Shaun Hoggan

VANCOUVER, Wash. – (May 13, 2008) – New Edge Networks, the business communications unit of EarthLink Inc. ( NASDAQ: ELNK) said Whitehall Jewelers Inc., ( OTCBB: WHJH), has expanded and renewed a multi-year agreement for managing and maintaining a private network linking the jewelry chain’s 375 stores in regional and super-regional shopping malls and power centers in 39 states. The contract is valued at $1.6 million.

Building on a long-standing business relationship, New Edge will manage and maintain Whitehall’s existing private IP network based on DSL technology. The agreement also expands Whitehall’s network to 78 recently acquired jewelry stores. Installation work at the newly acquired locations is underway.

The specialty retailer of fine jewelry uses its private wide area network for processing store transactions, sales polling, selected Web access and corporate email. To ensure privacy and security, Whitehall’s network traffic, such as payment transactions and email, does not traverse the public Internet.

“Our business relationship with Whitehall Jewelers has led to our mutual growth and success,” said Greg Griffiths, vice president of marketing for New Edge. “Both companies have benefited from trying new service approaches for optimizing the value of a private network after discussions in quarterly account review meetings.

Feedback from Whitehall was instrumental in New Edge’s decision to reorganize its operations support center and assign dedicated teams of technicians for supporting large customers with complex network configurations. When these customers call New Edge’s operations support system, they speak to someone they likely know by first name and who is familiar with their network design.

“Our private network is an important component of our business growth plans and strategies,”said Mark Funasaki, executive vice president and chief administrative officer for Chicago-based Whitehall Jewelers.

“We want to use our network to favorably transform the shopping experience for our customers,” Funasaki said. “Network flexibility, uptime and stability are paramount for smooth and efficient store operations.”

About Whitehall Jewelers
Whitehall Jewelers ( OTCBB: WHJH) is a national specialty retailer of fine jewelry offering a selection of merchandise in the following categories: diamonds, gold, precious and semi-precious jewelry and watches. As of April 30, 2008, Whitehall Jewelers operated 375 stores in regional and super-regional malls as well as power centers in 39 states. For more information, visit www.whitehalljewelers.com.

About New Edge Networks
New Edge Networks builds and manages private IP-based wide area networks that do not use the public Internet. Connecting business sites at virtually any address in the United States, New Edge allows businesses to choose any blend of available access technologies – from DSL and T1 lines to fiber-optic connections – for building private and secure MPLS networks with performance guarantees. A wholly owned subsidiary of Atlanta-based EarthLink Inc., ( NASDAQ: ELNK), New Edge is based in Vancouver, Wash. For more information visit www.newedgenetworks.com or call 1-360-693-9009.

Contact:
Sal Cinquegrani
1-360-906-9723
1-847-420-1750 (cell)
scinquegrani@newedgenetworks.com

This thanksgiving weekend the family and I had a great time visiting with Dave and Sterling’s family in Antioch.  Getting together with them reminds me of the great family I source from.  On Friday we went to the railroad museum in Sacramento.  Amazement crept into my soul admiring the huge engines and the fantastic work the museum had done in restoring the historical significance of these engineering feats.  Getting such a huge machine to push down the tracks at speeds in excess of 50 miles / hour is nothing less than a miracle.  The inefficiencies of those engines which ran on steam is incredible compared to the diesel engines of today. 

Doran lent me his treadmill from the eminent death most exercise equipment suffers in many garages around the world.  After loading the beast into the truck and hauling the monster to the our home in Pleasant Hill, I spent a couple hours cleaning off the cob webs and dust on the under used machine.  Taking the Edith chest and sitting chairs out of the office the treadmill fit nicely in the corner.  I was even able to put the Edith chest and two out of three sitting chairs back into the space with the pivoting tread in the up position so I only lost one sitting chair which never was used anyway.  To put the tread down I only need to move the remaining two sitting chairs with is not a big deal.

I have learned a sad truth which typifies my pitiful life.  Running seemingly was a chore before having the treadmill.   Deep concern set in knowing it was possible that an important communication might come across my email or a phone call would be missed.  Now that the treadmill is in my office the stress level has gone down because my computer and phone is within my sight. 

