Mostly Education Post

One of my favorites from the Band as performed by Aretha. Like most of us, she had her share of ups and downs, but she had a good run.

I read in the Wall Street Journal that France is banning cell phones from schools until high school age. I personally think that's a great idea. It's hard enough to keep students on task as it is. No point in adding to their distractions. Also I read in the paper that New York University is offering free tuition to medical students. The Home Depot founder gave 100 million to help underwrite the cost. That in itself is pretty impressive. And staying in the education vein, or maybe in vain, I decided to check in on Doug Stowe at The Wisdom of the Hands blog.

I haven't been reading him of late, mostly because I'm not currently involved in education and I'm not in a position to fix any of the current problems in education, even if I was so inclined. I'm pretty happy not having my blood pressure spike reading about all the silliness that is the current state of affairs. However, Doug Stowe is always a voice of reason, offering not only well deserved criticism but excellent suggestions that would go a long way towards fixing the problems if people in charge would implement them. I should start reading him on a daily basis like I used to.

I'm going to try and get some work done on the barn veranda today. I need a little muscle moving the platform and the columns. Hopefully, I can get that taken care of this morning and I can then fasten everything together on my own after I get them staged in place. After I get that accomplished I'll need to get some help once again to raise the platform up into place. I'll finish the floor and railings after I get it up in the air.

The Missus hit me up with a job on her walker. It's a roll around thing that she bought at a garage sale or something but she needs me to modify it a bit. Depending on how the weekend goes, I might be able to get that knocked out, or at least get a healthy start on it.

I checked with the airline on the luggage requirements for the Alaska trip. The carry-on bag can be no taller than 22" x 14" W x 9" D. My bag is that size exactly except for the height. With the wheels it's 2" too tall. A checked bag is $25.00 each way. I can get everything I need in the bag except my jacket - I might be able to squeeze that in if I use one of the plastic "shrink wrap" bags on some of the other stuff in the bag. I'm going to try that first but we we're talking about taking a larger piece of luggage for the bulky items and splitting the cost. Either way, I think I'm going to drill the rivets out holding the wheels on my bag and then it'll be good as a carry-on.