Best wishes for a very Merry Christmas and a safe and happy holiday season for you and yours

-Andy

Although I never went anywhere.

First of all, I’d like to apologize to all my readers for not posting over the last few weeks. More than anything, I’ve been kind of busy with school and just not had the creative energy to devote to this blog. Nothing has changed, but I am now making a real effort to spend more time posting to this blog and keeping everything up to date.

I’d like to thank those readers who have continued to check this site, as well as those who will soon resuming reading. To any new readers, I’d like to welcome you and I hope you enjoy the site.

Although not particularly recent, the layout of the site has changed since my last update. Gone are the sometimes faulty menu bars, allowing the sidebar to make a comeback. In addition, all advertising has been removed, and I am no longer accepting monetary incentive for posts (if you recall the few ‘Sponsored’ posts of the past).

With all of these changes, and my renewed commitment to posting, I hope that News. Views. Common Sense. can continue to grow into a successful and popular blog.

Thank you,
Andy

As any of you that live in Oregon, Washington, or the Northwest in general well know, the snow is falling and has been for a few hours. In Beaverton, near the 185th and Highway 26 overpass, we’ve got over an inch and I would not be surprised if we hit two real soon.

Just about every school district in the greater Portland Metro Area has closed or is on a 2 hour delay, even as I sit in school and type this, Beaverton remains open, with people still arriving more than 45 minutes late. Buses are stuck on various roads, some roads are turning into ice rinks, and accidents seem to abound.

I have heard of students who got into fender benders out there, and rumor has it that one teacher slipped on the ice and may have broken a rib. All I have to say is ‘Thank You,’ Beaverton School District, for calling yet another weather-day wrong. Not!

Breaking News at 8:35 AM: They are sending us home! But I’m not looking forward to the trip home. We’ve got 300 to 400 students at a school of 2600, more than 45 minutes into the day. Many staff are gone as well. This should be interesting.

Update: As it turned out, the 8:30 decision (it took a few minutes before they told us) was only the beginning. Even though all the buses that would end up being there were at the school by 9:00AM (presumedly they were late dropping off kids and simply decided to stay), none of the buses actually left until about 11:30AM, at which point we made it home almost as quickly as on a normal school day. I am under the impression that the district policy is not to release until enough buses are at the schools to release them all at once. Although the policy makes sense, Westview (and I was under the impression that Sunset as well) had buses chained and ready to go, sitting for almost three hours while who knows what was going on with the central office.

They were nice enough to order pizza for students waiting for the buses, which I thought was a kind gesture, but I wish they could have simply sent us out more quickly. I guess it doesn’t really matter, though, as everything worked out in the end.

I’m not sure why the administrators didn’t make the call earlier, but I heard something on the news about it being too hard to stop the process of starting a school day (and sending out buses) once it had begun. Great, but as one teacher put it, “They’re oh-for-three this year” (meaning not closing one day that most other districts did when there was some ice and at least one student getting into an accident as a result, closing for the day after the windstorm (December 15th) when most of the district had no real problems, and now today for putting thousands of staff and students in danger by not closing until 8:35AM.

Breaking News at 5:45PM: It looks like they’re getting more on top of it. Beaverton has just announced (at 5:35PM) that they will be closed tomorrow (January 17) as well.

• All schools and District facilities will be closed on Wednesday, January 17, 2007.
• All after school and evening activities have been cancelled for Wednesday, January 17, 2007.

Beaverton School District via Portland Information Network.

As you can see, News. Views. Common Sense. has a new theme. The biggest functional difference is the elimination of both sidebars, which both decreases site load times and allows for better compatibility with all monitor sizes. The change may take some getting used to, but all of the previous sidebar options are accessible from the top menu bar. Speaking of the menu bar, you can simply click a main link on the menu bar to open a menu with more choices directly below. Go ahead, try it!

The new theme should be working, but is still ‘Under Construction’ and as such, bugs of some sort may be present. If you experience any problems with the new site design please let me know at Jan07Redesign@newsvc.us or by leaving a comment. Also be sure to let me know what you think of the new design.

Seeing as how this is Friday, there will be a weekly video up within a few hours - something to look forward to.

I’d like to take this opportunity to wish all of my readers a safe, happy, and prosperous year in 2007. I also hope that this year beings an interesting batch of news and that the new, Democratic, Congress does not do anything to harm our nation or our national security. This year will see candidacy announcements left and right and plenty of fundraisers as we approach the 2008 primary season. I’m not going to make any predictions for the coming year, and I’m not going to do a year in review for the previous year, but I’m wishing everyone a very Happy New Year!

Now for the 2006 Metrics, thanks to Google Analytics. This data begins in August, when I switched the site to Wordpress and began to promote it beyond simply people I know.

Posts: 72

Visitors: 1,342

Top Ten Referrers:

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Christmas is always fun!

This picture was taken with my new Canon PowerShot A540 camera that I received as a gift this morning. This was one of the first pictures I took with it.
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I would like to cordially wish a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year to you and yours. Thank you for being the wonderful audience that you are. Merry Christmas and may God Bless.

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First of all, I’d like to apologize for my recent lack of posts. As the case would be, I’ve been kind of busy over the last two weeks and I have not really been paying enough attention to the news and Blogosphere to generate my usual caliber of posts. I have not forgotten you, and I will try to get back into the groove of things soon (and certainly by January when I finish my college applications).

Despite the lack of updates, I have been making some changes to the site. Mostly along the lines of minor layout changes, some of which you may have noticed already and others which are more subtle. In addition, I changed the load order of the page so that the content will load before sidebar, a significant improvement for those of you with slower connections.

Besides the layout, I am reorganizing my categories into broad topic areas and using post tags for more specific descriptions. While this may not make a difference for most readers, navigating the archives should not be easier and more intuitive.

Thanks for continuing to stick with News. Views. Common Sense. and thank you for visiting.

I didn’t spend much time online yesterday, and as I result I seem to have missed posting a message in honor of Veteran’s Day. I very much apologize for the oversight and I hope that being a day late does not offend anyone.

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I’d like to take this opportunity to wish everyone a safe and happy Halloween. Whether you’re going out trick-or-treating, taking your kids around, doing to a party, or simply staying at home passing out candy, enjoy yourself and be safe.

There are plenty of sites out there with safety tips (try a Google Search), so I’ll just mention a few that stick out in my mind.

Safety Tips:

1. Be sure that all children are escorted by a trustworthy adult.
2. Be sure to bring flashlights and avoid excessively dark areas.
3. NEVER enter a house when trick-or-treating.
4. Do NOT allow children to consume candy without first inspecting it for tampering and potential allergy inducing foods (if your child has allergies).
5. Look both ways before crossing the street and make sure the driver sees you.
6. Be weary of masks - they may make it hard to see.
7. Avoid driving, but if you must, go slow when children are nearby and on residential streets.
8. Have fun and dress warm - make this a Halloween to remember!

And to close, I’d like to present an special Jack-o-Lantern. I made this one back in the 2004 election season and I thought the message still rings true. With the election in a mere six days, I remind you all to:

The GOPumpkin

Have a great Halloween,

-Andy

PS - I also encourage you to check out the Capitol Steps Halloween Special, playing in most areas tonight on your public radio station. You can also download it online. If you like political satire music, I highly suggest you check out the Capitol Steps.