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Another message from the YOU AIN’T NOTHIN’ BUT A HOUND DOG PRESIDENT T THIS IS HILARIOUS! ...BUT I DON’T GET IT... of he Fourth of July means many things to many people in the United States but regardless of how patriotic you may or may not feel in 2012 with Taxmageddon just around the corner, there is no denying that the United States is the only country in the history of the World with a known birthday. Greece, Italy, England, Kenya, anyone? Feel free to offer a guess – and search the InterWeb if you dare — but no “birth certificate” will be found and surely not the “long form”. Our “birth notice” is on file in The Smithsonian for daily viewing…not locked away in some file cabinet in Honolulu or Nairobi…and is known as the “Declaration of Independence” authored by William “Mild Bill” Colden’s boyhood friend Thomas Jefferson himself, and signed by 55 others, most notably Benjamin Franklin, John Adams, and John Hancock, who after signing proclaimed “I guess King George will be able to read that!”. Less notable signers include Button Gwinnett from Georgia and Caesar Rodney from Delaware…but do not despair if this is news to you, even 44 didn’t get this question right on his citizenship test. When told he did not get a perfect score, he was so angry he missed a three foot putt. Unfortunately, most graduates of a U.S. high school or college today, upon waking up around 2 p.m. in their old room at Mom and Dad’s house, will learn that “Independence Day” is America’s birthday, but only because all of their “Friends” wished it so on Faceplant. Of course you will recall from your study of U.S. history – via Jeff Spicoli from “Fast Times at Ridgemont High” – “what Jefferson was saying was, hey, you know, we left this England place 'cause it was bogus, so if we don't get some cool rules ourselves - pronto we'll just be bogus too!” And then you remembered before heading out to blow off a finger or two with your homemade fireworks, that you actually do know at least one signer of the Declaration of Independence, but for the wrong reasons – Samuel “Sam” Adams. GIVE ME 4 MORE YEARS AND I PROMISE… I’LL BE REALLY GOOD AT GOLF B RADY’s most coveted award handed out at our Christmas Party each year is the Non-Einstein Award, given to the employee who performs an act of idiocy that truly demands special recognition. A few years ago the award was changed to the Sean Manning Award, given his unbelievable but sadly true victory streak that spanned eight years. Gretchen Prouty mercifully ended the streak when she won in a landslide in 2007 for her clever placement of a meatloaf recipe inside of a bound set of 90% complete specifications that were sent to the Rancho California Water District for their final review. Hand written comments we received from the District back then included, “Contractor shall provide meatloaf to the inspector on a daily basis, prior to the start of work,” and in response to a line item for Swedish Meat Balls, “is this an ‘or equal’”? Sean returned to form and recaptured the award once again in 2011, but now that we have some new WOOPS… WRONG BEAGLE greenhorn engineers in the house, the competition is becoming stiffer. An early contender for 2012 is Brett Patterson. When a company-wide email asked for a preference for the next morning of either donuts or bagels as an office treat, in a matter of seconds Brett enthusiastically responded that he preferred “BEGALS!!!!”… fortunately not the four legged kind once strapped in a cage to the roof of Ritt Momney’s car. Congratulations Brett on this important recognition in your stellar first year at BRADY, your employWELCOME TO DA CLUB, ee file is becoming quite thick in record time. Keep up the good work! BRETT! FINALLY—POSITIVE PROOF OF GLOBAL WARMING! ALOHA, MR. HAND! Of course living in a democracy requires that every four years America has to endure the torturous but hilarious process of electing someone for the worst job in the world – the President of the United States. Seriously, who truly wants this job? It was recently reported that a man jumped the White House fence, but after a brief chase, the Secret Service was able to talk President Obama into coming back and finishing his term. Good thing for us as he is the 4th best President in history. Between filling out his Final Four bracket live on man’s other best friend, ESPN, and endless appearances to deliver stand-up comedy on “The View” and “Oprah”, who has time to be President? He’s been such a crack up lately that even if he loses in November, he has been promised “The Tonight Show” in 2013. Memo to 44 – no matter how many times you appear on Oprah’s show, she won’t give you $14 trillion dollars. In the meantime, the typical American voter wants a candidate “I SEE NOTHING WRONG WITH BEING IN LOVE WITH SOMEONE OF THE SAME GENDER.“ who was born out of an apple pie, in the middle of a corn A picture that says 1000 words – Global Warming is for real, no question about it…other than Homer Simpson remains unconvinced. And if the picture is not enough to convince you, Barbra Streisand recently told Diane Sawyer on ABC News that “we're in a global warming crisis, and we can expect more and more intense storms, droughts and dust bowls”. But before they act, experts say they're still waiting to hear from Celine Dion. Ahnuld the former Governator also spoke about the dangers of global warming recently. His exact words were: “fire, hot, bad”. But for engineers, this is good, as it might just be what the doctor ordered for what used to be a great career choice. Of course we can lower the temperature here in the U.S. dramatically just by switching from Fahrenheit to Celsius, but this will only work until 2050, the year that experts say the world will be out of party ice. And then there will be a lot of angry people...most notable, Rick Brady. But on the good news front, they also predict by 2015 that Hillary Clinton might actually thaw out! IF GLOBAL WARMING IS REALLY MELTING THE POLAR ICE CAPS, THEN WHY ARE THE KLONDIKE BARS IN MY FREEZER STILL FROZEN? John McCain may have been a decorated Navy pilot and a prisoner of war, but he never single-handedly fought Aliens to defend and save his beloved U.S. of A. On November 6, join BRADY in a write-in campaign: Thomas J. Whitmore for President! Even President Obama said “it’s the right thing to do”! “Good morning. In less than an hour, aircraft from here will join others from around the world. And you will be launching the largest aerial battle in the history of mankind. ‘Mankind.’ That word should have new meaning for all of us today. We can't be consumed by our petty differences anymore. We will be united in our common interests. Perhaps it's fate that today is the Fourth of July, and you will once again be fighting for our freedom... Not from tyranny, oppression, or persecution... but from annihilation. We are fighting for our right to live. To exist. And should we win the day, the Fourth of July will no longer be known as an American holiday, but as the day the world declared in one voice: ‘We will not go quietly into the night!’ We will not vanish without a fight! We're going to live on! We're going to survive! Today we celebrate our Independence Day!” 2C, OR NOT 2C, THAT IS THE QUESTION SALE ON RACCOON FOOTLONGS—$4! IS SEAN WEARING EAU DE RACCOON AGAIN? A top contender for the best movie President is Peter Sellers in “Dr. Strangelove”, with arguably the best movie President name ever – Merkin Muffley...that unfortunately sounds a bit too close to Ritt Momney. But the BRADY choice for the best movie President of All-Times is Bill Pullman as Thomas J. Whitmore in “Independence Day”. President Whitmore is leading a society potentially doomed by a disaster of another kind – Aliens from Outer Space! Perhaps a much better way to select a President is to let Hollywood do it. Hollywood has had many great actors portray Presidents on the Silver Screen, and we actually once elected an actor to be a real President – Ronald Reagan. By most accounts, this turned out pretty well for America. John Wayne would make a great President today. Even today you look at a picture of John Wayne and you know exactly where he stood. Back then Democrats used to make fun of Republicans (i.e. Democrats with money) as the “John Wayne Party”, led by Guns and Moses himself, Charlton Heston. There is no doubt that our dual-cover model, John “Duke” Wayne, would make a great President in 2012. field in Iowa, while Toby Keith sings the National Anthem. In the end, we get to cast our final vote for two nearly equally uninspiring candidates by sorting through which image is worse – eating dog or taking your dog on vacation, in a cage while strapped to the roof of a car. CARL “TUF ENUF” RUF C oming out of our Charlotte…err Matthews, NC office…but we were well prepared…as this is just another story about a man named Sean (Manning), BRADY’s Vice President in charge of our “Matthews” office, an engineer, who barely keeps his family fed…even on a six figure salary. Sadly, this is what happens when you cross Shakespeare with Jed Clampett. Sean recently informed BRADY’s World Domination Headquarters in San Diego that we’ve grown so large on our “Southern Frontier” that it was time to pack up and move. We were wishin’ and a hopin’ that while Sean was out shootin’ at some food, he might come across some bubblin’ crude. Oil that is, black gold, Texas Tea. Turns out Sean didn’t listen to his kinfolk who said “Sean, move away from there”, that “Californy was the place to be.” So, instead of loading up the truck to move to Beverly…Hills that is, cement ponds, movie stars…Sean did make a move. He allegedly tossed a dead