The Mississippi River. I think. At least it should be.
March 2013
Reconnected.
So I’m sitting over the wing of an Airbus A320 calling itself Delta flight 408. The emergency exit door is making a creaky noise. Hopefully it isn’t the ejection system. I can still breathe and it’s giving me a little breeze so I’m just fine. I notice the little things. And thankfully, it’s not as breezy as this.
I’m not wearing purple and green, either.
It has been a good week in this adventure called life and I’m happy that work afforded me the opportunity for this trip. I’m ready to get home though. A brief stop in Detroit and then I should be home in time for lunch.
Food is always a good thing.
The wifi on the A320 is working brilliantly and I am happy about this. Someone wretched about a peanut allergy so no peanuts for us today. Sigh. I was in the mood for peanuts. If you’re allergic to peanuts, I’m sorry to hear that, but just don’t breathe my peanut dust. It’s not hard. Take a Benadryl if you’re nervous.
I am resisting the urge to write some code on this flight, primarily because I don’t have a lot of elbow room. Someday I’ll be able to fly first class. By then someone else will probably be writing the code, though.
Hat Tip.
Being out of town for work has afforded me the opportunity to eat out a lot this week, and it is only Wednesday. I am terrified to jump on the scale when I get back home, but aside from some alcohol choices I wouldn’t normally make, I have been doing my best to eat healthy during this trip.
Aside from feverishly looking up calorie counts while gazing at a menu in the selection of restaurants I have been in, I have noticed something that has brought a smile to my face.
99% of the men I have seen in restaurants this week have removed their hat for dinner. And better yet, there is evidence that these men actually did it as demonstrated by their hat sitting on their knee as they sit at the table or in the booth with their family and friends.
There is hope for our society.
I have mentioned before that it makes me quite crazy when a man doesn’t remove his hat for a meal. I find it rude. I’m not going to go on about it tonight, after all I have lectured about it before, but I guess it says something about the folks in this part of Texas when it is apparent that it is still standard practice for a man to remove his hat while at the dinner table. Granted, my observations would hardly qualify as a scientific study, but nonetheless, random samplings of data have given me hope that all is not lost when it comes to this aspect of polite behavior.
Now if we could do something about the high caloric counts in the food!
Allen, Texas.
So this is the view from my hotel window in Allen, Texas. The freeway with the blurry cars is US Route 75. It’s always busy.
I’m in Allen, Texas on business this week. I’ve met the other members of the group I work in for the first time face-to-face and I have to admit that I feel more comfortable than I thought I would. I like these folks. It’s so much better when one can put a face to a name.
Tonight we had a team building exercise at a place called Top Golf and I swung a golf club for the first time in my life. I’m not good at it at all but I was able to hold my own and not completely embarrass myself. I was happy that I got up the nerve to golf in front of my co-workers! Perhaps a couple of beers helped the situation.
The training is going well and I think my eyes have only gazed over once or twice so far. Sometimes when there’s a lot of incoming data one can get overloaded. Reviewing notes and the like is certainly helping. I’m such a geek.
My theory about my insanity is holding true; I still sleep best in the Central Time Zone and I have absolutely no explanation as to why.
One.
Since the advertised WiFi is not working on this flight, I thought I would try something else along the line of “firsts”. So I’m having my first in-flight alcoholic beverage.
I don’t know the name of the flight attendant that is working coach, but he is a handsome gentleman and he apologized for not having an orange to include with my Blue Moon.
The food choices are rather limited. My supper consisted of a can of Pringles, two free Biscotti cookies, a Diet Coke in a leaky cup and this can of Blue Moon. I see the first class flight attendant walking around with a submarine sandwich. Apparently that’s a first class thing only. Someone is going to have to let me fly somewhere via first class someday. Preferably on a 747.
That will be a grand blog entry entitled “Firsts”. In the meantime, I’ll enjoy my first alcoholic beverage on a flight.
Sigh.
So I was all excited on my flight from Syracuse to LaGuardia because there was WiFi. I confirmed that there would be WiFi on the 3 1/2 hour flight from LaGuardia to Dallas-Ft. Worth. I would be able to do my surfing thing and actually accomplish some things I wanted to get done online.
It was when we reached 10,000 feet and we were permitted to use electronic devices that they informed us that the WiFi on this aircraft was inoperative at this time. So, I paid $9.95 plus tax for a day pass of WiFi when I could have bought a shorter pass for the first flight today.
I wouldn’t say that I’m pissed off about this, but I do find it disappointing. If you’re going to scream about WiFi on your flights, you should make sure that your WiFi is actually working. Geeks get hostile when they’re promised an Internet connection and they don’t get it. I have several tech friends that have two internet connections at home so that they’re never disconnected. I have contingency plans for our internet connectivity at The Manor. While I’m sure that Internet connectivity is hardly a priority on a commercial flight, I do expect a company to come through on their promises.
So, Delta Airlines, you disappointed me a bit on this flight. I’m on a regional jet for three and a half hours, there is no entertainment available (though the three women in row 11 are amusing in an irritating sort of way) and now we have no WiFi.
Such a first world problem I know. I should have commissioned the LearJet.
Firsts.
So this is my first time publishing a blog post using in flight WiFi. I’m kind of excited about it. I’m flying Delta today and I’m finding this plane (CRJ700) to be quite comfortable, especially when compared to the Dash-8s I usually fly out of SYR.
