It's a dog eat dog world

Taking a break today from all of the work crap.

Drove out to Katy (west of Houston) to participate in the annual Katy Rice Harvest Festival Parade. The Golden Beginnings Golden Retriever Rescue group (to which we belong) was participating in the parade and I though Grayson would appreciate the exercise and playing with some of his brothers & sisters. Small town parade through the older section of town. Lots of typical parade entries (bands, floats, mayoral candidate, local real estate office, the Katy Cowgirls riding club, the local historical society, etc.). Our little group was the nonprofit animal rescue club. We had a heck of a turn out (21 dogs) of all ages, shapes and sizes. From a highly rambunctous and energetic 7 month old puppy (Oakley) to an seasoned 11 year old veteran (Ting), all of the dogs were up to the challenge. Turns our everybody loves dogs and loves to pet them as they walk by in the parade route. Of course, the typical Golden is just built for that kind of attention, so they were the hit of the parade. Didn't take very long before Grayson got the idea (Hey! If I walk up to that kid on the curb, I can get all sorts of love and attention!).

Of course, when mister center of attention gets hot & tired, he likes to lay in the gutter with the water & mud. There goes that bath I gave him last night...

Friday follies

Day one of our new system and I've spent it just putting out fires. Things that were supposed to work, didn't. Things that were never going to happen, did. People cannot log in. Where's my report? How do I do this? What's my password?

I try to be an accomodating kinda guy, but there is a REASON I did not go into the customer service field. Today went fairly well, given the major paradigm shift we have done to the company. New system , new language, the problems. I left the office last night around 0130 and the calls started coming at 0600. Oh, well, at least they are looking at the system now (they have to espeically since we disabled the old system). One side benefit is that my name is now on the lips of everybody in the company. The bad news is that any thing wrong with the system I get blamed for (remember, folks, I am not IT). The way today was going, if the toilets don't flush right, I will be blamed for it.

On top of a long day yesterday and late night, I hit the doorstep around 0200 ready to hit the rack and get a few hours of sleep. Of course, my adorable canine family member who loves to greet me at the door decided yesterday that he needed some adventure & excitement. He found something enticing in the yard and proceded to roll in it completely. By the time I got home 4 hours later (after he marinated a bit), he smelled like he had rolled in a litter box and a used diaper combined. Of course, he was extra clingy and wanted to be petted. I know, I know, he's a dog and I should expect this, but it is just not what I was looking forward to when I come dragging home in the middle of the night.

Some days you are the dog, some days you are the fire hydrant...

from the trenches

Chaos.
Pandemonium.
Building burning.
Women & children first.
General breakdown in social order.
Cannibalism rampant.



Spoke too soon. We spent all day yesterday playing catch up on system transactions. Kept having problems with the system we had not seen in our earlier testing (Please See Your System Administrator). We finally nailed down all of the problems and finished up our transactions around 0130. We officially turned the old system on last night and are now "live" (although I feel like the living dead). Getting this system up and running while we continue to operate has been way more fun that you can imagine. It's kinda like trying to put tires on the bus as we drive down the road. Regardless of how we feel, we turned this thing over to the users at 0300. Now we just need to sit back and wait for the accolades/praise (or complaints).

Let the games begin...

Holding on

Been a looong week. Early mornings, late nights can take a toll on an old body after a while. Whenever I stay up too late, I can feel it in the joints. Started a number of years back in Army when we got tagged as staff duty officer for the battalion. That means you worked your normal day and then you got to be in charge of the battalion after hours. Typically you stayed up all night making rounds or playing nursemade for your company/battalion. I broke up more than a few fights and had to escort several innebriated guys back to their barracks. After being awake for ~24 hours straight, my knees were the first to complain. Of course, once you were relieved in the morning, you went back to your normal duty assignment. No rest for the weary.

Our system update is going well. We are ahead of schedule and things seem to be going as planned (and that scares me). Been working on the process since last week and have been keeping crazy hours. Last night we were supposed to finish up our vaidation process at 2200 hours, but I got my testing done early and was able to pack out at 1930. Today is the big push. We will try to play catch up with all of the transactions which could run into the wee hours of the morning. Hope to start this beast sometime on Thursday. Of course, then the real complaining starts. Got to hold another workshop today for people who missed my last sessions (translation: they were too busy to make my classes last time). I am sure that no matter how much lipstick I put on this new & enhanced system, people will still think it is a pig. (Resistance is futile).

