Chuck’s Home World

It’s been a while since I’ve written anything directly into this blog. With Facebook and Twitter, I don’t feel I need to elaborate so often. But when I look at my web site, I feel it’s not being kept up to date so I must write a few things in more detail that what’s been posted via the social networks.

Work – We received a new video of the state of the company as of the 11th period in a fiscal year. Things are looking great and we’ll be getting our 10% back along with salaries being returned to pre-10%-cut days. That’s good news all around. We should be getting another video to talk about this in more detail this week but I won’t post any more about it.

This past weekend was pretty restful for me. I didn’t make it to the gym like I should have, but I was having some pains in my right foot that I wanted to be careful. I’m continuing to have pains in my right shoulder, but so far it hasn’t really interfered with my workouts. As of tomorrow it will have been a week since my last workout in the gym. I’ll see how the arm feels. The foot pain has gone so I’ll have no excuse.

I’m supposed to go to Fogo de Chão, a Brazillian Steakhouse in Baltimore tonight. I’m pretty sure I’ll make it, but I’m not sure it will be worth the calories and late night. The reservation is 8PM which is about my bedtime!

This past week and this week we’re meeting with the BIRD team. BIRD stands for Business Integration Research & Development (I think) – it’s the team of German’s that are currently seeing how we do things here in the Americas compared to what is done in Europe. Last week I hung out with the Sales team because I have various applications that need to be able to interface with the SAP, the system the German’s use.  In some cases, it may be possible that there is something in SAP that handles our needs for some applications, but we’re pretty sure there are some of our applications that will not be handled by anything SAP has to offer.  I suspect this is going to be a late night week.

I’m still loving my HTC Incredible, but there are some issues that need to be ironed out. For some reason (unknown to me, but apparently widespread) the phone reboots. I’ve seen it reboot several times in one day, and then it may go for a few days without rebooting.  Posts on various Android forums indicate this is known issue. I’m hoping it will be resolved with an update. So far it hasn’t rebooted during a conversation or anything.

The only other issue I have is that the battery doesn’t last for very long. I know I can get more out of it, if I cut off some services, but I like having the weather updated.  I guess I just need to try and remember to plug it in a night. At least I can charge it almost anywhere I go… got the car charger, and the computer cable. Fortunately it uses the same connector and chargers as my Storm did.

Speaking of the Storm, I hate it. I have to use the one for work sometimes and it’s the worse phone in the world!

Well, I’ve ranted and spent more time writing today than I had planned. I’ve got to go and get ready for work. I’ll try not to wait so long before I post again. You can follow my occasional posts at Twitter and become my friend on Facebook if you’d like.

On Saturday, I spent time in PA visiting my friends Jean and Kenny. I helped Jean out with some technical stuff (resetting wireless router, transferring files from one system to another). After having a bit of cheese and crackers (OK a lot of cheese and crackers) we headed out to have a wonderful meal at La Cucina’s (including a very confusing chocolate dessert). Afterwards, we spent a little more time doing some tech stuff, before I headed out around 7PM. It was a very nice day. I’m looking forward to the next time that we get together. Overall I didn’t screw up the diet that badly. In fact I couldn’t finish my meal nor my dessert. It was awesome to be able to stop when I was stuffed, instead of stuffing it down in order to clear my plate.

Yesterday, I got up around 5:30 AM, but around 1:30 PM I decided to take a nap. I slept for a few hours in the afternoon and that made me stay up later than usual. I think that help me shift my sleeping time.  I’m tired of getting up at 2:30 – 3:30 AM everyday when I don’t need to. I’ve been getting pretty good sleep, just starting too early in the evening and getting up too early for the day. Hopefully with the time change, the extra sleep over the weekend and some more effort on my part, I can get my nightly sleep and still get up early enough to workout before work.

This week at work is going to be another busy one. That’s OK. I can handle it. I may have to take a mental break now and then, but otherwise it’s challenging and fun. I just wish some people would get back to me with their testing results and suggestions.

Overall the diet is still going pretty good. I’m still dropping the weight but doing so very slowly. I think it’s best to drop it pretty slowly because its more likely to stay off that way. In a couple of more weeks I’ll be going in for another body composition to see how much muscle mass I’ve lost. I’m sure its a bit because I’ve not been doing any muscle building at all. I really need to get back into the gym!

Yeah, I couldn’t think of a title for this entry so I just went with that…

Its around 3AM as I write this short posts. Its been a little while since my last post so I thought I’d throw a few things up here. I’m sick and its tough to sleep right now so I figured why not take advantage of the time. I’d actually try to do some work, but I know I won’t be able to focus on getting anything done so I’m not going to!