Ran 3 miles yesterday and 3 miles today, I am starting to think that I would like to run a marathon in the next year.

There was a time in my life where I could eat just about anything and it would either be converted into energy or just come out the other end.  After several months of eating ice-cream floats I have learned a great truth about the human body.  When a human enters this world their stomach is lined with a special non stick Teflon coating which lets the good stuff through and kicks out all the bad stuff.  Over time, the special non stick Teflon coating wears off and is not as effective as it was during ages 1-30. 

If you have ever go to your moms house and see the Teflon coated pan she received as a gift for mother’s day 10 years ago, which is still being used to cook eggs a couple times a week, you will know what I mean about the Teflon coating wearing off over time. 

It would seem that the older I get my body seems to retain more of the bad stuff which previously slid right past my Teflon coated stomach lining.  The only logical conclusion to my weight gain is that the Teflon coating in my stomach is wearing out.  I have heard of this condition in other “thirty something year old” friends of mine.  I see many ads in my junk inbox for weight loss programs and pills I could take to lower my weight.  These are obviously supplements to replenish the Teflon coating on the stomach.  It is not my style to take pills to solve my problems so I went running tonight. 

Ran 2.5 miles tonight, temperature was 53 degrees.

Journey to Ixtlan, The Lessons of Don Juan

Shaun Hoggan

Diablo Valley College

Humanities 115

Instructor: James Wetzel

July 23, 2007

Journey to Ixtlan, The Lessons of Don Juan

Carlos Castaneda’s book Journey to Ixtlan The lessons of Don is about a professionally educated person, Carlos Castaneda, and his unpredictable interactions with Don Juan Matus, a self proclaimed Yaqui Indian Sorcerer whose viewpoint on life is seen through nontraditional means. Some would argue the un-seeming reality painted by Castaneda would indicate the character of Don Juan to be fictional, since his approach seems so foreign to the normalcy of most readers. When dissecting the book for meaning, Don Juan’s intent can be believable and even provides insights into the human psyche, which can be significant to the extent of changing the readers viewpoint on life and how to view and react to external forces around them, but does Castaneda embrace the beliefs of Don Juan? This paper will argue that despite copious amounts of time invested into Don Juan’s way of thinking, Castaneda does not fully subscribe to what is being taught to him by a genuinely sincere man, Don Juan.

Carlos Castaneda, in the first chapter, indicates his intent in seeking greater knowledge from Don Juan regarding the medicinal impacts of peyote and offers payment for Don Juan’s time. Upon rejection of Castaneda’s money, the reader begins to understand that something more exists to Don Juan than what meets the eye. Don Juan is portrayed as friendly, yet strange with cryptic, emotional cues when dialoging with Castaneda. Don Juan is also obstinate when it comes to choosing which choices are made and ensures they are consistent with his own belief system. The reader finds themselves trying to determine if something more exists to Don Juan than a simple Arizona desert living Indian.

Don Juan believes in forces which cannot be seen by natural human eyes, which include the human soul and the soul of all living things including plants, the wind, and the gurgling of a coffee pot. He is intelligent enough to understand that much of the human race is not aware of this and the knowledge, understanding, and ability to handle this information is power. A person can gain power by observing and practicing against these beliefs. The book surrounds the entire premise of Don Juan training Castaneda these beliefs and the new viewpoint on the world they will hold for Castaneda.

One of the crowning moments in gaining the power which Don Juan proselytes, is the moment when meeting one’s own personal ally. This is a time when the student or individual who has been prepared over an extended time is ready to meet a significant being who will be their individual aid, after a significant struggle with his or her ally. At the end of the book, Castaneda is faced with an opportunity of meeting his own ally after months of being trained in the ways of gaining power and having many experiences which could not be explained by any other means than the truthfulness of Don Juan’s words. It was certain that Castaneda had been challenged to his greatest extent and that he was able to identify and see firsthand what Don Juan had been teaching him was believable.

