I Live in Iowa: Week 70

I'm starting to get into some pretty big numbers. I don't know what to think about that.

This was a more interesting than usual week at work. I spent two days in a "Working with India" class. We learned about Indian culture and traditions and styles of communicating. Quite interesting stuff. Two big take aways where that people in India really respect hierarchy and this influences how they communicate because they like to "save face" which is to say not show weakness. We of course do the same in the US sometimes, but we often whine about work too, or preferably, admit that we do not yet know how to do the task. After all Americans rank number one in confidence!

I also had the opportunity to have a job shadow this week. I feel it is important to get kids into engineering early. Why? Engineers are economic value creators. We design stuff that never before existed. We innovate. Do other careers innovate? Yes of course, in fact art skill and exposure in education is probably one of the driving factors that is helping the US to remain an economic superpower. In other words, being able to solve the equation or click the buttons in the right order  will get you an engineering job starting at $50k with a bachelors and no experience, but the idea of connecting people on a website to really map social relationships, that's given Mark Zuckerburg billions. That's the kind of thing that you can't exactly teach in a class, but you can teach how to look at problems and solutions and abstract ideas. Moral of the story: exposing kids to engineering first hand = awesome!

Cross Country started this week! We are going to have a great team! We have 34 I think compared to having 11 last year. This story will surely develop.

I ran a bunch, I think 46 miles, but I haven't logged Saturday (13 miles) yet. I also bicycled a fair amount.

My sister came to visit Saturday and we went rock climbing! We also did some other things.

There is more to say, like I have a new gel foam bed! However, I am tired that will have to wait for another day.