I frequent a surveying message board and mostly lurk around but post from time to time when I feel I have something to add to a thread. It seems like about once a week or so, a surveyor posts a message about low-ballers who throw out ridiculous fees that in no way can cover their true expenses. The thread normally goes on about how we're a profession and should be paid accordingly. I readily admit that I'm right on board with this thinking.
What I don't get is that some of these same posters will then start another thread about needing tax or legal advice and mention that they're looking for the cheapest accountant or lawyer around. Yep, that's right - they're looking for the low-baller!
Why on earth would we complain about not being treated as professionals when the public is basing their choice of surveyor on fee only and then turn around and try to treat other professionals the same way?
To me, I want the best accountant I can get to help our company make as much money as possible. If the accountant charges a fair fee, I don't have a problem with it. Heck, I WANT my accountant to stay in business!
I guess the whole point of the post is that to be respected as a professional, we have to show the same respect to other professions.
Wednesday, February 27, 2008
Monday, February 25, 2008
Wildlife update
This past week, there was a lot of excitement in our house when my two youngest looked out the window to see five deer walking through our back yard.
All while I was not at home.
In the words of Charlie Brown - Good grief!
All while I was not at home.
In the words of Charlie Brown - Good grief!
Wednesday, February 20, 2008
The Longest Day of My Life
As I've mentioned on here a few times, my 12 year old daughter is a competitive dancer. Between the first of February until the first of June or so, she's normally at competitions about every other weekend. I try to attend at least part of them but it's usually my wife that is with her while I handle the soccer duties. It's not a sexist thing but with the costume changes between dances, the moms help in the dressing room with keeping everything organized, doing makeup, hair, etc. and the dads, for obvious reasons, are not allowed in there.
This past weekend, however, she was involved in a competition that was a little different than normal. Instead of wearing costumes, all the girls wore black leotards with tights and shoes and little or no makeup. Since my daughter can take care of these things by herself, my wife asked if I would take her to this competition. Being the supportive dad that I am, I quickly agreed.
I should have looked at the schedule first.
My daughter's first dance was at 1:00 p.m. The studio has a standard policy that dancers are to arrive one hour before their first dance so we left the house a few minutes after 11:00 and arrived at Southport High just before noon. I helped her find the dressing room and went into the auditorium to find a seat to watch.
I knew that Libby's routine was number 105 so you can imagine my surprise when they announced that the next dance to perform was number 70! Knowing that the average dance lasts anywhere between 2 1/2 to 3 minutes, I quickly calculated that I had about an hour and a half to kill before Libby's dance. Fortunately, I had my laptop with me so the time went by quickly as I worked on some proposals. It was about 1:30 before she took the stage and they did very well.
That wasn't the worst of it. Her next dance was not scheduled until about 6:30 p.m.
Without trying to seem happy that someone is sick, one of the dance moms was running a fever so the dad, Kent, brought his daughter. I quickly found him and we made plans to grab something to eat with our girls and maybe kill some time.
After a nice lunch at Ruby Tuesday's that we tried to make last as long as we could, we asked the girls what they wanted to do. They wanted to go to a pet store and see the puppies so we did. After that, the girls decided they wanted to head back to the competition to watch their friends from the studio perform their routines so we did.
And arrived back at 3:30. Great, only three more hours until the next dance.
Oh, wait. Did I say three hours? Nope! Shortly after we got back, Libby came over to inform me that the competition was running about an hour behind and she wouldn't be back on stage until closer to 7:30. Great, only FOUR more hours until the next dance.
Well.......let's just say it's a good thing Kent was there as he and I have somewhat similar backgrounds and interests so we had some good conversations. We alternated taking walks in the hallway, going to our cars to catch up on the Purdue basketball game and driving around to get something to drink. For the record, Kent had a Mountain Dew that REALLY looked good to me but I gave up soda for Lent so I opted for a frappucino instead. Okay, we had both gotten our caffeine fixes so we were ready to go!
The caffeine didn't last near long enough as shortly before the girls were to go on stage, Kent turns to me and states, "Okay, this is officially the longest day of my life!"
