This weekend I ran my first 5K of the year, the Montrose Frozen Blueberry race. Normally there’s a foot of snow on the ground and windchill temperatures in the low teens, but this year it was in the mid-fifties and a prefect day for a 5K! After the race I managed to catch half a play-off game before we headed out for date night.

For Christmas I had gotten Susan a couple tickets to Cinderella the Ballet. Before heading to The Whiting in Flint, we decided to eat out, apparently a lot of other people had the same idea. Our first choice, Italia Gardens was packed and had at least a 20 minute wait. We opted to go to Senior Lucky’s that was also pretty busy. We hadn’t been there before, but the people at work said it was pretty good… it sure was! Although it wasn’t Susan’s favorite ballet, I think she had a good time.

After church on Sunday, I tried to catch some of the play-off action and in between games I started working on getting another wall framed in. I learned an important lesson, if you need a sledgehammer to get the wall in place, it’s probably not the right size. After trying to “nudge” the wall, I managed to split the top plate. A little more sledgehammer action and the wall was down and in pieces. I rebuilt the wall (a little shorter this time) and got it in place. Just need to run to the hardware store to pick up some more 2×4’s and I can start working on another wall.

So I heard there was some pretty sweet mountain bike trails in the area and I wanted to check them out… only problem was I didn’t have a mountain bike. I managed to find a used one last week. I gave it a 10 minute test ride, talked the guy down 20 bucks, and tossed it in my car. Once I got it home, the first thing I did was get the seat post unstuck. With the seatpost removed I gave it a good dousing of WD-40, a little bit of grease and was able to slide it up and down with out a problem. I was glad I didn’t have to resort to extreme measures to get it out.

I’ve come to the realization that most bikes can do without a kick-stand, especially if the kickstand in question won’t stay up going over bumps. That was the first thing to go! The next thing were the metal pedals… they were in pretty rough shape and I swapped those out for some bigger plastic ones I had sitting on the shelf.

My next step was to take apart the headset and see what condition the steerer was in. Not sure how the previous user was using the bike, but there was sure a crap-ton of dirt that came out. The steerer had some rust (not as bad as the seatpost) and got a healthy douse of WD-40 as well.

Once the fork was re-installed, I needed to adjust the front brake. For some reason the quick release was difficult to use, after some tweeking I managed to get that working (important for wheel removal so I can load it into my car!) With the front end tuned, I started working on the drive train.

The cassette was in pretty rough shape, I set that aside to soak in some degreaser while I started looking at the crank. Luckily I had a crank puller and was able to get the crank arms off. I didn’t have a tool for the bottom bracket, but I plan to pick one up this week so I can take that out and get some grease down there.

After getting everything cleaned up, I started putting it back together. During my test ride I noticed the back brake wasn’t very effective. The pads were pretty wore down, but I figured I could tweek it to have a mostly functioning back brake instead of a kind of working back brake. Once I got the wheel mounted I gave it a quick spin and noticed it would start rubbing the pads… there was a major wobble, not sure exactly how a wheel gets quite that bad…

I’ve heard wheel truing is more of an art and decided to let the pros take a look at it. The bike shop down by the river took a little longer than I had hoped, but man they did a great job with that wheel. Yesterday I was able to get the brakes adjusted and derailleurs dialed in.

Today, I headed up to Rotary Park for a true “break-in” of the bike. There are quite a few trails up there and I had a helluva good time exploring the different areas of the park. The bike performed pretty well considering the state it was in when I bought it. It didn’t give me much issue except for a certain gear ratio… I think this might have to do with the poor shape of the cables, but a quick barrel adjustment and it seemed to give me less of an issue. I’m pretty pumped to hit the trails again! Pictures of the bike can be found over here.

Only a few days until Rev3 Knoxville and I’m pretty excited to be racing my first olympic distance triathlon. In other fitness news, Susan completed ANOTHER 1/2 marathon over the past weekend! Learning from my experience last year, I opted to not try a 1/2 marathon, but instead signed up for the mini-marathon (a whopping 2.6 miles!)

We got to the race a little later than I would have liked and managed to catch the last bus to the start line. My race started at 6:45 and I managed to get to the start line a little after 7. I felt like a poser for starting in corral 11 for the marathon, but oh well, it was still neat. Doing the mini-marathon did have its perks, I got to the finish line and had first dibs on all the post-race refreshments, I even got in line for a finisher photo! 🙂

Once I finished my bag of pretzels and a water, I headed back to the car for a change of clothes… I now know how superman must feel changing in a phone booth… a porta-potty can’t be much different (well a little smellier I bet…) I tried to make it back to see Susan start the race, but it took longer to get to the start then I thought and I caught the last few corrals going…

I asked Susan before the race where she could use some extra encourgement, and she said around mile 12. I headed off in that direction and waited for her… I was sitting in the shade watching the runners attempt one of the last hills of the race. Not very many of them looked happy. I also saw two guys running and juggling and a group of people supporting a dragon. After quite some time, I started to get a little chilled and decided to walk along the race course.

I figured Susan had to be coming around soon, and found a nice spot in the sun and enjoyed a band that was playing just across the street. A few minutes later, Susan popped up and I gave an encouraging shout and started clapping… only to not be heard by Susan… 🙁 I walked alongside of her for awhile, wondering if she was going to notice me or not. Once we got up to the corner, she took a double take and realized it was me. We had a chat about how she was doing and I tried to give her some encouragement… she only had less then a mile to go.

