Working From Home

It's Thursday and I've been working from home all week. The deal is that I can telecommute from home every other week and every other week I need to be in the office. I can do this until I move, probably after the real bad winter is over. It's nice but it has it's pitfalls. The nice parts are that I can sit in my own home, in my underwear if I want and work at my own pace treating my time as I want. The bad news is that I'm tweaky enough about the new job that I feel more pressure to produce here so I take fewer breaks, five minute lunches (remember, lunch is upstairs in the kitchen), start my day about 7:00 to 7:30 and end up about 6:00ish. Then there's the lack of regular coworker interaction and semi-regular interruptions by my daughter. We're busy and I have a lot to do but mainly I want to give the impression that I'm not slacking off because I'm sitting at home. It's not all bad, mind you. Part of it is pressure (self-imposed, of course) to perform and produce but part of it is a simple enjoyment of what I'm doing. My wife will encourage me to take breaks and get away from the computer and I usually respond with, "Yeah, yeah, I'll be there in a minute right after I finish ____". It's a weird, new sort of thing for me because I've never really done this but it's good and bad like everything else.

On top of all that we're still getting the house ready to sell and that is taking a fair bit of work. We finally got the living room more or less done, cleaned up and got the Yule tree up. Of course, it was near 10:30 before we were done. I'm spending a lot of time tired these days. It's good though, it beats sitting around and being bored and stressed out of one's mind.

Homecoming and Holiday Drivers

After my first week at the new job I'm finally home. I got my first paycheck and got on the road about noon. The drive home wasn't so bad until I hit Ohio. Cleveland, more specifically. New York between Syracuse and Buffalo was a little crowded but moved nicely. No real problems there. I stopped on the other side of Buffalo and got a bite. Pennsylvania wasn't bad either. About the same as New York. I stopped and got fuel and was a little frightened by the toothless state of the local yokels but all in all it was uneventful. Then I hit Ohio. I was ok through the upper northeastern part but I ran into traffic in Cleveland. I looked at the clock and realized it was rush hour. Bad luck but nothing sinister I waited it out. The drive south was not too bad and I figured that it was going to be an uneventful trip. Wrong. Once I hit Columbus everyone started having accidents. They had all of the southbound lanes closed for one accident and nobody was moving at all. I figured I'd be there all night. Then, without warning we all go from stopped dead to 60 mph. The accident they had the entire highway closed for was, as far as I could tell, on a side off ramp. From there things got worse. I figured I'd be fine as soon as I got south of the city limits. Wrong again. Every few miles some idiot in a mini van was driving 50mph and slowing down both lanes of traffic to a near standstill. At one point we were doing under 30mph and there was no accident or other reason for it, just some idiot pissing people off. It was at this time that I had a revelation. You've heard peopl use the term "Sunday Driver", right? If there are indeed "Sunday Drivers", then, by extension, there are likely people who are "Holiday Drivers". I was surrounded by people who are so inept at driving that they only drive during the holidays. In a way it was a good thing. It kept me occupied enough with my own irritation that the remaining time flew by. Before I knew it I was home and unpacking. Life was once again good.

A Weekend Alone

I'm still in Syracuse (I leave Wednesday) and for the first time in as long as I can remember, I am alone for the weekend. No family, no friends, just me and this town to explore. It's a little weird and disconcerting. I'm used to having my family around and I miss them when I'm not with them. Even when I've been on the road before, it's always been for a trade show or some other such thing where I had coworkers around who were also away from my family

So now, as you can probably guess, the issue becomes what to do with a weekend full of time, short on funds and all alone. I've spent the morning so far drinking coffee, eating some toast and checking out maps of the area. I plan on checking out some of the suburban type residential areas. I'd like to find a tar-je' (Target for you uninitiated) and pick up some shorts so I can use the workout equipment in the hotel here. I'll check out downtown and see what the area has to offer I suppose. If I have enough money left over and feel like I can afford it, Syracuse has a symphony orchestra and they're having a showing of Mozart's requiem tonight. I've seen it at the Kennedy Center in Washington DC and I'd like to see how central New York (CNY is the locally accepted abbreviation) matches up. At any rate, the long and the short of this post is that I am alone this weekend and honestly have no idea what I'm going to do. This much I do know: Starbucks is two blocks away. It's not Caribou but, well, what can you do?