The girls took the stage shortly before 7:30 and danced three other numbers in the span of about 45 minutes or so. Seeing my daughter on stage several times got me re-energized and I knew I'd need it as her last dance was originally scheduled for 9:40 but, of course, was now going to be at about 10:30 or so. Great, only three more hours until the next dance!
One of the things that Kent and I have in common is that we both formerly were high school basketball officials and still enjoy the game very much. And guess what else was going on at Southport High School on Saturday night? Yep, the girls regional basketball finals. We got to see an exciting game between Carmel and Ben Davis that was close. Now I was full of energy and could easily make it to the end of the night at dance.
Well..........in the words of Lee Corso..........not so fast my friends.
Being a guy, if I'm watching dance, I want to be entertained. My daughter's studio does a great job at that. As with everything in life, though, everybody has their own style. There was a studio there that, well, is a little more, shall we say, artsy-fartsy. After watching a few of these from this studio, I was completely drained of all energy again.
When yet another performer from this studio came out onto the stage, Kent said loudly enough for several of us to hear, "Oh great, another performance of rolling around on the floor!"
So to make a short story long (I know, it already is), our girls performed their final dance number at about 10:30, awards were given and we were out of there and on the road at about 11:15. My daughter was hungry so we went through the drive-through at Wendy's to get some chicken nuggets. For what it's worth, I don't go inside Wendy's anymore after the experience I posted about on here earlier. We were home just before midnight.
Another mom told my wife that Kent and I were real "troopers" this weekend.
I hope my days of trooping are over.
This past weekend, however, she was involved in a competition that was a little different than normal. Instead of wearing costumes, all the girls wore black leotards with tights and shoes and little or no makeup. Since my daughter can take care of these things by herself, my wife asked if I would take her to this competition. Being the supportive dad that I am, I quickly agreed.
I should have looked at the schedule first.
My daughter's first dance was at 1:00 p.m. The studio has a standard policy that dancers are to arrive one hour before their first dance so we left the house a few minutes after 11:00 and arrived at Southport High just before noon. I helped her find the dressing room and went into the auditorium to find a seat to watch.
I knew that Libby's routine was number 105 so you can imagine my surprise when they announced that the next dance to perform was number 70! Knowing that the average dance lasts anywhere between 2 1/2 to 3 minutes, I quickly calculated that I had about an hour and a half to kill before Libby's dance. Fortunately, I had my laptop with me so the time went by quickly as I worked on some proposals. It was about 1:30 before she took the stage and they did very well.
That wasn't the worst of it. Her next dance was not scheduled until about 6:30 p.m.
Without trying to seem happy that someone is sick, one of the dance moms was running a fever so the dad, Kent, brought his daughter. I quickly found him and we made plans to grab something to eat with our girls and maybe kill some time.
After a nice lunch at Ruby Tuesday's that we tried to make last as long as we could, we asked the girls what they wanted to do. They wanted to go to a pet store and see the puppies so we did. After that, the girls decided they wanted to head back to the competition to watch their friends from the studio perform their routines so we did.
And arrived back at 3:30. Great, only three more hours until the next dance.
Oh, wait. Did I say three hours? Nope! Shortly after we got back, Libby came over to inform me that the competition was running about an hour behind and she wouldn't be back on stage until closer to 7:30. Great, only FOUR more hours until the next dance.
Well.......let's just say it's a good thing Kent was there as he and I have somewhat similar backgrounds and interests so we had some good conversations. We alternated taking walks in the hallway, going to our cars to catch up on the Purdue basketball game and driving around to get something to drink. For the record, Kent had a Mountain Dew that REALLY looked good to me but I gave up soda for Lent so I opted for a frappucino instead. Okay, we had both gotten our caffeine fixes so we were ready to go!
The caffeine didn't last near long enough as shortly before the girls were to go on stage, Kent turns to me and states, "Okay, this is officially the longest day of my life!"
