Unfortunate Events

Just today I heard news from my father that there have been two deaths in the family this week.

I'm not even sure how appropriate it is to discuss this in such a public forum, but I'm so confused about how to feel and think that getting it out in writing may be the best way for some release.

It's so strange, sometimes, how things in life happen. These two people were aunt and uncle to my father, but neither were related to each other by blood. The former's health had apparently been declining recently, but her death was still somewhat of a surprise. The latter has been in and out of hospice care for the past few months and had survived his ailments much longer than anticipated, but had also passed on not even two days after the first death. My grandfather and my great aunt, this week, have lost a brother and have lost a partner; they lived in two different states and were not even related. The timing of these events was almost as if someone, intent on dealing pain to this family, had planned it. Really, what are the odds and what did the living do to deserve this?

These two relatives were very close to my parents and my sister and I saw them enough to at least know who they were and to receive Christmas presents from them most years. My father's side of the family are fairly spread out around the country, but we at least made a concerted effort to see both of these people when we were in their respective areas every few years or so; visits to South Florida, however, were more frequent than those to Mississippi.

Is it because I didn't see them as often as family on my mother's side or is it because we live in a time where people are more emotionally detached from each other that I earnestly feel that I should be upset and sad about these deaths, but also can't find myself feeling that way? I can hear the sadness in my father's voice as he tells me that he is supposed to be a pallbearer at his uncle's funeral, but can't attend due to being out of town on business and, hearing those wavering undertones in his voice, I'm more effected than I ever was at hearing of the deaths over the phone. Maybe my physical isolation from my family has had some influence here, but I just can't help but feel guilty that these emotions aren't coming more naturally for me.

I know those that are left behind, my great aunt, great uncle, and grandfather; are all very close to each other and are helping the others make it through these tough times. I'm comforted to know that there are also many close friends coming to their aid and will be able to offer the needed shoulders to cry on.

Betty and Dalton, I love you both and wish that I had been able to see you more before your passing. Despite everything, I still feel as though I've lost an important part of my family and hope that the hole that now exists will be filled with happy memories, stories, and photographs of better times.

PM Tips and Tricks: Moleskine notebook

It may be a little late in this BER season to be posting this, but maybe someone next year will be able to benefit from this sort of planner I devised to aid in keeping track of travel and paperwork details.

As you very well know, I am a white person so, of course, I like moleskine notebooks. If you click the image above, you can see a detailed depiction of how I've made my little 3.5" x 5.5" ruled notebook worth its weight in gold in relation to the program manager job. If you're a fellow PM and would like to use this idea, what follows is an outline for doing so:

1. Month Day, Year Day of Week
2. L(ocation): City, State (Zip Code)
3. H(otel): Hotel Name (Nightly Rate)
4. P(resenter[s]): Presenter(s) Name(s) (Developer's Initials)
5. S(eminar): Seminar Code(s)
6. T(ravel):
   Airline Name (Confirmation #)
   Origin Airport Code, Departure Time, 'to,' Arrival Time, Arrival Airport Code (Flight #)
   If applicable, other travel details
   

On the top line of the first page of each week, I write the week number and I alternate ink colors each week to make flipping to the right page easier. This is a great way to keep track of hotel nights stayed and plane flights taken when it comes time to checking all your award accounts to see if everything is up to date. Quite a few times I've realized a hotel night wasn't recorded and, because of this notebook, I haven't had to log onto a computer and pull up an old email with that week's itinerary on it.

I hope this idea can be helpful to anyone and I'd love to see what other PMs have used in a similar fashion. Let me know in an email or in the comments.

Lunchbreak Entertainment: Waltham, MA

View from atop Prospect Hill, looking over Waltham, MA

Another post in what may eventually become an on-going series revealing cool and interesting things for us program managers to do during our mid-day breaks from the tedium of the registration table.

If you're into jogging and just happen to be staying at the Hilton Garden Inn in Waltham, MA (greater Boston area), this post is for you. A few minutes' walk away from the hotel is a regional park called Prospect Hill Park featuring over 250 acres of undeveloped woodlands that feature multiple off-road jogging trails, paved roadways, campsites, viewpoints looking over the Boston city skyline, and plenty of spots to sit down and eat some lunch.

At the top of this rather tall hill are some abandoned military radio towers, some of which you can climb if you're feeling up for a great view of the surrounding area. The jogging is great and, unlike the hotel's treadmills, goes through a variety of terrain and inclines. The park is open year-round to foot traffic, but its roadways are closed for much of winter, so doing more than walking in the park during those months may prove difficult.

MA, Waltham - Prospect Hill Park from Joshua Johnson on Vimeo.

