I guess it’s getting to be that time of month again. I need to make another post to get me out of the hot seat. For all those of you that are reading this post, know that I am not really writing it for you, but for me. I haven’t been able to keep a journal very well, because I got burned once. Back when I was in High School, I wrote a program to keep my journal – A very good program, I might say, and kept it on my laptop so I could always enter entries. Well, as luck would have it, my hard drive in my laptop crashed and I lost about 4 years worth of entries. In retrospect, it is okay because, and a hormonal high schooler, most of my entries were about the flames I had at the time. Not too good to keep, though I would like to still have some sort of validation of my life.

So, when I left on my mission, I tried to keep a journal again, and I did for a couple months… a couple of times, but nothing to hoot and holler about. When I got married, I tried to again, and I am just really bad at keeping a journal. So, when I got the word from my friend Neo, that blogs might help me, I gave it a whirl, but as you can see, I did really well for a couple months or so and then it’s a every other week thing. I tell you this not for your benefit, but as a public reprimand toward myself to do better. So – thank you for visiting!

Pet Peeve: Today, I thought I would share a pet peeves I have because I believe that it is wrong to inconvenience others for no reason. OK, I hate people who drive during the day with their high beams on. Yeah, it’s daylight and my eyes may be adjusted for the bright atmosphere of day, but those dang high beams are awful bright and still hurt, no matter how bright it is. In the great state of Colorado, it is illegal to drive with your high beams on within something like 300 yards (one football field) of another vehicle with your high beams on regardless if it’s day or night! So, I just had to log this away for posterity. I remember back in high school I was pulled over for driving with only my parking lights on during the day, but I have yet to see someone pulled because they were driving with high beams. BUT the cops will pull you if you have LED Washer nozzles, even though they aren’t explicitly Illegal, but distracting…. so are GroundFX and other lights. Now, you might be thinking that I got pulled for something like this recently, but I haven’t.. This was spawned by a picture on Fox News from I-70 around Aspen Colorado where the prominent car was driving during the day with his high beams on. Good evidence that this guy was breakin’ the law.

Job Search: Ok, back to reality. Last, you heard that I was going to Utah and was supposed to hear from the company Qqest about a position. Well, to recap a little, the position I applied was for Senior Technician with a salary range of $38K – $40K, which is close to what I am currently making and I can support my wife and 2 daughters on that. Well, they led me on, bringing me in for interviews left and right, and finally I was extended a job offer, they offered me the job of Junior Technician at a rate of $29,000. Now, I remind you that I have a wife, 2 daughters one of which is quite sick and in the hospital and doctors offices more frequent than normal because she was born 15 weeks premature. I cannot support a family on that kind of income – especially without benefits. So, I pretty much told them to “Take this job and shove it!” I was a little disturbed, and unhappy because that meant I would have to be apart from my girls for a little while longer when…. no more than 5 minutes after getting off the phone with them, I got a call from a company called Infopia for the position Technical Support and Quality Assurance Manager. So, this guy tells me to come in for an interview at 4:00 that evening (Wednesday, November 23). So I did, and we talked for about 2 hours all about my experience software testing at Hewlett Packard and my experience as Senior Technical Support Analyst at my current place of employment. And then he tells me he wants to have me talk to another guy named Pablo, but he wasn’t there, so he sent me on the road with this addendum: “I seriously want to continue this dialogue.” So I went on to Thanksgiving, and returned home. Monday, I was supposed to hear from him, but I didn’t. Tuesday I emailed him and he replied that he was going to call me, and asked a couple more questions over the email. I replied to his questions but didn’t hear anything. Wednesday, I emailed again and we asked and answered more questions via email. Finally, yesterday, he called and I had a phone interview with Eric and Pablo, two other decision makers. Again, they asked me all about my experience and wanted to know if I knew the difference between JavaScript and Java, what a stack trace was, How cookies and SSL work, How to format SQL Queries, and how I would deal with Irate and unhappy customers. I answered all their questions quite well, I would say. So I am now waiting to hear back from them on the position. Sounds good to me though. Infopia is a small company with only 22 employees. They develop and support eCommerce software used by Ebay, Overstock, Amazon and so forth, and are currently ranked 11 on the prestigious Utah 100 list (fastest growing companies in Utah).

