Splat

Let's just start with a story from my day for no other reason that the fact that it amuses me . . . so, I work for this huge hospital system (12th largest in the nation). I train end users on PeopleSoft. We have major upgrade coming soon, so I've been going to all the hospitals doing some auditorium style sessions (there's no way I can get 3400 people through real computer training with their own PC in two weeks, so they get what they get). I have literally been to 14 hospitals in 10 days. To set up these sessions, I sent one email to all locations. In that email, I requested a projector and internet access. It worked fabulously everywhere except where I went today.

Today's destination was the middle-of-nowhere PA about two hours north of our house. The two hospitals I visited are literally the size of the Emergency Room at some of the Pittsburgh hospitals. We're talking way country, way small time. Honestly, the places could pass as nursing homes. Anway, I walk into the room and am reminded that people are perhaps a bit behind the times in the "country." Instead of a LCD projector that you hook up to a computer, both hospitals had the ol' transparency projectors. You know, the ones that use the magic of lights and mirrors to shine an image from a clear sheet of paper onto the wall. I hadn't seen one of those in probably ten years. I didn't even know they still made them.

To make matters even more entertaining, my second training of the day was held in a conference room that is in a building next to the hospital. They call it the "barn" because it's used for storing things like portable toilets, wheelchairs, etc. Oh yeah, it's also called that because IT USED TO BE A BARN. I have never heard of putting a conference room in a barn and I grew up in North Dakota. Simply amazing.

As for Alexis, she and I went to the playground after school so she could play on the slides. She got brave today and figured she'd go head first. It worked well the first few times because she used her hands to go slow and I was able to meet her at the bottom. The third time she forgot to slow herself down and I didn't make it around fast enough to catch her. She landed fast first in the dirt. I scooped mulch and dirt out of her mouth for at least ten minutes then she used two baby wipes to clean it out some more. After the nasty taste was out of her mouth, she went right back to the slide and did it again. Maybe the thrill was worth the splat.