[ Prospect Hill Park Advocacy Group ]

[ Waltham Recreation Department: Parks & Facilities ]

Since last I wrote, in most of the country, Spring has sprung. With it comes animals out of hiding, flowers into bloom, and grass into the deepest hue of green I have ever seen. It's now no wonder to me why some people live this far north; they deal with the harsh winters in exchange for a real change of seasons and spectacular Springs and Falls.

With the change of seasons and the more bearable climate in many of the northern states, I've taken an earnest interest in jogging as a way to keep in shape. If you know me, I've always been one to bitch and moan about how much I hate jogging as a sport; I found it too dull and repetitive for me to really enjoy (I preferred cycling or a more dynamic sport such as soccer). Well, I've decided to give it another chance now that the weather has turned delightful, I find myself in a different locale every day, and I've been shown quite a few entertaining podcasts to keep on top of. Luckily, this all coincided with a brand new specialty running store opening only a few blocks from my home: welcome to the neighborhood, West Seattle Runner (special thanks to co-owner Lori McConnell for taking the time to get me in the right pair of shoes)! How could I say no to the opportunity?

View of the lakefront jogging path looking out onto downtown Madison, WI.

I've found there are quite a few parks, nature trails, and pedestrian paths near many of the locations I visit with work, so it's made my days more fun trying to hunt them down and document them. If anyone knows of a good way to do this with an online tool (preferably one that includes photo uploads), please let me know. Right now, if the location is an established park or trail, I can bookmark it on Google Maps, but this is not always the case.

There are only a few weeks left before the end of my contract and I begin the barrage of location changes I have scheduled for myself over the course of my four month Summer break. It all kicks off with Memorial Day, baby. TI, here we come.

Successful sightseeing

Middle Ages Brewing Co., Syracuse, NY

Today, on the long drive between Albany and Rochester, NY, I managed to complete my goal of eating/drinking at all three of the Dinosaur Bar-B-Que locations in the state of New York: first Manhattan, then Rochester, and today Syracuse. A small victory in the life of a Program Manager, but a victory none the less.

Also, it happens that my aunt suggested that, while I was making that pit stop in Syracuse, I check out the Middle Ages Brewery. It's a great little place with a medieval theme to its interior decoration, and I just happened to get there with about twenty minutes before the beer tasting was closed for the day. Good beers, but what else could be expected from a brewery where all the batches are measured and made by hand? Oh, did I forget to mention that it's about a two minute drive from the original Dinosaur Bar-B-Que location?!


After a week of miserable, rainy days, my presenter and I enjoyed the mostly-clear skies and beautiful sunset on the rest of our journey to Rochester, where we'll end this oh-so-short four day week.

Next week is Spring Break, so I'll catch you on the flip side.

Weekend in Hotlanta

It ends up that there are only two airlines that make a direct flight from Nashville to Atlanta: Delta and Pacific Wings (their subsidiary, Tennessee Skies, in this case). Pacific Wings actually only has 9-seater prop. planes and flies out of the Nashville executive airport...sweet! I'm excited as this will be my first flight on a real "small scale" prop plane and certainly my first trip through an executive airport.

Not our plane, but you get the idea.

No crazy security lines, plush waiting room accommodations, free hot chocolate and Otis Spunkmeyer cookies; and REALLY nice restrooms are just some of the perks of flying through such a small airport. What a different experience that I shall not yet claim as "bad" in any way (we'll see what turbulence in a 9-seater plane feels like).

C'mon, Hotlanta, show me what you got!

Just a Little Philly Time

To start off this week of travel, I flew from Chicago to Philly, not a long flight at all. I got in early and, instead of the instructed cab ride, I got a rental car and headed into the city for a few hours of remaining sunlight (yes, that's right, sunlight in Philly!).

Being a Sunday afternoon, I was actually able to find some good parking and was incredibly eager to head to some of the locations participating in this year's PHILAGRAfiKA to see some great works on paper, which I wrote about in an earlier post. I ended up walking all around the Rittenhouse Square area of the city, which is just wrought with art galleries, small shops, and other nice things; a livable section of the city, actually.

A quick trip by Gallery 339 (fine art photography) and The Print Center, among others, yielded no results since most art galleries are only open from Tuesday through Saturday. There were a few events scheduled for earlier in the afternoon, but my arrival time from Chicago put me in a bit later than I needed.

Overall a good trip through the city, with a quick jaunt down South Broad Street before watching the US Men's Hockey team tie up the score against Canada through a restaurant window with some valet parking staff.