I’m such a geek.
Old.
I’m a tech snob. This isn’t something to be described as a negative aspect of my personality, it’s actually something that I’m kind of proud of. With technology where it is today, I think that the right tools are available to do what the masses need to do. I also fully believe that if you’re going to embrace technology, you need to do it properly, with the best tools you can get your hands on. This is something that has taken me years to realize; saving money isn’t going to save you money in the long run.
About a year ago, when I found out that I was going to be on a more frequent work on-call rotation, it was suggested that I finally get a company mobile phone. I took this advice and filled out the appropriate forms and waited for the red tape to unwind itself a bit. Our company is aligned with AT&T, so I knew that my smartphone choices would be different than what I was familiar with on Verizon. I was fairly surprised when I was told that I couldn’t have a smartphone of anytime, but rather I had two or three choices of flip phones to choose from.
Oh joy.
I ended up getting some Samsung flip phone that is so poorly designed that I have never used it. I have never given out my company mobile number to anyone, not even to the company. Instead, I opted to get a Google Voice number, which I can then direct anywhere I want to direct it.
Now, I’m not wasting company funds. When I am officially on-call, the Google Voice number is directed to my personal iPhone and to the piece of crap Samsung flip phone. The latter direction is just so that I have something audible to startle me awake should I get a call in the middle of the night. The piece of crap Samsung flip phone sits on my nightstand and does nothing even mobile related. The moment I am officially off-call I power down the phone and shove it away in a drawer.
The piece of crap Samsung flip phone doesn’t hold a charge for longer than 24 hours. It beeps and burps and chirps randomly at all hours of the night. I don’t know if it’s some sort of audible notification stating, “my battery is charged!” or what but it’s annoying. If I pick up the phone like you’re going to make or answer a call, I always hit the PTT button on the side by mistake which throws the phone into some sort of warning notification hell telling me that my PTT is going to charge me something. I don’t even know what my PTT Is. There is a constant notification on my screen stating that I missed a call on the 29th of December, even though I have pecked at the keyboard to get beyond this notification countless times. And did I mention that my iPhone has a better battery life than this thing?
The folks at work were kind enough to provide me with a holster to carry the phone on my belt. Sorry ma’am, but if I’m going to carry a holster that size on my belt, it’s going to have a Glock in it and people are going to be impressed, not laughing uproariously at me.
Through casual observation at work, I have noticed that most of the folks that you would think have a company cell phone actually carry a personal smartphone instead, with their company number forwarded to their personal phone. Most of the time the personal device of choice is an iPhone. Smart choices for smart people!
Flip phones were quaint back in their day but it’s time to move on. I don’t care if it’s an iPhone or an Android device, but in today’s business world where you need to be connected, you need to have a device that isn’t on the cheap and is going to do the job properly. Especially when you’re part of the telecommunications world.
Guess what I’m not packing with me for my business trip today.
Backed Up.
So I wiped out my Flickr account earlier this week. Before I did to, I remembered to back up all my photos and save them to my primary desktop computer, an iMac running iPhoto.
It was at this moment that I remembered that I had wiped out my iMac a few months ago and had never loaded my photos back into iPhoto.
I then panicked, thinking I had lost all of my photographs of the last ten years. It turns out I had saved everything on an old hard drive. I restored my iPhoto library successfully but all of this panic was a stark reminder that I need to get a backup solution back in place for our various computer systems. I checked with the budget department and was approved to purchase a Time Capsule for our Macinhouse. Off to the Apple store tomorrow!
I’m such a geek. And as a reminder of this, here is a restored picture of me from 2009 playing the part of Mr. Telephone Man.
Date Night.
So tonight Earl and I decided to mix it up a little bit try a restaurant at one of the local casinos for dinner. Normally we go to the ever-growing Turning Stone Casino but this restaurant is at Vernon Downs Casino, a much smaller venue that is trying to bring some year round pep to the aged horse track.
We knew it was going to be an interesting experience when Earl spotted a used condom next to the Jeep in the parking lot. It wasn’t ours.
The restaurant, Mr. G’s, was kind of meh. The ads showed an impressive bar space which led one to believe that it’s kind of like a pub. The truth of the matter is, the nice bar space is situated in one corner of this ballroom turned restaurant and quite frankly it had all the ambience of a hospital waiting room. Really high ceiling, foldable wall and one big fluorescent light fixture in the middle of the room. The food was decent, though Earl’s hamburger was kind of rare, but it didn’t kill us so we were satisfied. My beer was flat.
After that swanky experience we went into the casino, which only has video gaming machines. Since the ATM only gave out $100 bills, I put one in a machine and it was kind enough to let me take out $150 after three spins. I cashed in my ticket and called it a night. Earl had similar luck with his round of video gaming and we were out of there within a half hour. The condom stayed behind.
The slip pictured above is actually after Earl decided to play $5 on our way out. He actually came out ahead as well.
We decided to drive off to the aforementioned Turning Stone Casino where Earl played poker in the poker room and I watched people mill about for a few hours. I actually played one of my favorite games, “Count the Mustaches”. They were found on men both young and old and a couple of surly women. I didn’t include the ladies in my tally, that just didn’t seem like the galant thing to do.
Earl came out of the poker room with a wad of cash. We had a spot of dessert and decided to call it a night while we were still ahead in the game.
I think it was a good way to kick off the weekend.
