Gravity

"Tyler, can you change your name to 'Newton' for the summer? That way we can have 'Olivia Newton-John' all working next to each other in one office."
- Andy Shuman



Calling Tyler "Newton" wouldn't be much of a stretch (and not just because he's a self-proclaimed genius). We have several nicknames here, although some are not very self-explanatory:

• "Barney" - Brian Barhorst acquired this nickname long before the inception of Choice One. He claims he doesn't remember where it came from, but that he was given the nickname in the third grade. Anyhow, with three Brians, it's an obvious way to single him out. In fact, many of our clients call him "Barney" as well. And no, the nickname has nothing to do with the singing purple dinosaur, but sometimes we question it.
• "M. John" - Matt's traffic engineer persona/superhero name. Faster than a car through a yellow light, he can clear gridlock in a single bound!
• "Not Nick" - If you've ever seen our plans, you may have noticed that we tag everything with initials. Nick Selhorst arrived here about a year ago and created a problem we'd never had: duplicate initials. Nick Selhorst's initials, NJS, were the same as incumbent Nick Sanders's initials. So we deemed Nick Selhorst "Not Nick Sanders," and his initials have been NNS ever since.
• "Michael Soft Hands" - During an early co-op, before he was a full-time engineer at Choice One, Michael Seeger worked on the survey crew for a time. As is typical, Jeff "Shorty" North (that nickname IS self-explanatory) made Michael do all the sledge-swinging, and he got blisters--hence his "soft hands."

Clearly, nicknames here at Choice One generally come from some form of teasing. Basically, if you've embarrassed yourself, you have a nickname. Needless to say, it's not long after you arrive at Choice One before you have a nickname due our general unusualness, clumsiness, or ridiculousness. For, as you may have noticed, we have no "Einstein" or "LeBron" here.

Nick! Ear Muffs!

“Sometimes you walk into the craziest conversations here. You just look ahead and keep walking.”
- Nick Sanders

Between Megan recently being nine months pregnant* and not afraid to share (Wes has a habit of accidentally wandering into these conversations), Brian Schmidt cursing at his computer (and startling the co-op in the Loveland office with him), and Kaye’s recent purchase of a four-foot concrete Sasquatch as a gift for her husband (the nine-year wedding anniversary is the concrete anniversary, right?), there are certainly some interesting dialogs here at Choice One. Yep, all these Mindset quotes are quite real...

Nick's advice is pretty good, but if you feel inclined to listen, you might learn a few things from the random discussions around here. Perhaps you'll hear about the finer points between a lunch of Al’s Pizza versus Cassano's Pizza. Maybe you'll overhear all of the "sick" new terms Tony and Brittany are picking up from marketing intern and Chicago-area native John. Or, with luck, you'll hear how quickly Nick Selhorst can move his feet while dancing “Gangnam Style” at his wedding this past weekend (congrats Nick!).

Despite what you may hear, civil engineers aren't always boring and technical. You just have to walk into one of our conversations to prove it. Just keep in mind, though, that's it's probably best to look ahead and keep walking.

*Megan and her husband Andy welcomed to their family a healthy baby girl, Drew Elizabeth, on Tuesday, June 11. Congratulations Bornhorsts!