On the way back to my rental car (thankfully no parking ticket was issued for my expired meter), I stopped at a local dessert shop called Scoop DeVille, which was fan-tas-tic. Their ice cream blends (cookies & cream with peanut butter chip cookie dough, for me) are to die for. It's definitely going up on the Program Manager Restaurant Blog! That cup of heaven kept me awake on the drive out to the Cherry Hill area for a restful night at the Hampton Inn out in Voorhees. Love that place. The week is cruising along at a quick pace (as they all do) and my weekend stayover in Atlanta with Ciara will soon be upon me.

Philadelphia's Scoop DeVille sweets shop

Don't judge me.

Last week, another one of my many on-and-off double presenter weeks, I found myself on the east coast (big surprise), specifically in Harrisburg, PA. Now, this particular evening was after a long day, but luckily not a super long drive, so all four of us (yup, one presenter had his wife along for a few days) got to the hotel at a decent hour. I wasn't particularly hungry when we arrived, so the other took our minivan and went out to dinner at a local micro brewery while I hunkered down in my room. While they were away, I started exploring the hotel to find out where our presentation rooms would be the next day only to come upon quite a nice surprise:

A totally free, if not slightly sketchy, dinner! A group had been meeting in this room where a full buffet dinner had been served and had left not long enough ago for the food to yet get cold (this is how I can justify myself). Plenty of chicken and mushrooms atop some fettuccine; fresh salad fixings, desserts, sodas, and other yummies with no hotel staff in sight! Luckily for me, I had earlier noticed that my sleep room had both a microwave and fridge, what luck. Needless to say, I had plenty to eat that night (and a little for lunch the next day) with a few trips up the back staircase to my room.

These days where I get to my destination early are quite heaven-sent. Being productive and happening upon things like this are my relief from the tension of double presenter weeks.

Stormageddon, Part 2

So, apparently this thing that's happened is being dubbed Stormageddon. Cool name. Last I wrote, I had gone through a bunch of crap just to get from Detroit to my hotel in Harrisburg. Well, the craziness that started while I was in Michigan just got even worse as I got to PA.

After getting less than two hours of sleep, I go out to the meeting room to start setting up for the day's presentation. It didn't take long to realize that the banquet staff the night before had booked it home early to avoid too much snow; we had been moved to a room WAY too big for our 35-person seminar and WAY too dirty to have been cleaned after the wedding party who-knows-how-long beforehand. Luckily, one of the waitresses from the restaurant decided to come in and volunteer, even though she had no banquet/event experience. This let us get a pot of coffee brewed.

The day goes by, no participants show up, we cancel the seminar, and I spend the afternoon on the phone with the office to get travel details ironed out. The highways get shut down due to a state of emergency, our flight gets canceled, and, to top it all off, no cab companies in the area are open. We get scheduled for a train from Harrisburg to Philly and I bribe the owner of a cab company to get her and her husband to use their personal 4-wheel drive SUV to get us into town (thanks, Pam!). Before we leave, we find out our train has been canceled, but the next train, over two hours later, is still a 'go.'

We get to the train station and try to pass the time and not freeze too much. I napped while listening to the Fanboy Radio podcast (thanks, Dan) and my presenter caught up with some phone calls. The last train of the night finally comes and we board with the TWO other passengers...on the ENTIRE train. I've always wanted to ride a train long-distance, so I was pretty pleased to get to do this on the company's dime. Amtrak actually has some pretty cushy commuter cars, so it was at least comfortable.

We wait almost an hour at the Philly train station to catch a SEPTA train to the airport, but then find one of the only cabs running in the area instead. Shared the cab with a couple that had been waiting for that train for over two hours, drive down some one-way streets the wrong direction, get turned away from the highway by the National Guard, and finally get to the hotel.

I get two nights at the Hampton Inn and will hopefully get on a direct flight to Seattle tomorrow evening to start my week-long vacation. Time to kick back and get stuff done (we'll see how this website redesign goes...).

What a day!

I began today in Detroit at the oh-so-excellent Embassy Suites over in Southfield. What a great place, especially if you show up for each evening’s manager’s reception. My presenter and I knew there was some snow in the forecast, so I kept an eye out on our departing flights all day. Just around 2:30, only fifteen minutes before she let out for the day, I come to find out my two flights for the evening were canceled. Grrrreat. However, a quick call to my manager gave me an opportunity to get on an earlier flight going through Newark to get to my destination at a reasonable hour.

We get to the airport, I return the rental car, and get booked on another airline just in time to get my bags checked and go through security. Then the fun begins.

