BEN'S BUBBLY BLOGS

“I have this plant, but I can’t really see if it grew today… but over the course of a weeks, months, or years, you can see if this plant grew, or at least survived,” Pastor Andy Nelson addressed a group of students.

Pastor Andy Nelson is Morningside University’s campus chaplain. Much like a shepherd, his goal is to tend to the spiritual life of the Morningside community. If faith is important to students, whatever it might look like, his goal is to help them “connect to something bigger than you.”

Pastor Andy worked in a family hardwood flooring business when he was younger. He enjoyed the process of showing up and seeing what the day entails. He appreciates the process of being able to see the start to finish and knowing what he accomplished in between.

Pastor Andy’s knack for seeing things start to end doesn’t begin with plants, and it doesn’t end with physical labor. Instead, he brings faith to the table.

He began cultivating his faith at a young age. His family was super involved with church life and his face became familiar for church-goers. Many people would often ask Andy if he ever thought about becoming a pastor. Through years of discernment, and the pendulum swaying, he became a Pastor.

Faith shapes Pastor Andy’s view of life, death, how to help other people, and life after death. “[Faith] impacts how I live my life,” Pastor Andy said with a smile.

Although he enjoys seeing it start to end, he does admit that “there are days where it feels like all I did was spin my wheels.” He rests assured knowing that weeks, months, or years from now, he may reconnect with a person, and he will see the impact he made.

Pastor Andy is always excited to reconnect with students who he’s worked with in the past. “That’s one of the reasons why I love homecoming so much.”

Economists believe that hurricane Ian will cause short-term problems in the economy. In the long-term, there is expected to be an uptick in the economy because of the rebuild process.

In this article at the Wall Street Journal, it says natural disasters tend to cause a short, sharp economic contraction, especially in affected areas. But that lost economic activity is slowly made up in following years after the rebuild process is completed.

This article is objective because it is strictly stating the previous trends of disasters. It is also sharing that economists believe the trend will hold following hurricane Ian. This is news to me because I am interested in business and economy. Also, the hurricane is human interest to a lot of people because there are humans who are hurt and suffering as a result of the hurricane. One of my clients for my personal window washing business has a second home in Fort Meyers, Florida, and they told us that the damage is bad and they lost a lot following the hurricane.

A new club has arrived on Morningside University’s campus. “Grill Masters” is a place for food lovers to grilling enthusiasts to hone their cooking skills.

The club is student-led with Tom Moss at the helm. Moss is a sophomore and highly involved on campus with various groups and activities.

Moss is not the only person who is involved with Grill Masters, as a matter of fact, it took many people to get the group going. Tom said that the idea originally came together with a team of faculty and students who were dreaming of something new. He said the idea especially caught wave when they accepted to attend a food and barbecue event in Anthon, IA. Morningside University then agreed to partner and buy the grill.

Moss and other faculty quickly began getting students involved with the club. Moss thinks it is a great opportunity to learn and hone grilling skills.

The Grill Masters are able to cook about anything on their grill. Since the purchase of the grill, they have grilled chicken kabobs, hamburgers, hotdogs, bratwurst, and pork chops. They have also made different veggie mixes and corn on the cob.

Dan Witten was one of the faculty who had his hand in the early stages of the Grill Masters. He is an Assistant Professor within the Applied Agricultural and Food Studies Department. His teaching and research focus is on improving student learning through the use of experiential learning.

Witten commented about the club, “it is going to be a great outreach and experiential learning opportunity for students. It will provide possibilities for students from multiple disciplines to try something new.”

The Grill Masters have many plans for the future. First and foremost, they want to continue to grow. They set their sights on campus events. “It will be really important to try to get involved with more events to create learning experiences for our members,” Tom said. They also have plans to use some of the revenue they make as a group to split and reinvest in the club, but also offer scholarships to those who participate.

Isaac Henn, a griller and member of the club, said, “I am super excited about participating with the club. I enjoy grilling and learning new food skills. It’s nice that we can make some money off of it too.” He said that he’s not too worried about earning a scholarship from the club, but he believes that it could be a great opportunity for students who might need a little extra money for school.

Students interested in joining the Grill Masters may sign up by reaching out to Tom Moss or talking to faculty in the Ag offices, located on the first floor in Buhler Rohlfs.

In Target’s 2021 Annual Report, Brian Cornell, chairman and CEO of Target addressed shareholders.

He starts by explaining Target’s growth prior to Covid-19 has allowed Target to continue to grow through the pandemic. During the difficult times they invested more into their team members. Everything Target does “speaks not to the past but the future.”

Brian said, “In the simplest terms, we’ll keep growing because we’ve invested in the team, strategy and capabilities to do what’s at the very heart of our company culture.”

They aim to take care of the millions of families who make up Target’s team, community, guests, and shareholders.

The continued success is exciting because five years ago they saw the potential, but didn’t have the performance points. Brian said that they now have performance points, and they point to greater potential than before.

Jax Neubert lives to see the days that his professor cancels class.

After very little sleep the night before, Jax was not excited to be attending his classes. Hopping out of the hay and getting on his way, thinking it was just another day at Morningside University. His first class of the day, criminal justice. He knew an exam was coming up on Friday and that class would be a breeze.

All hopes held high, Jax was wishing he was back in bed. Instead, sitting in class, waiting for the professor to get on with his schedule. The professor began class by asking a series of questions. Jax described these next few minutes as “exhilarating.”

