It's the 2nd annual Lindsey Pilgrimage to the Oregon Coast, AKA Seaside 2008. We went last year and had a blast, so we decided to return this year. We also have friends who take an annual trip there, as well, so we'll have someone to meet up with.

We stayed at the local vacation condos. They were very nice and somewhat comfortable. The bed was rock hard and I had issues the first morning. Apparently I can't sleep on my back on that bed. The next night went fine, only a little pain. The only downer about the condo is they didn't have wi-fi access. You'd figure in the 21st century they would have wi-fi. The balcony was right over the main drag, so we were able to check out the sights and all the lights at night.

The Seaside main strip is where all the action is. There are shops, restaurants, an arcade and a little indoor carnival(bumper cars, tilt-a-whirl, and mini-golf). Also, the beach. Not a great place to swim (freezing ocean), but great sand to play in. In looking at the strip, there doesn't appear to be alot to do, but somehow we were able to fill 3 days.

The last night there, we camped (we couldn't get 3 nights at the condo) with our friends, which was pretty fun. We haven't camped in a couple years and although we didn't spend too much time there, we now know they aren't exactly roughing it themselves. (Only 2 tents, including ours) We may decide to stay longer with them next time, so we can be more interactive with friends.

So, day 1 after vacation and I'm dragging. I need to remember next time to take an extra day off to re-coup.

So, in my last post, I whined about my Xbox pushing up 3 red light daisies. About the same time, my HP laptop started shutting down unexpectedly. So I called in for them to repair it.

The boxes arrived one day after another and were shipped within 1 day of each other. (right before the holiday weekend, so shipping did take longer) HP does overnight shipping while Xbox does 3 day ground. This was HP's race to loose.

Email alerts show the HP box showed up Wednesday at HP and the Xbox showed up sometime Friday or the weekend. In theory, the HP should've already been shipped back to me. The Xbox was shipped on that next Monday and arrived Friday. About 15 days total.

During this time, I checked HP's status site and turns out they've been trying to call me. (Funny, my phone never rang). There was an issue with the LCD (I knew about it and wasn't expecting them to fix it) and refused to fix the issue without a $750 charge for the LCD repair (I paid about $400 for the laptop). Anyway, I convinced them to plug it into a external monitor, fix the issue and return it to me.

The laptop showed up the same day as the Xbox. A tie, right?

NOT.

Fired up the laptop and couldn't connect to my wireless network. Apparently they forgot to plug it in, or it went bad, or whatever. So, the laptop is back in the mail to the repair center.

Xbox is working fine.

THE WINNER IS... XBOX!!

By a mile. Next time I'm buying a Dell, for many, many more reasons than just this fiasco.

So, yesterday I had a pretty big sneeze. I've had them before, nothing big.  But later when washing my hands I noticed my eye looked odd. Something like this: (WARNING - It's pretty gross) Subconjunctival Hemorrhage Bleeding in Eye. Anyway, according to others I know and the interwebz, I'll be ok without a doctor visit for now. No blurry vision, just a bit of irritation.

Then today I come home, wanting to shoot up some bad guys on the Xbox. I power it on and start a game, it starts loading and freezes. I shut it down and back on and 3 red lights. yea, I had the same thing LAST YEAR, too. So I call in and get the repair setup.

Anyway, work at the 'Soft is going well. We are very busy. The group is growing and growing, so I'll most likely be around thru the end of my contract, if something doesn't come up sooner. <fingers crossed>

SPRING STORM 2008 - It's snowing, it's raining, it's hailing - AAAHHHHHHH!!!!!

One more week left at WH and I return to MS. I'm pretty pumped to get back where I was and pick up where I left off (even if I'll be doing other things). Now I need to see if I can get a full time gig there this time. There were 10 open spots opened in my group in the year I was there, so there's always that. Not to mention the group keeps growing.

WH is going pretty well, although it seems some management there thinks we are the red-headed step-children. Seems there are may eyes constantly watching us and when someone screws up, no matter how small, there is someone to point that out. Kinda sucks, but whatever. If you got nothing better to do than try to keep us down, you are wasting your time.

One thing about the contract that never sat well with me is management hired us because the team that was doing our job (from overseas) wasn't doing a consistent job. We came in, and people are loving the consistency. Now, they are talking about shrinking the team and sending the work back overseas. WHA? We did design the process, streamlined it and made it what it is today, but then sending it back to where they were screwing up? I don't get it. Cheaper, yes, but apparently management doesn't want it done right. One of the reasons I'm leaving (mostly because I have no idea who will be kept around)

Funny story - Andrew was watching Star Wars a few days ago. He kept saying, in his best Jabba The Hut voice, "Bring me Solo, and a cookie".

I was rolling...

This has been an interesting week at Weyerhaeuser.

