All posts by Benjamin Flessner

Two more weeks

Bus Ramblings

Well, I made the official call this morning. January 22 will be my last day as a CyRide bus driver. I should really go in and try to get as many pictures as I can…. since I still (theoretically) want to work on that Buss-Stuff page of Scrambled.

Earlier this week, I had talked to Karen about cutting down hours this Spring, since there was no way I’d be able to take 18 credits, drive 20 hours a week, and still do a decent job search as well as plan a wedding. There was talk about dropping half my shifts and only working 9 hours a week. That would be the only way for me to continue to be an employee. After some number punching in Excel last night, I figured, with all the times I’ll have to be off for choir or other related things, along with the lower pay rate and using up vacation time that I’d get as a bonus if I quit now, I would only make about $300 more working all Spring than I would retiring now. Not really worth it with everything else going on this spring.

So in two weeks, I’ll be joining the ranks of ex-CyRide drivers. I will sort-of miss it; driving a bus was always fun. But I won’t miss fearing a malfunctioning alarm clock, scraping my car at 7am, and lots of other fun politics that have made other drivers quit. Well… I still have my CDL for the next 6 years. Might as well hang on to it in case I need it later!

Do the Church swap…

Wedding Planning

Well, nothing ever works out perfectly, does it? After we thought everything was a go for Redeemer on June 4, we start hearing that her parents would really prefer having the wedding near home for a number of very good reasons. Well, the problem is most of the churches around the area are Catholic, and Lutheran churches don’t seem to take very kindly to having non-members come in and use their church for a wedding with a different pastor.

So what’ll it be? My church which makes her whole family uncomfortable, a Catholic church which would make Amanda, me, and my family uncomfortable, or a local Lutheran church that makes everybody uncomfortable. Read on to find out the answer!!!! 😛
Continue reading Do the Church swap… →

Getting over the sickness

Life Musings

Well, this morning I am finally getting over this crazy sickness I’ve had all week. Not fun!

Monday afternoon, with nothing to do, I sat on the couch and read up until I was supposed to go to work at 5. Having a small headache when I got up, I took an Excederin before leaving. Not 20 minutes into my shift, my stomach started feeling a little unsettled. Despite Karen’s urgings that I conserve my sick leave, I called in sick on the radio and was promptly switched out. ….I was switched out at the cardinal endpoint, not 50 feet from my apartment, but I still had to drive the bus back to base and then drive my car back home…. but that’s beside the point!

Good thing I made the call… ‘since I tried to go to bed by 7 and ended up in the bathroom throwing up and other fun stuff well past midnight. I could never get to sleep so I finally sat in the living room and tried to watch Fellowship of the Ring. I guess I did get a couple hours of sleep in. Thankfully I didn’t have anything to do on Tuesday.

Continue reading Getting over the sickness →

Mis-matched church calendars

Wedding Planning

Well, last Saturday night, I talked a bunch on the phone with Pastor Carpenter, from the Lutheran church where I grew up. We talked about what’s needed to be done and other possibilities, like my Uncle Henry, a retired Lutheran pastor doing the whole service. It seemed like this were going to work out great.

Now Amanda and I wanted to get married on a Saturday in May. I graduate on the 7th, my niece Amy graduates on the 14th, and Amanda’s sister Katie graduates from high school on the 28th. So I asked Pastor Carpenter if Redeemer (the church) was available. He said it looked like it to him, but I’d just have to call the church and confirm on Monday morning. Whoops! That day’s been taken for a year and a half! Great… I guess now we were set for June 4.

(Note the past tense… this entry is still back-dated. More details to follow!)

Day at Cornerstone

Leisure

Today I got to play with a bunch of techie stuff at Cornerstone church. It was awesome! Well… pretty cool at least. I spent the morning recording a bunch of old messages and equipping hours to my hard drive. I thought that’d take awhile, like it did on Sunday, but it was going really fast. Plus I was using two comptuers, so I was bouncing around those for most of the morning.