raccoon as far as he could down the hallway of our current Class C office building, and where it landed was in front of office “2C”, so “2C” is now where “we be”. As before, at least our new spacious office is on the top floor (as in the second, but nearly a decade since our original move-in still retains the title as the tallest building in Matthews), and of course still sits almost directly over a Subway sandwich store. And as before: memo to the DCAA, Jared said $5 foot-longs are allowable! Feel free to stop in and see Sean, Jeff “Jethro” Johnson and their “staff” (Rich Riser, Ty Corley, Jennifer Funk, and Izzy the dog). They will likely thank you fer kindly droppin’ in, and they’ll surely invite you back to their locality, to have a heapin’ helpin’ of their hospitality. And you can take your shoes off. As Sean said to Rick Brady on his last visit, “Y’all come back now, y’hear?” Rick was reported to say on his way out the door, “Whether ‘tis nobler in the mind to suffer, the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune, or to take arms against a sea of troubles”. We all guess you had to be there… In related news from the Southern Frontier, new staff assigned to Office 2C include Robert Manning (yes, related to Sean, aren’t they all?), Mike Clark, Kevin Clark (no relation), Carl Ruf, and Craig Colligan. Sean has also hired another brilliant intern, Caitlin Purvis, primarily because she is incredibly cheap to have on board, working for the non-negotiable BRADY offer of two Subway $5 foot-longs per day of service. According to the JETHRO “SHOELESS JEFF” JOHNSON “locals”, Caitlin is from the FayetteYO QUIERO BRADY! ville, NC area and is currently pursuing a Civil Engineering degree from the University of North Carolina Charlotte (UNCC). Ask Mr. Google Maps himself if you also have never heard of either locality. BREAKING NEWS—BRADY/FLUOR LLC AWARDED $250,000,000 AIR FORCE CONTRACT! J YOU AIN’T SEEN NOTHING YET W ust minutes before going to print, we were notified of the following: “Brady-Fluor L.L.C., San Diego, Calif., (FA4800-12-D-002) are being awarded a $250,000,000 indefinite-delivery/indefinite-quantity contract to provide various construction projects. The location of the performance is Joint Base Langley-Eustis, VA., to include any federal institution in the Hampton Roads area of VA. The contracting activity is the 633rd Contracting Squadron, Langley Air Force Base, VA.” More to follow in the next edition of The Quote! In the meantime, the perfect way to celebrate at BRADY—dogpile! WHERE SIT HAPPENS, PART DEUX O nce again, at BRADY of course, as we have passed another major milestone in the wide wide world of business. Fluor may claim to be 100 years old (no truth to the rumor they were founded in Hawaii in 1912), but at BRADY we can now proudly claim our own “century” mark of significance, as in the all-important 100+ employee count. And due to the fortunate date of our creation in 1999, with two worn out nickels in Rick Brady’s front pocket and an empty bottle of Grey Goose in the back, the math cannot be denied: we have survived the darkness and we’re now into our third decade and second century of business! It took all of 13 years to go from 1 to 100, and in one tick of the clock, as in 11:59:59 p.m. on June 30th to 12:00 midnight on July 1st, BRADY now has 28 new employees in Jacksonville, FL “NEWT SKYWALKER SAYS WE SHOULD OPEN AN bringing our company wide total to 130. And according OFFICE HERE” to our Austrian educated Bean Counters (Crystal Kolland and Richard DeVos, to name them both) in our Bean Counting Department, we’re comfortably holding steady at five nickels and growing, with a few newly minted Obama nickels on the upside, though sadly we’re up to three thousand empty Grey Goose bottles...and counting. While some Americans are heading for their finished-just-in-time million dollar condos built in abandoned nuclear missile silos “somewhere” in North Dakota, shopping along the way for wind-up radios, gas masks, freeze dried ice cream, and solar powered flash lights, BRADY staff is now quietly working hard on really hard engineering stuff in eleven U.S. states, two planets, and one moon. In the meantime, while panic reigns supreme, we at BRADY prefer to “Keep Calm and Carry On”…as long as we have our stocked to the rafters New Zealand warehouse full of cheese and crackers. The location of the Grey Goose will remain a secret. BEANS, BEANS, THE MAGICAL FRUIT EAT OUR CHEETOS DUST! ith zero connection to the rock song performed by Bachman-Turner Overdrive (BTO for those of us who lived through the 70’s but wished we never did), here’s a story about a man named Charles “Chete” Bell, former BRADY employee and long-time good friend of the entire BRADY family. Chete is the very proud father of three very extraordinary and extremely athletically gifted children: 15 year old twins Joshuah and Jason and 13 year old daughter Jhalisa. At the USA Youth Outdoor Track and Field Championships held on June 26Th through July 1st at the University of Texas – Arlington, the Bell children competed for the BRADY sponsored “Temecula Valley Time Machine” track team. The rest is history… Over the course of the five days with an average on MICHAEL JACKSON & track temperature around 100 degrees F with equivaTHE OSMOND BROTHERS rd lent humidity, the Bell Boys ran two of the four legs and finished 3 in the 4x800 meter relay with a time of 8:31.59. The very next day Joshuah finished second in the 800 meter run in a photo finish, with a blistering time of 2:00.29. Yes, two minutes, not two hours, second fastest time in the whole U.S. of A for a 15 year old. On July 29th, Jason and Joshuah ran two of four legs in the 4x400 meter relay and finished in 4th place with a time of 3:30.42. This coincidentally is the same time that it takes for the Average American to eat an extra-large hot dog stuffed crust meat lovers pizza and drink a six pack of PBR, solo. Not to be outdone, sister Jhalisa’s relay team finished in 8th place in the 4x400 meter relay with a time of 4:24.95. Once again, these are races for the fastest times in the U.S., not the fastest time your drunk uncles clocked in the three legged race during GET YOUR OWN! your backyard 4th of July BBQ. As Joshuah was asked after his last race if he “had a match”, he of course answered “not since Superman died”. We at BRADY are very proud to have sponsored these amazing athletes, and we have no doubt that “Baby, you just ain’t seen na, na, nothin’ yet”. Next up, the 2020 Olympics to be held...in San Diego…Texas! HAIL MARY A s in Mary Innamorato, one of BRADY’s great young “moment chasers” i.e. structural engineers, with a house now full of dirty diapers, but fortunately Danny is with thee. Mary and Danny became the proud parents of healthy son Number 2, Zachary (Zack), born on “May Day” as in May 1st, 2012 at 6 lb. Zack joins Big Brother Alexander, who celeMOTHER MARY 19 oz., and 19 inches long. brated birthday Number 2 on June 1. Let the endless battles of bumps, bruises, and tears of the brothers begin! Seriously, congratulations to Mary once again, you are only six away from OctoMom status. Rumor has it that Mary made more than a few “Mayday Mayday Mayday” calls from her hospital room, and continues to make a few 2 a.m. calls from behind her locked bathroom door. Memo Number 2 (and we don’t NICE SHIRT, mean Zack’s hourly Number 2s) to Mary and Danny: according to the GIRLY MAN! WhiteHouseLeaks, Mayday is an emergency procedure word used internationally as a distress signal. It derives from the fighting slogan of the French military unfortunately all too familiar to the United States, “Venez M’aider”, meaning “come help me”. Making a false distress Mayday call in the United States is a federal crime carrying time in the “Big House” up to 30 years and a fine of $5,000,000 dollars, which coincidentally is the time and cost it will take to raise your new son to adulthood. And with two boys two years apart in age, you might want to add ““Emergency Room” to your speed dial, while stocking up on Band-Aids and Ben Gay! FOOL ME ONCE SPANDEX MUCH? A s former President George W. Bush once famously blurted: "There's an old saying in Tennessee — I know it's in Texas, probably in Tennessee — that says, fool me once, shame on — shame on you. Fool me — you can't get fooled again." You would think that Rick Brady would have heeded Dubya’s advice in 2007 when he entered his first Executive Challenge Ironman event and finished dead last, as in 15th place out of 15 Executive Challenge competitors. Fool me once. Low and behold Rick decides that once was not enough, and secretly entered Ironman event No. 2 held right down the street from World Domination Headquarters…in Mallorca, Spain. Surrounded by nearly 2,400 Eurozone competitors, Rick managed to garner the award for the most double-takes as he was sporting the only sleeveless wetsuit in the “swim”, rode the only rental bike in the “bike”, and completed the “run” wearing shoes purchased at Costco while wearing a golf hat. It is not that Rick is cheap, but he is the only person alive to have driven the same VW bug to both his high school graduation and 10 year reunion party. Fortunately Rick does not understand “European”, so the words of non-encouragement went right over his oversized head, though fellow competitor and brother-in-law Alexander Perauer’s ears reportedly caught on fire. To the surprise of everyone here at BRADY, Rick somehow managed to finish in second place this time around (out of a reported field of three, in the “Geezer Class”), which earned him a spot in the Ironman 70.3 World Championship in Las Vegas on September 9th. Sadly, this is a true story, check it