In the beginning, Castaneda had to be coerced into doing any action which was requested by Don Juan. As time passed, Castaneda became more trusting to Don Juan’s teachings, and more readily did as he was instructed without external verbal or internal complaint. The instructions provided to Castaneda, although noteworthy, seemed greatly sacred. Not to be confused with secret, these sacred principles and teachings provided to Castaneda are proven sacred in chapter 1 as Castaneda, when discussing the recording of their meetings, asks Don Juan if he can record their conversations, Castaneda writes regarding Don Juan’s reaction:

This event indicates that Don Juan considers these teachings important enough to not put them onto a recorded or acoustic imagery medium which can be left to interpretation and dispute from external sources. Don Juan intends to deliver his message through the spirit of meaning, intent and personal interpretation to a directed audience, not external sources other than those intended.

Castaneda has the reader hook line and sinker considering that he has fully adopted Don Juan’s teachings until the very last paragraph of the book. After being invited to see his ally for the first time, Castaneda chooses to get in his car and drive away from the opportunity from meeting his ally. He does this after Don Juan has left his presence. He excuses his reasoning with a brief explanation of not being ready.

Readers should consider that Castaneda, with his copious amount of notes taken during this surreal experience, had plans to turn this work into something for his own personal benefit. Castaneda writes eight books related to the subject matter of Don Juan. He used the experience to further his opportunity on the world and not to pay homage on the valuable lessons taught by Don Juan.

References:

After arriving back from LA today around 11:30 PM, a sudden urge to run a few miles hit after realizing the 6 candy bars I ate earlier in the day (to stay awake from an early start today) were weighing me down physically and emotionally.  When leaving the home, Amber won the coveted “best wife in the world award” for performing as the loving mother which she exemplifies.  While walking out the front door, I could hear her laughing with my kids on the back lawn while looking up at the stars.  First of all, the number of moms who would allow their children to stay up past 11:00PM are few and far between.  Second of all, a woman with 3 boys under the age of 8 who just spent the day painting the house among other duteous chores around the home and can laugh like she was at that late hour deserves an award.

Running seems like such a chore while at home.  The pain of leaving my family, considering the little time I spend with them already, is difficult to face and frequently prevents me from venturing out on the community streets seeking better health.  Despite the pain in leaving my happy family behind I discovered the DVC track which is walking distance from where we live. While reflecting on how much I enjoyed running around the newly discovered soft padded rubber track, I truly missed my family and considered inviting them to run around the track the next evening.  I think it will be difficult to get them to come but I don’t see any reason why we cannot make running a family activity.  The track was super close to our home, fantastically soft to run on and was completely empty of all unknown strangers.  The moment made me appreciate where I lived and how happy I was to be back home after many years abroad.

On the topic of wondering if moving back home was the best choice, I stumbled across Amber’s blog and saw this photo:
http://www.asistersvoice.com/wp-content/uploads/2007/07/gold.jpg
I had realized when seeing this great shot that we could only get this living where we do.  Life is good!

Winter of the Holy Iron by Joseph Marshall III is about two cultures identifying themselves within the new western world who find unresolved conflict when looking into the telescope of the future.  Marshall, a Lakota descendent, authors a fictional novel where he paints a vision of his ancestry through strong character development and relationship building with the books characters and the reader.  Despite Marshall’s well written story surrounding the injection of the “Holy Iron,” otherwise known as a modern day flintlock rifle, the common thread and conflict is not found within

Superficial readers of Winter of the Holy Iron would argue that the book is about a Lakota war leader named Whirlwind who is faced with many choices and forces conflict among his fellow tribesman in his Lakota village when he brings home the recently shot victim, a Frenchman named De la Verendrye.  Those readers would indicate that the real meaning behind the book was intended to paint a picture of a moment in time when simple lifestyles of the Lakota people were suddenly complicated by new technology from the eastern world.  The questions which need to be asked in contrast to this simplistic viewpoint is: Why did Marshall, a Lakota descendent, who was raised by his grandparents, and whose first language was Lakota write a book about the eastern French civilization intermixing with western native American Indian culture?  Evidence of why Marshall may have written this book could be pointed out when reading between the lines of the text when

What to people do with their spare change?

