Travel

Stressed Out, Going Away

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I have been really stressed out recently at work. Some friends recently pointed that out to me. I have been feeling run down, but didn’t know that it was showing. Turns out it is. I need a vacation. I think/hope that will make things a bit better. On that note I will be off to Vegas next week for a few days. I am going to hang out with my friend Sean, and his wife Kelly.

Hopefully 1 night at a nice hotel getting the 5 star treatment, and then 3 days of hanging with friends that I don’t get to see too often will calm me down a bit. This trip is made possible by the Delta SkyMiles points I earned at Datastream. Delta ripped me off on the amount of points needed for a ticket since it was a short notice trip. That is the new thing airlines do. But at this point I didn’t care. I still have tons (and I mean tons) of points to use on travel.

Sean And Kelly’s Visit

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It sucked, they are a bunch of pain in the ass’s. No really, I am just kidding. I always wanted to play a prank on the blog. I know sean reads this, so hey Sean. I am kidding! Feel the love:)

I actually had a great time. I need to get together with them more often. I want to go out by them sometime after I move. I think it is time to cash in some Delta Sky Miles.

They had a cool rental car with GPS, that worked. I had a blast. I want to write more, but sleep awaits…

Mobile Technology

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I tell everyone I used to hate traveling for work. That is partially true. In the end I dreaded the trips, the waits in the airport, getting lost in po-dunk towns in rental cars, etc. In the beginning I loved traveling. I think I did too much too quick. Also I did this during a period of the worst air traffic delays in the history of US air travel. I also flew out of the most delayed airport in the US. An airport that the FAA said accounted for 25-30% of all delays at the time, Laguardia airport (LGA).

This entry is not about my love or dislike of travel, that I can save for many entries later. What I am thinking about is the cool technology you can use or rely on when traveling.

Studies are coming out now saying more and more people are “cutting the cord” or becoming wireless phone only households. I have been using my cell as my primary (or only) home phone since 1998. Earlier than that I lived at home with my parents and they did have an extra line, even though I never used it.

When traveling you can use the coolest tools that keep you in touch or working. The stuff out now is even better than what I was able to use when I traveled regularly 3 years ago. Wow, it has been 3 years since I did that.

When I was on the road I relied on a laptop (Compaq Presario 1875 or something with an AMD K6-2 180mhz processor, then a number of Micron 15″ TFT laptops, and eventually a Dell latitude CPx). The laptops I have now kick the ass of the ones I had then. My thinkpad T-40 I use for work is literally half the thickness of the micron’s I used and 3-4 times more powerful. The battery lasts like 4 hours. If I got 90 minutes on the micron or 60+ on the Compaq I was happy. Even my tiny Powerbook gets better battery life than the old desktop replacements.

My cell phone back then was several flavors of the Nokia 6160, Motorola Timeport, or later on a Nokia 8890. The service actually was as good as it is now. T-Mobile’s coverage has gotten better, but I used to go everywhere with my AT&T Tri-mode TDMA Nokia’s. The phone was big but worked all over. From Canada, to Portland Oregon, to Portland Maine. The difference is I am paying about half the price I paid back in 1999 for about the same amount of minutes or even more minutes now.

The other difference with cell phones are that my Treo 600 is a handheld and a phone. I also get wireless internet access on it. For me between 1998 and 2001 that was impossible for me. now I can get email on my phone or use another phone with bluetooth to get mail on my laptop. I didn’t even have a blackberry then. I would have killed for a blackberry when I traveled. I take it for granted now.

The WiFi hotspots would be awesome to have had when I traveled. I used to use Laptop Lane at some airports back then, but they weren’t everywhere.

VPN software and Exchange 2003 with RDP over HTTPS would have been awesome. Either would have been awesome. At Datastream we had to use outlook from outside the firewall using AT&T Global net dial up. It was so slow. Now it would be trivial and fast to use, especially with high speed internet in some hotels now. When I went to vegas last winter I plugged my Powerbook (then a 15″ TiPowerbook) into the network jack in the hotel and I was able to VPN back to work. It came in handy when Keith needed something when I was out. That is the coolness I am talking about. Technology that just works when you are on the road.

If I was still traveling I would probably look at the bluetooth GPS receivers they have out now. Connect it to my iPack 1945 and know where I am. It would be killer.

What is also funny is that more and more people are using gadgets on the road. Besides the pain in the ass people on cell phones everywhere (writing this as someone’s phone goes off on the train). I mean laptops PDA’s, and other neat stuff. Around me right now on the train is 4 ladies with huge laptops doing work. One has to be my mom’s age. 4 years ago that wouldn’t be going on. When I am on the train to kingston I always see several people with blackberry’s or Pocket PC’s & Palms of several varieties. Then there are the iPods. They are everywhere. Note to self need new iPod for train trips like this. must replace sold one ASAP.

I just find these observations amusing. Why, because all this stuff that I see I have been doing for years. That is no big deal, but I always used to get made fun of by some of my friends about doing it. Then like clock work 6 months later they would be doing the same thing. I don’t consider myself a trendsetter but some technology stuff I get right away because I think it will work for me. I was that way with the first bluetooth phones. I got it and used it to connect to my PC and use a bluetooth headset. Turns out that it didn’t work very well, but it worked and I used it for months.

