In Healthcare, remember the little guys too.

Healthcare is a very demanding field. Not only for the nurses and doctors, but for everyone else that work in the field.

There have been plenty of stories of nurses and doctors doing great things. Unfortunately. not much is talked about the people that work "under" them. This blog post is not taking anything away from them, but I want to write and thank the other people who help make for a great healthcare experience when you go to the Hospital. So, just to say it. Thank you to all Nurses and Doctors.

First off, we will start with is custodial. These people work their butts off making sure all the rooms are clean for the next patient. They clean all the floors. The restock the restroom. They clean up blood and vomit and wash away a lot of things people do not know about, prior to their arrival. Thank you to all the custodial workers out there for keeping our Hospitals clean.

Now lets go to a little patient care. The CNA's [Certified Nurses Aid]. I do not know if I could do their job. These men and woman work their butts off. Cleaning up patients, changing patients, sometimes having to be on a one to one with a patient. These people sometimes have a large amount of patients to help take care and breaks are sometimes a luxury to them. To all the CNA's. Thank you for doing a great job in helping in patient care.


Lets go a little to administration side of things. I am not talking about the people who work in the Admin offices, but the unit secretary's that are helping keep charts up to date, answering the phones and overall helping make sure the admin side of the unit they are working on goes smoothly as possible. Thank you to all the unit Secretaries.

But, how to those people usually get registered? Thank you to all the registration people out there who get the people registered quickly as possible to they are in the computer to help get the ball rolling in their care. A lot of times, these are the people getting your co-pay or deposit for they care you were given. Thank you to all the registration people out there.

Lets go back to the Emergency Department. Lets thank all the techs. These people are EMT's and Paramedics. They act like a CNA for the Emergency Department. They are also starting/pulling IV's, helping with CPR a vital component to the smooth running to the Emergency Department. Thank you to all the Emergency Department techs out there.

Security does a vital role as well. Being part of this team, I take pride in helping pride a welcoming atmosphere and helping keeping patients and staff safe. These people, especially in my experience go through a lot of abuse sometimes. I have been kicked, punched, spit on, bit, kneed, ect. Sometimes at the same time! They also help make sure only the people are supposed to be there are in there. I take pride in my work in making sure everyone is safe to the best of my ability.

Now, lets go behind the scenes. Lets thank the Facilities Dept, or sometimes better known, as Maintenance. They keep the Hospital running. Literally. They change out the light bulbs, keep the power plant working, fixing the doors, fixing leaks. Pretty much is something needs fixing, they are called upon to make it happen and they do an awesome job helping keep the Hospital running. They are the people you can thank that make sure you can see OK at night when you are in the parking lots.

We cannot for IST [tech support]. The people who make sure all the computers are running and making sire all the IT things are taken care of. Be it helping you reset your password if you locked yourself out [guilty], to making sure you can get your email. They are the men and woman who keep the IT component running.

There is also another department I think really gets little to no thanks, but without them we would be spending a lot of times finding things. Central Distribution or maybe called the "warehouse". The people help restock gowns, have all the extra supplies the Hospital needs to help give great healthcare. IV pumps to batteries, they got them.

To everyone who works in healthcare medical or not, thank you for doing a great job in your field.

Keeping Us Safe

Wakes up in the morning
Looks at his wife sleeping beautifully
Kisses her softly
Keeping her from waking

He gets ready for the day
Looks into the mirror
Wonders if this will be
The day the unthinkable happens

He drives into work
Walks into the locker room
Puts on his badge and gun
And sets off to the briefing room

Briefed on the new details of the job
What to look out for
Get in his car
And starts to serve

Most days nothing special
Minor arrests here and there
But one day it might happen
When he doesn't come home

These are the men and woman
Who serve and protect and serve
Putting their lives on the line everyday
To keep up safe.


By - M.J. Henriques on 04/07/2009

Why minimum wage should not be raised

By the title of this piece you might think I am some horrible person who thinks that wants people to not move up in their lives and stay living as the "working poor". Quite the contrary. I do not want to see people living as working poor.

