The Return...

Sorry for the long delay.  Most of you know that I post mostly while at work, and my schedule has not been allowing me to post.  We had a guy leave and another take vacation.  Hopefully things will get better this week.  So here's the short story.  Those of you that know me or follow me on Twitter know that I crushed that Meteorology test, to the tune of a 97%.  The score made me feel so good.  I'm still carrying an A in my algebra class(although I'm playing hookie tonight to go to the Caps game).  So school is going well.   My car on the otherhand, was not doing so well.  I had to replace the clutch, the pump, the fly wheel and put two new oxygen sensors into it, in addition to replacing the tires(which I planned on.)  So, $2500 later I'm back on the road.  I guess that's part of the chance you take when you buy a used car with a manual transmission.  Lucky for me, I REALLY like the car, because it looks like we are going to be together for a long time.   Carey and I celebrated out 6th wedding anniversary over the weekend.  We went to the Melting Pot to cook our own food. It was great fun.   Lets see, what else....Carey is close to being done her Masters, we got a sectional couch for the "man cave"(that was before my clutch blew up, go figure.) That's all that comes to mind at the moment.  Oh yeah, one last thing.  Thanks to the "Pig Hat Girls" for the free tickets to the Caps pre-season game two Sunday's ago.  I'll have to tell you that story later.   Later!


s

I haven't forgotten you!

I have had a miserable week at work. Total disaster after total disaster, and since I do most of my blogging from work, it got pushed off.  I've had three days this week that made me wish we hadn't bought the house, because I would have quit on the spot. There is just too much crap, and too much drama!

The highlight of this week was the Caps beat down of the Pens in Pittsburgh last night.  I would be more excited if they had Fleury in goal, but it was fun to beat up on our old backup goalie.

Orioles fan fest this weekend, so I'll be back on the autograph train, and I'm going to the Caps game Saturday night. It should be a fun weekend.

s

Here we go again...

The US Junior Mens Hockey Team gets their chance to extract revenge on Canada tonight.  I'm actually looking forward to watching this more than the Caps/Canadians game tonight.  Hopefully luck will be on my side and Canada will go O for two in the games I care about tonight. 

I'm back at work, like the rest of us after the holiday.  I actually feel pretty motivated at the moment.  The job is still frustrating, but I'm getting better at dealing with it.  I started reading my Mac OS X certification book I bought a few months ago on Sunday.   I got an infusion of energy for technology over the Christmas holiday, Carey's cousin is going to start college next year, and he is really into technology.  Chatting with him for a few hours on Saturday really re-energized my interest.  It's funny how life works like that.

I'm going to see the doctor tomorrow to see if he can help resolve the stomach issues I've been having for a few weeks.  I have a bad feeling it may be an ulcer, but we shall see. Hopefully that won't be the way I start 2010.    

Until tomorrow, LETS GO USA!!!

s

The End Of The World

The last two months have been kind of different here in the office. The device we use to monitor and control access to the Internet has been down. Users were able to Twitter, Facebook, MySpace, Youtube, etc. Well, that all came to a screeching halt at lunchtime today. Our device is fixed and back on-line. I'm sure this will be a fun afternoon, I can already hear the users whining. There are some aspects of my job that I do like. Listening to users complain is generally one of them.

Speaking of jobs, we found out a month or so ago that CVS is closing the pharmacy at our location and moving all of our reimbursement folks to Pittsburgh. Since then I have been able to confirm at least four other programs that will be leaving us around the same time. We are going to lose about 125 positions, in our building. This won't impact me directly, at least right away. I do know if the user count does not rebound, they won't need five people to support 150 local users, so I've got to keep my eyes open.

All else is well, no complaints. Talk to you soon.

S

The blog returns...again.

Hey all,
Before I address the pic above, I'd like to issue an apology.