The New Adventure

I'm here in Syracuse (or 'Cuse as per some of the bumper stickers I've seen here lately) and I'm getting ready to start day three. The trip started Tuesday morning at 5:00AM when I had to get out of bed and get ready to go. After a lengthy goodbye, I got in the car and made my way for gas and coffee. I had to sit outside and read my book (I'm re-reading Slaughterhouse Five by Kurt Vonnegut - If you have not read this book there's something very very wrong with you that needs to be corrected right away) until the place opened but it was only a few minutes. By 6:10 I was on my way. I stopped once or twice to take care of a few biological functions and eat but other than that I made good time and arrived just when I thought I would. The drive was uneventful. Flat, straight and not much to see, kind of like ugly bookworm girls. I arrived mid afternoon and spent the rest of my day filling out HR paperwork and getting aquainted in a mild sort of way. I left about 6:00PM, checked into my hotel and was grateful to find it was an extended stay place with a stove and fridge and all the conveniences of home. I went grocery shopping for the week, refilled my fuel tank (made the whole trip on one tank of diesel - I love my VW) and ate ravioli as I spoke with my family on the internet (Yahoo messenger with a webcam and a mic). It was a good first day.

Day two was even better. I spent the morning learning the ropes from Daniel, my new partner, and getting better aquianted with some of my new coworkers. The afternoon was spent on my first project. About 6:30, my boss, my bosses boss (Tech Op VP) and one of the project managers all went out and had dinner. I have to say that I don't think I've ever walked into a job and had people bend over backwards so far to treat me well, to welcome me and to make me feel comfortable. I am overwhelmed and grateful for having landed such a position with such a great company. If my career is anything like the past few days I will be very happy to retire from here.

We're Definately Moving

I know it's been a while and to my avid readers, I apologize. I've tried to post a few times but blogger is apparently having a few issues. Well, no biggie, I've been really busy as of late anyway. The job hunt thing has really picked up the past few weeks and I'm up to my butt in trying to juggle my schedule right now. To give you an idea, on tuesday I was going through airport security on my way to Philadelphia (When I'm in leadership of this nation I'm abolishing the TSA and, by extension, the department of homeland security but that's a story for another time) and during that time I set up an interview for Monday, talked to one headhunter and had to call another back. I still have the interview on Monday and I will go but honestly I think it's a waste of time. Regular readers of this blog will note that I mentioned Syracuse New York on September 16th. Well, it finally came to last night. My new boss and I will agree to terms this weekend and I'll be up there this week. I'm so excited I can't sleep. That's why I'm up and doing this at nearly 4:00 in the morning. A few hours before I heard from Derick I got a phone call and e-mail offering me the postion in Philadelphia. I didn't answer the calls because I was in a phone interview with the folks in Denver. Get the idea? It's been like working a full time job lately. Which, according to my ever wise father in law, it should be.

One more airport story that some will find interesting but others probably wont. See the guy in the picture? That's Arn Anderson, pro wrestler, formerly of WWF/WCW four horseman fame. I met him at the airport after missing my flight Tuesday morning. He apparently had the same experience and was not a happy camper. To give the man credit, he shook my hand and was very cordial but was obviously pissed and I can't say I blame him at all. The idiots running TSA security that morning must have had a hundred passengers all trying to get through one metal detector that morning. To compound matters, the group of minimum wage losers was running slower and as efficiently as a retarded kid in a calculus class. I'm sure we weren't the only people to miss our flights.

So anyway, TSA sucks, I have a job (or will this week anyway) and if you don't hear from me for a while, it's probably because I got locked up for making comments critical of a government entity. Welcome to Amerika. Your papers, please.