I seriously had the most stressful day today. It seems like everything is out of control for the moment. Then we had and oh so fun screaming match at the house when I got home from work at 10:30PM. That's always a fun way to cap off the day.

I decided to finally brave the cold and walk home at 10:30 because I was hungry. I didn't go get lunch because the rest of my team was going to McDonalds for lunch and I haven't eaten there since 1994. I like to keep it that way. Not to say that I will not eat the occasional fast food meal but McDonalds is never going to be part of my menu.

On the web design front I finished surebert 2.09 which is even better than before. I want so bad to integrate it into the new estrip. It would make the site much better but I really don't have time for that right now.

I would do anything to have a week of programming time to work on estrip. I have like 10,000 ideas and re-factoring jobs I want to do. Sometimes, I miss being a student/proferssor for that reason but most of the time I don't so I am not going to dwell on that.

There was an article in the Buffalo News about the salaries of all the hospital CEOs. I know this is my boss's boss's boss so I probably shouldn't even comment on this, but I am surprised that Dr. Hohn, the CEO of Roswell gets paid $644,000/year plus benefits. It's just way higher than I expected. Apparently, he, like many other CEOs in the area helped make the hospital profitable and so that makes him worth so much. He oversaw it's transition from a state organization to a public benefit corporation (WIKIPEDIA - Public benefit corporation).





Quote from the Buffalo News

Roswell is unique in the area because it's not a community hospital. Although it serves cancer patients from a broad geographic region, its other missions are medical research and education, and it gets significant funding from grants, especially from the government.

Founded in 1898, Roswell employs 2,700, including 227 doctors and scientists. But with only 101 beds, it handles less than 5,000 admissions and 153,000 outpatient visits in a year. However, it has about $89 million in grants and contracts, with 522 research projects.

It's one of 39 national comprehensive cancer centers designated by the National Cancer Institute. And it's one of only 10 of the 39 that are separate from a university. So when setting compensation, the board and a consulting firm look at seven hospitals that are most similar to Roswell, including Memorial Sloan Kettering in New York and the Dana Farber Cancer Center in Boston.

"Ultimately, supply and demand drives compensation. There's no way to get around that," said Richard D. Paris, Roswell vice president of human resources. "Ultimately, you get what you pay for."

Hohn, an experienced surgeon and current chairman of the National Comprehensive Cancer Network, has led the hospital for about a decade since being recruited here from M.D. Anderson Cancer Center in Houston. In that time, he's overseen the hospital's conversion from a state entity into a public benefit corporation.

Yet his pay, as well as that of three other top Roswell executives, is actually less than that of three-fourths of the seven comparable cancer centers, and right at the midpoint for all cancer centers and teaching hospitals, Paris said.

I decided I was sick of chewing on my mustache every time I eat. Maybe shaving my head is next.

I am sure that I need this new T series vaio . I am willing to do whatever is needed to get it.



The remote control for my firebox finally came. It has a thermometer. I really wonder if being heated could be any more convenient.

Last night I hung out with (e:mike) and (e:terry) and dave. We went out around chippewa.

There was something crazy going on around chippewa. There were police everywhere blocking all of the streets. It wasn't even just chippewa.

This image shows all the police lights although you cannot really see anythign but the light but it is pretty.



They were blocking parts of Washington and franklin too. There was nothing about it on the news website today or in the paper.

The video shows more details.

::Download Flash Video::

Check out this sad empty dance floor at underground. Fo rme that place died when the moved the couches to near the outside door about 2 years ago.

::Download Flash Video::

Has anyone ever watched House Capades on FOX on sundays. They guarantee that if they show your house on the show they will sell it or buy it theseleves with 30 days. That is a pretty amazing offer. Anyhow, their web site is quite confusing and I have no idea how to browse more info about the houses they showed so I wrote to them. I hope it helps them out.

Rick,
I got your contact info from the contact information link on housecapades.com. I visited the housecapades website today after the airing of your show on Fox 29 in Buffalo. I found the navigation a bit confusing but what was more confusing was how to find information about the houses that I saw on the show.

When I click the Featured Homes Link I am presented with a form requiring my contact inforation and asking which house I am interested in. Unfortunately, the on air segent which gives information at the end of a house showing did not appear to present any sort of identification number that I recollected.

As a professional web design analyst and programmer, I believe this is a fatal flaw in the design of your site and probably turns away people who may otherwise be interested. It also prevents people who missed the on air show from being able to browse the houses at a more convenient time.

I would suggest at least a photo gallery /stats list recapping each of the houses that you have shown on the last on air segment and perhaps even a mapping utility to visually search through the listings. Both technologies are trivial to maintain as they can be fully automated.

Thank you for your time,
Paul Visco

I had to remove some stuff about a rock star gone bad that was here.