To my dearest wife. I'm sorry, I'm a douche bag, I know this. The fact that you have chosen to stay with said douche bag makes me happier than I can explain. I love you, and I hope that you know that I will strive to be a better douche bag in the future. I love you.

Moving forward...I found the above pic of the greatest hockey player in the World on Sunday. The Caps, like all 29 other NHL teams opened training camp this week. I want that shirt. Anyone who knows where I can get one, please let me know.

I have been sick for roughly the last week, so I'm still recovering from that. Thank goodness this hit before the Vegas trip.

I have a new iron in the fire at work, it has to do with me changing to a new position in a new department. I will pass along more info as I get it. God knows, I need a change of scenery at work.

Carey is back in school. This class on Yellowstone that she is taking seemed fascinating to me at 1st, but the more I help her with it, the more I wonder how this instructor got the course approved, as it appears to be his personal vendetta against the National Park Service, whatcha gonna do.

Lastly, and most importantly, Carey's grandmother got her tracheotomy tube removed on Monday. This is a MAJOR milestone for her. We were up in New Jersey to visit her over the weekend and she has made amazing progress. She's doing PT and OT at least once a day now, and will hopefully be strong enough to go home. Its good news all around! YAY!

s

The weather is here, wish you were beautiful...

Good afternoon! I found out this morning that our boss is "too sick" to make a trip to see us this week. His presence doesn't affect me one way or the other, I'm just wondering if he got a case of the "I don't want to go to Rockville Flu" or if he honestly is sick. I know he hates his job as much as I hate mine, he's told me that. Who knows. It's been a mildly frustrating day today. It's been one of those days that makes me feel like I work with kids...apologies to my teacher friends.

I'm supposed to play hockey tonight, but we shall see if that happens. It's a 10pm game and I don't think I'm willing to be tired for two days just to play for an hour tonight.

I don't have a lot going on this week...and I think I'll keep it that way.

Until tomorrow.
s

The hits just keep on coming...

SI.com has released the next installment in the NCAA cheerleader series. Today we have been presented with the cheerleaders of the mid-west bracket. I know, I know. You're welcome.

I'm suffering from a case of the 'I don't wanna be here's" today. I don't know why, but today I have the burning desire to do absolutely nothing. Its frustrating. It seems that the stupid co-workers are back up to their antics after a nice 2-3 week break. Coworker #1 is back to spending his entire day on Gmail chat, and coworker #2 is back to thinking that I'll clean up all his messes for him. The week or two of honest to goodness teamwork we experienced is gone. I found out this morning that I have my 2008 employee review this afternoon. My boss is going to take a half hour to tell me that I'm not getting a raise. Hopefully something constructive will come of this, but I'm not holding my breath. The last few of these have been lots of fluff, followed by a meager pay increase. Since no-one here is getting an increase, the content of the review itself ought to be very interesting.

The doctor informed me this week that my BMI(Body Mass Index) is 36. Anything above 25 is bad. The quest is now on for me to avoid having to take diabetes pills, blood pressure pills, and who knows what else. I'll try to throw a quick blurb in each week to let you know how that's going. Weigh in day will be Friday, and this week isn't a complete week, but I will take a measurement tomorrow to see where I stand. The silver lining is that it should really help my hockey. I'll be much faster with 20-30 less pounds to carry around. YAY!

Enjoy the cheerleaders..thanks again to si.com.

I like to move it move it, I like to move it move it.

I'm sorry for the lack of blog action this week. The execs at work, in their infinite wisdom, have decided to have us move most of the users in our building around. My week has been a combination of running wire, punching cables and meetings about running wire and punching cables. I'll be here most of the evening tonight, and all day tomorrow. I'm hoping to resume normal blogging next week. I hope you have a great weekend. I know I will. :-)

s

Post 50!!

Who would have thunk that back in December when I started this that I would have stuck to it for 50 posts. I've had almost 800 page loads since I started this, which is very cool. I'd like to take a second to thank my regulars, and I hope you continue to enjoy my writings. I thought about doing some fancy "Top 50 things about me" post, but I honestly cant think of 5o interesting things to post, so I'm gonna stick with what got me here. Thanks again and enjoy.