out at www.ironman.com if you share our disbelief, and given this event is only for serious Ironman competitors/ winners of 2012 events, it does appear that an- I CAN’T FEEL MY LEGS! other last place finish is in Rick’s future. He did return home with a nice trophy, his first trophy win of any kind since he finished last in his 4th grade Square Dance contest. Nice job Rick – don’t forget to stop by Costco in Temecula on your way to Vegas to pick up a Hello Kitty single speed beach cruiser complete with a front basket, an “out-of-my way” toot-toot horn, handle bar streamers and flowers, and a rear mounted flag – so we can easily spot you while you are being lapped on the bike course. And to protect us from the likely ugly results on September 9th, remember that what happens in Vegas, stays in Vegas! LET THEM EAT CAKE… AND ICE CREAM W e all know the public sector is “doing fine” with 44 in the lead creating new jobs left and left, and we’re not even counting the soon to be hired 16,500 new IRS employees. Very quietly and with zero fanfare, BRADY continues to create a whole bunch of new jobs in our Hampton Roads office led by Bill “Mild Bill” Colden. According to Bill, the projects we have completed of late have been “pretty vanilla”, but vanilla happens to be Rick Brady’s, as well as Ritt Momney’s, favorite flavor. Of course Rick’s preference goes to back in the day when he was in the 4th grade, when making ice had just been invented, and Baskin Robbins had only one flavor – vanilla. In between finishing jobs left and left while racking up a stack of outstanding performance reviews and Star Safety Awards, Hampton Roads’ BRADY staff has managed a few extracurricular activities such as volunteering for the SAME Fisher House Project (the equivalent of the Ronald McDonald House of the Military Hospital System, without the calories). The Fisher House project provides a place for military families to stay while their loved ones are receiving hospital care. And for the second consecutive year in a row, we also managed to squeeze in another sponsorship of a local Little League Juggernaut, the BRADY “Orioles”, once again managed by part-time “America’s Got Talent” competitor, Little League coaching whiz, and full-time BRADY Superintendent Glenn Waldschlager. Though we can’t afford ESPN’s Little League Channel, we are confident the Orioles went undefeated for the second consecutive year in a row. We are also confident that not only did each player receive a trophy, but a puppy as well. It was clearly the right thing to do. Congratulations, Glenn! PERSONALLY, I PREFER CHOCOLATE Note to Bill for next year: Elaine Nelson, BRADY’s HR Manager, says we may have violated Federal I PREFER NEOPOLITAN! Government Frozen Food and Farm Dairy Law by stating our favorite ice cream flavor is vanilla. Apparently we need to purchase our ice cream from a store buying diverse dairy products from farms paying a minimum wage for domesticated farm animals. President Obama said he would sign the pending bill, even though it currently does not have the regulations he had pushed for to discourage gender-based discrimination in the farmyard. Thanks Bill – we can’t wait for our next six figure fine. Good thing we all have free health care on the way! WE ALL SCREAM FOR ICE CREAM! OH WELL, NUMBER 14 IT IS... T he local ranking of the largest engineering firms in San Diego is always a “big deal” here in Ron Burgundy’s home town. Last year we made a huge leap from the 9th largest local firm in 2010…to the 12th largest in 2011…that we described as the George Costanza “shrinkage” phenomenon. Fast forward to 2012. Revenue is up 68%. Check. Staff size has grown by 42%. Check. We’ve moved from the 12th largest firm…to the 14th largest? Uncheck and WTF? Thanks Rick Brady for leading us in the wrong direction once again, we should be the 16th largest this time next year. Parsons somehow managed to claim 1st place over AECOM and UR Next – it looks like their mergers and acquisition bank accounts have sprung some Titanic size leaks. In classic engineering techno babble, a spokesman from Parsons uttered to the press: “our increase in staff was a result of reclassifying transient assignments from the previous year”, but then again, clearly something is up as the private sector, according to the White House, is “doing fine”. What a surprise, we at BRADY did not know that communist China has a private sector, but it does make sense. We also can’t be sure if Parsons hired a bunch of short term transients or if it is just Government Math at work once again, but with his “not have way” with words, Mr. Parsons should run for President! I LOVE BRADY...AND SCOTCH! WE STILL BELIEVE IN ZERO N AVFAC presents Star Safety Awards to contractors for exceptional performance in the area of safety. In the past few months, BRADY has received three separate awards celebrating our organizational commitment to safety. As written by our new in-house snob (see “Riche Man, Poore Man”) and Safety Man Extraordinaire, Dallas Poore, MBA: “It’s always nice to have good news to share on the safety front. In May, BRADY received a Certificate of Commendation for Safety Excellence by the Associated General Contractors of America in celebration of our corporate safety record. Two BRADY project teams also received STAR Safety Awards for the P401 Replace Fuel Storage Facilities, Point Loma, CA; and Replace Reservoir Roof 200814, Camp Pendleton, CA. The P401 project also celebrated 900 days without a single lost time incident. BRADY would like to thank our key teaming partners, Nova Group, Inc./Underground Construction Co., a Joint MAYDAY! MAYDAY! MAYDAY! Venture; and Joint Venture partner RQ Construction – as well as our stellar subcontractors - for their outstanding teaming efforts and genuine concern for employee safety. We are all in this together!” On the other left coast, our Hampton Roads office has also been recognized by the U.S. Navy for 50,000 consecutive hours in a row of not a single hour of lost time. Fortunately they are not aware of the injury Rick Brady sustained at our Mad Men party on April 3rd, when he fell backwards over a stack of drawings on the floor of Mike “Mount” Slawson’s cubicle, but we are happy to report that he did not spill a single drop of vodka out of his red party cup. RICHE MAN, POORE MAN O r should we say Snob Alert II? More big news recently reported from Santee, CA, the little town 20 miles down the 52 freeway from La Jolla: Dallas Poore, former Captain in the U.S.M.C. and our Go-To-Guy for everything no one else wants to do, is now Dallas Poore, Master of Business Administration Graduate of the Business School at the greatest college south of the I8 freeway, San Diego State University. Dallas managed to squeeze in his MBA studies between juggling his two kids (Devil Dog Corbin and Little Princess Kyla), Queen and wife Laura, while also working at his primary job (Safety Man Extraordinaire) and working on his other true love and secondary job (professional photography)…and taking care of other important duties such as creating the The Quote cover as well as tending to vodka spills left over from the weekly “Mad Men” party (4 p.m. Thursdays) in Rick Brady’s cube at World Domination Headquarters. Oh well, as of June 16, 2012, he is now a certified “State” man, with a giant diploma to prove it. Looks like we’ll need to order another “Rick Brady Class” oversized hard hat to fit his swelled head due to his newly enlarged brain. Hopefully “learnin’ how to do all that cypherin’ of dem big numbers” will pay off for us and Dallas both – it looks like his days in the Poore House will soon be over. Congratulations Smarty Pants, we are proud of you – feel free to order that cement pond for your backyard! BLUE HAWAII W e are happy to report that no sooner than we’ve arrived on the scene to save the day in Jacksonville, FL (see “Some Like it Wet”), LTJG and Naval Aviator Jeremy Anderson has flown the coop out of JAX and is on his way to serve the Red, White and Blue in Kaneohe Bay, Hawaii. Hawaii will be his home for the next 3-4 years, more than enough time to do recon on each and every bar in the Aloha State. On his way to Hawaii he made a short stop in San Diego to enjoy the Survival Escape Resistance and Evasion (S.E.R.E.) School located in Warner Springs, CA, just outside of San Diego. Oddly enough, BRADY is also working at S.E.R.E Camp, designing and building a $2,670,548 sewage treatment plant replacement project. So goes the life of the “turd herder” wastewater/sanitary engineer, though it appears the old engineering saying is true: “there really is gold in sewers...as well as a bunch of Baby Ruths”. According to our own Jim Bowen, there was enough money in the BRADY budget to allow Sean Sudol to bury a few strategically located bags of Cheetos and six packs of PBR for Jeremy to “discover” while “training”, thereby improving his survival/ passing chances...as if he truly needed it. In the end, he passed with flying colors, blindfolded and barefoot, with both arms tied behind his back, though he was unable to explain his Cheetos “Agent Orange” colored teeth and beer breath to his Commanding Officer. His last words on his way to Hawaii: “Eat my Cheetos dust!” EIGHT IS ENOUGH A s in eight (8) straight years of finishing dead last as the worst place to “do business” in the United States, just ahead of North Korea, Nigeria and The Congo…the time has come to say “adios, hasta la vista”, Ahnuld the Governator style to the Golden State once known as…the Golden State. Even Ahnuld said “Do it now, Kalifornia is for Girly Men!”