Kevin's Ramblings…

Where did January go? It seems to me like it was a short month. We had a pretty warm January in Calgary with a 2 week Chinook keeping the temperatures way about zero for most of the month. A week ago today, it was 16C, today it is -16C, quite the difference. We also got about 6″ of snow yesterday.

Today is Super Bowl Sunday. I don’t think I am going anywhere to watch the game, nothing has come up. Instead, I am making chili. As a change, I am using chicken breast instead of ground beef. Gotta go and get a few more ingredients, even though I was at the grocery store yesterday. I’ve sorta changed plans on what I am making. Oh well…

Back to work tomorrow and no road trips planned for the week, that might change but nothing in the works right now.

Enjoy the rest of your weekend and go Patriots, beat up on the Seahawks…

Last night we had a return to winter after a rather long, two week Chinook finally left us. We had experienced temperatures up to about 16C, quite nice for the middle of January.

I woke up this morning to about 6″ of snow. Back to shovelling, clearing the truck and having to drive using 4×4. Oh well, it is January.

Tomorrow is Super Bowl Sunday. Patriots versus the Seahawks. I typically don’t go for any NFC teams, this year will be no exception. I have always been a fan of the AFC, unless the Dolphins or Raiders are involved that is. So, go Patriots !!!

No real plans for the rest of the weekend, other than catching the game. Next weekend we start with baseball evaluations. I think we need to draft about 10 players in total. Bring on spring…

I have a 50″ LED tv in my living room and a 32″ LCD in my office. I subscribe to Telus Optik service, it isn’t bad. I have a crapload of stations but I only seem to watch a handful of them.

I am currently watching Seinfeld. It has now been off of the air for about 16 years. I still love it. I have watched every episode probably between 10-15 times I am sure.

I don’t tend to watch any new shows. I didn’t watch Seinfeld until its original run was over. The only “new” shows I might catch are Dragon’s Den and its American cousin, Shark Tank. I can’t really think of anything else new I watch. I do watch Big Bang Theory, but never watch the new episodes, I catch it on the Comedy network so it is older ones.

I watch a rather cheesy sci-fi show, Star Gate SG1. I haven’t seen most of those episodes either and it wrapped up about 6 years ago.

I have all of the sports channels as well, don’t watch a lot but catch playoffs for sure. Sunday is the Super Bowl of course and I will catch it, hopefully at some restaurant/bar, not sure as yet.

So, I guess I pay a fair amount for old shows. I don’t mind. I could likely get most of these shows on Netflix or something, not sure. It is bundled with my internet. I will likely keep it when my contract is up, which is soon as well (May).

I don’t watch too much else, and almost nothing in the summer, I am out too much. I do have the tv on sometimes while I am working, essentially background noise. I’ve seen all of the shows before so really, I don’t need to watch it, listening is good.

Anyway, back to Seinfeld, still one of my favs. Enjoy the weekend.

I live in basement of a bungalow in Calgary. It is one of the many illegal suites in Calgary. There are many things that make it illegal such as not having a range hood over the stove, no fireproofing between floors and possibly most importantly, I don’t have control over the heat.

There are two women who live above me. In general, they are good neighbours. They are normally quiet, with the odd exception. The biggest issue is the heat.

Right now, my place is 78F. A tad warm. That is in the bathroom as well which doesn’t have a heat vent in it. I am sure it is much warmer in the living room. I knocked on the door, it seems that they are now out. Nice.

So, as opposed to melting, I am not sure how hot it will get down here, I’ve turned the furnace off. A little drastic perhaps, but I am not sure what else I can do.

I think what happens is that they come home and are cold. As opposed to putting on a sweater, or turning the thermostat up 1-2 degrees, they crank it just about as hot as it will go. I’ve asked them before, “have you turned the heat up?” – no, we didn’t. Ok, well, something is going on, it is almost 80 downstairs.

Anyway, since no one is there, the heat is now off. I will likely turn it back in later tonight, hopefully they will have gotten home by then and turned it down perhaps.

The whole thing is a little insane really. How hot is too hot?

I haven’t had Swiss Chalet in about two years now. I decided to go to the nearest one to my house tonight for take-out. Now, I know that I was “brave” and ate by myself when I was in Red Deer, but this is Calgary, I’m not that brave…

I ordered it online and drove to pick it up, brought the dogs along for company.

The take out entrance is a little odd to get to. It is around the side of the building, right where the drive thru is but the odd thing is that there isn’t a sidewalk to get to the door. You basically have to walk along the roadway to get to the door, not entirely safe. Well, I’m a big boy and can avoid traffic…

I get inside, there was a lady in front of me and a guy waiting and one of their drivers arguing about a bill with the counter person. This went on for no less than five minutes, then the person in front of me was served. Another driver came in a and sat, waiting for his order I’d guess.

Since I was standing beside him, I noticed a rather ripe order coming off of him. I was thinking if I ordered delivery and he was the driver and came to my door smelling like that, I think I’d refuse the order. Gross…

Anyway, I paid for my order and drove home. I got the chicken stir fry, not bad all in all. I guess next time perhaps I will order outside of the dinner hour, might be better service. Oh, that and I’ll skip on the delivery…

After yesterday’s computer issues, today was a much better day.