I’ve been meaning to add a new post on here for awhile, just haven’t gotten around to it. 😉 November seemed to sneak up on us this year, maybe its because we’re used to lots of white stuff covering the ground and being very cold. I managed to finish my second ever five mile race the Saturday before Thanksgiving.

I developed an app to help keep me on track during my training for the race. Although I didn’t beat my previous time, I felt a lot better finishing this race then that one. It also didn’t help my time that the course was a lot tougher, a stiff wind that always seemed to be coming right at you (even after the turn-around point) and hilly! I took a quick lead ahead of Susan to put some time between us, and as we passed each other, her words “I’m catching up to you!” was all the motivation I needed to keep going strong!

Susan was on call for Thanksgiving so we watched the game and had a nice little meal for ourselves. Susan made the dessert and I somehow got to do everything else! Waldo has been doing good, he seems almost like another dog now that we let him out by himself. We should have gotten the invisible fence a lot sooner!

After finding a good deal on cyber Monday for a 32″ LED HDTV and hooking it up, I started looking into alternative means to Charter for cable and internet. To get the HD Channels on a 2nd tv we would need to rent another receiver from Charter and get charged five more bucks per month. Charter’s internet pricing was cheaper than AT&T’s for high speed, so I started looking for options for cable. DirectTV definitely had the best 2-year contract deal, but once the 2 years was up, it jumped to a ridiculous amount and I didn’t really want to enter into a contract. The other option, Dish network, was pretty closely priced to Charter and provided more channels, but we’d still have to get two receivers and charged extra per month for the second one (I think it was 7 bucks here).

Then I had a radical idea, what if we ditched cable altogether? I don’t typically watch a whole lot of tv anyway, so after convincing Susan we could save quite a bit of money, we decided to give it a shot.

The first step was to see what major networks were in range of our house. Using a couple tools on the internet, I found ABC to be the furthest one out at around 40 miles. This is important as someone is addicted to Once Upon a Time, no ABC meant no deal!

The next step was to test an antenna with at least a 40 mile range. There’s some pretty neat antennas out now-a days, including ones that are paper thin and can actually look like part of your decor. I saw Best Buy had an antenna with a 50 mile range and figured if I wasn’t able to get all the stations I needed *ahem* ABC *ahem*, I’d return it and for go this great idea. After getting the antenna home and hooking it up to the tv, I was able to get 18 channels (most in HD), including ABC!

One of these days I’m going to actually figure out WTF is up with our coaxial cable wiring. We have a dish in our backyard with three lines attached to it. Our cable box has a 2-way splitter and a 4-way splitter (the 2-way feeds into the 4-way). Inside our house, we have a wall jack in each of the upstairs bedrooms, the upstairs tv area, a wall jack and a line in the living room, a wall jack and TWO lines in the master bedroom. Hauling my old school CRT around I determined neither upstairs jack worked nor the wall jack in the master. Outside there are two sets of three wires cut. One set comes from the satellite and one set obviously goes to the wall jacks. I still don’t know why 2 working lines were needed for the living room and bedroom, but that’s what I got…

Before venturing off into the attic I wanted to make sure I got my wiring figured right. The plans were to keep the one tv upstairs and the other for the master. I disconnected the 4-way splitter from the 2-way and wanted to get one of the lines that went to the master. I must have been lucky as the first cable I tried happened to be the right one. After marking each end of the cable, I saw the upstairs jack was already marked (isn’t that convenient?). I moved the incoming line to the 4-way splitter that way I could hook up the modem to whatever line I wanted and both of the tv lines to the 2-way splitter.

Once the wiring was figured out I was off to get a 50′ line to run from the attic to the cable box. We don’t have a full attic and a tall person doesn’t belong in ours. It wasn’t easy and the A/C unit didn’t make it pleasant going in and out of the attic. Once I started the mounting process I found out there was enough slop that I couldn’t use my ratchet wrench for the lag bolts, no it wasn’t metric because I tried that to and didn’t have much luck. I also thought to myself, gee I better not drop one of these bolts in the 6 inches of blown insulation, but happened to do that at least 5 or 6 times, almost gave up looking for the last one I dropped… 🙁 After a dozen trips in and out of the attic I finally had the antenna mounted. Using an app on my phone, I pointed in the direction I thought would be good and went to program the tv’s. Lo and behold I managed to pick up 22 channels including all of the major broadcasting networks, success! I was really happy to not have to play the adjust, scan, adjust, scan, adjust, scan game!

Along with the antenna, I also got a set top box. I went with Roku XS. It lets you stream HD content to your tv from a few different sources, including NetFlix (which we had) and HuluPlus (which I signed up for, $7.99 / month). So, after taxes and fees and all that fun stuff, we were paying close to $85 / month for cable television, add $5 for HD channels on the second tv and figuring the $8 for HuluPlus let’s say that’s a savings of $80 per month. That’s almost 1000 dollars a year we’ll be saving by dropping cable, I know there’s a better way to spend that money… such as say a new triathlon bike! 😉

Speaking of which, my triathlon training has officially started a couple weeks ago. Watching the Kona coverage (the Super Bowl of triathlons) last Saturday has got me pumped up and I can’t wait to get to the starting line to see how my training pays off!

