It’s a new year once again, and we all know what that means… many people are making resolutions to start anew and make changes.  Whether or not you are resolving to change anything, there is something we all can do to help life go a little more smoothly:  get organized and make a plan.  Whether it’s for work, at home or both, a little organization and planning can go a long way. 

Maybe you have some projects around the house that you have been putting off, or maybe you have been wanting to try a new approach to a work task.  The key is to start small and don’t let yourself get overwhelmed by it.  Write down your thoughts and what you would like to accomplish, then make a list of what you need to do to get there.  At this point, don’t worry about the steps or what comes first; just jot things down.  Once you have a list, prioritize the items and determine what comes first, second, etc.  Now follow your list one task at a time, marking off each one as you go – that gives a great feeling of accomplishment! 

Another important item in getting organized and planning is a calendar.  You can use an online calendar such as Google, an app on your smart phone, or an old-fashioned hand held day planner. Use whatever is easiest for you and what you will be most likely to refer to.  Write or type in appointments, meetings, anything of importance that you want to remember.  At the end of each week, look at the upcoming week to see what you have ahead.

Many of you already do these things and kudos to you!  But for those of you who have trouble getting organized and planning ahead, try these simple steps and see if it helps.  Whatever you do, have a great, successful 2012!

Controltrends.com is the “The Place” to get your HVAC controls information. Need reliable product reviews, training videos, and the scoop on new products? Want to hear what controls experts and manufactures have to say in informative interviews?

We know how valuable your time is and encourage you to subscribe to our website so we can keep you updated on the latest “control news you can use.”

Being a subscriber to controltrends.com automatically enters you into our monthly drawing as the Controltrends.com fan of the month, as a winner you will receive a really cool prize and we will acknowledge your company on the Controltrends website, which will allow our world wide community the opportunity to discover your company.

Controltrends.com is thrilled to acknowledge Ken Smyers from the Edward C. Smyers Company as our November Controltrends Fan of the month. The Smyers Company is a distributor of HVAC controls, including Honeywell Burner and Boiler controls out of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.

Ken, as our Controltrends November fan of the month, will receive a $25 Mastercard Gift card.

Thanks to Ken Smyers and all of our Controltrends.com subscribers.

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by Gabrielle Gribble

According to Jobvite’s Social Job Seeker Survey 2011, job seekers are turning to Facebook first. LinkedIn is actually coming in a distant second. To read more click here.

We are very happy and proud to announce that once again Stromquist achieved the prestigious classification of a Honeywell Diamond Distributor for 2012.  Every year we strive for this honor, and we are always thrilled when we are succesful. 

We would like to thank Honeywell for this privilege, but more importantly we would like to thank all of our customers who helped us make this possible.  If it weren’t for you, we would never be able to do it!

Honeywell released it’s new Rapid Eye Driver today. This Honeywell- Tridium software tool allows integrators to easily incorporate digital video surveillance capabilities into larger building control systems.
in this video you can see unintended consequences as the Honeywell Rapid Eye video camera catches Honeywell building automation controls specialists greeting each other with what appears to be a version of the HVAC brotherhoods second secret handshake.

Roger Rebennack, Honeywell Webs Security AX guru, know as “the most exciting man in the controls industry“, the man that Dos Equis modeled “the most interesting man in the world” adds on, categorically denied any knowledge of a Honeywell Secret handshake on the HVAC controls show Control Talk.

Yet he was caught on camera by a Honeywell Rapid Eye video camera doing what appeared to be a secret handshake.

Confronted with the video, Mr. Rebennack at first claimed that it was not him doing the secret handshake. When it was point out that the video was filmed using a Honeywell Rapid eye video camera, Mr. Rebennack could not refute the authenticity due to the high quality and reliability of the Honeywell Rapid eye cameras. “What can I say, the Rapid Eye is the best camera in the world. The Rapid Eye Don’t Lie”

The fact that Honeywell Rapid eye cameras are now available through authorized Honeywell building automation controls distributors like Stromquist & Company is besides the point.