I also got to take apart the DVD duplicator to figure out why one drive wasn’t working for someone. I didn’t really do much except for unplug it and plug it back in. I burned 5 Cds and it seemed to work fine for me. Maybe that’s all it needed.
Continue reading Day at Cornerstone →

I’m not a push-over anymore!

Bus Ramblings

No longer can you ride my bus without paying… HA!

I used to be a big push-over when people said they didn’t have any money, saying, “yeah, just bring double next time.” I finally learned to put my foot down. I was driving Green route and had 4 kids try to get on at the high school. They were going to the mall, an entire 4 blocks away. The first girl, who was obviously with the group, drops in 50 cents. The next person suddenly gets this dumb look on his face and says “oh, you have to pay at this stop?” Yup. It’s not a bad day outside; you can walk to the mall if you don’t have any money on you. I’ll even give the girl a refund for the 50 cents. They begged for awhile and I kept shaking my head. One tried to walk on my bus and I put up my hand and said, “no,” or something super-authoritative like that. Then one of them looks in his wallet and pulls out a dollar bill. I said, “well that will cover two of you.” More pleading, more staring them down. They finally got off my bus after swearing at me several times.

I was pretty proud of myself. On one hand.. yes, the bus follows a certain route and might as well carry people around rather than drive around empty. On the other hand. I had at least two people on my bus who had paid up the full four-quarters fare, and even if it weren’t theft to ride the bus without paying, it’s not fair to the other people who did just drop money in the farebox.
Continue reading I’m not a push-over anymore! →

This mac thinks it’s a PC!

Computer Stuff

Once-in-awhile I get an hour of spare time on campus. I usually like to come to the Durham lab and use the dual-screen media computer… just because I’m used to dual-screens and I like them. Today there was somebody already using it… curses!! Well… there is a mac with dual displays…. but… it’s a mac.

Yay for remote desktop. I have the two screens connected to my two computers back in my apartment. Voila… two windows computers “running” on a mac. (Forgive me, I don’t speak French well.)

Now to just get used to the annoying keyboard and single-button mouse.

Slightly stressful weekend

Family, School

Unlike previous weekend updates, I can’t say this one was “great!” Although spending time with Amanda is always fun, I had a few too many things to do that caused just a little bit of stress.

First of all, I had the com sci midterm on Monday night… so I was spending some hours studying for that. The larger part was fleshing out the Design Doc for Sr. Design. That I spent probably 8 stressful hours Saturday/Sunday night working on. Without going into a giant rant about it, I’ll just say I was not happy… with the content I had to work with, with the computer I was working on, and the insanely slow dial-up internet. I’m so glad Amanda puts up with my ranting phone calls and keeps me in line!

Oh… to clarify. I stayed in Waverly through Sunday night because my uncle’s funeral was on Monday morning in Waukon, IA. So… that’s what I did on Monday. Couple hours up to the funeral, then 3.5 hours back to Ames just in time for the Com Sci midterm.

The good news is the midterm went very well. Even though I was almost sick going into it, I felt I understood everything on it, and was feeling a lot better afterwards. Couple Voyagers, pizza, and bed made for a good night!

Dyersville is technical!!!

Computer Stuff

So, I’m working on Amanda’s mom’s computer… getting stuff up and running. But I found I didn’t have quite all the drivers I needed, and downloading them over a modem would take forever. So… since Amanda was supposed to be getting her oil changed anyway, I figured I’d bring my laptop to the dyersville library to try and download the drivers on a faster connection. Unfortunately, the library doesn’t open until 9. So… on a whim, I opened up my laptop to see if MAYBE I could get a wireless connection outside the building. I did!!! It’s very tempermental, but it’s working pretty well anyway! Way to go Dyersville.

Actually, techie comment… I see two access points… one is “library” so it’s obvious where that one’s coming from. The other one, “linksys,” we’re suspecting may be coming from the police station next door. And that’s the one I’m getting a better signal from. Hmmm… well if they didn’t want other people to use it, they should secure it up a bit more 🙂 . I’m only downloading drivers anyway… not like I’m actually doing any damage.