My Home Away From Home

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This is an updated version of my webpage and is dedicated to all of those who make it possible and the Web itself. Many thanks to all.

Me: Jeff Thayer, 54, currently living in Pittsburgh, Pa. I've been here since 1969 and was formerly an Air Force brat. Pittsburgh is my first permanent home.

Work: I am a registered nurse at Marian Manor nursing home and have been there for fourteen years. It's demanding work at times but rewarding, and I'm grateful to be a part of it.

INFLUENCES
First, my father. You have taught me everything and your writings are the most compelling that I've ever read.

Mother. Overlooked but not unappreciated and never forgotten. I'm never too old to seek your advice.

My sister, Sarah, her husband, Paul, and their 7-year-old son, Jordan. You're inspirations all with great thanks for your new family. Jordan is the best nephew that I could ever ask for.

Links to other sites on the Web:

The link to my favorite experience. My 1986 Trans Am bicycle trip. Thanks to all those I rode with: Steve, C.J., Patty P., the Beins, and the people at Adventure Cycling who made it all possible.

Beer websites abound and are one of the first things I looked at when I went online. Here are two. Michael Jackson is considered the world's foremost authority on beer, and Beertown, USA is the homesite of the American Homebrewers Association, its magazine, Zymurgy, and the Great American Beer Festival.

To know my employer, Marian Manor, is to know me. It is staffed with very dedicated people, and I am privileged to be part of it. Before becoming a nurse, I worked for 12 years in the kitchen. I can't say enough about the Manor and the fairness with which they have treated me over the years. It is most fun to be able to feature the nursing home's website on my own webpage.

For a better view of the problems that nursing homes face, please read "No Place Like Home,"a series of articles published in 2002 in the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette.

The federal government has just released the first ever national rating system of nursing homes. Over 16,000 homes were rated across the United States. A database of nursing homes rated, including Marian Manor, can be seen at U.S.A. Today.

My families' association. Without it, I wouldn't know anything about my heritage. I'm proud to be a Thayer.

NPR Radio is simply the best radio in the land, with broad-based reporting and thoughtful analysis. You can also play word games with Will Shortz, crossword puzzle editor of The New York Times.

With thanks to my good friend, Ruth Kyle, I am thrilled to mention her father, "Bounce" Biringer. Bounce played trumpet for many of the big bands, including Raymond Scott, the former band leader of "Your Hit Parade" and composer of Bugs Bunny cartoon music. If Bounce were still alive today, I would learn everything I could about Raymond Scott and life in the bands.