. It is clearly time to get out of Dodge as a recent report on Global Warming predicts that most of the left coast of America, as in Californy, will be under water by the year 2100. Oddly enough, the other left coast of America will not be affected. Sounds like more Government Funded Science at work. For now, it is perfectly clear that all roads to common sense for business now lead out of California, so we’re loading up the truck and moving, not to Beverly, but instead to the Numero Uno state to conduct business, as in eight (8) straight years…Texas. Dick Van Patten, Special Counsel to BRADY, declared that “Eight is Enough” and even 44 himself agreed in his twice daily personal fundraising phone call to Rick Brady that “it is the right thing to do”. With BRADY revenue now almost evenly split between the two left coasts, with new and exciting, regulation free work now underway in Texas with Big Brother Fluor; with Corporate Fluor now also located in Irving, TX for the last seven years; and with the Jacksonville (see “Some Like it Wet”) BOS contract now in motion, a more central and business friendly place to re-call “home of the free, land of the brave” is clearly no longer “The Land of Fruits and Nuts”. BRADY will still remain firmly anchored in our World Domination Headquarters in San Diego, truly the World’s Finest City unfortunately located in the Country’s Worst State, but BRADY, as in Rick and Crystal, will now be calling a Dallas condo home. Of course with Global Warming heating up the U.S. like a fried egg on a Dallas sidewalk in July, Yuma will soon lay claim to the title of America’s Finest City. The decision is irreversible – we’ve already turned in our Birkenstocks and pulled the dog out of therapy, and we’ve already been to Costco in Temecula for our cowboy boots and hats (set of six each, of course). Rick’s annual presence in southern Californy will remain unchanged as he is already out of MAMAS, DON’T LET YOUR BABIES GROW town for more than six months out of UP TO BE NERDY ENGINEERS each and every year, traveling around the world in search of opportunities that were once plentiful in Californy. It GOVERNOR McFLY? takes a fair amount of time to go to ANYBODY HOME? the Moon and back, but unfortunately about as much time as it takes to drive in a Prius from San Diego to Los Angeles. Wish us luck as we lay claim to another office location and state to do “bizness”, our 11th and counting. Looking forward to trying some armadillo tacos, Texas Tea, hanging out nightly at Billy Bob’s in Fort Worth, and drinking Lone Stars at the Broken Spoke in Austin! HOW DO YOU LIKE DEM ORANGES? N ews Flash: BRADY’s Orange County office in Surf City U.S.A. (Huntington Beach for all of you east of the left coast) is now BRADY’s fourth largest office! Of course, we only have four official offices servicing 11 U.S. states, but there is no doubt that our Charlotte err Matthews office is now looking over their collective left and left shoulders as the TRex now known as “World Domination Headquarters, The OC” is rapidly gaining ground. Even with Howard Johnson spending 8 days a week with Casey Cochran in Jacksonville, FL launching our BOS contract with Big Brother Fluor, Andree Johnson as the Lone Ranger is running marketing rings around what is left of our consulting engineering competition. New clients include the Municipal Water District of Orange County (MWDOC), HOWARD AND ANDREE: Foothill MWD, East Orange County Water District, Poseidon ReBRADY’S 2011 HALLOWEEN sources (the end is near, desalinated water will be delivered COSTUME CONTEST WINNERS sometime this century!), the City of Buena Park, and Laguna Beach County Water District. The lineup of new clients stretches from what will soon be left of the left coast of California to the soon to be America’s Finest City, Yuma AZ. We are clearly one Johnson away from taking over the entire Orange County engineering services market. If your last name is Johnson, regardless of your experience, though a great attitude is required as well as a strong liver, feel free to send us your resume! One felony is acceptable, according to our HR Manager Elaine Nelson, but the work day begins at 7 a.m. and often ends at 2 a.m., likely either at the Swinging Door, the Green Girl, the Salty Dog, or the Fling, the KEN DILLS AT THE OC’s finest dive bars. Welcome to BRADY’s Old School of Business! SWINGING DOOR SEE YOU AT THE SALTY DOG! MARATHON MAN I NEVER SHOULD HAVE STOPPED FOR THAT NUMBER 2! S cott Shroyer, P.E., one of our great young structural engineers in our San Diego office, has spent the better part of 2012 running around North Island NAS managing a multi-million dollar water line design-build project for the U.S. Navy. All that on the job “training” paid off nicely as Scott competed in the Rock and Roll Marathon aka “Worst Parade Ever” in San Diego on June 3rd. Scott’s offi“WHERE’S THE NEAREST cial finishing time was 3:13:03 minutes, an epic perforSUBWAY?” mance for 99% of the world outside of Kenya, but sadly Scott fell short of his goal of qualifying for the Boston Marathon. Apparently, a time of 3:05:00 is the cut-off. So, a 7:22 pace while finishing 154th out of 7,106 runners is not good enough? Coincidentally, this is the same pace of the Average American…as timed from the couch to the refrigerator and back. At least you “I RECOMMEND THE GREEN beat Oprah (4:29:15, check the InterLINE!” Web if you also find this to be unbelievable) and remember, toenails are for sissies. Scott plans to give it another shot next year, but in the meantime, might we suggest the Rosie Ruiz (2:31:56) method, though unfortunately there is no subway in San Diego. Trolley, perhaps? Good luck next year, slow poke! HE AIN’T HEAVY... H e’s my brother (with apologies to the Hollies and their 1969 No. 1 pop hit). Per SNL 44 Impersonator Extraordinaire Dale “Let Me Be Perfectly Clear” Barnard, “he” means Fluor Corporation, and “brother” is loosely defined as our “Big Brother” in the U.S. Government’s Mentor-Protégé Program…not the “brother” from anNO, WE AIN’T THE BEATLES! other mother (you know who you are up there in the OC), or the “brother” serving five-to-ten in the Big House for violating the three strikes “ain’t” law per Rick Brady’s mother: “It ain’t proper to say ain’t three times a day because it ain’t necessary”. Apparently, you needed to be there in the 1960’s to get the joke. Though “he” as in Fluor may be a bit old, as in 100 years, and perhaps a bit heavy (40,000 employees and growing), and sometimes referred to as moving at the speed of a glacier with the THE REAL FAB FOUR turning radius of a U.S. Aircraft Carrier…it is perfectly clear that we at BRADY are very proud to be associated with one of the greatest companies ever founded in the United States. Being a “glacier” is not a bad thing; they take millions of years to form and every now and then an iceberg pops loose and a big ship springs a leak as a result…one in particular from 1912 comes to mind. Glaciers sculpt mountains and carve valleys over periods much longer than 100 years, representing an irresistible force that even Al Gore can’t stop. The U.S. Aircraft Carrier, from the Midway and the Kitty Hawk to the Nimitz and the Lincoln, from the Yorktown and the Hornet to the Enterprise and the Reagan, is the greatest demonstration of power, security, and good will in our lifetimes. Need help anywhere in the world – call the U.S. Navy. Misbehave anywhere in the world – answer to the U.S. Navy. Need to do the imKNOCK, KNOCK! possible by tomorrow anywhere in the world – call Fluor. For better or worse, Fluor is both the Glacier and the Aircraft Carrier. BRADY is a single Snowflake and a Boston Whaler by comparison. Hopefully in 87 years we at BRADY can make Fluor proud. Congratulations to Fluor on reaching 100 years, and thank you for allowing BRADY to be present at the Big Birthday Bash in Dallas on April 21, 2012 (thank you Ray Barnard for the great box seats!). Rick Hendrick was thrilled that we were able to bring George Hamilton to the Party! SOME LIKE IT WET B RADY is pleased to announce that we are “doing fine” as our BOS contract win with Big Brother Fluor is official and the work is now underway. As of July 1, 2012, BRADY has added twenty four (24) fulltime staff and three (3) part-timers to operate the water, wastewater, and cement ponds for the Navy’s Facilities in Jacksonville and Mayport, FL. The BRADY team who negotiated with our new BFF’s at IBEW Local Union 177 to put all the pieces together for our largest contract win to date, as in $37,810,258, spanning up to eight (8) years: Vice Presidents Howard Johnson, Sean Manning, Scott Reilly, and Don Whittaker; Controller Richard DeVos; and our entire Human Resources Department, consisting of three…Elaine Nelson, Pam Blum and Jessica Winchester…and most importantly, “our boots on the ground” leader and the newest biggest fan of the soon to be Super Bowl Champs (San Diego Chargers), Harold Keith aka “Casey” Cochran. There is joy in Mudville after all, as our own Casey/Babe Ruth is now at bat. According to the “Government”, BRADY “will be responsible for operating and maintaining five water and wastewater treatment plants up to 3 million gallons per day capacity, over 90 sewer lift stations, over 750,000 linear feet of water distribution and sewer collection piping systems including potable wells, pump stations, water storage reservoirs, valves, fire hydrants, pressure reducing valves, backflow preventers, meters and manholes, and five large cement ponds”…and taking care of an occasional visit from a U.S. Aircraft Carrier, SAN DIEGO SUPER CHARGERS Fluor Class. But we at BRADY say yay for the cement ponds, but don’t blame us if you come across an occasional Baby Ruth! I SMELL A CHANGE ORDER! ATTACK OF THE ZACK NUMBER 2 TORPEDO LAUNCH! HE AIN’T