11:59 PM Louisiana to Sean: "So you were starting to like your job..."
OK time for a little bit of job related stuff. Right now what I do is write appraisals. They get reviewed by someone with their national certification, we both sign it, it goes out. No big deal.
Welcome the state of Louisiana.
As of August 15, Louisiana is dropping its voluntary certification program for a mandatory license program (this is a good thing) and disallowing non-licensed people from signing a report, even if it is under the supervision of a licensed appraiser (this is a bad thing for me). They've created a "trainee appraiser" license one can apply for that gives the right to co-sign. In order to get that I need 60 classroom hours towards my licensing and 15 hours of USPAP (Appraisal Standards and Practices) BY AUGUST 15!
Now you would think that with a Finance degree with a specialization in Real Estate, I'd have my 60 hours at least, but only my appraisal class counts (for 45 hours at least). My Real Estate Principles and Real Estate Finance classes are deemed useless.
What this means is that unless I can get 30 more hours (15 licensing and 15 USPAP) by August 15, I can still write appraisals for the certified people in the office and get paid the same, but I can't co-sign the reports and when it comes time for me to apply for my MAI (national certification) and State License, any appraisals that I do between August 15 and whenever I get my trainee license I can't record. That could be problematic in getting the correct number of points I need in certain time frames and getting to record any really good complex properties that might come my way.
We're looking to see what can be done about this (it might actually be 60 hours including the USPAP stuff). The appraiser that taught my appraisal class at LSU teaches a USPAP 2-day course pretty regularly, but getting it completed and all the paperwork done to get licensed in less than 3 weeks isn't going to be easy. This of course needs to be done on top of the pile of appraisals I have on my desk (and taking 2 weekdays off might as well be suicide).
Anyway, I'll update when there's some progress on this.
And yes, even when I get my license, I get to be a "trainee" for the 3-4 years. Oh joy.
11:06 PM
I had a report to review tonight so I decided to play with the color scheme a bit. I wanted a more neutral background, there was starting to be a little too much purple and gold here, even for me. I want some sort of earthtone background, if anyone knows a good RGB # to use, feel free to leave it in comments and I'll take a look at it.
I'll refer you to Brian's site for most of the ICON news since I was more or less there for all of the reports Bobby called in.
Now I will break out this convention into the Good, the Bad, and the Ugly.
Good Bobby didn't let himself get talked into running.
Nice views from the district suite (RCA Dome and the old downtown train station)
LSU won 3rd Place Club Achievement Gold Division
LSU won Honorable Mention for Club Newsletter (probably would have placed if we spent money on glossy paper and color copies instead of service projects and member benefits)
The Schroeder-McDonald-Stacy Ammendment was unanimously passed by the House of Delegates and the resolution I wrote didn't need to be used. (I will post it below)
Bob Moore ripping apart various officials on the House of Delegates deius for incompetance
They kept us away from the Key Clubbers enough to keep anything bad from happening.
Pete Holiday happened to show up.
Half the St Louis Convention video showing the Budweisser plant.
Booing of the St Louis Rams in the Convention video.
Rupert calling his entire board a bunch of "tools" knowing full well what he was saying.
Bad The suite was about 1/3 the size of last year's.
Having to walk past the 40' picture of Peyton "At least I was smart enough to not go to Ole Miss" Manning on the side of the RCA Dome to get to the convention center.
House of Delegates' inability to pass a dues increase in session 1.
No meal at Governor's Gala/Awards ceremony
Left Coast Liberal Ammendments from CalNevHa.
Short blonde moron from CalNevHa making a comment about slavery after Ralph says "mankind" in the pledge is part of our tradition.
Notre Dame stupidity in general.
Notre Dame stupidity in ammendments.
The fireworks display at the baseball game. I've seen better in the street in front of my house on New Years Eve.
Former LSU Star Brandon Larson goes 0-4 with an error at the baseball game.
The forced and contrived scripting for sessions. I'm not blaming the trustees, but year in and year out the parts that are supposed to be conversational turn out sounding ridiculously contrived. Maybe its time to spruce the scripts up a little more.
Ugly The Kiwanis staffer that did not know the words to the NATIONAL ANTHEM!
"No"
The ensuing hour of House fun including the attempted removal of the chair and parlimentarian
Kiwanis President Designate Moore's wife having to call him via cellphone to come to see the shit ging down in CKI House.
The complete joke of the Carthage Pullmans awarded at closing session
Sitting between the Michigan District and Notre Dame at the baseball game.
The candidate pool. Some were good, but when you're wondering which drugs some of the winners are on, you know there's a problem.
Kiwanis Trustee Anderson telling an off-color joke as his intro to CKI.
Well that's what happened at convention more or less. As for away from the convention, all I really got to do was see the NCAA Hall of Champions. They had a huge display on the College World Series full of LSU pictures including an entire wall dedicated to the "Shot Heard Round the South" in 1997. I looked high and low for CWS legends from Tulane and Ole Miss, but none were to be found. In the wrestling display, we found a picture of a very young wrestler for Pitt struggling his way out of a hold. Looking past the fro, we were able to tell that we were looking at none other than Your Olympic Hero Kurt Angle. It's True, It's Damn True.
The ride back was a lot more fun than the ride up. We stopped in Nashville to see one Tony Charles (they won't call him Ant there and I was given wierd looks when I asked to see Ant) at J. Alexander's Restaurant. Ant is doing well and plans to be coming back for a visit sometime in the next month or so. We also stopped in Tuscaloosa, Alabama and accidentally got off at the ghetto exit (at least I hope Bama has a better exit than this one). The sign on the c-store door said "No more than two students allowed in store at a time. Must leave schoolbags outside store." Who said Bama was full of thugs? We stopped in the booming metropolis of Meridian, MS for the night where we watched South Park: Bigger, Longer, and Uncut, corrupting Ralph's fragile young mind with its cursing. What's so innappropriate about the lyric "You're a cocksucking asslicking unclefucker"?
Now, for those interested, here is the resolution that would have been presented to the House if the Schroeder-McDonald-Stacy Ammendment failed. I have apparantly lost this historic document, so I am working from memory
WHEREAS We, the Delegates of the 2003 Circle K International House of Delegates meeting in Indianapolis, IN, understand that a dues increase is necessary for the future of CKI; and
WHEREAS Many Delegates have stated that their reasons for not supporting the dues increase proposal placed before this 2003 CKI House of Delegates is a lack of supporting financial information;
THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED That we, the Delegates of the 2003 CKI House of Delegates meeting in Indianapolis, IN, charge the 2003-2004 CKI Board of Trustees with the task of researching and proposing a dues increase to be placed before the 2004 CKI House of Delegates meeting in St. Louis, MO; and
BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED That supporting financial statements justifying the proposed increase must be provided to the membership via www.CircleK.org no later than 180 days prior to the start of the 2004 CKI Convention in St. Louis, MO; and
BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED That due to the current fiscal crisis in CKI, we strongly discourage the mass printing and mailing of these documents.
The hard copy I wrote of this was worded better, but the main points were the same. Had the ammendment Bobby presented failed, this would have gone before the House as a way for the next board to have a mandate to propose the increase in dues and given the members the information that they demanded for this increase. We really didn't think that the ammendment would pass (or that the second half would pass UNANIMOUSLY), so this was waiting in my pocket in the peanut gallery.
Feel free to leave your comments on any of this stuff.
"If we must take this war into their homes and burn them to the ground, we will do so."
-Gen. William Tecumseh Sherman
President, Louisiana State University
