Advisory Committee

 

I went to the advisory committee meeting at the college last evening. While coming home I heard this one on the radio. I'm not a huge fan of country music but I do enjoy some of the older stuff. Also it was 33 degrees while driving home and it was 52 degrees in Luckenbach when I looked it up after getting home. That's a temperature more to my liking. The older I get the more I understand people retiring and moving south. 

I was spinning the dial on the radio while driving home to see what else I could find to my liking and unfortunately, FM radio, like television, has become a vast wasteland as far as I'm concerned. The two public radio stations I used to listen to played jazz and blues music in the evenings - now it's all talk. There are Christian stations, "urban" stations, Spanish stations, Country stations, Classical stations, and, of course, Classic Rock. You would think there would be room on the dial for a little jazz music.

The advisory committee meeting was informative. The format is to have the general meeting and then break-out sessions for the individual programs. This was the first in-person meeting since the cooties hit and there have been some changes in the personnel. The general session went quicker than many of the ones I attended in the past, so that's a good thing. The light meal that was served had vegetarian options - another good thing. The break-out session for the welding program was very informative.

One of the members is an adjunct there as well as being involved in the training program for the Boilermakers Union. He related how if his students at the college could pass the welding test he could get them out on permit working 7 - 12s starting at $38.50 per hour - 40 hours at straight time, 32 hours at time and a half, and 12 hours of double time per week. He couldn't find anyone willing to do that after the students figured out that equated to an 84 hour work week. That was just going to be too much for them. I told the guy I'd be willing to go back to work for that kind of money. He asked me how old I was and told me they have a program for guys 75 or older. I'm not interested in going back to work but I would like to know more about the program. I'll have to go back up there and talk to the guy one of these days.

One of the other committee members is a salesman for Lincoln Electric and mentioned their Hyper-Fill welding process. It's a MIG gun that feeds two wires at the same time, essentially doubling the deposition rate. Pretty clever how it works.

Taking the Missus back to the dentist today. Depending on how that works out, have to see what else I get done.