The girls took the stage shortly before 7:30 and danced three other numbers in the span of about 45 minutes or so. Seeing my daughter on stage several times got me re-energized and I knew I'd need it as her last dance was originally scheduled for 9:40 but, of course, was now going to be at about 10:30 or so. Great, only three more hours until the next dance!
One of the things that Kent and I have in common is that we both formerly were high school basketball officials and still enjoy the game very much. And guess what else was going on at Southport High School on Saturday night? Yep, the girls regional basketball finals. We got to see an exciting game between Carmel and Ben Davis that was close. Now I was full of energy and could easily make it to the end of the night at dance.
Well..........in the words of Lee Corso..........not so fast my friends.
Being a guy, if I'm watching dance, I want to be entertained. My daughter's studio does a great job at that. As with everything in life, though, everybody has their own style. There was a studio there that, well, is a little more, shall we say, artsy-fartsy. After watching a few of these from this studio, I was completely drained of all energy again.
When yet another performer from this studio came out onto the stage, Kent said loudly enough for several of us to hear, "Oh great, another performance of rolling around on the floor!"
So to make a short story long (I know, it already is), our girls performed their final dance number at about 10:30, awards were given and we were out of there and on the road at about 11:15. My daughter was hungry so we went through the drive-through at Wendy's to get some chicken nuggets. For what it's worth, I don't go inside Wendy's anymore after the experience I posted about on here earlier. We were home just before midnight.
Another mom told my wife that Kent and I were real "troopers" this weekend.
I hope my days of trooping are over.
Sunday, February 17, 2008
Wild Life
Or maybe more correctly as wildlife.
If you're in my age category, you'll rememer watching the show "Green Acres" growing up. Well, that show could easily describe the relationship between my wife and I as she grew up in New Jersey, not too far from New York City, and I grew up in the little town of Crothersville, Indiana.
My wife lived in a suburban subdivison, I grew up on a farm. My high school graduation class had 58 students in it; hers had somewhere around 700. Heck, her high school was bigger than my town!
Anyway, since graduating from Purdue, we've lived in the Indianapolis area. Our first place was a one bedroom apartment. We jumped into home ownership with a three bedroom ranch in a newer subdivision that we outgrew fairly quickly as kids came along. Our next house was a three bedroom two story with a basement in a brand new subdivision that was okay but not necessarily comfortable as our kids got bigger. Both of these houses had wide open yards that left us open to all of our neighbors anytime we were in the front or back yard. While this was what my wife was accustomed to, I still longed for a little more privacy as I had grown up without a neighbor any closer than about a quarter mile away.
So this past summer, my wife and I moved into our current house. Honestly, it's only a little bigger than the last house but does have a fourth bedroom so everybody has their own. The best part for me though, is that our lot is wooded and during the summer when the leaves are on the trees, we can't see any of our neighbors even though they're not really that far away. It's got a small creek on two sides so traversing to the neighbors to borrow an egg is not that easily accomplished.
Growing up, I had always enjoyed walking back into the woods and seeing animals in their natural habitat but I never expected to see them at our current house because, while the lot is wooded, it's much more of a suburban setting in a subdivision.
I've been pleasantly surprised. I put up a bird feeder and bird house within the first week we were here and attracted all kinds of birds that I could sit and watch on a Saturday morning. I've probably seen a dozen squirrels at one time chasing each other around in the trees. We've seen snakes, raccoons, possums, and rabbits from time to time as well but all along I've been telling my family that the ultimate would be seeing deer in the back yard. Well........it finally happened..........twice..........both times while I was not home. I'm so disappointed that I'm thinking about running to Tractor Supply and picking up a salt block just and putting it out only when I'm at home to increase my chances of seeing them.
I did get a nice surprise last week as I was standing at the kitchen window and thought I had seen a dog running through the back yard. I did a double take as I realized that it wasn't a dog but rather a wolf making his way through. Probably going somewhere to see if he could get a little venison.
I'll let you know when I finally get my deer. Maybe this week...........
If you're in my age category, you'll rememer watching the show "Green Acres" growing up. Well, that show could easily describe the relationship between my wife and I as she grew up in New Jersey, not too far from New York City, and I grew up in the little town of Crothersville, Indiana.
