Use popular web sites and social media to travel the world this summer.
With August already here, it’s time to take that summer trip. But don’t go broke doing it. Social media and the web can be gold mines when it comes to saving money and finding great ideas. At jetsetter.com, five-star resorts and hotels go for half their usual rate. The Daios Cove in Creete, Greece, with spectacular mediterranean views and its own private beach — with waiter service — has rooms for $249 a night. The same price at the ritzy Hotel Punta Islita in Costa Rica.
Here are tips on getting you web travel savvy before summer is over: Read More »
Labor Day has been and gone. Apparently no one can wear white now and the fish have stopped biting. Well, the first bit might be true (not sure why) but don’t tell my son Adam about the second - he’s got the fishing bug! He got it from his mum, not from me. My wife Julie enjoyed fishing with her dad when she was younger, and is converting the rest of us. Not sure I’ll ever be a true aficionado myself, but it looks like our kids will.
Anyway, the video shows Adam’s excitement at being only one of two folks to catch fish that Labor Day weekend on Mickie’s Big Mack (that’s the name of Mickey’s boat!). The boat was full of fishermen and fisherwomen and fisherstories. I don’t know much about fishing, but when it came to my turn to tell a yarn folks were surprised that I knew about “superchill” (we had been discussing the Lake Tahoe water temperature earlier, before sun-up). What is it? well… Read More »
So my wife and I recently took a two week vacation to Alaska – without computers or anything but camera’s and our ever important smartphones. I didn’t realize that Marie Hattar, our Segment VP was going to write a blog about the importance of vacations and productivity – see that here. Imagine that, I overachieved via a vacation!
At any rate, back to the vacation – we left on Sunday so Saturday was reserved for clothes washing and packing. Great plan until the motor on the washing machine froze. We ended up Saturday night finishing the wash at her father’s house. Then after the trip (that was fabulous by the way. Everyone needs to take a cruise through the Inside Passage!) we ended up having the repair service visit to confirm the motor was shot (new motor cost more than the washer was worth, so conclusion: buy a new one) and using his washer/dryer for another week. That meant bundling up two plus weeks of wash, carrying it to his house, doing the wash for a few hours, etc.
I was reminded of the challenges a manufacturing company would have due to an unexpected machine breakdown. You have to isolate the problem, get appropriate repairs, possibly upgrade the machine, possibly line up alternate manufacturing capability, etc. I’ve blogged before about the needs for continuing MRO schedules and the importance of properly servicing your manufacturing machines and lines. But how do you prepare for a critical machine that suddenly breaks? Can you rapidly sub out the work? Can you quickly get the machine replaced? What if the newer machine doesn’t fit in the line directly? Read More »
This week the U.S. celebrated Labor Day, a holiday that, according to Wikipedia, celebrates the economic and social contributions of workers. To my mind, that translates to productivity. But interestingly, on the holiday that marks the end of summer, I came across this interesting piece: “Hey, America: Take a Vacation!”
The takeaway: compared to other countries around the globe, Americans not only get less vacation time from their employers, they don’t even use up all their allowances. And yet, as CNN Reporter Fareed Zakariah notes, “America’s growth historically has been fueled mostly by investment, education, productivity, innovation and immigration. The one thing that doesn’t seem to have anything to do with America’s new growth is a brutal work schedule.” It really makes you pause.
So this leads me to a series of What Ifs: What if, instead of logging the extreme hours that we do, we used that time to revitalize ourselves—to become more productive in our family relationships; to explore hobbies or creative interests that train our brains to work in new ways; to pursue volunteer opportunities that can contribute to the betterment of others. What if we took time to do things that truly brought us together as fellow citizens to help build stronger communities?