Doing a 1/2 marathon is something I never really saw myself doing. Sure enough, we were on our way to the start line early (very early) last Saturday morning. Traffic was light and we managed to get to the Titan’s stadium with lots of time to spare. I was getting my number on and fueling up for the race, while someone was getting impatient. At this point I mentioned putting sunblock on, but apparently that was a dumb idea and they would be “OK”. After a quick pitstop at the porta-johns, we were ready to get to the start line. Since the race finished here and started at the Centennial Park, we needed to get on a shuttle and head over that way. Sounds pretty easy… in theory… No one was really sure what to do, and there was a lot of shuffling going around and not much instruction from the volunteers. After seeing two or three sets of shuttles leave, a volunteer finally said we were all standing in the wrong spot, the shuttles won’t stop here and we needed to move down the sidewalk. After seeing another set of shuttles go through, we finally got on one and we were off! Not too much longer I noticed we were in a different lane than all the other shuttles and started passing them. Apparently, we were taking the “long” way…

Once we finally got to the park, it was time to find the start line. There were a ton of people, like 31,000 not including the spectators. We found the mass start of racers and realized our start corral was way down from where we were. We finally got to our corral and got in line around 7:00 AM (the official start of the race). Each corral got its own start and there were a couple of guys on mics keeping the crowd entertained. Our start time was around 7:48 AM, so I guess we really did have a lot of time to spare.

The first couple of miles went pretty well, my ankle started hurting a little, but at this point not too bad (had a sprain during my training :(). Around the 5k mark, my ankle was definitely swelling and I was having a hard time keeping pace with Susan (although I did beat her for the 5k time ;)). My foot started numbing up and I tried walking it off without much success. Around mile 5 I felt the onset of calf cramps (something I’m pretty familiar with during racquetball and knew I needed to get some electrolytes/water soon). Each watering station I was sucking back the cytomax and water and that seemed to help… a little… Mile 10 I was full on walking, my ankle was hurting pretty good… at least my foot wasn’t numb any more. After an energy gel some more cytomax and water, I thought I’d give running a shot… bad idea… My calf cramps hit and I know I took a few awkward steps and managed to limp to the side of the road. A couple people asked if I was ok, I said I’ll be fine, reassuring them with a smile. I have had calf cramps before, but nothing like this… I started pulling my toes and tried to stand up and was almost able to walk… Sat back down and stretched a little more. Finally I was able to get moving, I saw a med tent (just before mile 12) and almost threw in the towel. I told myself no matter what I’m finishing what I started. My legs were sore, my ankle was throbbing, but I was pushing forward. Managed to get a semi-speed walking pace going, although I wanted to run, I knew if I did I was done.

I remember going down the hill before the finish line thinking, ok just a few more steps… just a few more steps… can’t sprint, just keep moving and I’ll finish… The finish line never looked so beautiful before, although I was in a lot of pain, I was happy it was over. I got corralled towards the post-race refreshments and on the look out for Susan (who kicked my butt and is a little crazy for wanting to do another one…) I ate a couple bananas grabbed a water and started heading back towards the porta-potties (where I thought we were meeting after the race). Susan was no where to be seen, so I thought maybe she would be at the car… finally I found her and we started talking about our race experiences. I wouldn’t say it was a fun experience, but I enjoyed it for the most part. I probably won’t be doing another one for awhile… I’ve got training to do, triathlon season is coming into full swing! 🙂

So it’s always been an interest of mine to get a scuba diving certification.  This past weekend, I took my firsts steps in doing so.  The Clarksville Athletic Club (CAC) had a barbeque kick off for their Scuba Club and I was able to test out the gear and find out how neat it really was.  After going from one end of the pool to the other, I was ready to sign up for the 5 day training class (times yet TBD).  The best part was if you signed up that day, you got a 50% discount on the class!

In other news, I’m still commenting the 60 miles to work and back.  Things are going pretty good…  I seem to be getting things done faster then can be assigned to me…  Last Friday my boss finally gave me a project that should take some time to finish (as of writing this I’m almost half done…), so much for that. 😛  The commutes not so bad…  I figured out the traffic patterns and try to keep an ear on the traffic reports on my travels.  It should get even better when my car comes in (2012 Ford Focus).  Haven’t heard anything lately, but it should be built very soon!

We are still both training hard for the Nashville 1/2 Marathon that is rapidly approaching.  We’ve decided the CAC is not really all that great of a club and really wished we hadn’t entered a two year contract.  The big seller for me was the racquetball courts, but I soon found out having three courts and tons of people showing up on the challenge nights means not a whole lot of time playing…  maybe if I found a buddy that would take care of that.  The rest of the gym feels small for the number of people that go there, they could really use another facility (possibly on the other side of town… near us :)).  Once we finish the 1/2 marathon, and assuming I’m still breathing, I’ll start my training for a triathlon coming up in July (depending on how well that goes I’m thinking of doing another one later in the year).

Whoa…where has the summer gone, *ahem* and the updates to this site?
Last week my boss found we were heading for Nashville this year… things
will be interesting over the next couple weeks, it seems she has had it
out for me for awhile now… Both of the phone interviews lead to on-site
interviews… I already got my rejection from one of the companies and am
still waiting and hoping on the other job. We went to the bookstore to
pick up a GRE prep book for me, not sure if I see myself going back to
school, but it is something I have been thinking a lot about lately.
So far our summer has been pretty un-exciting (could be the reason for
lack of posts on here?) We had planned to go up north to stay with Susan’s
folks for the weekend of the fourth. Unfortunately I was unable to go. The
Friday beforehand I was told I needed to get a bunch of stuff done for our
client out in California. Not wanting to get sent on site again, I stayed
down and worked through the weekend. Susan took the dog and found out he
isn’t really fond of the water.

