La Verne Fire Department

I had the unique opportunity today to visit the La Verne Fire Station #2 while on a field trip. This morning at about 9:30am, my Fire 9 Hydraulics teacher, Captain Robert Lopez took us to see how the fire engine pumps work. The picture featured above shows the exact engine we got to take a look at today.

The captain on duty was Robert Russel and he did a great job explaining how the pump works and how to use the equipment needed to operate. After 30 minutes of brief explanation, Captain Robert Russel and his crew rolled out some hose to show us how the engine pump works while running. I personally really enjoyed the experience and got a lot of "faces" to some of the equipment talked about in class.

I wanted to give a big thank you to the La Verne Station #2. They were very helpful and insightful.

Link: La Verne Fire Department

Facebook or Nothing

I have been thinking a lot lately about Facebook and how it has taken over our internet communication. Since the boom of Facebook, everyone and their dog now has a Facebook page. Did you know that 25% of the internet traffic in the US is from Facebook?! At first it seemed to be a subtle easy way to talk with friends on a online platform. Now it feels like our online platform (Facebook) is taking over the way we communicate entirely. It's not that I am against this new way of communicating, I just feel that like many others we are all stuck in "Zuckerberg's Dream".

The internet gives you the ability to create and do almost anything you want. With this knowledge why are we all going to one place for communication when there are thousands of ways to interact? For example, (and the main reason for this post) Blogger, a great tool created by Google allows everyone to make a customized profile and share whatever knowledge they want. The difference with Blogger is it allows you to make your profile however you wish and change the way you want it to look or feel. If everyone had a blog instead of a Facebook we would more freely exchange ideas and have more personable pages. I mean it's not like everyone shops at the same store to get her clothes right?

Everyone wants to be an individual. Rightfully so, we should change the way we see the internet and make it ours by creating our own blogs, websites, ideas, etc. In doing this we will be more independent and able to change the internet, not let the internet change us.