In my previous post I mentioned a new work laptop and BlackBerry. I’ve received both. I’m pretty happy with the laptop so far (Dell e6500) but haven’t really needed to use the phone yet. It’s not active on the BES yet, so I can’t use it. It’s a Storm 2 so I can compare it against my original Storm. Its OK, but I don’t like the call buttons being under the glass. I like my Storm’s separate buttons.

I’m still in the process of getting the necessary tools installed in order to start developing a bit for the BlackBerry. I was thinking of going with Adobe Dreamweaver, but it’s so expensive and I can do what I need to do with free tools.

Work continues to keep me very busy. A newer high priority project has begun… it’s tough because I can’t seem to get some existing projects done because something of higher priority always comes along.

Final entry note – I weighed in this morning and I’ve dropped a few more pounds. I know I’m somewhat dehydrated though so I’m sure its not a great a loss as the scales are showing, but I’ll live with it for now. I just hope it continues to drop instead of hovering around the same readings…

I’m just getting over a quick cold. I’m surprised that I’m feeling better already. Still have some stuffiness in the head (more than normal) but I’m definitely feeling better.

Saw Dr. Dua yesterday (Tuesday) and it was a good visit. I was down to what I was visit before last and have dropped the couple of pounds I gained over Christmas. I’ve reduced my daily calorie budget to 1600 cals, and will continue that until I’ve dropped a few more pounds. I really hope to get into the gym this weekend. It will be the first time back in a few months and I really need to get in there. Hope I feel up to it.

Work is still keeping me very busy. There is talk of me getting a new laptop and a blackberry (IT Spare) for some development work. That will be nice on both accounts.

That’s all for today. I’ll try to post more later.

I attended a company wide meeting this past Friday. They gave an overview of where we stood and where we’ll be by the end of the fiscal year and what they plan for next year. Our new fiscal year begins on July 1. On that date, every employee’s salary (everyone, no exceptions) will be cut by 10%. A 10% cut is a lot, but a 100% cut would be worse. Now, the plan is if we make a certain amount of profit for the FY 09/10, we’ll get that money back. If we make a little more, then we’ll get another 5% of our base salary too. If we are doing better by then, our salaries should be put back to the previous rate. The rest will remain the same as far as our benefits (still contributing to our 401K, still paying for our medical insurance, etc.).

So I guess I’ll need to adjust my budget. I may try to find some extra programming work. Thursday night, John told me that I’d always have a position at CAS if I wanted it. That’s good. I think I’ll rough it out though. My current employer is a good one, and I work with a lot of good people.

I’ve been working at the new job for a little over a week. Its pretty fun so far, but to be honest, its not much different than what I’ve been doing. I think I just have more time to do it. Plus I’m not watching the time as much, working a bit longer if I need to.

I’ll be heading over the San Francisco in a week or so. I’m looking forward to seeing my friends again. I’ve been to San Francisco before but didn’t really do anything while I was there. For me, I get more done when I’m traveling with someone instead of alone.

If you like BBC shows and you have Netflix, check out Chancer. This 1990/1991 series features a very young Clive Owen. Its pretty interesting. I’ve watched the first disc and will be watching more over the week. I had a problem where the 2nd disc in the series wasn’t in the correct envelope, but Netflix is really good about fixing that type of problem. I should have the correct 2nd disc at home tonight to join the 3rd that I’ve had for a couple of days.

The day went by and the only difference is that I received several congratulation emails from various people.  My boss sent out a “welocming” message to the company stating that I’d been working as a contractor for almost three years (its been almost 4) – I ragged on him about that.

Thursday will be the big test… will I make the right turns or will I head to my old job location? We’ll have to see.

I wonder how many schools do this. I remember in the 5th and 6th grades we did. I think it was usually the younger grades actually doing the dance, but we were all pulled into the gym to watch. Maybe things have change in the last 30 odd years.

Yesterday, I took the day off. Things were slow enough over at R&S that I decided it wasn’t a bad thing to do and I was able to use up a bit of leave before I left CAS. I’ll still be losing some time though as I can’t use the 20 hours or so that I’ll have before tomorrow.

Today at 10 AM I’m having my exit interview. Its been a long time since I’ve had one of those. Tonight, some of us are going to the local Pub Dog where we’ll spend a couple of hours hanging out. Its a transition party, because people from R&S and CAS are invited. From CAS’s perspective, its a leaving party, but from R&S’ its a welcoming one. It’ll be fun.