As you can see on the gym page, I’ve been able to do quite a few races
this year. My times seem to be getting better overall, but my best times
are when it’s raining out… who said running in the sun was fun? I’m
still trying to get my training in for my triathlon in September, it’s
getting closer, and I’m getting more excited. I’m getting a lot better in
the water and am pretty sure I won’t drown during the event. There’s been
talk of doing a 1/2 marathon in Nashville next year, whether we sign up is
yet to be determined.

All the extra work I put in to getting our client live, I was still sent
on site a couple weeks ago (whatever happened to restricted travel?)
Things went a lot better this time, most likely because I wasn’t sent by
myself… They actually bought lunch for us a couple times and took us out
to dinner! We went to a few different places, including a Mediterranean
cafe, an Indian restaurant, and a seafood place. It was all really good,
especially the seafood place. Our customer is finally seeing what it is to
deal with the third party company in the project and I think they realize
it’s not us that’s the problem… hopefully we will get them running our
new software soon with no problems (or I’ll have another job 😀 ).

It was our annual users group last week, and I had to give a
presentation Monday. Luckily I got there early, as my boss said her laptop
was set, but she never tested the software. I spent a good 45 minutes
getting everything set up so I would have something to show during the
demo of the software I had been working on. I spent some time talking to
one of the video vendors later in the week, and the things they are doing
was pretty slick. They were excited about the video software I had created
(…if only they were located in Tennessee!)

Things are quite busy in the Jeske household as of late. Susan found out
about a job opportunity, with Corning, in Clarksville, TN. So, my job hunt
focus will now be going south (quite literally). I’ve applied for a dozen
or so jobs and have had two phone interviews already! Hopefully, I’ll hear
something back this week. Once I land a job down there, it’s two weeks at
DICE and I’ll be heading to Tennessee. Susan still has a few more months
left to finish her MBA and will probably move at the end of this year…

Scout’s become more adventurous towards Waldo, although she doesn’t
really care for him much. She will come down stairs nowadays, usually
begging for food. Most of her time is locked away in the dark on her
“throne”. We decided to scrape the toilet training, Scout seems set in her
ways and things weren’t progressing well. Waldo has gotten a lot bigger
(probably close to 50 lbs) and has lost a lot of fur… We took him in for
a haircut and he got shaved down… he actually doesn’t look quite so bad
anymore, maybe I’ll get a picture of him up soon.

We’ve had a couple races since the last time I posted… Susan’s still
doing good, finishing in the top of her age division. I managed to improve
my time a little bit in May, but for some reason the race earlier this
month was a tough one. The Pinconning CheeseTown challenge is coming this
weekend and I’m hoping to improve my pace time (even though it is a 5 mile
race 🙂 ). I’ve officially started my triathlon training last week… I’ve
already paid, so it’s too late to back out now! If you head over to the
gym page you can see my goals for each week in the three different sports,
so far, so bad… I didn’t quite make my goals last week… by the end,
there should be a lot of green on that table! 😀

Wanting to get the most out of my bike, we went to the bike store last
Thursday to pick up some clip-less pedals. For those not familiar clip-less
pedals are actually pedals you clip into (makes sense, doesn’t it?) You
wear these really spiffy looking shoes, that aren’t very much fun to walk
in, and become one with the bike. After installing the pedals, I tested
clipping in and out in the driveway and in front of the house… I was
ready, or so I thought… We hit the trails and the first stop we come to
I un-clip the right side and somehow started leaning to the left. Luckily,
I was able to get my left foot out in time before I hit the pavement… I
wasn’t so lucky last night. We were just about done with our ride and one
of the last stops, I really was one with the bike, all the way down to the
ground. I caught myself and didn’t really scrape my knee too bad… I
guess I must not have hurt myself that bad, as when Susan asked if I was
ok, she just kept going… I got back on my bike, only thing that really
was hurt was my pride. 😉

Job update… I had a phone screening with Dow for a DB Administrator
position! They sounded pretty interested in me on the phone, so who knows
maybe I’ll get a call back for an interview… although they said they
were considering a large number of candidates for the position (keep your
fingers crossed 🙂 ). This past weekend was quite the busy one. Saturday
Susan and I went to the gym together. She wanted to break in her new
Reebok fit shoes, and I was itching to get on the racquetball courts. As I
start putting my gym clothes on in the locker room, I noticed I forgot to
pack a pair of shorts. I ran over to Dunham’s, but by the time I got back,
my fellow racquetball players were gone, oh well there’s always Monday…

I managed to get the lawn mower out and as I was finishing up the
backyard… yes… it was snowing… lightly, but noticeable. Later that
night, we went to the Midland Center for the Arts for an orchestra
concert. It was… interesting… The first half was solar system themed,
and they had a couple narrators read a passage at the beginning of the
pieces. In the backdrop they had a large projection of various stars and
planets, which for some reason stuttered a lot… The second half, a huge
choir came out and in my opinion was more enjoyable.