Mr.Rebennack has stepped forward, acknowledging that their is a brotherhood of HVAC controls specialists, the highest order being the group known as “Honeywell WEBS AX security specialist ” and that a Honeywell secret handshake exists.

HW marketing and legal disavow any knowledge of Mr. Rebennack’s handshake behavoirs and connection to any secret handshakes.

There are many in the controls world that hail Mr. Rebennack as a hero for bringing the Honeywell secret handshake out into the open for all to enjoy.

The folks at the DAP APP, the worlds leading authority on ancient secret handshakes have confirmed that the handshake Mr.Rebennack was seen performing is in fact one of the oldest secret handshakes know to man.

They are so impressed with Roger Rebennack that they have renamed this handshake “THE REBENNACK” and voted Roger Rebennack one of the top ten most influencial people in secret handshake history. They are even creating and I phone app that will feature “The Rebennack”.

Controltrends has created a “Roger Rebennack” secret handshake fund, that will offer support to those members of the HVAC controls brotherhood that dare for greatness like Roger and share the HVAC secret handshakes.

Send your photos of HVAC pros doing the “Rebennack handshake” to equist@mac.com. For every one of your photos we post on ControlTrends, Stromquist & Company will make a donation to the Roger Rebennack Secret HandshakeFund. Best photo wins and IPOD, and one lucky person wins a lunch with Roger Rebennack, “the most exciting man in the controls industry”

In addition to being very fun and entertaining, Roger is one of the most knowledgeable people on the planet when it comes to access and security and building automation controls. He can show you how to integrate a building automation control systems with the access and security systems, and save building owners tens of thousands of dollars while making their buildings operate more efficiently.

To find out more about what Honeywell WEBS AX can do for you check out my radio interviews with Roger.

Also stay tuned to Controltrends over the next couple of months as I will be posting the real interview with Roger on Control Talk as well as several Roger how to videos on the Honeywell WEBS AX security products.

As many of you know G & O Thermal Supply the master HVAC controls distributor out of Chicago offered strong evidence that the second secret handshake originated in Chicago. New evidence summited by the HVAC and boiler controls supplier that Pittsburgh relies on for Johnson, Honeywell, and Belimo controls the Edward C Smyers Company suggests that the second secret handshake in fact originated with relatives of the Smyers that dates
back to George Washington Smyers this countries first Heating controls distributor. It is common knowledge that the Edward Smyers Company is the oldest and most reliable HVAc controls distributor in Pittsburgh but did this second handshake originate in Pittsburgh or with G & O Thermal Supply in Chicago. I will let you be the judge.
Notice that when Tom Smyers Jr. and his brother Bart do the second secret handshake it is slightly different than the way Dave Gottfred of G & O out of Chicago does the handshake. Ken Smyers, the Smyers family historian, tells me that this in fact is a modification to the second secret handshake that is unique to Pittsburgh and customers of the Edward C Smyers company out of Pittsburgh.
In fact the following is Ken’s history of how the second hvac secret handshake was created by his family in Pittsburgh:

“We often reflect upon our company origins in the earliest days of producing Pittsburgh Steel, when the giants of automatic controls and instrumentation were born, when Honeywell, Barber-Colman, Johnson Controls, and the other control manufacturers first began regulating water and steam, controlling temperatures, pressures, and humidity, and when Fireye and Honeywell Flame Safeguard Controls were first applied to their respective markets, and the simple but reliable and flourishing methods that first anchored our business began. We welcomed the electromechanical, solid state, direct digital controls (DDC), and Enterprise Automation technologies that would sustain our business for more three generations and beyond, by allowing us to continue providing outstanding customer service, technical support, while offering an incomparable local inventory, augmented by our membership in CGNA.

There is always a history to consider. Long before Federal Express and UPS NDA, there were many reliable and expedient ways to move commerce and services north and south, east and west, and to all points in between. Horses, wagon trains, railroads, bus lines, and personal carriers and trusted agents, all brought valuable goods to those in contract and concert with one another, and always, accommodated by a secret and common denominator: a secret handshake.

