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Saturday, December 31, 2005

Sophie

Hi, my name is Sophie!  You can come anytime and play with me.Sophie is the new addition in the Adam's household. She is 9 weeks old and currently weighs 14 pounds. Sophie is a Golden Retriever and Lab mix. Both of her parents are pure breds. Sophie came from a breeder in Catonsville and was one of 13 puppies. We think that she wasn't given a lot of love and attention since she craves it from everyone in her path. Sophie is currently being create trained and so far, hasn't left any "surprises" since the process has started. It did however, take her a couple days to realize that she was going to be in the create when no one was home or around her. The create is referred to as "Sophie's home".

Sophie loves being outside. She loves leaves and especially loves when the wind blows the leaves. She also likes to roll around the lawn and when she is ready to come inside she sits "pretty" by the front door. Sophie's favorite toys are her raw-hides and her tug-of-war chewy.

Sophie still has a long way to go with all of her training, but is doing an impressive job so far adjusting to her new family and her new environment. She is the top DIVA in the house! Sophie looks forward to celebrating the new year and many more years with her new family that adore her.

Sunday, December 25, 2005

Tis The Season....

I want to wish everyone a happy and safe holiday. Let this holiday time bring you warmth and love from all your loved ones.

Merry Christmas!!

Thursday, December 22, 2005

Only a few days before Christmas

We are only a few days away from Christmas and everyone is out getting their last shopping needs for the holidays. I am done with my shopping luckily with the help of my girlfriend who just loves to shop. She implies shopping is like therapy but only cheaper--go figured. I hope everyone have a safe holidays and enjoy those precious moments with your family and please don't take for granted. With that note, check out this cool video of synchronizing music to Christmas lights.
Click to see video

Thursday, December 15, 2005

My Last Paper of My Undergrad Career

Nickel and Dimed by Barbara Ehrenreich

Can Americans survive on minimum wage current standards? Barbara Ehrenreich answered this question in her latest book, Nickel and Dimed On (Not) Getting By in America. Barbara has already developed her good name by writing twelve books, some of which have been named on the New York Times Best Seller list. As she ventured off from her high class status and made her entrance in the lower class, she began to realize that blue collar workers are not lazy, which is a common label placed on them. Since our government set standards for low paid workers, it is up to us, the American citizens to exploit these standards because with them in place Americans cannot survive.

Barbara Ehrenreich sets up three locations around the United States in her trial of being a low paid worker, her goal is to see if she will be able to survive earning minimum wage. Her first stop was in Key West, Florida. She a waitress. Her second stop was in Portland, Maine and this time she was a cleaning lady and worked in a nursing home. Finally, her last stop was in Minneapolis, Minnesota where she was a Wal-Mart associate. At each of these locations Barbara had to find lodging at affordable rates and pay for all of her necessities. As she tried to manage to stay a float from this project Barbara begun to understand that Americans cannot really make it in America with just one job.

Barbara exploited how the job market for the lower class is tough and has a quick turn over ratio. For example, the lower class workers will turn in applications but never seem to get a response. So, Barbara came to the assumption when she was trying to apply for jobs from the want ads, “Most of the big hotels run ads almost continually, if only to build a supply of applicants to replace the current workers as they drift away or are fired, so finding a job is just a matter of being in the right place at the right time and flexible enough to take whatever is being offered that day” (p. 15). Also, low wage workers have to physically work hard on their feet all day and everyday; meanwhile, the body can only handle so much abuse and workers have to take time off or quit to let their body recoup. This is why low wage workers cannot survive in America because the pay is so little while there is somebody there waiting to take that job.

Barbara exploited the lodging market in America by scrambling around to find the lowest and safest affordable housing in each of her three locations. In most cases, Barbara stayed in motels for most of her lodging because of the availability. When she talked to her co-workers about their living conditions some were sleeping in their cars or staying in motels as well. In Minnesota, the housing market was so stiff that she had to stay in a motel for $245 a week which she claims is “…scandalously high, higher in fact than my aftertax weekly pay will amount to” (p. 150). On top of that, the motel didn’t have locks on the door or screens in the window. With the higher cost of living and the lows of minimal wage, Americans cannot survive off this equation.

Barbara exploited by the standards of minimal wage that Americans have to multiple jobs in order to survive. At each location Barbara did her investigation she had to obtain two jobs just to make ends meet. Two jobs bring exhaustion and self-inflicting pain to the body. Nobody can maintain a hectic and frustrating cycle on the body year after year. Barbara, herself was having a hard enough time to handle the physical work just in a month work. Minimal wage needs to be readjusted so Americans can survive in a low class work environment.

Barbara exploited how management took advantage and treated their employees with unfairness. When Barbara worked at her second job in Key West, the job environment was hazardous. When Barbara was in Portland, Maine she had an encounter with co-worker, Holly who had twisted her ankle while on the job. Holly was afraid to tell their boss what had happened because she didn’t want to lose the valuable pay or even worse, her job. As Holly apologized to the boss for falling, Barbara was getting upset over the unfair treatment her employer was dishing out. So, Barbara got on the phone and said, “…can’t keep putting money above his employees’ health and I don’t want to hear about ‘working through it,’ because this girl is in really bad shape” (p.110). Holly had a few days off afterwards but her only options were to take off and nurse her ankle without pay or work to pay for her injury. Without Barbara there pushing Holly to voice her injury, the injury would have went unnoticed and management would have taken advantage of yet another low class worker.