HEAVY... H e’s my brother (with apologies to the Hollies and their 1969 No. 1 pop hit). Per SNL 44 Impersonator Extraordinaire Dale “Let Me Be Perfectly Clear” Barnard, “he” means Fluor Corporation, and “brother” is loosely defined as our “Big Brother” in the U.S. Government’s Mentor-Protégé Program…not the “brother” from anNO, WE AIN’T THE BEATLES! other mother (you know who you are up there in the OC), or the “brother” serving five-to-ten in the Big House for violating the three strikes “ain’t” law per Rick Brady’s mother: “It ain’t proper to say ain’t three times a day because it ain’t necessary”. Apparently, you needed to be there in the 1960’s to get the joke. Though “he” as in Fluor may be a bit old, as in 100 years, and perhaps a bit heavy (40,000 employees and growing), and sometimes referred to as moving at the speed of a glacier with the THE REAL FAB FOUR turning radius of a U.S. Aircraft Carrier…it is perfectly clear that we at BRADY are very proud to be associated with one of the greatest companies ever founded in the United States. Being a “glacier” is not a bad thing; they take millions of years to form and every now and then an iceberg pops loose and a big ship springs a leak as a result…one in particular from 1912 comes to mind. Glaciers sculpt mountains and carve valleys over periods much longer than 100 years, representing an irresistible force that even Al Gore can’t stop. The U.S. Aircraft Carrier, from the Midway and the Kitty Hawk to the Nimitz and the Lincoln, from the Yorktown and the Hornet to the Enterprise and the Reagan, is the greatest demonstration of power, security, and good will in our lifetimes. Need help anywhere in the world – call the U.S. Navy. Misbehave anywhere in the world – answer to the U.S. Navy. Need to do the imKNOCK, KNOCK! possible by tomorrow anywhere in the world – call Fluor. For better or worse, Fluor is both the Glacier and the Aircraft Carrier. BRADY is a single Snowflake and a Boston Whaler by comparison. Hopefully in 87 years we at BRADY can make Fluor proud. Congratulations to Fluor on reaching 100 years, and thank you for allowing BRADY to be present at the Big Birthday Bash in Dallas on April 21, 2012 (thank you Ray Barnard for the great box seats!). Rick Hendrick was thrilled that we were able to bring George Hamilton to the Party! SOME LIKE IT WET B RADY is pleased to announce that we are “doing fine” as our BOS contract win with Big Brother Fluor is official and the work is now underway. As of July 1, 2012, BRADY has added twenty four (24) fulltime staff and three (3) part-timers to operate the water, wastewater, and cement ponds for the Navy’s Facilities in Jacksonville and Mayport, FL. The BRADY team who negotiated with our new BFF’s at IBEW Local Union 177 to put all the pieces together for our largest contract win to date, as in $37,810,258, spanning up to eight (8) years: Vice Presidents Howard Johnson, Sean Manning, Scott Reilly, and Don Whittaker; Controller Richard DeVos; and our entire Human Resources Department, consisting of three…Elaine Nelson, Pam Blum and Jessica Winchester…and most importantly, “our boots on the ground” leader and the newest biggest fan of the soon to be Super Bowl Champs (San Diego Chargers), Harold Keith aka “Casey” Cochran. There is joy in Mudville after all, as our own Casey/Babe Ruth is now at bat. According to the “Government”, BRADY “will be responsible for operating and maintaining five water and wastewater treatment plants up to 3 million gallons per day capacity, over 90 sewer lift stations, over 750,000 linear feet of water distribution and sewer collection piping systems including potable wells, pump stations, water storage reservoirs, valves, fire hydrants, pressure reducing valves, backflow preventers, meters and manholes, and five large cement ponds”…and taking care of an occasional visit from a U.S. Aircraft Carrier, SAN DIEGO SUPER CHARGERS Fluor Class. But we at BRADY say yay for the cement ponds, but don’t blame us if you come across an occasional Baby Ruth! I SMELL A CHANGE ORDER! ATTACK OF THE ZACK NUMBER 2 TORPEDO LAUNCH! s in eight (8) straight years of finishing dead last as the worst place to “do business” in the United States, just ahead of North Korea, Nigeria and The Congo…the time has come to say “adios, hasta la vista”, Ahnuld the Governator style to the Golden State once known as…the Golden State. Even Ahnuld said “Do it now, Kalifornia is for Girly Men!”. It is clearly time to get out of Dodge as a recent report on Global Warming predicts that most of the left coast of America, as in Californy, will be under water by the year 2100. Oddly enough, the other left coast of America will not be affected. Sounds like more Government Funded Science at work. For now, it is perfectly clear that all roads to common sense for business now lead out of California, so we’re loading up the truck and moving, not to Beverly, but instead to the Numero Uno state to conduct business, as in eight (8) straight years…Texas. Dick Van Patten, Special Counsel to BRADY, declared that “Eight is Enough” and even 44 himself agreed in his twice daily personal fundraising phone call to Rick Brady that “it is the right thing to do”. With BRADY revenue now almost evenly split between the two left coasts, with new and exciting, regulation free work now underway in Texas with Big Brother Fluor; with Corporate Fluor now also located in Irving, TX for the last seven years; and with the Jacksonville (see “Some Like it Wet”) BOS contract now in motion, a more central and business friendly place to re-call “home of the free, land of the brave” is clearly no longer “The Land of Fruits and Nuts”. BRADY will still remain firmly anchored in our World Domination Headquarters in San Diego, truly the World’s Finest City unfortunately located in the Country’s Worst State, but BRADY, as in Rick and Crystal, will now be calling a Dallas condo home. Of course with Global Warming heating up the U.S. like a fried egg on a Dallas sidewalk in July, Yuma will soon lay claim to the title of America’s Finest City. The decision is irreversible – we’ve already turned in our Birkenstocks and pulled the dog out of therapy, and we’ve already been to Costco in Temecula for our cowboy boots and hats (set of six each, of course). Rick’s annual presence in southern Californy will remain unchanged as he is already out of MAMAS, DON’T LET YOUR BABIES GROW town for more than six months out of UP TO BE NERDY ENGINEERS each and every year, traveling around the world in search of opportunities that were once plentiful in Californy. It GOVERNOR McFLY? takes a fair amount of time to go to ANYBODY HOME? the Moon and back, but unfortunately about as much time as it takes to drive in a Prius from San Diego to Los Angeles. Wish us luck as we lay claim to another office location and state to do “bizness”, our 11th and counting. Looking forward to trying some armadillo tacos, Texas Tea, hanging out nightly at Billy Bob’s in Fort Worth, and drinking Lone Stars at the Broken Spoke in Austin! EIGHT IS ENOUGH A HOW DO YOU LIKE DEM ORANGES? N SEE YOU AT THE SALTY DOG! ews Flash: BRADY’s Orange County office in Surf City U.S.A. (Huntington Beach for all of you east of the left coast) is now BRADY’s fourth largest office! Of course, we only have four official offices servicing 11 U.S. states, but there is no doubt that our Charlotte err Matthews office is now looking over their collective left and left shoulders as the TRex now known as “World Domination Headquarters, The OC” is rapidly gaining ground. Even with Howard Johnson spending 8 days a week with Casey Cochran in Jacksonville, FL launching our BOS contract with Big Brother Fluor, Andree Johnson as the Lone Ranger is running marketing rings around what is left of our consulting engineering competition. New clients include the Municipal Water District of Orange County (MWDOC), HOWARD AND ANDREE: Foothill MWD, East Orange County Water District, Poseidon ReBRADY’S 2011 HALLOWEEN sources (the end is near, desalinated water will be delivered COSTUME CONTEST WINNERS sometime this century!), the City of Buena Park, and Laguna Beach County Water District. The lineup of new clients stretches from what will soon be left of the left coast of California to the soon to be America’s Finest City, Yuma AZ. We are clearly one Johnson away from taking over the entire Orange County engineering services market. If your last name is Johnson, regardless of your experience, though a great attitude is required as well as a strong liver, feel free to send us your resume! One felony is acceptable, according to our HR Manager Elaine Nelson, but the work day begins at 7 a.m. and often ends at 2 a.m., likely either at the Swinging Door, the Green Girl, the Salty Dog, or the Fling, the OC’s finest dive bars. Welcome to BRADY’s Old School of Business! KEN DILLS AT THE SWINGING DOOR MARATHON MAN S I NEVER SHOULD HAVE STOPPED cott Shroyer, P.E., one of our great young structural engineers in our San FOR THAT NUMBER 2! Diego office, has spent the better part of 2012 running around North Island NAS managing a multi-million dollar water line design-build project for the U.S. Navy. All that on the job “training” paid off nicely as Scott competed in the Rock and Roll Marathon aka “Worst Parade Ever” in San Diego on June 3rd. Scott’s offi“WHERE’S THE NEAREST cial finishing time was 3:13:03 minutes, an epic perforSUBWAY?” mance for 99% of the world outside of Kenya, but sadly Scott fell short of his goal of qualifying for the Boston Marathon. Apparently, a time of 3:05:00 is the cut-off. So, a 7:22 pace while finishing 154th out of 7,106 runners is not good enough? Coincidentally, this is the same pace of the