A little history - I've been at this contract going on 5 weeks. We have a pretty good team, except the lead. A decent guy, but not what I would call "Lead material". The way I see it, I didn't hire him, so I just do my job and keep him in the loop. There were alot of little indications that he was struggling at the job and upper management saw this. So, the decision was made this week to let him go. The guy who took his spot seems to be more organized, but we'll see if this is the case. Apparently the ex-lead was pretty pissed when he came in to drop off his badge and collect his stuff. I'm not sure how he didn't see it coming. There were some pretty big screw ups. Anyway, out with the old, in with the new.

We actually started getting in the servers to build this week. Yes, these are the servers we were supposed to start when we came on 4 weeks ago. Better late than never, I guess. They are expecting us to churn out 12 servers a week. Truth is, I could do 12 myself a week. (I'd be extremely busy, maybe some OT, but I could do it)

I also realized something that annoys me. The "Apply" button. Why do you press it when you just hit OK next? Here's a little education for you:

• The "Apply" button applies the settings, but the window doesn't close. This is to apply the settings and allows you to make more changes.
• The "OK" button applies the changes and closes the window.

So, if you hit Apply and then OK, this really doesn't do anything more than just hitting OK would. If you are an average Joe computer user, I don't expect you to know this, and it's not really something you are doing all day. Yet a computer tech guru, as myself, and alot of people I work with, this should be known. As many times as we have that screen up, imagine how much time is wasted hitting Apply and then OK.

Your little tech tip of the day. No thanks are necessary. :)

http://www.enjoyzibra.com/openit/

OK, I saw this thing and was very skeptical about it. I didn't think it could work as well as it claimed. I saw it in the store and it was pretty cheap (under $10), so I picked it up.

Mind you, I hate the new plastic clamshell everything is packaged in. I swear you need a blow torch just to get at your item. Usually power tools and bleeding are the final result.

NO LONGER!

This thing is AWESOME. The best 10 bucks I spent. I had some new light bulbs in that packaging and it cut through it like butta. My son bought a toy today, strapped to the package like normal. This thing cut thru the plastic, the wires holding the toy and the tape. SWEET! No blood was shed today.

• The cutters cut thru plastic, wires, zip ties, etc.
• The box knife cuts tape, cardboard, and does not lock open (kinda pro and con. It was tough to handle like I usually do)
• There is a screwdriver that swings out - reversible Phillips and flathead, for opening battery compartments.

Long story short, I hope the inventor of this makes a million

If it were any other company, I would've told them to take a hike long ago.

So, I get an email a few weeks back a company would like to interview me for a position. no problem, I respond with the information they needed. No word for a week and a half. I email them, asking for an update, knowing some things can take. They inform me I had an interview the day before.

WHA?? And why did I not get informed? Turns out they sent the information to some email address that's not mine. So, I let them know this and they get it rescheduled for the next Friday.

The next Friday comes around, I get ready and drive to their office for my interview. I get there 15 minutes early, go into reception and wait. 45 minutes later, nothing. The receptionist gets a co-worker of the HR rep I was to meet and they have no idea why I'm there as the HR rep IS OUT OF THE OFFICE. They go back to call him and see what's up.

Another 45 minutes pass and they come back. Apparently my interview is scheduled for Monday. I run home and check my email and everything I have says Friday. I even responded "Great see you Friday at 9:30"

I sent an email to the recruiters asking what happened and to confirm the actual date and time. Then realized my contract started Monday. I emailed the contractor to see if I can start Tuesday, not Monday and they responded with a "We'd rather you start Monday". Thinking I'd rather go for the sure thing than something that may or may not happen, I email MS again, letting them know if the interview is on Monday that I need to reschedule. Email from interview on Sunday - "interview is canceled"

Wednesday rolls around and no word to re-schedule. I email and get a response - "The position was canceled".

WTF?

Now, I went thru all that BS for NOTHING. I never met the HR rep, I didn't know what the job position was, heck, I don't know if the the position was ever really canceled, they just felt there was too many mistakes (on their part, mind you) to continue with me (but that's mostly me being paranoid)

Anyway, back to square one.

The Halo 3 launch came and went with very little bumps in the road. The only major problem was scratched disks on the limited edition. Luckily, nothing that affected me and my work, which is good because I had enough work with the CAP 6.5 issues/changes to keep plenty busy. Just answering alot of questions from the agents. They still took a HUGE amount of calls, but nothing that needed to be escalated to us.

The whole scratched disk issue irritated me. Yes, MS had the disks manufactured, but they didn't make the disk placing machine settings light enough to not attach it correctly to make a few bucks on replacing disks. I was just glad to see it didn't make the front page of USA Today, touting how crappy MS is for doing this. The kicker is, most DISKS STILL WORK. As far as CD/DVDs go, that's all I'm worried about. Does it work? Yes? No issue. NEXT!

Another year rolls around and another good person leaves for a break. I was first, then Reid was next, then Drew, now James. All of which were doing great work, but because of 1 person's selfishness 10 years (??) ago, thousands of us suffer. I came back, Reid is doing pretty well at his current job and I think I'll see Drew and James back again, but taking 100 days off sucks. Like I've said previously"

Worst

Policy

Evar

Anyway...