Having seen a broad spectrum of uses for loose change it is easy to understand that there are as many uses as their are coins in the world. Among some of the more interesting uses seen are:

-Storing them in a jar or bottle
-Flicking them across a school room at that boy or girl to get their attention
-Dropping them on the ground at the fast food drive in
-Putting them in a donation jar at the cash register
-Adding to the waiter or waitresses tip
-Squeezing them into a collectors book
-Rolling them into paper wrappers from the bank
-Donating them to the salvation army and Santa during Christmas
-Heavily used by the tooth fairy
-Dropped out of the car door when parking
-Vacuumed out of the car seats when cleaning the car
-Spun around on the table when playing finger games
-Stored in the living room couch
-Used to fill up the coin holders in cars that come with them
-Collected
-Retrieved in the ground by metal detectors

A financial adviser who I know who spends their time getting others out of debt made an observation of those who have lots of money laying around their home who all typically have financial difficulties. I have seen this in homes where I know there are financial difficulties and more often than not they will have small piles of change laying all around their home. The kitchen counter is one of the more popular locations.

Personally I am an anti coin guy. I am a believer that coins are there to increase the price of goods purchased from merchants. If an item costs 5.96 and we give the merchant 10 dollars we get 4.04 back. Is is likely we will save the $4 in our wallet or purse but what happens to the .04 cents? If the money gets lost, the item we just purchased cost 6.00 which effectively is an increase of the goods purchased. If this happens frequently than what amount of money is discarded every year in the US?  According to CIA.gov the estimated US population in July 2007 is 301,139,947. If everyone in the US discarded one penny per month that would equate to ~$36 million annually in lost coins in the US alone.

Today while running 3.5 miles I found a quarter and a penny which looked like they were discarded out of some ones car. The good news is that have added an additional .26 cents to my net worth. The bad news is that the poor schmuck who discarded this money is .26 cents poorer today.

Tonight while flying back to Salt Lake City I sat next to two women, a mother and daughter, who both were wearing these dark sunglasses which covered half of their head. As I have observed, these large, square shaped, with rounded corner glasses have become more popular over the last year. These are the type of glasses which will be seen on a VH1 program ten years from now where the show will whisk the audience back in time and highlight all of the silly and crazy trademarks of the decade.

It is not all that unusual to see a couple of women sporting a pair of fancy new sunglasses but what stood out to me as strange was the flight started out at 8:50PM when it is obviously dark outside. The flight gave me some time to catch up on a book I have been reading about Native American culture so I did not pay too much attention to the ladies on my right hand side. Upon landing and peeking across the two seats out the window to see the lights of the airport I noticed the two women were both still wearing those fancy glasses. I pondered for a little while why they were still sporting those huge glasses while it was dark out. Were they superstars who did not want to be recognized? Did they just have an eye surgery which prevented them from being exposed to extreme light without damage to their eyes? Were they hiding from some one else who was also on the plane? Were they aliens with strange pupil shapes and they did not want anyone to notice? Anyone’s guess is as good as mine. I still remain perplexed why both of them felt it important to keep their shades on after it was completely dark out. This is one of the mysteries I considered while jogging 3 miles tonight.

Donny World is located in Briones Valley California.  We spent most of the 4Th there where we enjoyed sliding down the massive slides in Donny Pascal’s back yard.  Here is a shot of Dave and I just about to reach the bottom of the slide.  Amber has more shots on her site at www.asistersvoice.com

Looking at the thermostat today and seeing 105 degrees assures me that summer is finally here. I think that if I could live in this type of weather year round I will have died and gone to heaven.

The fourth of July has come and gone. The day was spectacular! It was a good time to reflect on the wonders of freedom and the options which are opened up by its liberating choices. Dave’s family came along for an early monring ski run. It was nice to see his kids behind the boat with smiles on their faces. I had a few good runs and Monica got a great shot of me which I have included in this post.