Life Stuff: I got to spend an entire week +1 with my family. Let me back up a bit. I went to visit my family from the 11 through the 14 of November and had plans to return on the 19th, So I asked if I could take my daughter back to Colorado with me for the 4 days. So I did. I drove home on the 14th, and it was probably one of the worst drives I have ever had. I left and it was raining in Salt Lake City. I continued on and about 100 miles out of SLC, the rain turned to snow and I was relegated to a crawl on the interstate. Literally – 25 miles or less per hour. Well, I got through that mess and continued on the street until about Rawlins, when it started snowing and blowing, and much to my chagrin, getting dark. My daughter was an angel, she didn’t fuss or complain at all. We got gas in Rawlins for the long drive home. We continued and got to Arlington, where the snow turned into one of the worst blizzards I have ever seen. Complete white out and I was virtually alone on the interstate. Every time a semi would pass, it would white me out and I would have to stop and wait for the snow to go away. I continued through this mess, white knuckled, and I heard my little Emery say a prayer that we would be safe (she is only 3). I took courage from her little prayer and continued on. Eventually, I was alone – couldn’t see the road – and the passing lane had about 8 inches of snow on it. Just when I was coming to my wits end, a semi truck cut me off on the interstate….. those were my lights of life! He led me out of the blizzard, where I saw the interstate had closed right behind me 20 miles back and allowed me to finish my 12 hour drive home.

Well, Emery and I had a fun week of playing and such, and we went back to Utah on the 19th. The driving conditions were perfect and we had a good week, aside from the Qqest upset aforementioned. Tuesday and Wednesday before Thanksgiving, I hung Christmas lights and enjoyed my family. It was a lot of fun. Thanksgiving was great, we ate lots of food and had good company. Saturday, the 26th, I had my friend Kevman over. It was great to see him and hang out. We went to dinner and came home to eat junk food and watch movies. We watched most of Sahara.. that was until the Blizzard knocked the cable out and we had to watch Charlie and the Chocolate Factory.

So, on Sunday, the 27th, I drove home again, starting out in 5 inches of snow. I got to the interstate and was pleasantly surprised that the roads were only wet, not icy or snowy. I continued on my way (much slower than normal) when I saw a sign stating the interstate was closed. I was already about 3 hours into my trip, so I called to see exactly where the interstate was closed – Just past Rawlins. So I drove to Rawlins and waited there for about an hour before deciding I needed to get going. So I backtracked about 30 miles and took Highway 789 to Craig, Colorado. Icy, snow packed and slow going for that leg of the trip. I then took US 40 from Craig to get home. I have grandparents in Steamboat, Colorado, so I have made this drive a number of times in my life. It started snowing in Craig, so I was slow going. Well, I got to Rabbit Ears pass, which is notorious for being bad in the snow. Again, I was the only guy in white out conditions…. but this time it was on a curvy mountain pass rather than a relatively straight interstate as in Arlington. White knuckled again, I drove along the road, having to use the rumble strips in some places because I couldn’t see the front of my bumper and my headlights only gave off a mystic glow. I found a couple cars on the road, but when I pulled up behind them, thinking we could travel together, they pulled over and let me pass… alone again. sheesh. So, I did this for about 2 hours until it started to clear up. I never want to drive in that again. My trip Sunday took 13 hours. ugh.

So, Tomorrow, I am going back to Utah again because this company, Infopia, may want to bring me in for more interviews on Monday, but this time, I am flying! I’ll let someone else worry about the weather while I sip my soda and read the AirMall magazine!

I would write more, but I am being bombarded at work with phone calls. This post so far has taken over an hour and a half to write to this point. Just a couple things left. (I just have to blog this) At the front gate, there are usually SPs checking badges to allow people to get on base, but today there was a officer from the CSPD. I have never seen that before – weird. So, phone ringing again…. Ok. I am signing off. If there is anything else to share.. I’ll do it later. Cheers!