Minimum wage was never designed to be a "living" wage. Especially if you are basing that off of only one income. Minimum wage was started to get people "started" in the work force. A way to pay people a wage that was legal, but low enough to be an incentive to move in your career or to start the career you wanted to have. That is why a lot of times you see pictures of teenagers and people in their low to mid twenties in commercials for those companies.

If you work at McDonald's for 10 years and are still making or just above minimum wage, that is noit businesses fault. Businesses are in the business to make money.  There are some smaller business that pay their employees well, and yes, I do put McDonald's in smaller businesses since most of them are franchised to a private owner.

What a lot of people do not put into account is the costs of running a business. A lot of these protestors think that all the overhead costs businesses have is the wages to their employees. Do they put into account all the other costs; such as rent/lease, product, legal fees, vendors, utilities, ect?

Then people complain about companies like Walmart paying only minimum wage. You know what? You applied for the job, it was then offered to you with the pay rate and you accepted. So, in essence, you are complaining that you accepted a job with the full knowledge and understanding of the pay rate will be. Then, complain about not getting paid enough. Also, part of the reasons why the wages are lower is so they can sell their product at a lower price, which in turn, keeps people coming back to their store.

People need to realize, especially in the United States, you get what you pay for. I for one am not going to pay 5 bucks just for a burger that was quickly cooked on a double sided grill where I could not say how it should be cooked, other then being "well done" and then slapped on a bun.

If you work at someone where that only pays minimum wage for years and do not move up or get better career skills, that is not the companies fault. You might want to look in a mirror and ask yourself. Why am I only making 8 dollars an hour? You should also ask yourself; what can i do to get a better job and make more money. Also, did you do anything to move up in the company you were in or did you just stay where you were at and now you complain about it?

Hate Crime = Your life is more important than mine

OPINION: 
Why is it that we consider a crime done one person, worse than done on another person? Why is it that if I assault someone of the same race, it’s usually just a simple an assault, but if I assault someone who happens to be of another race it can be labeled a hate crime? Why it is if my wife hits me, is domestic violence, which carries more of a punishment then if she were to hit a coworker that upset her?

These are question I do not believe are getting asked. And if they are, they are either being deflected or completely ignored.

Now, let me preface that I have never been arrested or charged with a crime, other than a couple minor traffic violations. I have been the "victim" of violence. Not of from someone in my family, but I have been assaulted by people of other races. That does not mean I think they should get anymore punishment for assault than if they were Caucasian.

Though I do not agree with hate crime laws, I do understand why people put them into law. But, in my opinion, all that does is show that someone else is better other people when it comes to what punishment is deserved.

Let’s take domestic violence for instance. In most states, if there is a claim of domestic violence almost every time, someone is going to be arrested. Most of the time it’s the male and I can understand why the "State" presses charges when the victim wont. I can see that. But, if convicted the domestic violence charge, as opposed to a assault charge, even though it’s a misdemeanor, the punishment is harsher. You go to jail longer and your gun rights get taken away.

Also, let’s take so called hate crimes. There is an added punishment if you commit a crime against someone due to their race or sexual orientation. What that tell me is this. That murder that killed that person that is a "hate" crime is more important than the murder of someone that was not a "hate" crime. One life or crime committed means more than the other, only due to the reason why the crime was committed.

If we are ever going to get through this false pretense a lot of so called equality activists are trying to reach, we have to treat everyone the same. That includes the punishment they receive for the crime they commit.

Be it for someone is another a race or making disparaging remarks about their mother, the punishment should be the same for the crime they committed.

I have the freedom to use proprietary software

When you think of freedom, what comes to mind? The men in woman in the armed forces? the red white and blue of the United States flag? The freedoms we supposed still have in our Constitution? But what if I asked you what freedom means when it comes to software?

The man who is leading the "fight" of software freedom is Richard Stallman, or more commonly known as RMS.

RMS wrote the GNU utilities that was eventually paired with the Linux kernel, which was created by Linus Torvolds. He also wrote the GPL license, which pretty much spells out his ideals of freedom in software.


Contributing to open source has brought us countless Linux distributions and Linux software. Also Windows and MAC software as well.