I think this is the first blog posting I’ve done since I’ve updated WordPress to version 2.5. I do like the new Admin user interface (something you guys don’t see). We’ll have to see if its worth the update. I think it is so far.

Work has been going pretty good. If you’re reading my twitters you may notice that I’ve been taking off a couple of hours early each day this week. My current employer won’t pay out the leave that I have because its not counted as “Vacation” per se.  Because of the way its classified, they’re not obligated to pay it out when I leave. So I’m taking it a bit at a time. I’m not taking any today, but I may take half a day tomorrow, but that depends on the work load I have.

I’ve been using my Macbook Pro mostly as my “work computer.” Its pretty good but I’m missing a few standards that I was used to having. I install Open Office (OpenOffice.org appears to be the official name and website). Today I needed to do some number crunching and used the OOO Calc – their version of Excel. There are a few things to get used to, but overall its pretty good and will do the job for the little I need to use a spreadsheet. I’ve thought about buying MS Office, but I already own MS Office 2003 and really don’t want to spend more money MS software. I had to buy another copy of Vista for the Macbook (well worth it) but if I can get away with using an open source solution, then why not?

Looks like we’re moving within our office.  Well, I should say that I’m moving but my name hasn’t been placed on another office. I want to move along with the guys, but I’ll just setup in an empty room near by. So I’ll pack up my office for the departure and then only unpack what stays here.

I still have some things to do like post some more photos up on the site. I was looking for some wedding photos from a few years ago and found the photos that I took during last year’s Oakmont Weekend. I realized that I didn’t post any of them. I also need to post up Ashley and Derrick’s wedding photos too. I should have worked on this early today because I’ve been up since 2:45 AM anyway.

At least for a couple of weeks and until I get through a couple of projects I’ll be working some extra hours each night. I don’t mind, but I also know how to work Quality over Quantity. Many people spend hours and hours working on something only to turn out crap when they’re done. I learned that once I start making mistakes, its better to stop and get some rest.

I was able to work about 2 extra hours last night on a project that is coming due pretty quickly. I’m not a lead on this project so I take my directions from a coworker. Its his baby and since my time is limited, I’m used strickly as a resource. I’m the only resource for another client’s projects and I’ll be spending a good bit of time working on one of their’s in the next couple of weeks.

On this past Monday afternoon, I was approached by the company accounting controller about some recent time off I took. I’m still recovering the amount of leave I have due to my company paying me an extra 80 hours of leave at the end of the year. I was out due to my back and should have been on short term disability by then. When I returned to work my leave balance was -115 hours (yeah, minus 115 hours!). With my current leave accrual rate, it would take around 7 months to get into the black again. Anyway, the result of the conversation was that I may have to take part of the time as unpaid leave. She was going to speak to my boss who is on vacation but I told her to do what she had to do.

I really wanted to take a short trip down to visit family in South Carolina, but it sure doesn’t look like it will happen in June. Maybe a weekend in July, just don’t know.

Well, the guy who was my boss when I was hired, is leaving. I say he was my boss when I was hired because in the last few months he’d pretty much been working as a developer the entire time. His last day is in a couple of weeks, although they’re trying to keep him another week. Overall I’m happy for him, its a great career move, er, well, more like a complete career change. He’s completely walking away from development, and will be doing what he’s been going to school for. Its a good thing.

This will shift a bit for me because they want me for the project that he’s been working on with another guy. They’re under contract and they think I’m the best fit. The problem is that I’m not available for full time on this project. I’m dedicated to another company for 3 days a week, but we’re going to see if we can cut that down to two days. We started off at 2 days but for over a year now (not included the time I was out on disability) we’ve been working the three.

I have two more working days this week. Its been going pretty good so far. I spent Monday in my office, Tuesday and Wednesday at a client site and I’ll be spending the last two work days in my office again. Its definitely good to be back to work.

I started back in the middle of a pay period so I had to fill in last weeks time as leave without pay. I received my last disability check on Tuesday and it was one day short since I returned on Monday instead of Tuesday. I mailed the previous check last week and its not shown up on my account yet. I’ll give it until Friday to show up before I make a call or two. This recent check will be deposited today since I’ll be close to a branch.

Cookies! Yesterday I had a package waiting for me when I got home. My friend Carol sent Valentine cookies. She’s cool like that. She makes cookies and sends them to her friends for holidays. They were good too, making a very pleasant after supper treat.