Average American…as timed from the couch to the refrigerator and back. At least you “I RECOMMEND THE GREEN beat Oprah (4:29:15, check the InterLINE!” Web if you also find this to be unbelievable) and remember, toenails are for sissies. Scott plans to give it another shot next year, but in the meantime, might we suggest the Rosie Ruiz (2:31:56) method, though unfortunately there is no subway in San Diego. Trolley, perhaps? Good luck next year, slow poke! OH WELL, NUMBER 14 IT IS... T he local ranking of the largest engineering firms in San Diego is always a “big deal” here in Ron Burgundy’s home town. Last year we made a huge leap from the 9th largest local firm in 2010…to the 12th largest in 2011…that we described as the George Costanza “shrinkage” phenomenon. Fast forward to 2012. Revenue is up 68%. Check. Staff size has grown by 42%. Check. We’ve moved from the 12th largest firm…to the 14th largest? Uncheck and WTF? Thanks Rick Brady for leading us in the wrong direction once again, we should be the 16th largest this time next year. Parsons somehow managed to claim 1st place over AECOM and UR Next – it looks like their mergers and acquisition bank accounts have sprung some Titanic size leaks. In classic engineering techno babble, a spokesman from Parsons uttered to the press: “our increase in staff was a result of reclassifying transient assignments from the previous year”, but then again, clearly something is up as the private sector, according to the White House, is “doing fine”. What a surprise, we at BRADY did not know that communist China has a private sector, but it does make sense. We also can’t be sure if Parsons hired a bunch of short term transients or if it is just Government Math at work once again, but with his “not have way” with words, Mr. Parsons should run for President! I LOVE BRADY...AND SCOTCH! WE STILL BELIEVE IN ZERO N AVFAC presents Star Safety Awards to contractors for exceptional performance in the area of safety. In the past few months, BRADY has received three separate awards celebrating our organizational commitment to safety. As written by our new in-house snob (see “Riche Man, Poore Man”) and Safety Man Extraordinaire, Dallas Poore, MBA: “It’s always nice to have good news to share on the safety front. In May, BRADY received a Certificate of Commendation for Safety Excellence by the Associated General Contractors of America in celebration of our corporate safety record. Two BRADY project teams also received STAR Safety Awards for the P401 Replace Fuel Storage Facilities, Point Loma, CA; and Replace Reservoir Roof 200814, Camp Pendleton, CA. The P401 project also celebrated 900 days without a single lost time incident. BRADY would like to thank our key teaming partners, Nova Group, Inc./Underground Construction Co., a Joint MAYDAY! MAYDAY! MAYDAY! Venture; and Joint Venture partner RQ Construction – as well as our stellar subcontractors - for their outstanding teaming efforts and genuine concern for employee safety. We are all in this together!” On the other left coast, our Hampton Roads office has also been recognized by the U.S. Navy for 50,000 consecutive hours in a row of not a single hour of lost time. Fortunately they are not aware of the injury Rick Brady sustained at our Mad Men party on April 3rd, when he fell backwards over a stack of drawings on the floor of Mike “Mount” Slawson’s cubicle, but we are happy to report that he did not spill a single drop of vodka out of his red party cup. RICHE MAN, POORE MAN O r should we say Snob Alert II? More big news recently reported from Santee, CA, the little town 20 miles down the 52 freeway from La Jolla: Dallas Poore, former Captain in the U.S.M.C. and our Go-To-Guy for everything no one else wants to do, is now Dallas Poore, Master of Business Administration Graduate of the Business School at the greatest college south of the I8 freeway, San Diego State University. Dallas managed to squeeze in his MBA studies between juggling his two kids (Devil Dog Corbin and Little Princess Kyla), Queen and wife Laura, while also working at his primary job (Safety Man Extraordinaire) and working on his other true love and secondary job (professional photography)…and taking care of other important duties such as creating the The Quote cover as well as tending to vodka spills left over from the weekly “Mad Men” party (4 p.m. Thursdays) in Rick Brady’s cube at World Domination Headquarters. Oh well, as of June 16, 2012, he is now a certified “State” man, with a giant diploma to prove it. Looks like we’ll need to order another “Rick Brady Class” oversized hard hat to fit his swelled head due to his newly enlarged brain. Hopefully “learnin’ how to do all that cypherin’ of dem big numbers” will pay off for us and Dallas both – it looks like his days in the Poore House will soon be over. Congratulations Smarty Pants, we are proud of you – feel free to order that cement pond for your backyard! BLUE HAWAII W e are happy to report that no sooner than we’ve arrived on the scene to save the day in Jacksonville, FL (see “Some Like it Wet”), LTJG and Naval Aviator Jeremy Anderson has flown the coop out of JAX and is on his way to serve the Red, White and Blue in Kaneohe Bay, Hawaii. Hawaii will be his home for the next 3-4 years, more than enough time to do recon on each and every bar in the Aloha State. On his way to Hawaii he made a short stop in San Diego to enjoy the Survival Escape Resistance and Evasion (S.E.R.E.) School located in Warner Springs, CA, just outside of San Diego. Oddly enough, BRADY is also working at S.E.R.E Camp, designing and building a $2,670,548 sewage treatment plant replacement project. So goes the life of the “turd herder” wastewater/sanitary engineer, though it appears the old engineering saying is true: “there really is gold in sewers...as well as a bunch of Baby Ruths”. According to our own Jim Bowen, there was enough money in the BRADY budget to allow Sean Sudol to bury a few strategically located bags of Cheetos and six packs of PBR for Jeremy to “discover” while “training”, thereby improving his survival/ passing chances...as if he truly needed it. In the end, he passed with flying colors, blindfolded and barefoot, with both arms tied behind his back, though he was unable to explain his Cheetos “Agent Orange” colored teeth and beer breath to his Commanding Officer. His last words on his way to Hawaii: “Eat my Cheetos dust!” FOOL ME ONCE SPANDEX MUCH? A s former President George W. Bush once famously blurted: "There's an old saying in Tennessee — I know it's in Texas, probably in Tennessee — that says, fool me once, shame on — shame on you. Fool me — you can't get fooled again." You would think that Rick Brady would have heeded Dubya’s advice in 2007 when he entered his first Executive Challenge Ironman event and finished dead last, as in 15th place out of 15 Executive Challenge competitors. Fool me once. Low and behold Rick decides that once was not enough, and secretly entered Ironman event No. 2 held right down the street from World Domination Headquarters…in Mallorca, Spain. Surrounded by nearly 2,400 Eurozone competitors, Rick managed to garner the award for the most double-takes as he was sporting the only sleeveless wetsuit in the “swim”, rode the only rental bike in the “bike”, and completed the “run” wearing shoes purchased at Costco while wearing a golf hat. It is not that Rick is cheap, but he is the only person alive to have driven the same VW bug to both his high school graduation and 10 year reunion party. Fortunately Rick does not understand “European”, so the words of non-encouragement went right over his oversized head, though fellow competitor and brother-in-law Alexander Perauer’s ears reportedly caught on fire. To the surprise of everyone here at BRADY, Rick somehow managed to finish in second place this time around (out of a reported field of three, in the “Geezer Class”), which earned him a spot in the Ironman 70.3 World Championship in Las Vegas on September 9th. Sadly, this is a true story, check it out at www.ironman.com if you share our disbelief, and given this event is only for serious Ironman competitors/ winners of 2012 events, it does appear that an- I CAN’T FEEL MY LEGS! other last place finish is in Rick’s future. He did return home with a nice trophy, his first trophy win of any kind since he finished last in his 4th grade Square Dance contest. Nice job Rick – don’t forget to stop by Costco in Temecula on your way to Vegas to pick up a Hello Kitty single speed beach cruiser complete with a front basket, an “out-of-my way” toot-toot horn, handle bar streamers and flowers, and a rear mounted flag – so we can easily spot you while you are being lapped on the bike course. And to protect us from the likely ugly results on September 9th, remember that what happens in Vegas, stays in Vegas! LET THEM EAT CAKE… AND ICE CREAM W e all know the public sector is “doing fine” with 44 in the lead creating new jobs left and left, and we’re not even counting the soon to be hired 16,500 new IRS employees. Very quietly and with zero fanfare, BRADY continues to create a whole bunch of new jobs in our Hampton Roads office led by Bill “Mild Bill” Colden. According to Bill, the projects we have completed of late have been “pretty vanilla”, but vanilla happens to be Rick Brady’s, as well as Ritt Momney’s, favorite flavor. Of course Rick’s preference goes to back in the day when he was in the 4th grade, when making ice had just been invented, and Baskin Robbins had only one flavor – vanilla. In between finishing jobs left and left while racking up a stack of outstanding performance reviews and Star Safety Awards, Hampton Roads’ BRADY staff has managed a few extracurricular