After checking the forecast for the hundredth time, we were almost ready
for the 6K race in Midland on Sunday (it was gonna be a bit chilly 🙁 ).
Before the race, we headed over to the Verizon store to get our phone bill
discount squared away and decided to stop into Quizno’s for a bite to eat.
No… Quizno’s wasn’t my idea nor my ideal choice for a pre-race meal, but
alas that is where we went. After picking up our packets and catching up
with Susan’s sorority sister and fiance, the race was about to start. We
headed over to the start line (runners in front, walkers in back…
runners in front, walkers in back… runners in front, walkers in back…
ok I think we get it…) Carl Lewis was there and told us the MOST
important part of the race was to not go out too fast (pssh, fun, what’s
fun?) The start seemed to come really quick… “Runners on your
markBANG”… yeah there was no pause or “Get Ready” or anything… Even
though it was my fastest pace and would have been my fastest 5K and my
first 5K under 30 minutes I was told I needed to try harder… (fun,
what?) Susan got second place in her age division, beaten once again by
her sorority sister… maybe someone else needs to try harder. 😉
Well… I finally did it, I am now committed to doing a Sprint Triathlon
up in Tawas on Sept. 11. I’m hoping to get some updates to the Gym section
so you can see how my training is going. If all goes well, who knows maybe
I’ll switch to the Olympic length. 😀

I hit the two year mark at DICE a couple weeks ago, things are going
pretty good. I’m still working on my video application that is really
starting to take off. I guess it helps when the only other company that
produces a similar product is going out of business… Although, I did
take a personal day last Wednesday to take a trip down to Detroit. It
wasn’t a sight-seeing kind of day, although I went to parts I hadn’t seen
before. I was at the federal building for a few hours taking the FBI Phase
I exam. I found out recently I failed that exam, but I can take it again
in six months if I want. I’m not sure if I’m going to take it again, IF I
do pass I need to pass the physical fitness test with at least a 16 (12 is
the FBI minimum, but the Detroit office requires a 16) in order to go to
the next phase. I’ll probably take it if I’m able to pass the PFT by then
(it’s pretty tough… you can check out the requirements on the FBI’s
website…)

Waldo’s been home for a few weeks now, he seems to be getting bigger and
bigger every day. As of lately he hasn’t been having a lot of accidents in
the house (which is a good thing 🙂 ). Scout and Waldo are pretty much
mortal enemies. We ended up moving all of Scout’s stuff to the upstairs
bathroom (she wouldn’t use the litter box because that would require going
past the dog…) She pretty much spends all her time in there now, which
she seems happy… maybe they will get along some day. We are training her
to use the toilet instead of a litter box, it started off pretty rocky,
but since the upstairs move, she is actually starting to do a lot
better… We bought a Litter Kwitter, which basically is a litter box that
sits on the toilet. As the cat gets more used to the idea, you can put
different trays in with bigger and bigger holes. Right now, Scout is at
the no-hole phase and actually using the Litter Kwitter while it’s on the
toilet (something she wouldn’t do before).

St. Patrick’s day came and went and the Sunday after we were in Bay City
for the annual St. Patrick’s day race! I ran the 5K while Susan did the 5K
walk. I managed to beat my best time ever… Susan also did really good,
she got third place in her age division… and beat my super-competitive
boss! Susan also did a 4 mile walk the next Saturday and got second place
in her age division (beaten only by one of her sorority sisters she signed
up with).

Mexico

If you haven’t heard, Susan and I took a little trip down to Mexico in
January. One of Susan’s sorority sisters had a destination wedding, and we
thought this was the perfect excuse to get out of cold, snowy, Michigan.
Our trip started off pretty early (before the sun was up) as we made our
way down to Detroit. We took Susan’s car, so that meant I got to ride
shotgun. As most of you know, a good “avigator” gets the directions and
plots a route to make it easier on the driver. Since we’ve been to Detroit
Metro before, I figured it would be easy enough to wing it… As we were
getting into Detroit we managed to time it just right to hit rush hour
traffic (glad I wasn’t driving 😉 ). Whether it was early morning or
stress from so many cars around, Susan doubted I knew where we were going.
I told her to watch for the big sign that had “Detroit Metro Airport” on
it. Susan knew Detroit Metro wasn’t actually in Detroit, and expected not
to see such a helpful sign. Just as we rounded a corner, sure enough there
was a big blue sign that told us where to go… had it in the bag all
along. 🙂 We managed to get our bags checked and through security and
still had plenty of time to sit and wait for our flight…

The flight out of Detroit was on time and went smoothly, our connection
out of Chicago on the other hand was not so much. We boarded on time, but
had to wait on passengers from connecting flights. After at least 30
minutes with no one getting on, the pilot comes over the speaker to tell us
there was a problem with a light bulb. This particular light bulb was for
when the plane lost power, the pilot’s would still be able to navigate
using the control panel (probably important…) Finally, the connecting
passenger’s boarded and we were hopeful to take off soon, but it was
at leastan hour before we pulled away from the gate. Since it was pretty
cold out, we needed to get de-iced, well we waited in line for the de-icer
and that took a good 30 to 40 minutes. We started taxi-ing and before you
knew it, we were off, a couple hours later than expected.