What Barbara explored in her investigations was surprising to both her and the readers who are engaged in her book. Barbara uncovered an epidemic that many Americans fight each day, just to make ends meet or put food on the table for their family members. Barbara only did three months of low waged work; however, she got an understanding how hard it is to survive in America. With finding adequate lodging, food, and employment that any other lower class citizen, Barbara still couldn’t get ahead and feel comfortable financially. Also, she had some benefits throughout her investigation by having a car, which carries along a car payment, and money stashed away in case of an emergency. If that is not evident enough, Barbara even took time off between the jobs to recoup from the physical abuse that her body had encountered through her rigorous work schedule. After going through what Barbara had to endure she still couldn’t make it and she only had to worry about herself. If Barbara can’t make it on her own in addition to cutting corners, how can Americans survive in America on minimal wage with no corners to cut? They can’t.

Monday, December 12, 2005

UB Last Finals

This is my last week of school as we head into finals. I only have to write one paper on a book called, Nickel and Dimed by Barbara Ehrenreich due on Thursday. Also, I have one final in Database with a project due on the same night--Thursday. Then, I am all done with school. Yay! Now, give me a beer! I was supposed to have a final on Wednesday night but since no one in my class has completed their e-commerce site. The final was cancelled and the e-commerce site is worth double. Enough with the bullshit, like I said before, pass me a beer--it's all over!

Thursday, December 08, 2005

No NYC this Christmas


Every year that I have been with Jennifer we made a journey to New York City. We usually take a bus ($45 roundtrip) and spend the whole the day together visiting NYC finest venues such as: plays, China town, Ground Zero (a few month after 9/11), Central Park and of course Time Square. I think this year with everything being so crazy with school, family, and Christmas that we are going to put off the trip until after the new year. It sad that we are going to break our routine trip but it is better this way. We can enjoy the christmas holidays while not having to put out extra money. The picture above was taken on one of our past trips to New York and I added a comic book effect with photoshop.

Tuesday, December 06, 2005

Quick summary of Punta Cana

I'm excited!Bowman going out boogie
As many of readers know, Jennifer had surprised me with a trip to Punta Cana for my college graduation gift. We stayed for 4 nights, 5 days. She decided to booked through Apple Vacation, because our last trip though them was great.Jennifer is relaxing The apple rep greeted us at the airport and took us right to our destinated bus. The bus ride wasn't as bad as some of the reviews that Jennifer had read. (There were tons of pot holes in the road and at times we were zig-zagging down certain roads) Apple had supplied us with a charter bus, so we felt less bumps, compared to some of the other smaller shuttles. The ride was about an hour long, but we were interested in seeing the country, so we were focused on looking out the windows. We arrived to Secrets and were greeted with champagne and a cool damp towel for those who were in shock from the heat. After being refresh by our greeters, Jennifer went to check in and was asked if she wished to upgrade to the Excellence club. Due to past reviews Jennifer had read, she declined and was told that the room wasn't ready. I truly think that this is because Jennifer had declined for the upgrade. We went to have lunch in a buffet setting and came back about 45 minutes later and still the room wasn’t ready. This time we had a drink at the bar and waited the 20 minutes that they said it would be. Still, the room wasn’t ready. She's have always been lucky!!Jennifer kicked up a fuss and within 5 minutes the room suddenly became ready for us. The room was a standard garden view room. The room was beautiful. We had a jacuzzi tub, 2 bottles of champagne, a fruit basket and flowers that decorated the room. We were glad that we did not do the Excellence upgrade. We relaxed for awhile and went to the Apple meeting that we were scheduled to attend. (This meeting is usually standard for giving general information about the country and what to expect, highly recommendable) For our first dinner at the Boudreaux, which was amazing and watched the nightly entertainment, which was ok, kind of cheesy but entertaining. Tuesday we just relaxed by the pool and went to the beach party that night which consisted of wonderful food. Ralph, was our tour guideWednesday we went on our first excursion, the Outback Safari, this was an extremely long day. They picked us up at 9am and we didn’t get back to the resort until 5pm. We toured a Dominican home, a plantation, tasted sugar cane, green oranges and locally grown pineapples.A young man helping his pappy with sales of coffee and coco We were also taken to a ranch and had Dominican food for lunch, we didn't really like the food, but many of the people did enjoy it. We were then taken to a beach to boogie board. The waves were extremely rough, so not a lot of people participated. The tour guides also had us stay in a confined space. By the end of this day we were exhausted. heading for the mountainsWe asked how long it would take to get back to the resort and were told 15 minutes...15 Dominican minutes, which means 1 hour. On Thursday we went on our second excursion, which was deep sea fishing. The man arrived at the resort to pick us up at 11am. Children play at schoolWe picked a few others up and traveled about an hour to a beach. We hopped on a small boat which took us to the fishing boat and hoped on. We went about 6 miles out to sea. The diesel fumes were extremely strong. People were feeling really sick. We later knew that it was from the diesel fumes and not the motion. After catching nothing we went back to get ready to get off the boat.I love Jen in the sand While waiting for the smaller boat to come get us, I noticed that smoke was coming in from the side of the boat. The boat had caught fire!!! Yeah, that's right we paid $200 to catch fish but instead we caught fire. Luckily, a guy that was with us works on boats, so he knew what was going on. The second boat came just in time to get us back to shore safely.playing cards in front of their house The sad part is, I told the Apple reps and the very next day our same tour guide was at the resort picking people up to go right back on that boat! SCARY!!!!All in all, we had a great trip. I might not recommend the deep sea fishing though. Secrets was beautiful. The staff was nice, not overly nice like Cancun, but nice. Our room was beautiful and clean. The food that we had was very tasty. The drinks weren’t very strong, but Jennifer liked the Pina Coladas. Very relaxing trip for 2 college students in their last year!!
Jennifer at the beachDid you wanna go ride some waves?Atlantic OceanNear by school kidsLobster and Filet anyone?Coming back to the States