No Word - Seattle Trip Update

While I look forward to getting the hell out of dodge, I haven't recieved my advance check nor have I recieved an itinerary from the travel agency the company uses. I emailed my supervisor this morning but have no word back yet.

This could be tied to the fact that my company seems to think that we should pay to work and then submit an expense report to get reimbursed. I don't mind the normal buy my gas and get reimbursed by the following week. I do get mileage reimbursment. But they also expect this for travel. This means having around $2000 bucks available credit on my credit card...and waiting at least 2 weeks to get my money back because I have to send in the reciepts for hotel,car rental, fuel/mileage, parking etc. or they won't pay me. Another gripe I have is the fact I don't get payed interest for use of my money. The credit card companies charge interest based on an average daily balance...these costs definately drives the balance up.

When you are a full-time employee of a company, you shouldn't have to pay to be able to work. Especially, if they don't pay you enough to have discrecinary income to use. Our reviews are due and I understand the company is giving raises based on performance...the average being 3%. My district manager is so tight I'm not expecting anything regardless of how good I feel I do.

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Off to Seattle

The boss called me yesterday and said they needed me in Seattle again. At first I was to be leaving this morning but then they ran the numbers. I would get there too late to do anything today and have only one day before 2 days off. So I'm supposed to leave here Sunday Night and come back next Friday night now. Since I haven't got reimbursed for the last trip yet, they are supposed to send me an advance overnight. I haven't seen an itinerary confirmation yet either though.

In anticipation, I picked up a cheap printer to take along so I don't have to fire-up my laptop except to run the GPS if I get lost. Somewhere I have an old serial thermal printer that I got with Epson CP/M laptop years ago. These things work forever. I'm sure it still works but the question is can I get it to work with XP or not is another issue for another day.

Looks like the weather will be tolerable up there next week also.

Last night we had one heck of a storm blow through here, The winds were around 30-40 mph. At one point we got hail the size of malt balls you get at the show. The rain came in buckets with spare compartments. It was so intense actually that the roof started leaking. I'm not gonna get in a tizzy though. I've seen daylight show through brand new roofs before and never have a leak. There's likely 3-4 more years life in this roof as it sits. If it leaks again under normal conditions, we will move the plan up a bit.

The good news is that there is no major damage to the house, my new fencem and the water drains as planned in my new lawn area.

 

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Friday The Thirteenth

I'm not exactly superstitious but things seem to happen on this day for some reason.

Day started out pretty good. Left for Paradise early to pick-up a laptop I had re-imaging from the day before and take it to the client in Oroville. The image setup went ok but for some reason the software push that follows failed to exit. Took forever to get to the desktop. Then had problems installing the printer. Not looking real good at this point.

Finished that job and went and installed a printer in Chico...went well. Since I was in Chico ( I planned this good) I stopped at a private clients office to setup a 1 TB hd drive on the network and it was DOA. Spent 2 hours on the phone driving home before I got an RMA number from the manufacturer...

On the way to my first job I got a speeding ticket. I was actually going the same speed as the cars in front of me but I was at the end of the line keeping my distance. I was the easiest target I guess. I'll probably go for the traffic school to keep it off my record, I do fairly good considering I drive around 60,000 miles a year. It's been a few years since I've been stopped for anything at all.

So while the day kinda sucked, nothing terribly bad happened that couldn't or hasn't happened any other day besides Friday the Thirteenth.

 

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iPhone?

I think the vote is still out on this new fangled device. I've read several articles since it's release. Haven't seen one yet, but I guess it's a matter of time. Depending on what article you read, they either love it or hate it or are neutral. Just like everything else though, it's a matter of personal opinion.

I think the $600 pricetag and the fact in order to use it as a phone you have to sign-up with AT&T for a 2 year contract means I won't buy one. I caught part of a Kim Kommando show yesterday and she said that the 2 year contract was for people with good credit, Not mentioned on the Apple website is the fact that for people with not so stellar credit, they have a pay-as-you-go monthly offer.

In this area, AT&T cell service has been less than stellar from everything I've heard.

Rush Limbaugh is giving away 10 iPhones, a check for $1500 to cover 2 years of service and subsriptions to his website and newletter if you sign up for the Rush in a Hurry newsletter which is free. They currently have 4 left. You can find it at http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/

Personally, I can't see why people waited in lines to get one. YouTube allready has quite a collection of iPhone videos. One of the funnier ones shows a guy opening one up with a screwdriver and a claw hammer. The guy obviously has more money than brains.

On a closing note...I read that the iPhone has already been "hacked" so it can be used and not require signing up for a 2 year contract just to use the multimedia features.

I'll wait to get one free/

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2 Days of Damage Control Leads to Cooler Weather

It was good to have a holiday follow my Seattle trip. We had a great time swimming at the lake and then took off early evening to catch the fireworks in town. I brought the camcorder with me and taped the entire 23 min show. Not sure if I can post it or not since it is rather huge.

Anyway, my employer failed to get someone to cover my area while I was gone. So I had some calls backed up when I returned. I suppose it could have been worse but It usually has the tendancy to make me look bad since I'm the one that shows up to fix things.

Then of course there was the 112 degree weather and the swamp cooler not working correctly.

Saturday, I installed a new curtain rod and hung the curtains I had cleaned and fixed several months ago. When I took the curtains down I found the board the rod was mounted to separating from the wall due to the weight. The window, unfortunately, is an 8 foot wide by 5 foot high single-pane window and catches the afternoon sun.

The curtains were made for a 10 foot window the way they were previously hung. Now that it's finished and mounted correctly, there is room for pictures or something at the sides of the curtains. Actually looks much better than it did before.

The swamp cooler guy came out friday and adjusted the float in the cooler and it's working better now. Not sure how they could charge for the service since just a few months earlier I paid for a full service which included that, We called for service because the float was out of adjustment and water was running off the roof....still gonna call them on this.

Things have cooled off at work, and the house.

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Back from Seattle - Happy 4th!

Got to see some fireworks last night from 19000 feet. I was on a puddlejumper from SF to Redding coming back from Seattle. It was quite a different view from that far up as opposed to being on the ground looking up.

Seattle reminds me of LA with trees and lots of water. Traffic sucks.

Fortunately, the vehicle I rented got good gas mileage. I think I saw 3 or 4 stations in my travels. The bathroom flooded at my hotel so I switched rooms but had to switch back because the Internet didn't work in the new room. I stayed at the Days Inn on 7th right downtown. Really close to the Space Needle.

Monday night after I finally got done with work, I walked over to the Needle to see about dinner...they were booked up! So I ate across the street at a place called Sports. Food was good.

The weather was amazingly nice for the 2 days I was there. Even got to 85 degrees! Reminded me alot like Santa Cruz weather but Seattle is more famous for its' rain than its' sunshine.

ANYWAY HAPPY FOURTH OF JULY!