My wife lived in a suburban subdivison, I grew up on a farm. My high school graduation class had 58 students in it; hers had somewhere around 700. Heck, her high school was bigger than my town!
Anyway, since graduating from Purdue, we've lived in the Indianapolis area. Our first place was a one bedroom apartment. We jumped into home ownership with a three bedroom ranch in a newer subdivision that we outgrew fairly quickly as kids came along. Our next house was a three bedroom two story with a basement in a brand new subdivision that was okay but not necessarily comfortable as our kids got bigger. Both of these houses had wide open yards that left us open to all of our neighbors anytime we were in the front or back yard. While this was what my wife was accustomed to, I still longed for a little more privacy as I had grown up without a neighbor any closer than about a quarter mile away.
So this past summer, my wife and I moved into our current house. Honestly, it's only a little bigger than the last house but does have a fourth bedroom so everybody has their own. The best part for me though, is that our lot is wooded and during the summer when the leaves are on the trees, we can't see any of our neighbors even though they're not really that far away. It's got a small creek on two sides so traversing to the neighbors to borrow an egg is not that easily accomplished.
Growing up, I had always enjoyed walking back into the woods and seeing animals in their natural habitat but I never expected to see them at our current house because, while the lot is wooded, it's much more of a suburban setting in a subdivision.
I've been pleasantly surprised. I put up a bird feeder and bird house within the first week we were here and attracted all kinds of birds that I could sit and watch on a Saturday morning. I've probably seen a dozen squirrels at one time chasing each other around in the trees. We've seen snakes, raccoons, possums, and rabbits from time to time as well but all along I've been telling my family that the ultimate would be seeing deer in the back yard. Well........it finally happened..........twice..........both times while I was not home. I'm so disappointed that I'm thinking about running to Tractor Supply and picking up a salt block just and putting it out only when I'm at home to increase my chances of seeing them.
I did get a nice surprise last week as I was standing at the kitchen window and thought I had seen a dog running through the back yard. I did a double take as I realized that it wasn't a dog but rather a wolf making his way through. Probably going somewhere to see if he could get a little venison.
I'll let you know when I finally get my deer. Maybe this week...........
Shameless plugs
I've been an administrator for a website designed for my hometown of Crothersville, Indiana for a few years now. It was started by a friend of mine, Shelley, and she's really the one who runs it all but she allows three others of us to keep tabs on what's going on and moderate the posts. Most people are pretty good on the forum and there's really not much work to it.
Anyway, the reason I bring this up is that Shelley and another of the administrators, Alisa, both have their own blogs as well that I really enjoy reading.
Shelley's can be found at http://whatifitdid.com/
and Alisa's can be found at http://itsoffmychestnow.blogspot.com
If you have a chance to check out either one of them, it will be well worth your time.
One warning with Alisa's blog, however, is that she's a huge Tony Stewart fan. So if you're a Jeff Gordon fan like me, you can skip over all the orange Home Depot #20 stuff and it's bearable.
Anyway, the reason I bring this up is that Shelley and another of the administrators, Alisa, both have their own blogs as well that I really enjoy reading.
Shelley's can be found at http://whatifitdid.com/
and Alisa's can be found at http://itsoffmychestnow.blogspot.com
If you have a chance to check out either one of them, it will be well worth your time.
One warning with Alisa's blog, however, is that she's a huge Tony Stewart fan. So if you're a Jeff Gordon fan like me, you can skip over all the orange Home Depot #20 stuff and it's bearable.
Friday, February 15, 2008
The Heartbreak of Psoriasis (er, I mean parenting)
It's heartbreaking for me as a parent to see one of my kids come to the realization that their dreams are probably not going to come true for them.
I remember as a youngster that I would spend hours outside shooting hoops (because that's what we do in Indiana) just knowing that I was going to be a professional basketball player. I'd count down the seconds and heave a shot just before the buzzer sounded. A few times I actually made it and was the hero of the game. Of course, when I missed it was because I had been fouled and went to the free throw line to win the game.