We landed in Mexico and it was a nice change to see the sun shining.
Normally I don’t have problems flying, but I had a head cold this time and
my left ear was plugged up pretty bad… I couldn’t hear much over the next
couple days. The line to get into Mexico was crazy long and we spent quite
some time waiting with foreigners that had no personal space bubble
issues. Once through customs, we were ready to get to our resort. We found
our shuttle (the guys with the sexy flower shirts) and were soon on our
way. There were a few others on the shuttle and I think we were the second
to last ones off (which meant we didn’t get to the resort until late
evening). The resort we stayed at was really nice and we were happy to
finally be in Mexico, where the sun is always shining (or so we thought).

The next day, we met up with Susan’s sirority sisters on the beach. We
sat in the sun (and partial overcast) and relaxed, until the wedding party
left to go get ready for the wedding. We took this oppurtunity to explore
the resort and go monkey hunting (apparently the resort had monkeys that
came to the grounds, though we didn’t actually see any…) The wedding
was nice, although the armed guards roaming the beach in the background
was an interesting sight. There was a mariacchi band and drinks on the
beach after the ceremony. Someone got a pretty strong mojito and must have
been feeling pretty good before dinner. 😉

The resort was pretty big (it was technically two resorts in one) and
had four different restaurants you could go to (Italian, Mexican,
Japanese, and American Steakhouse). Dinner was at the American Steakhouse.
After dinner, we went to the beach, where a small hut serving drinks was
open for us. Apparently if you’re Greek, that means you need to drink a
lot… Susan was looking kind of tipsy, but the night wasn’t over yet. We
headed over to the DiscoTeca… where there was a dance floor, and of
course more liquid refreshments. It was getting pretty late, Susan and I
called it a night, but the rest of the crew stayed until they closed it
down.

The next day was a day of recovering, *ahem* for some of us… It wasn’t
particularly nice out… overcast and a bit chilly. We were invited on an
excursion with the rest of the group, but we had made plans for an
excursion the next day. This actually turned out in our favor, we found
out it was rainy and they didn’t really have a good time. We hung out in
the resort, read our books, and tried to find those darn monkeys.

Our excursion was quite the trip… we signed up for Tulum Extreme. This
included seeing the Mayan ruins and some extreme sports, zip-lining,
repelling, and snorkeling. We got up early and waited for our shuttle to
show up. Any where you go in Mexico, it seemed you needed to go through a
security checkpoint (atleast at the touristy places). After a half-dozen
checkpoints picking up the rest of the group from various resorts, we were
on our way. We headed off on what seemed to be a highway until we started
slowing down and turned onto a dirt road… no signs, no nothing. A couple
miles down this road, we pull off onto a two rut road with a gate. The
driver gets out, unlocks the gate, pulls through and locks the gate behind
us. As we’re traveling down this “road” through the jungle, we started to
wonder what we had gotten ourselves into.

We finally pulled into an area with other shuttles… and people, whew!
After putting our bags in lockers, we were fitted with harnesses and given
some instructions on our first activity… zip-lining. The climb up the
tower was interesting, they were pretty high up and the stairs weren’t
really level or the same size. Although the shortest, I think the first
line was the most exciting, mostly because I hadn’t done anything like
this before… There were three runs and it was really a lot of fun! After
zip-lining, we got to do repelling. Another short lesson before we started
and up the tower we went. I thought it would be down a rockface or wall or
something, but it was actually a free-fall repel. It was pretty thrilling
to walk backwards over the step at the top of the tower… and after I got
my picture taken, I went down… fast! 🙂 Susan was a little unsure of
repelling, but she was happy she did it.

It wasn’t a really hot day (like we thought Mexico would be), so we were
kind of anxious about the snorkeling part. We headed down to the cenota
(kind of like a cave with water in it) and put our snorkeling gear on. As
we got in the water, I was pretty surprised, it didn’t feel at all cold to
me… one of the couples commented it was warmer than the outside pool at
their resort. Our guide look pretty chilled, but he got in the water and
lead us through anyway. After drying off and changing clothes, it was
lunch time. The cooks at that place were awesome, we had some of the best
grilled chicken I had ever had. Once we got back on the shuttle, it was
time to go to the Mayan ruins… Unfortunately we weren’t actually allowed
to climb the stairs or touch the ruins, but it was still really neat to
see.

We got back to the resort later in the afternoon and hung out with
Susan’s sorority sisters until dinner… we had made reservations at the
Japanese restaurant. You get to sit around a hibachi grill and the cook
comes out and does a performance while he cooks your meal. Even though I
didn’t catch the shrimp in my mouth, after the cook flung it at me, the
food was great and we had a really good time.

The next day was our last day, and it was beautiful out… figures…
Once we got to the airport, we needed to check our bags and get our
boarding pass… no easy task. The line for our airline was big… almost
as bad as getting into Mexico… We finally get to the counter at least an
hour later and had our boarding passes in hand. We were pretty hungry, so
we got a quick bite to eat… heading the warning of a co-worker to stay
away from the nachos… Our flight started boarding shortly after we
finished eating. Once our group was finally called, we had to go through a
security inspection. Little did I know, Susan was going to try to hi-jack
the plane (ok… not really). She had a thumb drive on her (don’t ask me
why =P ) that the end retracted on and security didn’t know what it was. I
had gone through with ease and was wondering what the heck was going on…
After going through EVERYTHING in Susan’s carry-ons, including opening
perscriptions, she got the OK to board… The flight back was pretty
uneventful after that.