Enough of my observations. I am off to stretch my legs on the train for a while and maybe take some pictures with my Treo and post them to my MoBlog!!!

This blog entry was written while listening to Higher from the album “Human Clay” by Creed And Superman from the album “America Town” by Five for Fighting

Vacation Planning

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I have to start looking at vacation places. I have my max amount of days I can accumulate. I haven’t been away since last June when I went to barbados with my family. I was thinking of taking a long weekend and going to New Orleans to visit Jayson. I wanted to go April 16 – 19, but the airfare was really expensive. I thought Jet blue’s prices were consistent. That they didn’t go up as the date of travel got closer. I was wrong. It was like $400 for a round trip ticket to New Orleans that weekend, but if I planned something in May it was $220. Delta who I also like to travel on wanted almost $300 and I would need to transfer in atlanta. Now the atlanta airport brings back memories of my travel days at Datastream but I would rather have a direct flight that was cheaper, and oh lets throw in some free TV while I am at it. Jet Blue I am sold.

I really do need to plan a real week long vacation. I have too many travel ideas. I can think of like 5 different places I want to goto. I need to pick one and go. Maybe this summer?

Travel Time

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As of right now I am planning a trip to our Kingston office for tomorrow and possibly friday. I say as of right now, because I say that allot and things sometimes change on their own.

I have to go and interview candidates for a helpdesk position we are trying to fill up there. Also have other work that needs to get done up there. We are in the middle of planning a new software build for all our desktops. We are also going to revise our security policy for users also. you have to be exact when doing this stuff or you get 80 users who cannot do anything because their security profile is messed up.

More news tomorrow if I do end up going…

Friday, Kingston Trip

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Friday I went to kingston for the day. Most of the trip was uneventful. That is good when traveling. I worked on the Group Policy Objects with Kai. I think we ironed out the kinks in what we want to do. For some reason our old profile we made would crash when we modified the security settings, but the new one I just created didn’t. Of course there is no major difference between the two. Go figure.

The trip home wasn’t that good. It took an extra hour or so to get home. Not sure why. the train was late. They said it was due to engine problems. Then we went slow and stopped allot along the way. I tried to sleep a bit on the train. I never do that so it was different for me. I used all my laptop battery power during the day and forgot to charge it. That wouldn’t be a problem if I sat on a window seat with a power outlet, but I sat on the aisle and couldn’t use it. The van wilder dvd I have been meaning to see will have to wait.

People on the train pissed me off. Like 4 people around me were either talking on their cell phones the whole time or one guy was playing a game on his phone with the stupid sounds turned on the whole time. People need to learn some etiquette.

Vacation, Day 6 Saturday

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Vacation is over for me. My family is staying till monday but I am off. It was a great restful vacation. I didn’t do a lick of work. I am glad I got the chance to rest. I had to leave early (1pm) for the airport so I didn’t get any pool time today. The airport trip and check in was uneventful. That is always good. They changed the plane so my seat got changed. I asked for another change since I got put in the back, and I didn’t like that. I asked for something closer to the front of the plane. The next thing I know I am in business class. I guess this plane had more biz class seats than the last one and they didn’t know what to do with some extra passengers. Whatever, I got bumped up. I wasn’t one to complain. I got worried when the flight attendant asked if I was originally a biz class ticket and I answered no. Turns out that because of the confusion they thought that I paid for biz class and were going to put me in first class. I think I looked respectable or something. I don’t know why she asked me and not the other people sitting around me. Well I have an idea, but I won’t write about it. I try to dress biz casual when I travel, so I can look decent and vie for an upgrade. it worked today. if it wasn’t for my big mouth telling the truth I might have had a double upgrade. I am a snob because Delta Biz elite is much nicer than American’s Biz class. Oh well. I write this while I am in the air on the way home. Just watched the in flight movie “two weeks notice”. it was ok. The steak for dinner was good though. the jack Daniel’s and coke I had was better!

I hope customs and cab hunting at JFK is ok. Then this would have been a good day. I got “randomly” screened before I got on the plane. I never understand those. They make me take my shoes off, and inspect my PDA, but don’t even look at my laptop, belt or wallet. My wallet even set off the metal detector and they didn’t look at it. I am not complaining, I just don’t understand security. I think it is just a show to make people think they are safe. I guess it is good if it calms the mass’s. I guess what they say is true “ignorance is bliss”.

Mothers Day

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Mothers day was nice. I went over to my parents house. My sister, brother in law and his family were over. The only no show was mikes sister. We had a good brunch, and played with the baby. it is very funny to see grown ups going all crazy over a baby. Of course I am included in that group of crazy people. I can safely say I do not like it at all when Morgan cries.

We fixed some problems with our Barbados flight. They did stuff to our seats so my sister got all pissed at American Airlines. I actually had inporved seats so I wasn’t pissed.

I also did some more work with VMWare. I got red hat to install fine on my laptop. The only thing now is to install the vmtools onto the red hat partition. That requires some config changes so I am working on getting that done soon. I also need to get the network card working properly with the vmware.

I got up at 4:30am today to catch my flight. I made it. I am writting this blog at 30+ thousand feet. I meet Gus at the airport, but he was flying standby on my flight. That means I don’t know if he actually made the flight. I hope he did. I will walk around and look after the drink cart goes by.