Today we go back to grey and cold, but we will be back into the 60's tomorrow so that will be nice. The wife and I are still hashing out our vacation plan for this year. It looks like we might scrap the whole St. Lucia thing and do something stateside, on the west coast. We shall see.

Work is work, the demands that the business places on us are still crazy, but we manage to get by. I'm still thankful that I have a place to go to work every day. I found out yesterday that had I had the desire to manage about tow years ago, I could have easily moved into that role. its interesting what you learn when you talk to an old boss. Figures 'eh...I'll stick with it doing what I can and hopefully that opportunity will come up again.

All else is well, nothing to exciting going on, so I'll just keep taking it one day at a time. Lata!

s

''I'm not even supposed to BE here."

That line from clerks is the line that best sums up my weekend. As you read(hopefully) in my previous post I ended up at work on Saturday night/Sunday morning. The post mortem is this:

1. The compressor in the AC unit was dead. It ran out of coolant and kept running, getting so hot that it burned up. The company that installed it did not have another compressor in stock, so that machine is dead until Tuesday. They ordered some portable AC units for us to keep that room cool.
2. My co-worker touched base with me at 6:30am on Sunday morning. He was totally oblivious and unwilling to come in and help out. Unreal.
3. We ended up getting portable AC's up and running and were out of the office by 9:30am.

Yesterday was a strange day, as the day after an all nighter usually is. We slept for about 2 hours and then forced ourselves to stay up for the rest of the day. I feel lucky to have some good friends who were willing to share their afternoon/evening with us to help us get by. It worked out to be a fun night. By 9:15 both the wife and I were asleep. We slept like rocks all the way through the night. It was great.

I had a very interesting conversation with my co-worker this morning about his inability/unwillingness to fulfill his duty while on-call. The meeting I have with my boss tomorrow about this should be even more interesting.

The last thing that I want to mention is the fact that I used the word WE a lot in this post. This was not a mistake. My wife was with me through this entire ordeal. It was her decision to come with me to work. Her philosophy was" I can either go and be with you, or I can stay here and not sleep while I worry about you." So she was with me through the whole deal. I know she reads this and I want her to know how much what she did meant to me. She went 27 hours without sleep and this wasn't even her issue. Having someone there when I was at the lowest point was very comforting, having someone to talk to, someone to vent with and keep me calm. So to my wife...Thank You...in the most public way I can think of. You are the best, I love you.

Until tomorrow.

Its 3:41am...where are you?

Most normal people are home in bed. Im supposed to be home in bed, but I'm not. I'm at work. I'm sitting here waiting for an air conditioner tech to come and fix one of my AC units. Here's what went down.

1. I'm not supposed to be on-call this weekend. I had taken the wife out for a nice birthday dinner with some friends. Tapas up in Baltimore, YUMMY! It was a great night. I hadn't been feeling all that good lately so I didn't drink at all. Lucky for me. We turned in at about midnight when the house phone rang. I checked it, being that it was midnight and we were not expecting any calls. It was work. I checked my cell phone, retrieved the message and called in. I was notified that my co-worker was not responding even though he was on call, and I was needed to check on this sick AC unit.

2. After trying to find a way out of it, I gave in, got in the car and came in. I'm lucky I did, because I found my UPS room to be above 90 degrees and the AC to be non functional. Between 1am and 3am I went back and forth with folks from work, folks from the AC company, and folks from my building. By 3:15 a tech was finally on the way. I'm currently waiting for him as my giant fan runs to keep the UPS some sort of cool. I bet the wife will never forget this birthday, as she decided to come to the office to keep me company. She's currently sleeping at the desk for my "on-call" co-worker, who I'm sure is blissfully sleeping at home.

Being responsible sucks.