activities such as volunteering for the SAME Fisher House Project (the equivalent of the Ronald McDonald House of the Military Hospital System, without the calories). The Fisher House project provides a place for military families to stay while their loved ones are receiving hospital care. And for the second consecutive year in a row, we also managed to squeeze in another sponsorship of a local Little League Juggernaut, the BRADY “Orioles”, once again managed by part-time “America’s Got Talent” competitor, Little League coaching whiz, and full-time BRADY Superintendent Glenn Waldschlager. Though we can’t afford ESPN’s Little League Channel, we are confident the Orioles went undefeated for the second consecutive year in a row. We are also confident that not only did each player receive a trophy, but a puppy as well. It was clearly the right thing to do. Congratulations, Glenn! PERSONALLY, I PREFER CHOCOLATE Note to Bill for next year: Elaine Nelson, BRADY’s HR Manager, says we may have violated Federal I PREFER NEOPOLITAN! Government Frozen Food and Farm Dairy Law by stating our favorite ice cream flavor is vanilla. Apparently we need to purchase our ice cream from a store buying diverse dairy products from farms paying a minimum wage for domesticated farm animals. President Obama said he would sign the pending bill, even though it currently does not have the regulations he had pushed for to discourage gender-based discrimination in the farmyard. Thanks Bill – we can’t wait for our next six figure fine. Good thing we all have free health care on the way! WE ALL SCREAM FOR ICE CREAM! BREAKING NEWS—BRADY/FLUOR LLC AWARDED $250,000,000 AIR FORCE CONTRACT! J YOU AIN’T SEEN NOTHING YET W ust minutes before going to print, we were notified of the following: “Brady-Fluor L.L.C., San Diego, Calif., (FA4800-12-D-002) are being awarded a $250,000,000 indefinite-delivery/indefinite-quantity contract to provide various construction projects. The location of the performance is Joint Base Langley-Eustis, VA., to include any federal institution in the Hampton Roads area of VA. The contracting activity is the 633rd Contracting Squadron, Langley Air Force Base, VA.” More to follow in the next edition of The Quote! In the meantime, the perfect way to celebrate at BRADY—dogpile! WHERE SIT HAPPENS, PART DEUX O nce again, at BRADY of course, as we have passed another major milestone in the wide wide world of business. Fluor may claim to be 100 years old (no truth to the rumor they were founded in Hawaii in 1912), but at BRADY we can now proudly claim our own “century” mark of significance, as in the all-important 100+ employee count. And due to the fortunate date of our creation in 1999, with two worn out nickels in Rick Brady’s front pocket and an empty bottle of Grey Goose in the back, the math cannot be denied: we have survived the darkness and we’re now into our third decade and second century of business! It took all of 13 years to go from 1 to 100, and in one tick of the clock, as in 11:59:59 p.m. on June 30th to 12:00 midnight on July 1st, BRADY now has 28 new employees in Jacksonville, FL “NEWT SKYWALKER SAYS WE SHOULD OPEN AN bringing our company wide total to 130. And according OFFICE HERE” to our Austrian educated Bean Counters (Crystal Kolland and Richard DeVos, to name them both) in our Bean Counting Department, we’re comfortably holding steady at five nickels and growing, with a few newly minted Obama nickels on the upside, though sadly we’re up to three thousand empty Grey Goose bottles...and counting. While some Americans are heading for their finished-just-in-time million dollar condos built in abandoned nuclear missile silos “somewhere” in North Dakota, shopping along the way for wind-up radios, gas masks, freeze dried ice cream, and solar powered flash lights, BRADY staff is now quietly working hard on really hard engineering stuff in eleven U.S. states, two planets, and one moon. In the meantime, while panic reigns supreme, we at BRADY prefer to “Keep Calm and Carry On”…as long as we have our stocked to the rafters New Zealand warehouse full of cheese and crackers. The location of the Grey Goose will remain a secret. BEANS, BEANS, THE MAGICAL FRUIT EAT OUR CHEETOS DUST! ith zero connection to the rock song performed by Bachman-Turner Overdrive (BTO for those of us who lived through the 70’s but wished we never did), here’s a story about a man named Charles “Chete” Bell, former BRADY employee and long-time good friend of the entire BRADY family. Chete is the very proud father of three very extraordinary and extremely athletically gifted children: 15 year old twins Joshuah and Jason and 13 year old daughter Jhalisa. At the USA Youth Outdoor Track and Field Championships held on June 26Th through July 1st at the University of Texas – Arlington, the Bell children competed for the BRADY sponsored “Temecula Valley Time Machine” track team. The rest is history… Over the course of the five days with an average on MICHAEL JACKSON & track temperature around 100 degrees F with equivaTHE OSMOND BROTHERS rd lent humidity, the Bell Boys ran two of the four legs and finished 3 in the 4x800 meter relay with a time of 8:31.59. The very next day Joshuah finished second in the 800 meter run in a photo finish, with a blistering time of 2:00.29. Yes, two minutes, not two hours, second fastest time in the whole U.S. of A for a 15 year old. On July 29th, Jason and Joshuah ran two of four legs in the 4x400 meter relay and finished in 4th place with a time of 3:30.42. This coincidentally is the same time that it takes for the Average American to eat an extra-large hot dog stuffed crust meat lovers pizza and drink a six pack of PBR, solo. Not to be outdone, sister Jhalisa’s relay team finished in 8th place in the 4x400 meter relay with a time of 4:24.95. Once again, these are races for the fastest times in the U.S., not the fastest time your drunk uncles clocked in the three legged race during GET YOUR OWN! your backyard 4th of July BBQ. As Joshuah was asked after his last race if he “had a match”, he of course answered “not since Superman died”. We at BRADY are very proud to have sponsored these amazing athletes, and we have no doubt that “Baby, you just ain’t seen na, na, nothin’ yet”. Next up, the 2020 Olympics to be held...in San Diego…Texas! HAIL MARY A s in Mary Innamorato, one of BRADY’s great young “moment chasers” i.e. structural engineers, with a house now full of dirty diapers, but fortunately Danny is with thee. Mary and Danny became the proud parents of healthy son Number 2, Zachary (Zack), born on “May Day” as in May 1st, 2012 at 6 lb. Zack joins Big Brother Alexander, who celeMOTHER MARY 19 oz., and 19 inches long. brated birthday Number 2 on June 1. Let the endless battles of bumps, bruises, and tears of the brothers begin! Seriously, congratulations to Mary once again, you are only six away from OctoMom status. Rumor has it that Mary made more than a few “Mayday Mayday Mayday” calls from her hospital room, and continues to make a few 2 a.m. calls from behind her locked bathroom door. Memo Number 2 (and we don’t NICE SHIRT, mean Zack’s hourly Number 2s) to Mary and Danny: according to the GIRLY MAN! WhiteHouseLeaks, Mayday is an emergency procedure word used internationally as a distress signal. It derives from the fighting slogan of the French military unfortunately all too familiar to the United States, “Venez M’aider”, meaning “come help me”. Making a false distress Mayday call in the United States is a federal crime carrying time in the “Big House” up to 30 years and a fine of $5,000,000 dollars, which coincidentally is the time and cost it will take to raise your new son to adulthood. And with two boys two years apart in age, you might want to add ““Emergency Room” to your speed dial, while stocking up on Band-Aids and Ben Gay! 2C, OR NOT 2C, THAT IS THE QUESTION C SALE ON RACCOON FOOTLONGS—$4! IS SEAN WEARING EAU DE RACCOON AGAIN? CARL “TUF ENUF” RUF oming out of our Charlotte…err Matthews, NC office…but we were well prepared…as this is just another story about a man named Sean (Manning), BRADY’s Vice President in charge of our “Matthews” office, an engineer, who barely keeps his family fed…even on a six figure salary. Sadly, this is what happens when you cross Shakespeare with Jed Clampett. Sean recently informed BRADY’s World Domination Headquarters in San Diego that we’ve grown so large on our “Southern Frontier” that it was time to pack up and move. We were wishin’ and a hopin’ that while Sean was out shootin’ at some food, he might come across some bubblin’ crude. Oil that is, black gold, Texas Tea. Turns out Sean didn’t listen to his kinfolk who said “Sean, move away from there”, that “Californy was the place to be.” So, instead of loading up the truck to move to Beverly…Hills that is, cement ponds, movie stars…Sean did make a move. He allegedly tossed a dead raccoon as far as he could down the hallway of our current Class C office building, and where it landed was in front of office “2C”, so “2C” is now where “we be”. As before, at least our new spacious office is on the top floor (as in the second, but nearly a decade since our original move-in still retains the title as the tallest building in Matthews), and of course still sits almost directly over a Subway sandwich store. And as before: memo to the DCAA, Jared said $5 foot-longs are allowable! Feel free to stop in and see Sean, Jeff “Jethro” Johnson and their “staff” (Rich Riser, Ty Corley, Jennifer Funk, and Izzy the dog). They will likely thank you fer kindly droppin’ in, and they’ll surely invite you back to their locality, to have a heapin’ helpin’ of their hospitality. And you can take your shoes