The open source community, I believe has been instrumental in software development and progress. Most servers, more then likely the server that is hosing this blog, is running on Linux. Android uses the Linux kernel. Microsoft and Apple even contribute code to the Linux community.

Suffice to say, open source is great and has made a lot of things possible in the computing world.

But getting back to the topic at hand. RMS believes all software must me open sourced, being able to change the code and freely distribute that code/software. In other words, if I make a piece of software, I cannot keep the source code closed. I cannot let people not distribute the software I made without my permission. And I have to let people change my software as they see fit.

The issue of this "freedom" is people, alot of times will take a free sandwich when possible. Why pay 50 bucks for a piece of software when I can get it for free? Why should I have to pay for something if I don't have to.

Now, RMS does give the caveat of charging someone a fee for writing a custom pievce of software. But even that does not negate the possibility of the custom piece of software getting out in the open. Therefore, that, more then likely multi thousand investment a company made was for not, since now anyone can use the same software someone "paid" for now for free.

I take issue that someone is telling me that to be free, I have to restrict my choices on what software I can use. That someone believes that if I make the decision to use a closed source piece of software, I somehow am restricting my freedom. Isnt my freedom to use any software I want, without it having to be part of the GPL license? Do I not have that right to pay for something that only I have access to, since I am the one who made the investment for that software to be created?

And what about the developers? How many developers, besides Linus Torvalds is making a great living on the making software, per the GPL? As the great Bryan Lunduke has said, developers have to eat. We have to realize that if we want good software we have to pay for it and we have to realize that it might be proprietary. Do you really think AAA game shops like Valve, EA, ect is going to invest millions of dollars into a game, only to immediately open source the entire project for anyone to do anything with?

Long story short, I have the right to use any software I legally obtain. More to the point, I have the freedom to choose to use proprietary software.

2014 Olymics. A time for Gay Pride...

The Olympics, either summer or winter, it comes four times a year respectively. A time where athletes from all over the world compete while representing their country. A time where countries, who might even be in a "conflict" with each other, compete with each in "friendly" competition.  A time when you need to show gay pride....Wait, what? Yep, that's right. Since Russia has enacted their controversial law prohibiting "non traditional sexual orientation".[homosexuality] there have been protesting in the streets and a call for boycotting the 2014 Olympics, which will be held in Sochi, Russia.

According to an article from the AP, "An athlete of nontraditional sexual orientation isn't banned from coming to Sochi," Vitaly Mutko said in an interview with R-Sport, the sports newswire of state news agency RIA Novosti. "But if he goes out into the streets and starts to propagandize, then of course he will be held accountable."

So, in other words, you protest for gay rights, you get arrested.

A lot of people think these "anti gay" should be not enforced during the Olympics  Others are calling for the United States to pull out of the Olympics. People are also organizing a boycott of the Olympics.

Now, I would like to say I am for gay rights. I am for gay marriage. I do not care who you marry or who you sleep with as long as you are both consenting adults. Though I find this wrong, I do not care if you decide to marry your own family members. None of my business. Now, that does not mean the Government needs to recognize that type of union. Honestly, I am against any Government recognition of marriage. I also believe that if you want to boycott the Olympics  that is your right. Fight with your pocket book.

But, getting back to the main topic on hand. The Russian government still plans to enforce their anti gay laws. Now, they have said if they know an athlete is gay, they are not going to arrest them once the enter the country. As long as they do not protest, then nothing will happen to them.

Now, I have couple thoughts about this. First off, the Olympics are not about gay rights, or activism. The Olympics are about countries throughout the world coming together to compete, while representing their countries. A time where even though the United States and Russia are at odds with each other with the Edward Snowden case, we would still put those political things aside. We will still send our Athletes there to represent the United States in athletic competition.

With that said, this is another country with their own set of laws. Getting out of the internal politics of people living in Russia, if you go to Russia and you break their laws, you are subject to their judicial system and penalties that come with the crime you are convicted of. Just like if you go to any other country. Kinda like here in the United States. In Colorado and Washington states, it is now legal to smoke marijuana and have a small amount on you. But, in states like Texas, any possession of marijuana is a felony.