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Friday, 29 June 2007 |
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For those of you who haven't stopped by for a while, you should know that we've moved. This blog is being abandoned. You can continue following the sentiments you'd previously seen on this blog, by clicking on the graphic, below... UPDATE: July14,2007 -- The last thing I did on my way out of town last night was to manually restart the server that hosts NorthDecoder.com. The last thing I should have done was to restart the webhosting software. Looks like it'll be down until I get back to town tomorrow. Sorry. |
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Thursday, 28 June 2007 |
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As you probably know, this website is on its last leg and is going to be abandoned soon. Because of the instability of the site (and some of its readers... and writers... ) I'm eventually going to just let it shut down. Until then, I intend to occasionally come back and restart the server after it crashes, but don't expect this site to be online all the time and don't expect it to be around for long. I've registered a new domain name and set up the skeleton of a website. There's good news and there's bad news. The bad news: I'm not done setting it up. I just started on Tuesday night and barely looked at it yesterday. It has hardly any of the features this has, but it will have all of them after I get it completely set up. It won't necessarily have all the content from here, but it should have all the features. Messing with the website is something I do in the late night hours and early morning hours, so it's going to take time to get the new site completely up and fully functional. Be patient. The good news: The new website should be far more stable and far less prone to crashing once or twice per day. It should be at least as fast as this site, but will probably be a lot faster. I think I'm going to install some components to make it a bit more flexible. I'd be happy to take input from you folks if you have suggestions on how to make it better.
I looked for a name that would be a little more generic than BismarckDems, but also point to the fact that it's a regional-interest website. I'm not 100% satisfied with the website name I ended up with, but it's what I got. I don't like the graphic I whipped up Tuesday night (it's hard to read) and don't care for the catch-line-phrase thingy. It all needs some work. But, I'm starting to use it today. From now on, look for new content on the new website. HERE IT IS!!! |
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Tuesday, 26 June 2007 |
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Just because we're limping along doesn't mean we can't ruffle some feathers, right? A source suggested that North Dakota Workforce Safety & Insurance (WSI) -- displeased with the somewhat negative results of the performance audit done by the State Auditor's Office -- spent something like $100,000 to get a second opinion on morale at WSI. It looks like the opinion didn't turn out so well for WSI. The entire report is something like 110 pages. I'm not going to post the whole thing (I think). It takes up too much space and bandwidth. But I'll post some high points. Here are a few excerpts. The link afterward will just be to the pages from whence these clips were lifted. (click the graphic to enlarge) (Click here to view the cover page and the source page) So... 63% of the employees at WSI indicated they disagreed with this statement: "Personal favoritism or bias that is unrelated to performance is not practiced in my organization," with 32% strongly disagreeing. That can't be good. And... almost 73% disagreed with this statement: "Policies and procedures are applied consistently across the organization." Merely 46% disagreed with this statement: "Unprofessional behavior (e.g. inappropriate displays of anger or affection, crude or vulgar language, inappropriate jokes) is disciplined." Sounds like a great place to work, eh? How many starting teachers' salaries could have been paid with the $100,000 in public money that went to pay for a second opinion that simply confirmed what the audit paid for with our tax dollars already told us? |
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Tuesday, 26 June 2007 |
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 This is gonna sound (read?) really obvious, but I'm having major problems with the website and very little time to deal with it.
If you're one of those people who will complain that all my content has vanished and suggest I'm trying to hide something, I'd urge you to make PDFs of everything here that you care about because there's about a 75% chance that I'm gonna abandon this entire site and start from scratch. You probably can't tell -- other than that the weather is missing -- but the site is just barely limping along right now. |
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Sunday, 24 June 2007 |
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This weekend diversion suggestion from Hockeymom: |
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Friday, 22 June 2007 |
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A guy tries to make a snarky comment about a story in the Tribune and it turns into an overdone trip down memory lane... Read this basic, no-nonsense story and then the comments, starting with ol' Hank down at the bottom. It's kinda funny in a pathetic I-have-nothing-better-to-do-than-burn-30-minutes-reading-a-bunch-of-stupid-meaningless-comments kind of way. Oh. And, by the way... George "Tricky Dick" Bush has attained a new all time low approval rating. 26% according to the latest Newsweek/MSNBC poll. Attaboy, GW. |
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Thursday, 21 June 2007 |
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 Local skater does well in national and international competition.
The new dance team of Lynn Kriengkrairut, 18, and Logan Giulietti-Schmitt, 21, won the bronze medal at U. S. Nationals, joining their training partners Madison and Keiffer Hubbell and Emily Samuelson and Evan Bates on the podium. The dancers then capped off the 2006-07 season by finishing 11th at the 2007 World Junior Figure Skating Championships in Oberstdorf, Germany. Next season, they plan to compete in seniors because Giulietti-Schmitt has aged out of juniors. "We hope to make Nationals and skate well," Kriengkrairut said. "There's no pressure on us in our first year in seniors so we'll just try to accomplish as many goals as we can. We'll just keep skating and see how far it will take us." Kriengkrairut, who is from Bismarck, North Dakota, began skating when she was about six and a half years old. "My parents wanted to keep me busy," she said. "They had me in tennis, golf, ballet, tap dance, piano, and violin. I played tennis and golf until I was in high school and still play for fun. I was on the school tennis teams in eighth and ninth grade and the golf team from ninth to 11th grade. But I found skating to be the most challenging and rewarding." Skatetoday.com
I didn't see this in the paper (though I only skimmed the sports section) and thought the young local skater deserved some attention. [Update: While we're at it... here's a link to a KX story about Greg Eslinger, another local athlete who's doing well internationally.] |
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Thursday, 21 June 2007 |
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 The big news out of North Dakota today is that a Wisconsin-based group has sued the state of North Dakota.
The foundation, a group of atheists and agnostics, argues that the state’s Division of Juvenile Services and the Ward County Social Services Department should stop committing children with behavioral and emotional problems to the Dakota Boys and Girls Ranch, which, according to the ranch’s Web site, helps “children and families succeed in the name of Christ.” The ranch — actually an association that provides a variety of residential and day programs around the state — and directors of the two government agencies are named as defendants. The complaint says that “children are disciplined for refusing to participate in the spiritual aspects” of their therapy and that objectionable behavior is deemed a “corruption in the eyes of Jesus Christ.” “This is much more troubling than other cases,” said Annie Laurie Gaylor, co-president of the foundation, “because it is a captive audience and a vulnerable population that is unabashedly being indoctrinated in Christianity. They are being committed by the county or the state without their consent.” New York Times [link to ranch added]
I'm not sure what to think of all this. I'm not personally offended by the idea of troubled kids getting a bit of religion. It's the state involvement that might create a problem. Here's the questions that keep going through my mind: "Who would be leading the charge in the lawsuit if we were talking about the State making kids go to a Ranch being run by Muslims instead of Christians?" If the answer is "nobody," then it's probably not a problem. Otherwise it probably is. |
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