This is my story of Miguel

My uncle was able to do something recently that I think is super cool. I am always amazed by people who are able to use trials from their own lives to be a blessing to others. I have many great examples of this in my family, which is truly humbling because it means I have a lot to live up to...where much is given, much is required. My uncle seemed so happy when he first told me about this experience, that I asked him to write a guest post for my blog. This is his story.

This is my story of Miguel.

I first saw Miguel on a Friday that I was picking up Lynda and her friends from Verrado High School. I have always been too early when I show up to get her form school, but on this day I was late. Being late means I was the very last car in the long row of vehicles parked along the sidewalk waiting for our children. This also means I was the closest to the area where all of the school buses park.

School is out and here comes the crowd of kids. One of the first kids to head toward me is a young man using crutches. No big deal I thought and kept looking for Lynda. As I take another look at him, I am expecting to see a cast or brace or something on his leg. Nope, there is nothing there. He is missing his leg! I continue to look at him as he walks directly past my truck and heads to his bus. He really impresses me with how smoothly he gets into the bus. Right up the steps without any hesitation…very impressive.

My interest and empathy is now piqued for this young man. I tell Jody about this as soon as I can and have such a strong urge within me to help this young man. At this point, I do not know anything about him other than what he looks like and the fact that he is missing part of his leg. As you well know, this is something we are very familiar with. The next day, Saturday, Trinity Lutheran School was having their annual fund raiser carnival and our whole family was there. Jody noticed a lady wearing a Verrado High School sweatshirt and struck up a conversation with her. She found out some information about Miguel (we still didn’t know his name at this point). We found out he was in a car crash about a year ago and had to amputate his foot due to trauma damage. His family is poor and they do not have insurance. They could not afford a prosthetic leg.

Now I have a mission to help this young man. I decided to go directly to the school principal to see what I could do. I started with an email, then left a couple of phone messages at the school and finally went to the school in person. All of these actions were left unanswered. I was impatient and a little frustrated. That afternoon, I finally got my response from Tom Huffman, who is the school principal. He had been working on getting information for me and also had Miguel’s school counselor on the line with a conference call. Cool! I set up a meeting with Miguel, his family and his counselor for the next week.

I now have to set up a meeting with my prosthetist to see what he can do to get a prosthetic leg. I tell Dennis, my prosthetist, this story of Miguel to see if he could donate any of his services or a leg and he says he will check into it and see what he can do. We set up an appointment for the same day I am meeting Miguel. We will all end up driving to his office on that next Friday. During this next week, Dennis lets me know that he will cover the cost of the prosthetic leg. Yahoo. I feel so excited to have helped someone else with my disability. I cannot explain this feeling that was driving me to help Miguel. I truly think God had this mission planned for me. His family was overjoyed that someone was going out of their way to help him. The story did get a little more sad when I got a family history from his aunt. It turns out that the family is in such dire need of help that he is living with his aunt and her 2 children while mom is in Mexico and his dad is working in California. This young man is going through this horrible life experience without his parents.

We got him a prosthetic leg and now I need to set up some physical therapy to get his muscles in shape for this new leg. I make another phone call to Matt Figueroa. He is a friend from my high school that was my physical therapist during my recovery. He also is ready to donate his time and efforts to Miguel. This will be the tough part because Miguel has done nothing with that leg for a year. I am sure the muscle has atrophied to nothing in that time and his knee has not been flexed in as long as well. I have not asked or heard about how this progress is going but it was all set up for him to just give Matt a call. He knows Miguel’s story and was ready for him.

I just got an update this week about Miguel and found out his new prosthetic leg is ready and he was getting it today. January 28, 2010. I am hoping to see him in about a week to talk to him and see his progress.

Boys!

We went to my aunt and uncle's house for dinner tonight. Wil and Andy boxed - apparently Andy got boxing gloves and was beating up my uncle, so my uncle came home with his own boxing gloves Monday night. They can now start hosting real matches at their house.



Between boxing rounds, we watched part of the Saints vs. Vikings playoff game. Andy was rooting for the Vikings and came out of his room dressed in his Vikings jersey and shoulder pads to watch the game. I love that kid! He cracks me up!

Cinderella's Carriage

Saturday was our niece Lyzette's fourth birthday party. I volunteered to make the cake, so I could use some of the cool new cake decorating toys I got for Christmas. Her favorite princess is Cinderella, so I decided on a Cinderella's carriage cake.

The masterpiece!

Blowing out the candles...as you can probably tell it had a bit of an accident in the car - the layers slid off of each other. GRR!

I think it turned out pretty cute for my first try at a carriage cake. There are definitely things I would do differently next time...mainly I would make it so I wouldn't fall apart during transport! But, I'm sure all great cake decorators have had massive wrecks...it's just part of the learning process - or at least that's what I keep telling myself!

P.S. I start my next cake decorating class in February! HOORAY!

Barrett-Jackson

Wil and I went to the Barrett-Jackson Auto Auction Friday night (thanks to some passes from work). We had a great time looking at all of the cool cars and memorabilia. Here are a few of our favorites...

This motorcycle was seriously awesome! It even had pipes that flames could shoot out of on the other side!


The coolest part of the show was where cars were waiting in a holding/staging area before they were taken inside for auction. Wil was already inside the area, but a Barrett-Jackson rule enforcer was blocking my way in. I asked if I could walk in there to see the cars and he said, not without a pass. I whipped out my handy dandy pass that I received from work and he let me right in (coolest pass ever!).