I left Calgary this morning at 630 headed for Red Deer. I still had some cleanup to do with regards to the recent hardware refresh. It was a good drive, roads were clear and dry – something that can be rare in January in Alberta.

The day in Red Deer went well. I got everything done and left around 3pm. The drive back was excellent, locked in the cruise at 120 and made it home in an hour and a half.

Since I am back to working at home tomorrow, I had to figure out what was wrong with my computer. I connected to my home wireless network and hen connected to work via VPN, the connection dropped a few times in 10 minutes. I connected to my router via a network cable, luckily I had a 25′ cable hanging around. My connection was stable. Ok, that narrows it down. It is either my wireless network or wireless on the laptop. My other wireless devices are ok so I downloaded the most up to date drivers for wireless, my VPN connection now seems fine.

The real test will be tomorrow, gotta make sure I can actually work a full day without my connection dropping out on me. I think all will be well.

It is sort of an unwritten rule that IT people aren’t supposed to have IT issues, not sure what was going on with this one. Oh well, a wrench thrown into the mix occasionally keeps me on my toes…

Today was one of those days and I hope it doesn’t repeat anytime soon.

I was in the office on Friday to prepare myself a new computer since the one that I’ve been using for nearly three years lease is up.

All seemed to go well with the image, I brought it home and did some final tweaks over the weekend.

This morning, I connect via VPN and immediately started having issues. My connection would be solid for a few minutes and then would die on me. I couldn’t use Outlook, our phone system or our chat system. Fun. Those three programs are a large part of my job or rather they allow me to do my job.

Around 930, after not having much luck in fixing anything, I decided I needed go head into the office to try my luck. I decided reimaging the laptop was my best bet.

I have been using Office 2010 for a couple of years now, so I reinstalled it this time around as well. I also use another program which has a component from Office 2007. For some reason, the two aren’t getting along on this new computer.

I can work around those issues, not the end of the world. I returned home with the intention of actually handling some tickets for the afternoon. Monday’s are typically very busy, today it wasn’t too bad, I wasn’t missed all that much.

I ran into the same issues at home again. My internet connection is fine, I can browse around, get email, whatever I want with no issues. I connect to VPN, it works for a few minutes and then drops. No word from the network team so I have no idea what’s going on.

I am returning, for what seems like the 100th time to Red Deer tomorrow. I am hoping my issues will be resolved by Wednesday, guess we will see.

If that isn’t the case, I think I’ll change professions. Maybe I’ll become a short order cook…

The baseball season is under way, well, sort of. We had our first coaches meeting anyway. Went pretty well as expected, I guess.

We have a few players who aren’t returning, which is too bad. One player also had a coach attached so he’s not coming back either, that sucks.

We do have a slight shortage of coaches at the moment, I’m sure it’ll work itself out. One of last year’s players who’s aged out has volunteered to coach, so that’s great. I’m hoping my assistant from last year won’t be traveling as much for work as he was last year.

A few more pieces of the puzzle to put together and we will be good.

It felt like baseball weather today, 16C, nice and sunny too. Felt like spring for sure. Most of the snow is gone now. I know we still have almost three more months of winter, it isn’t close to being done.

We start evaluations in two weeks time. By then, we’ll know exactly what we need to fill the holes. Looking forward to a great season.

Tomorrow is the first coaches meeting of the year so it is sort of like the beginning of the baseball season. With the recent weather, it almost seems like spring. I am sure we will have quite a bit of crappy weather in the next couple of months but baseball is right around the corner.

We start indoor valuations in the next few weeks and then comes the draft. I am looking forward to getting back on the field.

Today was a relaxing day. I didn’t even wake up until after 730, which is sort of late for me. I am glad that I don’t have to work this weekend, it is nice to have a couple of days off. I have to figure out when to use some of my lieu time, I have 4 or 5 days available.

It is supposed to be a high of 16C tomorrow, that is going to make the ball season seem all that much closer. Go Rockies !!!

I think I may have mentioned that we have been having unusually warm weather, pretty much for almost two weeks now. Day time highs in the upper single digits, not bad for nearly the end of January in Calgary.

We’ve had chinooks before of course, but they typically last for a few days at most, not 10+. I won’t complain, it is nice being able to walk the dogs just wearing a hoodie. No gloves or hat, almost spring like.

Odd thing on today’s walk though. Lots of melting snow of course, all over the sidewalks but although the temperature is about 8C, the water on the sidewalks is frozen, making for a rather dangerous walk. How exactly is that possible? I am guessing that the ground is still cold enough for the water to freeze, it just seems odd to me. Blondie is not a dog that doesn’t like to pull, pretty much all the time when we walk. I know, my fault, I never really trained her well. She will walk nicely, if I am after her all the time, I just don’t bother. I just thought it was strange with ice all over and the air being so warn.

I am actually going into the office today, first time in about 5 weeks. It is hardware replace time and I need to finish prepping my new laptop. There are around 20 staff that I haven’t met, likely won’t make any huge effort today since I am rarely there – we will talk when you are having issues. It will be nice to see some of my coworkers face to face again, some, hmmm… 🙂

It is the weekend after another long work week, try to enjoy it.