Although a short trip, it was a fun one, maybe we’ll go back some day!
😀

Work

Work has not be fun lately… my new motto is “They keep paying me, so I
keep showing up…” We’ve been told to work a set number of hours for the
past couple of months that has been well over the typical 40. I’m still
waiting for them to give us a requirement less than 40 (hah, like that’ll
ever happen). If you recall (or you can check out pretty much the only
blog for last year) I had a business trip from hell. Well, I didn’t
realize it, but that trip actually seemed pretty good compared to the one
I went on last December. I’ve been working on a video viewer application
and I was to deploy it on site. What I was told was not what the client
was expecting (yay communication!) I was in Ontario, CA (about an hour
south of L.A.) for about a week. The first day I got in late afternoon and
was a short day. I talked with their IT guy and the project lead about
what I was told and what they wanted, needless to say they were a little
disappointed and definitely upset.

I went back to the hotel… and for some reason I got the company’s
worst laptop and my programming environment wouldn’t compile anything. I
had grabbed the installation discs before I left and tried installing and
re-installing to no end. Finally, I decided to download a free
environment, which took quite a few hours on the hotel’s slow internet
connection. I finally got my laptop set up and was ready to code the next
day (or so I thought…)

I wasn’t given an entry code or fob to enter the building, so I had to
rely on someone being there when I got there. I knocked on the door and
rang the bell (which I found out before I left was broken…) No one let
me in. I jumped in my rental car, pulled my laptop out and starting
programming. The project lead showed up, but must have missed me as she
looked like she was in a hurry… I tried packing up my laptop and jumping
out, but I was a little too slow. This time I noticed a number in the
window. Gave that a call, managed to get a hold of the IT guy and he let
me in. This day was a long day, but I did manage to fix some bugs in our
software. The video portion wasn’t working quite to their liking… I
tried my best to replicate what their old software did, but it wasn’t
going well. I was in contact with my co-workers, but they couldn’t really
help me. I left this day feeling a little optimistic tomorrow had to be
better (hah!)

After I got back to my room, I decided to take a walk and went to the
mall not far from the hotel. It was one of the biggest malls I had ever
been in and was pretty impressive. After clearing my head, I went back to
the hotel room and started programming. It was getting late and I hadn’t
made much progress, but I thought I was on to something. The next day I
was stuck outside the central for only a few minutes, as someone actually
heard me knocking on the door this time. This day was by far the worst and
by late afternoon I was pretty stressed out. While I was working, people
would come in and talk to me and I would explain what I was doing (or
trying to do). Apparently the central owner came in (I wasn’t introduced,
but I guess that’s no excuse) and I told him I don’t know why it’s not
working or when it would be done, but I was trying my best. He seemed
pretty irate and stormed off. About 15 minutes later, the IT guy comes in
and tells me that I shouldn’t tell the owner I know jack-shit about a
project and that I should just go home. Yeah that was pretty nice, so I
packed my stuff up and went back to the hotel…

Another late night of coding and a call to Susan for moral support, I
was glad I had only one more day left on my travel. I actually made some
significant progress that day, I was able to demonstrate how the software
would work… eventually… but the project lead and IT guy weren’t too
impressed and wanted nothing to do with it until it was finished.
I’m not sure how I got stuck with my return flight, but it was not very
much fun. I returned my car, and got to the airport around 5 pm pacific
time. My flight out of California was at 7, and I landed in Phoenix an
hour later. I started walking around the airport, but couldn’t seem to
find my connecting flight. I must have looked lost, because one of those
cart driver guys asked if I needed help. I told him I was looking for a
Delta flight and he said hop on. There wasn’t hardly anyone in this
section of the airport, so we were cruising along pretty good when he
asked if I was sure I was looking for a Delta flight. I pulled out my
itinerary and it said Delta, even though my boarding pass had a different
airline on it (because I printed it from their kiosk). He brought me to an
exit and told me I had to go to a different terminal. Afterwards he
mentioned he didn’t work on tips, but if I wanted to tip him I could. I
gave him a couple bucks, reconfirmed how to get to the terminal and I was
off.

I ended up leaving security and had to go through it once again when I
got to the new terminal. I’ve been on quite a few flights lately and I
never had to take my shaving kit out of my carry-on. Well, as I was
pushing my bag into the x-ray machine, the operator clearly indicates to
remove all liquid items from your bags. I tried grabbing my bag, but it
was too late… oops! The operator than announces to remove all liquid
items from your bag and proceeded to list all the contents of my shaving
kit in an unfriendly manner. My bag was ran again and I had to have
someone inspect the contents of my shaving kit, including a chemical test
on my bottle of contact solution.

I got to my gate and had a few hours to wait, I was flying on the red
eye that left just after midnight. I must have been tired, because I don’t
remember much of that flight. I got in Atlanta around 6 am eastern time,
my flight here left at 9. If you’re thinking this flight plan wasn’t a lot
of fun, your right it wasn’t. I landed in Detroit a little after noon and
FINALLY made it home around 2:30.

I somehow managed to rack up 80 hours of work time in five days…

Winter Carnival and Puppies

We went up to Winter Carnival this year and even though the snow statues
weren’t AS impressive as they normally are, it was still a lot of fun. We
drove up Friday night and stayed the night in Michigamme. The next day we
headed up to Houghton and met up with a couple we knew. They had already
seen the statues, so we went out on our own. It was sunny and a little
chilly, but a nice day nonetheless. We had dinner reservations at the
restaurant on the top floor of the hotel downtown (the restaurant name
always seems to be changing). We had a window table and were able to see
the ski-torch parade and fireworks. That was a lot of fun.