Oh well, "You can't please everyone, so you've got to please yourself." — Ricky Nelson

Once more unto the breach, dear friends

We are entering the final week of our system upgrade and are planning to go live this weekend. It has been a long and tortured road we have travelled. Lots of testing and retesting and trying to see if the system is going to work as anticipated. We have been playing with this upgrade since last December and, while I would still like some more time to get comfortable with it, there comes a time when you must cast off and hope for a favorable wind. Long hours, late nights, lots of last minutes things to finish up. Of course, with change, there are those who will embrace it as progress and those who will complain regardless of how much it will improve their lot. One of my jobs is to make them happy (or at least keep them quiet).

I think I need more Scotch.

See ya'll on the other side.

Junk yard dog

Ever done something you haven't done in years and thoroughly enjoyed it?


I used to do a lot of my auto repairs on my stable of vehicles. Part because I am a hands on kind of person and part because I am a bit of a tightwad and hate to spend mega bucks for a job I can do in my garage. I've got the tools & skills to do some of the minor vehicle repairs. Over the past few decades, I've done a number of brake jobs, repaired windows, replaced many batteries/water pumps/radiators/shocks/gas tank, done tune ups, repaired a clutch, and even rebuilt a carburetor (that's a complex chore). I've busted many a knuckle or scraped my hands pulling parts off or putting them back in place. I've been in grease and grime up to my shoulders trying to fix one of my herd. More than once I've busted my head on the hood of a car and let loose a few colorful adjectives (Shadow didn't hang around those times). The past few years, I've been busy & have not had time to work in my garage as much as I used to. However, necessity is the mother of invention and I wound up back in my garage for a few repairs.

All of my wheels are of older vintage (we tend to keep our cars longer) and they are getting up in the mileage. Like the rest of us, as they get older, they tend to have problems that can only be addressed with copious amounts of money and/or a good mechanic. The driver's seat in the land barge has had problems with the seat track mechanism for a while. Momma cannot sit in it because the track gears are stripped out and you cannot move the seat forward. Had it priced out at the dealer and it could run from $650 to $1000 to fix. Being a fiscally minded person (translation: cheap a%%), I balked at those prices and chose to live with the issue. However, yesterday I embarked on a mission to hit several junk yards in search of a new motor/seat out of a wrecked truck. Spent about 4-5 hours on the north side of town in a couple of junk yards combing over wrecks looking for a working replacement. After several possible solutions, I finally found a seat track and motor assembly that I was able to disassemble and test out. Sure, it is a bit rusty and needs some cleaning, but it works well and is far less expensive than the repair shop would charge. This morning's challenge is to install it on the land barge (Hope this will is only a 2 beer job). The fun part (for me) was combing through all of the wrecks to find parts I can use on any of my vehicles. I used to do that many years ago in my youth. Sure it was hot, there were a gazillion mosquitos, got grease & grime up to my eyebrows.

Need a new door handle for that 95 Bronco? How about the ash tray from your 99 Cadillac? The backseat from a 03 Expedtion? You can pretty much find anything if you are willing to dig.

Friday Follies

Another week down. It's been another one of those weeks where you come skidding into the weekend all beat up and bruised but feeling glad to be alive.

Weather has been pretty darn good down here (for south Texas). Moderate temps and cloudy/rainy, but after a summer of no rain and blistering heat, this feels great. Makes for great hunting weather. Work lumbers on with its typical fire drills, political infighting, and mindless projects. This week has been no less chaotic. We staged a mock disaster drill where we shut down operations simulating major disaster to our facility (like a hurricane) and moved operations across town for half the day. My role was to insure we had communications with our suppliers to contact them in case we needed emergency shipments, but basically I was on the computer testing our system and answering e-mails. Typical dog & pony show. Looked good in theory and on paper, but when the real crap hits the fan, who's gonna stick around town and be here to keep the fires burning? When Ike hit last year, most of the area south of us evacuated north and were not in town to help recover. I was one of the "dedicated" ones who stayed in town and "volunteered" to help run the place when the rest of Houston was shut down. The rest of the week was pretty much the same stuff. Meetings with suppliers, chasing down part issues, trying to finish up our testing and keeping the lid on minor issues. I would complain, but that's part of my job: part firefighter, part magician, part sage, part hall monitor.

One of my ancillary chores has been making plans to attend our 30 year college reunion in October. 30 years? Geeze I feel old. Can you recall what you were doing 30 years ago? Part of me wants to go and see my old friends/roommate/outfit but part of me is hesitant. I like to think that, in all of these years, we've grown up a bit, but some people never seemed to have left college. I'll go just to see what 30 years and several kids & pounds have done to a few people. Of course, it is always interesting to see how many are on their second (or third) marriage (I'm still working on my first) or how many kids they have or who took the longest to graduate. Past reunions were a visit to the past to see how successful you've become and how much you have changed (in a few cases it wasn't that much). At this stage, we're at the age where we can start comparing grandchildren and retirement homes (none for me, yet).

I'll let you know how it turns out.