Switching from my canceled flight with US Airways to a new itinerary with Continental, at the Detroit airport, requires a terminal change, which means I had to sprint outside and catch the next shuttle available. I get there with less than ten minutes to spare before the baggage check deadline and get through security with no problems (or lines, for that matter). I have just enough time to grab a quick sandwich from Wendy’s before rushing to the farthest terminal, only to find the plane is delayed, but in-transit.

An uneventful flight into Newark was a pleasant surprise. Not so pleasant was arriving to find my connecting flight was delayed an hour. Not too terrible, but not great considering the new departure time was 10:00 p.m. with slightly more than an hour’s travel time. All seven of us passengers that didn’t give in and make the 2.5 – 3 hour drive from Newark to Harrisburg had to sit in the back three rows of this small prop. plane in order to balance out the weight. We must’ve sat on the tarmac waiting in line to de-ice for at least another half an hour before taking off.

Finally we get to the Harrisburg airport, which is much nicer than I had imagined. As things end up, the airline lost my personal luggage (the tech. case showed up alright) and, after waiting forever to talk to someone about that, I was the last passenger in the airport. At this point, all taxi cabs and rental car agents are gone. Totally gone.

After calling a few cab companies that were all closed due to the snowfall, I find one that had a single guy working that didn’t mind coming to pick me up (he wasn’t even supposed to be working the airport route). With the snow and dark roads, we eventually made the twenty-six mile drive to get me all settled in my hotel room by 3:45 in the morning. What a day! We’ll see if anyone shows up for the seminar in a few hours, especially considering the estimated 10” of snow expected by morning.

Locked Out

Last week, I learned what NOT to do when having a late night arrival at a hotel then getting a room on the ground floor: lock yourself out.

So, after a long-delayed flight out of Detroit to Kansas City, my presenters (yup, two of them, again) and I check into the Courtyard Marriott and I get a free upgrade to a jacuzzi suite (sweet!).

Upon entering, I immediately close the security bar on the front door (force of habit by now) and go to drop my bags on the floor, bed, or wherever. I then notice that the hotel has a nice courtyard between the sleep rooms and the adjoining conference center (Adams Pointe). I step outside and, as I close the door behind me, I notice the security bar starting to fall into place as my room keys are both still on the bed. Crap.

The front desk staff helps me get another room key and, by this point, I had forgotten about the lock on the front door. Not for long, though. Now I've gotten myself locked out of the room TWO different ways. Great job, genius.

With some dedication, wire coat hanger, and frozen fingers (why did I have to leave my jacket inside, too?), I managed to jerry-rig the sliding door's lock out of place. By this time, it was almost 12:45 a.m. and I hadn't even started unpacking.

Not a good start to the Kansas City visit, I'd say. The next day proved to be a bit better, especially with the sympathy from the front desk landing me a free mini-bottle of wine to enjoy at my next destination.

One more week until vacation

After yet another long week of traveling with two very great presenters, I found myself somewhat energized to get back to Seattle and do something productive (if not only to catch up on a little sleep). I actually spent most of the flight between Chicago and Seattle reading and doing things on my computer, which is unusual since, by the time the doors of the plane close, I'm usually fast asleep.

I came home to both of my roommates being away for the weekend and my final W2 form waiting for me on the living room table. Woke up today after the first decent night's rest in at least a week to the chipper sounds of birds chirping in the trees outside and the rays of the morning sun reflecting off the house next door. What a beautiful city this is, especially when the some comes out!

After deciding against heading up to Ballard to do some rock climbing (that can wait for vacation in a week), I got out of the house to go get a haircut. I've walked past this local barbershop so many times since moving out here in October, but today was the first time I stopped in to Westside Barbershop for an appointment. After scheduling a haircut, I headed to the one local comic book shop, Arcane Comics. Dan would be so proud of me because I finally spent money on some comics and even went so far as to get a subscription service started (don't worry, I'm just looking at two specific titles right now).



A quick walk to the Seattle Public Library, West Seattle Branch, to drop off some materials, down to the Admiral Viewpoint to enjoy the blue-skied view of downtown Seattle, over to a few other stores for various things, and then back to the barbershop to trim up my attempt at the 'Pete Campbell.'

Attracted by their Super Bowl specials, I headed over to Swinery Meats, "Seattle's first and only sustainable butcher and meat shop," and bought some lamb & beef meatballs with a delicious romesco sauce. Meatballs, spaghetti, steamed veggies, and a nice tall Franziskaner beer were dinner before another night spent packing up my weekly food, clothing, and entertainment.

This time, I've only got a four day week with a change in presenters mid-week before the staff meeting on Friday preceding a week-long break. Valentine's Day is coming up quick, everyone, don't forget to start making your plans (if that's your thing).

The Rule of Nine Volts

Two per presenter, per week. Plus one if you're feeling iffy.