As young wholesalers and distributors, the Smyers family learned the secret handshake was borne of purpose. It served as a sign, counter-sign, a means to cross boundaries safely, and was proof-positive that the conveyor was a “person in the know.” Upon the execution of the secret handshake, any and all the entitlements, trusts, benefits, and discounts shared by gentlemen in the know, were to be rendered without reservation. The conveyor was to be considered to be a fellow business partner, competent and familiar with the honorable trades and bonds made between men, and of course, women, for the purposes of commerce.

The origin of our family’s secret handshake was traced back to a Smyers relative, who as a frontiersman in the year 1754, swore his honorable allegiance and service to a young Lt. Colonel George Washington, on assignment for the Governor of Virginia, Robert Dinwiddie, who had sent the future first president of the United States to Pittsburgh with regimental papers and orders to occupy, fortify, and defend the Upper Ohio Valley, against a French army advancing southward from Canada.

In a quiet ceremony that belied the grave events to come, in the presence of both Iroquois and Shawnee Chieftains, the young Washington passed the secret handshake to the Smyers family at the confluence of the Monongahela, Allegheny, and Ohio rivers, beneath the great interior height, that would later be named Mount Washington, in tribute to Washington’s heroic deeds. In time, Fort Pitt would be built on the historic grounds that would soon outlast its purpose, and give way to the Point State Park, and the Three Rivers would become the City of Champions, home to the Pittsburgh Steelers, Penguins, and Pirates.

The secret handshake still serves us well in many of our business matters and in defending our territories against the more modern invaders.”

I leave it to you our readers to decide: G & O Thermal Supply out of Chicago or the Edward C Smyers Company out of Pittsburgh. The nod goes to the company with the most comments.

Stay tuned as the third secret handshake will be revealed later this week at Controltrends.com

Based on this photo that I received today it would appear that the origin of the second secret handshake is not Pittsburgh, Minnesota, or Milwaukee but Chicago. Dave Gottfred of the Gottfred clan, and the prodigious G & O Thermal Supply in Chicago was caught on camera doing secret handshake #2.

G & O is a master distributor for Honeywell, Johnson, Belimo and other HVAC and building automation controls and it makes one wonder if their success might be attributed to ancient HVAC traditions and secrets like the handshakes that have been passed down through the ages.
Did this handshake originate in Chicago ? Or some other place like Pittsburgh as I indicated in my last post ?

The Smyers company out of Pittsburgh is not only known for great customer service and products but many believe that secret handshake #2 was their family’s creation. Until we get photographic evidence to the contrary the nod goes to G & O Thermal.
Controltrends is your source for this and other HVAC mysteries. We will keep you posted.

Ok for those of you who have mastered the first secret hvac handshake it is time for you to
move on to the second secret handshake know as the “camp fire”

Rumor has it this handshake was orginated many moons a go in the great north country. Old timers at Honeywell say it started in Minnesota with HVAC mystics working in boiler rooms on Honeywell Flame safeguard controls.

The folks at Johnson Controls disagree saying the “camp fire” was invented by the wizards at Johnson Controls in Milwaukee at the same time the Johnson one pipe pneumatic thermostat came into existence.

Many say distant relatives of Dave Gottfred and Bill Oberheide of G & O Thermal started this secret handshake in Chicago.

Some say it was not the Gottred’s or Oberheide’s but the Smyers family out of Pittsburgh who started this tradition. It is said that to this day Tom, Dave, Kenny, and Jesse Smyers identify key customers with this ancient secret handshake.

One thing is for sure if you go North you better master the “camp fire” if you want any respect in the northern HVAC community.

If you are the first to come to the Stromquist Counter in either Georgia or Florida to place or pick up and order and perform the first two hvac secret handshakes you will win a really cool prize.
Send your secret handshake photos and videos to stromquistcompany@gmail.com and we will post them on controltrends.