They had two cars we thought were really cool in that area. First was a Ghostbusters car.

The hood is up because they couldn't get it started to drive into the arena for auction - HA! If you look closely, the guy in the front passenger seat is one of the original ghost busters! His name is name is Ernie Hudson in real life, and he played Winston Zeddemore in the movie.

Our favorite car of the night, by far, was the Batmobile! Seriously...how cool is this thing?

It comes complete with working .30 caliber machine guns that fire oxygen and propane and a FLAME THROWER! Plus it's street legal - not sure how a car that has working machine guns and a flame thrower could be street legal...but that's what the description said.

We thought it would sell for a ton of money, but it ended up only going for about $57,000 or so. Can you believe that? I mean, $57,000 is a lot of money, but the Ghostbusters car went for more than $80,000. You would think the Batmobile would be better than the Ghostbusters car!

Random side story: Apparently my grandma's brother Arthur Wahlers was one of the first guys invovled in the Barrett-Jackson. Back then it was Wahlers something, or something Wahlers...she couldn't remember. How cool is that?

Ocean Front Property in Arizona

Ocean front property in Arizona
From my front porch you can see the sea
I've got some ocean front property in Arizona
If you buy that, I'll throw the Golden Gate in free

I LOVED that song when I was little - mostly because I thought it was cool that they talk about Arizona, and that's where I live! This week, this song almost came true. My version goes like this.

Lake front property in Arizona
From the main road by our house you can see a lake
We've got some lake front property in Arizona
And tornado watches and warnings to make

So...I never claimed to be a songwriter. But holy cow...what is going on with Arizona weather?

I don't think I've EVER heard of a tornado watch or warning in Arizona! But on Thursday...there it was. Complete with flashing directions interrupting my watching of The Office telling people in Scottsdale to seek shelter by going to a basement (yeah, we don't really have those here) or interior room with no windows and to cover themselves with a blanket or pillow to protect from falling debris. Yes...it really did say that. It also said if you were in your car you should pull over and lay down in a ditch.

Wil's and my response? "How come all the cool weather happens in Scottsdale...why can't we ever have a tornado warning in Peoria!?!" (we had a watch...just not a warning). Yeah...we're like that - we love storns. I don't think we would really want a tornado that destroyed stuff and hurt people, maybe just one that knocked down trees and made then cancel work, but didn't cause any serious damage (is that too much to ask?).

From Desire to Hired

I was published on our work blog again, and thought I would share. You can read it at TheInsideLaneBlog.com or right here!

From Desire to HIRED.

Recently a colleague, known on this blog as Amanda P., and I attended an intern interview day at ASU. Really, a better description would have been an interview marathon. Twenty interviews in six hours – we could barely form complete thoughts by the time we were done! Out of all the interviews and potential interns, two or three stood out and were offered internships.

We understand that job seeking, especially in this economy, is tough. The desire for a job is simply not enough. We’re learning through friends and colleagues that the experience or ability necessary to do the job also is just the beginning of the qualities desired for any position, including interns. So we compiled a list of the traits our two or three stellar interviewees had, so you can use these tips for your own job search.

Honest knowledge of the company.
Many of the students we interviewed did not know much about E.B. Lane beyond the name of our company and that we are a fully integrated agency. The ones that impressed us knew our clients, examples of campaigns we’ve done and some had even attended guest lectures by our management team. Knowing about us showed that the student was invested in searching for a career and eager to work for us. Everyone likes to hear about themselves, so the more a student knew about E.B. Lane, the more interested we became in them.

Our tip: Flatter the company first, and then sell yourself.

Industry knowledge.
Public relations is NOT promotions. We did not attend four years of college to stand on a corner somewhere and hand out pens, necklaces or koozies. Hopefully you are not paying for four years of college to distribute trash and trinkets. Social media IS important, however. We wouldn’t be asking what you know about it if it wasn’t. The interns who impressed understood what public relations is, according to the textbook and in their own lives, and they understood and used social media tools. The students who were offered internships knew the terms, understood the basic concepts, and could apply them.

Our tip: Understand the industry and job you are interviewing for and regularly exercise the skills you will need to succeed in that position.

Relevant writing samples.
There were few things more impressive than when students came prepared with writing samples and a portfolio to review. We especially appreciated those who brought copies of the writing samples for us to keep. In fact, our interest in one interviewee went up dramatically after she left our table and we had a chance to read through her writing samples more closely.

Our tip: Leave behind samples of your best work.

Experience.
We treat our interns much like entry-level employees, so previous internship experience is a huge factor in our decision of who to hire. During the interview, we looked for hints that this person would be able to hit the ground running and would have the skills and confidence necessary to succeed. Chances are, the interviewer will have to defend those they choose to hire or recommend to a boss or coworkers. The interns that showed confidence in their experience and abilities gave us immediate confidence in them. Said another way, the interns we selected removed the fear that recommending them would leave people wondering what we were thinking.

Our tip: Confidently discuss your experience and how it applies to the position you’re seeking.

Dress.
This one should go without saying. The operative word being “should.” Almost all of the potential interns we interviewed were professionally dressed, but there were one or two that we moved down our list of choices because they were dressed too casually or their hemline was a bit too short. First impressions are all you get in an interview, students who dressed the part made it much farther into the selection process.

Our tip: Dress for the job you want to have.

So what do you look for in an intern? Are there any other qualities you look for in a potential intern or new employee? Start the year off right and comment away.

Author: Jessica G posted Wednesday, January 13, 2010

HOORAY!

Go Cardinals!