After dinner, we headed back to our friends house. They had recently
gotten a cockapoo and she was really cute. We had been talking about
getting a puppy… a flyer had gone around at Corning for labradoodles…
and I think when we saw that cockapoo, it sealed the deal. We had gone to
see them before their eyes were open and they were pretty cute than. We
went back later to pick one out, and Waldo will be coming home next week
(not sure how Scout is going to like that, but it should be interesting 🙂
).

Fitness

As you might have noticed, there will be a new section to my website.
I’m going to try to keep track of my progress of 5Ks and my workout time.
Mostly for me so I can update it anywhere, but feel free to check it out.
😉 I have been playing a lot of racquetball recently and have more wins
than losses in my league. I really wish another one started up for the
summer. I’ve actually been debating upgrading my racquet, so I headed over
to a couple of sites online and signed up for the demo program. The first
racquet I got was the most expensive of the three, but it was really nice
and I’m tempted to get it… I’m still waiting for the other two to come,
but from reading online, I’m still leaning towards that first one I got.
I’m still trying to get in shape and am still running those 5Ks. I
already ran my first one for the year, in Montrose. Seeing as how I ran
this one last year, I figured I’d be able to find it pretty easily. I
printed off a handful of directions and left with plenty of time to get
there. Well, I guess I should have brought my avigator with me, as the
directions weren’t quite accurate and I somehow got turned around in
Saginaw. After retracing my steps, and getting on the correct road south,
I finally saw some familiar sites and new I was almost there… which was
a good thing, because the race was starting soon… I got to the school,
found a spot to park and headed to registration. They couldn’t find my
name to give me my packet… luckily I had looked the day before and knew
my number… sure enough my name was on that package. I tossed the shirt
in my car, quickly put my number on and headed to the start line. It was
probably less than 30 seconds and the race had begun (…no sense in
cutting it close or anything…) The sun was shining, the wind wasn’t
blowing, and I was packing some handwarmers. I wasn’t as cold this year as
last year, and had a lot of fun. I didn’t stick around long and headed
back home (the right way) with a 5K under my belt to start the year.

Playstation

I must have been a good boy last year, because Santa brought me a PS3
for Christams. I know I was promoting the Wii… and for good reason (it’s
still topping the sales charts), but the need for an upgrade was there. We
have an HDTV and having a video game console that could play blu-rays
seemed to make sense. 🙂 After getting everything set up, we watched our
first blu-ray, The Dark Knight, and I was hooked… and not sure if we
could go back to watching standard definition. 😉 I signed up for a
Gamefly account, which is kind of like Netflix but for games (…and a lot
slower…) and have been fighting for TV time ever since. We also have a
streaming disc that allows watching things off our Netflix account
instantly to our TV which is pretty cool… I was surprised how flawless
it looked, it was like watching a DVD, but over the internet…

Class

As some of you may know, I took an accounting class last fall. Before
our final, we had a chance to earn some extra credit by taking a ten
problem exam during class. Each question was pretty detailed and it was an
all or nothing kind of thing, and each worth ten points. Silly me, I had
forgotten to grab my calculator before I left for work. I get to class and
found out I wasn’t the only one who forgot one. The professor did have an
extra one, but I was the second to ask… I told him I had a basic
calculator on my cellphone and he said it was alright to use. After
getting through the first couple of problems, my phone starts vibrating…
it was a call from one of the guys I was to play racquetball with that
week. So, I hit the button to ignore it and continued with the exam. Sure
enough, ten minutes later, I get another call… I bet that didn’t look
suspicious… at all… I must have done decent on the exam, I think I got
7 out of 10, which meant a whopping 70 points of extra credit… I didn’t
necessarily have to take the final, but I did and ended up with a 98% in
the class! 🙂

Eyes

It was that time of the year when I had to get my eyes checked and
contacts ordered. I signed up for an appointment at Lenscrafters and
intended to get the contact brand I’ve been using for quite a few years
now. During my appointment, they kept asking if I wanted a scan of my eye
and were surprised to hear I had a previous eye injury (even though I
mentioned this before…) After getting my prescription and telling the
sales associate what brand of contacts I wanted, she outright told me they
would be more expensive then this other brand. I told her I’ve tried other
brands before and they didn’t work out for me. She said these were
different… so I said fine I’ll try them. I ordered two boxes (they had
two in the store) and was told I could take them back if I didn’t like
them.

One week later, I was back and said I didn’t like them and wanted to
order the brand I liked and didn’t care if they were more expensive.
WELL… it turns out the brand I wanted was 35 bucks a box and the brand
she wanted to sell me were 50 bucks a box… Yes, that’s right what I
wanted was less expensive then what she sold me. After returning the four
boxes I had and ordering the other brand, the price “magically” ended up
being the same. I had gotten a discount on the brand that cost 50 bucks a
box, but it was still nine dollars more than what I should have paid. I
wasn’t really worried about the nine dollars and was happy to just have
the contacts I wanted. I decided right then I would not be going back to
Lenscrafters… ever…

Funny thing is I got this thing in the mail the other day from them,
thanking me for going back to Lenscrafters. Well, there was an online
survey I got to take and I told them exactly what I thought of their
services…