Like most great societies, the HVAC industry has it’s secret handshake. However,since we are such an incredible industry and thanks to our friends at the Dap APP we are fortunate enough to have more than one secret handshakes. In fact there are over one hundred!!
This one is called the “Park it in the garage” dap.
The first person to come into the Stromquist counter in either Atlanta or Florida and perform the secret handshake of the week with their Stromquist counter person after placing or picking up an order will win a Terralux LightStar 300 flashlight. So checkout how to do the “park it in the garage”

Our mission at Control trends is to give you “Control News you can use” but what use is that if you do not know the secret handshake? Check back weekly to learn all 108 Secret Handshakes and win really cool prizes while being really cool.

Stromquist and Company would like to take this time to say “Thank You”. Thank you to all of our military veterans and veterans throughout the country and the world. We would like to thank all those who have and those who are still serving our country this Memorial Day. I especially would like to dedicate the following article to Stromquist employees:  Paul Eskin (U.S. Marines), Mark Gerety (U.S. Army 1980′s), Randy Hereford (U.S. Army Airborne Viet Nam Purple Heart), Matt Koenig (U.S. Army Combat Engineers 1990′S),Oscar Hansen (U.S. Coast Guard), Paul Morin (U.S. Army), and my nephew Nick who has served in Iraq and is still serving in Afghanistan on his last of five tours of duty as a combat Marine. Take the time to say thank you. We are grateful. I hope you enjoy the article.

A Memorial Ride

The early morning sun starts lifting itself above the horizon, the exhausts of my motorcycle are warm too warm to touch but warm enough to hear the tones of the engine’s song.  A burst of golden light in the form of fine silk threads streak through the purplish grey morning clouds filling my eyes with colors beyond description. The universe has opened itself to me as I let off the throttle just a little bit just to take the splendor of it all in. This wonder does not last very long but I am going to enjoy every sparkle of this light show as its reflections dance across the polished chrome and paint of the motorcycle’s gas tank.

The slight chill in the air is fine by me knowing that when the sun comes up in its full glory it will bath me in the light of warmth. I open the throttle back to where the motorcycle is feeling strong and exciting to me. Time and distance seem to melt away along with any other thoughts that have nothing to do with the ride that I am experiencing. Smaller objects in the distance are becoming larger and the larger items that pass by me become smaller and smaller until they disappear in the blur of distance.

The massive over hanging oak trees are glittering with different shades of green leaves and mixed in between is the agelessness of the old Spanish moss hanging down like great beards of grey color. The trunks of the oak trees are a mixture of soft hues of brown to deep blacks forming never ending trails through the bark that reminds me of the road that the motorcycle is traveling on. A turn to the left, a turn to the right, and a slight straight away keeps me on the road through my mind and the next small town ahead.

I slow down the motorcycle down even though I do not see a speed limit sign as I approach the small town. The town seems deserted. I see no one driving down the streets or walking the over grown weed infested sidewalk passing through what I perceive as Main Street. I stop the bike in the mangled looking parking lot of a broken down gas station. The gas pumps have been uprooted from the broken up concrete slab that once held them. The bolts that bound the pumps to the concrete have turned to just a fine power of rust and the cracks of the concrete are filled with weeds and ants carrying out their daily activities. Still I have seen no one come through this small desolate Alabama town.

The more I looked around this town the more I saw. I now focused on what made me stop at this gas station to start with. Lining the streets are dilapidated old houses most with tired peeling paint and several with signs of self destruction. The view reminds me of some landscape from a previously read horror book. This is a sad town one that seems to have been lost. Lost in history and from the minds of all those who once lived in this small town except for one thing. The flags. Small American flags on the edge of every driveway approaching each house and pressed deep into the ground. I walked across the street to look closer. Each small flag had a cross and when I read the short painful words on the cross tears came to my eyes. The words on the signs were saddest words ever written. Each cross and flag was a marker for each man in the town who had died in war. The man’s name, his age, and the war he served in were placed on the marker, hand written in black paint on a simple white cross. As I cross the street to continue my journey I notice a couple of vehicles coming down the road and I snap a photograph to remember the site, as if I could ever forget it.

I get on the motorcycle whispering a small prayer in my mind for this small town never wanting to forget this small town or what this town gave up for me to be able to continue down the road and enjoy THE RIDE.