everyone.  I realize it has been kind of quiet on the blog lately, and I apologize for that.  Between work and school, I am finding it harder and harder to find the time to write a blog post, but I want to try and get back into the habit.  I enjoy using my blog as a place to think and write because it helps me when it comes to writing papers for school.

I am happy to announce that since my last blog post I secured employment.  It took me a long time, but I am happy to be working again.  I was unemployed for 18 months.  That is a long time to be unemployed, and I know that other people have been unemployed even longer.  I wish those people and anyone else who is trying to find a job the best of luck.  I understand how hard it can be sometimes.

I decided to takes a sales job.  Well, I did not exactly decide to do it, I just happened to apply for a place that asks their employees to sell.  I have never really been comfortable with selling, so I worried that the new job would not work out too well.  Boy was I wrong.  I discovered I have a knack for selling stuff because of my open and friendly attitude, and I owe it to a technique that I have been working on since I started.  Basically, I do not try to sell people anything.  Instead, I look at my job as one of educating people.  Let me explain.

I sell computers, printers, and other electronics items.  One thing that many people do is head to a store only thinking about purchasing the one item that they want.  Unfortunately, they do not consider the other possiblities.  For example, you want a new computer, but have you thought about the type of software you might need on this new computer like an antivirus or antispyware?  That’s where I discuss things with my customers and point out the other things to consider.  Need a new printer?  Have you thought about the need for a printer cable?  How old is your current printer cable?  Things like that are what I do.  Yes, I do offer additional items for people to consider, but when I look at it from the point of trying to help the customer make the most of their purchase rather than selling them additional stuff, I approach it differently.  I think my customers enjoy the approach too.

Not only have I started a new job, but I am also working on my bachelor’s degree now in Web Development.  I just finished obtaining my associate’s degree in Web Design, and I decided to continue with my education.  I love it, but I have to work on a  few more generals before I get to jump into learning stuff like php, .net, and database programming just to name a few of the things that I look forward to learning.  I am excited, but the bachelor’s level program is much more demanding than the associate’s level.  I know I can handle it though.

So, that is my update for now.  I will check in again very soon.  I have some updates on my own Minecraft server, some observations about computer stuff, and anything else that comes to mind.  Check back again soon!