It's probably because she's my youngest or maybe because she's my only girl but my daugther, Libby, has recently realized that she's not going to become a professional dancer. She's a good dancer but not a great dancer, technically sound but not one that draws your eye in a group.
I guess I should be happy that I've no longer got "kids" in the house and they've all become great young people but there's a part of me that loved it when they still had big dreams, believed in Santa Claus, the Easter Bunny and the Tooth Fairy.
I hope there are still big dreams ahead for each of them.
I remember as a youngster that I would spend hours outside shooting hoops (because that's what we do in Indiana) just knowing that I was going to be a professional basketball player. I'd count down the seconds and heave a shot just before the buzzer sounded. A few times I actually made it and was the hero of the game. Of course, when I missed it was because I had been fouled and went to the free throw line to win the game.
It's probably because she's my youngest or maybe because she's my only girl but my daugther, Libby, has recently realized that she's not going to become a professional dancer. She's a good dancer but not a great dancer, technically sound but not one that draws your eye in a group.
I guess I should be happy that I've no longer got "kids" in the house and they've all become great young people but there's a part of me that loved it when they still had big dreams, believed in Santa Claus, the Easter Bunny and the Tooth Fairy.
I hope there are still big dreams ahead for each of them.
Wednesday, February 13, 2008
Hot Tub Talk
Without a doubt, my favorite place to spend time at our house is in the hot tub. Fortunately for me, my 14 year old son, Brad, likes to sit and relax there, too.
It must be the relaxed setting that makes the conversations between Brad and I special as he feels he can ask me anything while we're in there. Topics of discussion can range anywhere from soccer to school to how much money a car costs and everything in between.
Seems like the same happens with Brad and I when we're in the car alone going to and from soccer practices and games.
So.......if you're a parent, try to find that special place when you can relax and have conversations with your kids. You'll be glad you did!
It must be the relaxed setting that makes the conversations between Brad and I special as he feels he can ask me anything while we're in there. Topics of discussion can range anywhere from soccer to school to how much money a car costs and everything in between.
Seems like the same happens with Brad and I when we're in the car alone going to and from soccer practices and games.
So.......if you're a parent, try to find that special place when you can relax and have conversations with your kids. You'll be glad you did!
Saturday, February 2, 2008
Standard Survey Price
I'm a little bothered by the phrase "standard survey price".
I had submitted a proposal for an ALTA survey in Shelbyville recently that involved an apartment building and was near a railroad that we'd have to deal with. After looking at it, I proposed a fee of about $3,000. When the potential client received the faxed proposal, he called me to inquire why the fee was so much. I explained to him the steps we had to go through to complete the survey and he replied "Okay, but I was looking for a standard survey price of $1,500." While I was trying to explain to him that there was no standard survey, he interrupted me and ended the phone conversation.
Later last week, I was reading a popular survey message board (which makes me a big survey geek just by association) and someone was asking about fees for an elevation certificate. This person was doing multiple certs in one area and was wondering if he should reduce his fee from his "standard survey price" of $700.
Somebody's gonna have to educate me, I guess, since I've never done a "standard survey" yet. If someone else has, please send me a copy so I can see what a "standard survey" is.
I had submitted a proposal for an ALTA survey in Shelbyville recently that involved an apartment building and was near a railroad that we'd have to deal with. After looking at it, I proposed a fee of about $3,000. When the potential client received the faxed proposal, he called me to inquire why the fee was so much. I explained to him the steps we had to go through to complete the survey and he replied "Okay, but I was looking for a standard survey price of $1,500." While I was trying to explain to him that there was no standard survey, he interrupted me and ended the phone conversation.
Later last week, I was reading a popular survey message board (which makes me a big survey geek just by association) and someone was asking about fees for an elevation certificate. This person was doing multiple certs in one area and was wondering if he should reduce his fee from his "standard survey price" of $700.
Somebody's gonna have to educate me, I guess, since I've never done a "standard survey" yet. If someone else has, please send me a copy so I can see what a "standard survey" is.
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