Jax said the professor asked the class, “Who wants to study the study guide?” No one responded.

“Who needs to go over the book?” The professor asked. Again, no one responded, Jax said.

“Who wants to go the f— home?” Everyone came to life and raised their hands. The professor let the class leave five minutes into class.

Jax was grateful for this classroom experience, “I was tired because I had to wake up at 5am… it made my day.” He was able to go back to his dorm room and take a nap.

Help wanted: a sign that has become all too familiar for small businesses. The continued shape of the market is causing many small businesses to get creative with hiring. Goldman Sachs reported to Wall Street Journal in this article that more than one-third of small businesses said hiring challenges had worsened in the three months ahead of September 1st.

I think this is news because to me it’s super relevant. I am a small business owner myself. Although I have not had any problems with hiring, I do see the possibility of problems arising in the future. I have several business mentors that I have also talked to who said they have a hard time hiring in the current state of the market.

It’s really hard for me to determine if this article is objective or subjective. The article is made up almost entirely of quotes from business owners and their methods of hiring. I would like to think that everything the people are saying is factual; however, it’s hard to determine if they might say something different on the news.

I put most of my effort into writing the lead and the first two paragraphs. Figuring out the most important detail of the news story was the most time consuming. I wanted to put the most of my effort into the lead and first two paragraphs. Trying to formulate my decision and make the rest of the story flow afterwards was difficult. I took a unique approach to my story. Instead of writing simply about the new iPhone 14, I wanted to write about how Steve Jobs’ daughter reacted to the new phone. I felt like sharing her opinion makes news because she is Steve Jobs’ daughter, and her opinions are aligned with many social media users. 

The most difficult part of writing article one was filling out the information after I talked about Steve Jobs’ daughter’s comments. I was not exactly sure where to take the story because I was done with the main topic. I took on lots of brainstorming and decided it would be best to talk about the new iPhone 14.

I encountered a series of problem. The biggest problem I encountered was finding the right transitions to tie the whole story together. I knew I wanted to include a photo as well, but WordPress was being difficult to import my picture. Once I got my photo imported, I needed to make the story make sense around the picture. It didn’t quite make sense initially. I went back and revised greatly.

Global food supplies are expected to tighten as alarms continue to sound over this years disappointing harvest.

Last week the U.S. Agriculture Department lowered its nationwide corn production estimate to 13.9 billion bushels, 3% lower than its August projection, and 8% below 2021’s total. This comes after the global food supply was already tightened due to Russia and Ukraine conflict.

This is news to us because everyone consumes food. We currently don’t have any reason to be concerned, but we should continue to follow this topic. In this article by Patrick Thomas at the Wall Street Journal, some are saying that at least two more years of good harvests in the Americas are needed to ease the pressure.

This article is also objective because there are no opinion based content. They write about the facts, or what we know as facts. The estimates that the U.S. Agriculture Department has posted, and what the conflict in Russia and Ukraine has done to the food supply. They also include that the lackluster harvest this year is contributing to this drops in expectations and concern over the food supply.

This morning I approached multiple people requesting for objects out of the ordinary. The interactions and reactions I had were interesting.

The first object I must obtain was a knock knock joke. The first person I walked up to and asked, stood there with a smile, laughed, and said, “sorry man, I would tell you the orange joke, but I got to get to class.” I simply responded, “that’s not a knock knock joke, but I’m sure the class you’re heading to is.” He grinned, fist bumped me, and walked off, presumably to class.

I did not give up on this challenge. I strolled into the Lincoln Center, and I found my next knock knock victim, sitting there at the tables, studying. I opened up by telling a knock knock joke myself, and I asked Ashley Wilcox to tell me one in return. In a shocked manner, she did.

She started, “Why did Sally drop her ice cream cone?”
I responded, “I’m not sure, why?”
“Because she got hit by a car.”
My jaw dropped, “that’s not a knock knock joke!”
She said that the joke wasn’t finished yet. Then she continued, “Why did Sally fall off the swing?”
“Well, I don’t know, this seems like a fictional world… why?”
“Because she lost her arms in the car accident,” Ashley responded, laughing.

On the edge of my seat, I waited for the punch line.

“Knock knock,”
“Who’s there.”
“Not Sally!” Ashley exclaimed.

Ashley commented that this was her favorite knock knock joke, and she was grateful that I asked to have her tell a joke.

My next object might not be as simple, but I knew exactly where to go. I headed straight to the mail room. My eyes were searching wide and far for a thick rubber band.

At last, I make it to the mail room, and I ask Lauretta Shaver, the front desk lady, for a thick rubber band. She laughed and said she would get me one. Walking away from me, she asked, “Do you need big big, or just thick,” she paused, then held up a few rubber bands, “will these work?”

I thanked her for the rubber bands, and went on my merrier way.

At four o’clock this morning a blaze killed fifteen racehorses prior to the start of the racing season.

A fire took hold of a barn outside of Norfolk Downs Race Track in Chicago. The barn had twenty-five racehorses stabled. Of the fifteen dead, thirteen of the horses were thoroughbred and two were saddle horses.

The fire started in the middle of the barn. Arson is the suspected cause because the only heaters and electrical outlets in the barn were in the tack rooms at the ends. An arson squad was called to the scene. 

Jim Connery, fire chief made a statement, “The fire exploded near the center of the barn. Flames were shooting out of the building when we got here. The fire is definitely suspicious.”

The fire smoldered until noon and the only remains are charred wooden supports.