off. As Sean said to Rick Brady on his last visit, “Y’all come back now, y’hear?” Rick was reported to say on his way out the door, “Whether ‘tis nobler in the mind to suffer, the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune, or to take arms against a sea of troubles”. We all guess you had to be there… In related news from the Southern Frontier, new staff assigned to Office 2C include Robert Manning (yes, related to Sean, aren’t they all?), Mike Clark, Kevin Clark (no relation), Carl Ruf, and Craig Colligan. Sean has also hired another brilliant intern, Caitlin Purvis, primarily because she is incredibly cheap to have on board, working for the non-negotiable BRADY offer of two Subway $5 foot-longs per day of service. According to the JETHRO “SHOELESS JEFF” JOHNSON “locals”, Caitlin is from the FayetteYO QUIERO BRADY! ville, NC area and is currently pursuing a Civil Engineering degree from the University of North Carolina Charlotte (UNCC). Ask Mr. Google Maps himself if you also have never heard of either locality. field in Iowa, while Toby Keith sings the National Anthem. In the end, we get to cast our final vote for two nearly equally uninspiring candidates by sorting through which image is worse – eating dog or taking your dog on vacation, in a cage while strapped to the roof of a car. Perhaps a much better way to select a President is to let Hollywood do it. Hollywood has had many great actors portray Presidents on the Silver Screen, and we actually once elected an actor to be a real President – Ronald Reagan. By most accounts, this turned out pretty well for America. John Wayne would make a great President today. Even today you look at a picture of John Wayne and you know exactly where he stood. Back then Democrats used to make fun of Republicans (i.e. Democrats with money) as the “John Wayne Party”. Republicans were gun slinging nut jobs led by Guns and Moses himself, Charlton Heston, but there is no doubt that our dual-cover model, John “Duke” Wayne, would make a great President in 2012. HOW DO YOU LIKE DEEZ GUNS? A top contender for the best movie President is Peter Sellers in “Dr. Strangelove”, with arguably the best movie President name ever – Merkin Muffley...that unfortunately sounds a bit too close to Ritt Momney. But the BRADY choice for the best movie President of All-Times is Bill Pullman as Thomas J. Whitmore in “Independence Day”. President Whitmore is leading a society potentially doomed by a disaster of another kind – Aliens from Outer Space! “Good morning. In less than an hour, aircraft from here will join others from around the world. And you will be launching the largest aerial battle in the history of mankind. ‘Mankind.’ That word should have new meaning for all of us today. We can't be consumed by our petty differences anymore. We will be united in our common interests. Perhaps it's fate that today is the Fourth of July, and you will once again be fighting for our freedom... Not from tyranny, oppression, or persecution... but from annihilation. We are fighting for our right to live. To exist. And should we win the day, the Fourth of July will no longer be known as an American holiday, but as the day the world declared in one voice: ‘We will not go quietly into the night!’ We will not vanish without a fight! We're going to live on! We're going to survive! Today we celebrate our Independence Day!” John McCain may have been a decorated Navy pilot and a prisoner of war, but he never single-handedly fought Aliens to defend and save his beloved U.S. of A. On November 6, join BRADY in a write-in campaign: Thomas J. Whitmore for President! Even President Obama said “it’s the right thing to do”! T Another message from the PRESIDENT of he Fourth of July means many things to many people in the United States but regardless of how patriotic you may or may not feel in 2012 with Taxmageddon just around the corner, there is no denying that the United States is the only country in the history of the World with a known birthday. Greece, Italy, England, Kenya, anyone? Feel free to offer a guess – and search the InterWeb if you dare — but no “birth certificate” will be found and surely not the “long form”. Our “birth notice” is on file in The Smithsonian for daily viewing…not locked away in some file cabinet in Honolulu or Nairobi…and is known as the “Declaration of Independence” authored by William “Mild Bill” Colden’s boyhood friend Thomas Jefferson himself, and signed by 55 others, most notably Benjamin Franklin, John Adams, and John Hancock, who after signing proclaimed “I guess King George will be able to read that!”. Less notable signers include Button Gwinnett from Georgia and Caesar Rodney from Delaware…but do not despair if this is news to you, even 44 didn’t get this question right on his citizenship test. When told he did not get a perfect score, he was so angry he missed a three foot putt. GIVE ME 4 MORE YEARS AND I PROMISE… I’LL BE REALLY GOOD AT GOLF A IF GLOBAL WARMING IS REALLY MELTING THE POLAR ICE CAPS, THEN WHY ARE THE KLONDIKE BARS IN MY FREEZER STILL FROZEN? ALOHA, MR. HAND! Of course living in a democracy requires that every four years America has to endure the torturous but hilarious process of electing someone for the worst job in the world – the President of the United States. Seriously, who truly wants this job? It was recently reported that a man jumped the White House fence, but after a brief chase, the Secret Service was able to talk President Obama into coming back and finishing his term. Good thing for us as he is the 4th best President in history. Between filling out his Final Four bracket live on man’s other best friend, ESPN, and endless appearances to deliver stand-up comedy on “The View” and “Oprah”, who has time to be President? He’s been such a crack up lately that even if he loses in November, he has been promised “The Tonight Show” in 2013. Memo to 44 – no matter how many times you appear on Oprah’s show, she won’t give you $14 trillion dollars. In the meantime, the typical American voter wants a candidate who was born out of an apple pie, in the middle of a corn B Unfortunately, most graduates of a U.S. high school or college today, upon waking up around 2 p.m. in their old room at Mom and Dad’s house, will learn that “Independence Day” is America’s birthday, but only because all of their “Friends” wished it so on Faceplant. Of course you will recall from your study of U.S. history – via Jeff Spicoli from “Fast Times at Ridgemont High” – “what Jefferson was saying was, hey, you know, we left this England place 'cause it was bogus, so if we don't get some cool rules ourselves - pronto we'll just be bogus too!” And then you remembered before heading out to blow off a finger or two with your homemade fireworks, that you actually do know at least one signer of the Declaration of Independence, but for the wrong reasons – Samuel “Sam” Adams. picture that says 1000 words – Global Warming is for real, no question about it…other than Homer Simpson remains unconvinced. And if the picture is not enough to convince you, Barbra Streisand recently told Diane Sawyer on ABC News that “we're in a global warming crisis, and we can expect more and more intense storms, droughts and dust bowls”. But before they act, experts say they're still waiting to hear from Celine Dion. Ahnuld the former Governator also spoke about the dangers of global warming recently. His exact words were: “fire, hot, bad”. But for engineers, this is good, as it might just be what the doctor ordered for what used to be a great career choice. Of course we can lower the temperature here in the U.S. dramatically just by switching from Fahrenheit to Celsius, but this will only work until 2050, the year that experts say the world will be out of party ice. And then there will be a lot of angry people...most notable, Rick Brady. But on the good news front, they also predict by 2015 that Hillary Clinton might actually thaw out! FINALLY—POSITIVE PROOF OF GLOBAL WARMING! RADY’s most coveted award handed out at our Christmas Party each year is the Non-Einstein Award, given to the employee who performs an act of idiocy that truly demands special recognition. A few years ago the award was changed to the Sean Manning Award, given his unbelievable but sadly true victory streak that spanned eight years. Gretchen Prouty mercifully ended the streak when she won in a landslide in 2007 for her clever placement of a meatloaf recipe inside of a bound set of 90% complete specifications that were sent to the Rancho California Water District for their final review. Hand written comments we received from the District back then included, “Contractor shall provide meatloaf to the inspector on a daily basis, prior to the start of work,” and in response to a line item for Swedish Meat Balls, “is this an ‘or equal’”? Sean returned to form and recaptured the award once again in 2011, but now that we have some new WOOPS… WRONG BEAGLE greenhorn engineers in the house, the competition is becoming stiffer. An early contender for 2012 is Brett Patterson. When a company-wide email asked for a preference for the next morning of either donuts or bagels as an office treat, in a matter of seconds Brett enthusiastically responded that he preferred “BEGALS!!!!”… fortunately not the four legged kind once strapped in a cage to the roof of Ritt Momney’s car. Congratulations Brett on this important recognition in your stellar first year at BRADY, your employWELCOME TO DA CLUB, ee file is becoming quite thick in record time. Keep up the good work! BRETT! “I SEE NOTHING WRONG WITH BEING IN LOVE WITH SOMEONE OF THE SAME GENDER.“ THIS IS HILARIOUS! ...BUT I DON’T GET IT... YOU AIN’T NOTHIN’ BUT A HOUND DOG