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 |  I travel the country on business, sometimes the world. Come see where I've been. |
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Talk about perks, my job has one of the best ones I can think of! I travel in the course of business, delivering classes for my employer. I am a Senior Training Specialist for Motorola Solutions, and teach classes on a wide variety of subjects centered around 2 way radio communications. I'm qualified to deliver approximately 30 different classes, but about half of those are 'Legacy' classes, and are not in demand anymore. My students are technicians, those who maintain, program, calibrate, and repair large 2-way radio systems. Some of these systems are statewide, and use TCP-IP networking to allow sites to communicate with others. Some are small, traditional type radio sites. The size doesn't matter, in each case the systems must be kept operational at all times, since many of them are Public Safety Systems. So I get to travel, sometimes frequently, 3-4 weeks in a row.... where am I this week? This probably won't have daily entries, but I will make entries when I get to go somewhere, and keep an updated list of coming trips. My schedule changes faster than the weather, so don't be too surprised to see me list an upcoming class, only to remark later on that it is cancelled, or delayed. Delays are fine of course, but a later date might mean that someone else gets to go instead of me,,, Well, here we go with this, let's see where it takes us.  Best Cultural And Regional Honorable Mention |
| Date: Week of March 18th Locale: Schaumburg, Illinois This week finds me in Schaumburg cross-training a co-worker. I have to say that this is very satisfying to me, for a couple of reasons. Let me explain. When I was hired by Motorola, I knew NOTHING about RF, radios in particular. Well, I did know two things. I knew that AM stands for Amplitude Modulation, and FM stands Frequency Modulation. But they (the management people I was interviewing with) told me that if I could teach, they (Motorola) would teach me RF theory and practices. I had a good technical background thanks to my Navy career, but it definitely wasn't in RF. But my thinking was, "I learned Nuclear Power, learned how to operate, maintain, and repair a Submarine Nuclear Power Plant, so I could definitely learn RF!" When I interviewed, I had to do what's called a 'Practice Teach', to prove I could deliver classes. My students were instructors, people I'd be working with if hired. After I was done, one of the senior instructors (Bob) told the man who would had the final say about new hires, that he should not hire me. He explained that I didn't have the background for the job. As you know from reading above, he was absolutely right. But Alex (the hiring manager) said, "Jim is former Navy, from the Nuclear Power Program, I'm going to give him a chance." Bob later became my manager for several years, and this story is one of our favorite to tell. Bob taught me a lot about RF and radios in general. He was always willing to answer any questions I had. What does that have to do with this blog entry? It was Bob who I was cross-training this past week.  In Closing This week I am home in central Illinois doing 'office work'. Next week I will deliver a class on line. Til next time, be good to yourselves and those you love, and WRITE! |
| Date: Week of March 11th Locale: Austin, Texas This week finds me in Austin, Texas delivering about the same class I delivered in Quebec last week. Fortunately, it wasn't near as cold in Austin as it was in Quebec! All went well in delivering the class, I was able to answer every question they asked, and helped them with some things they hadn't been able to do before. The firrst day of the class started off a bit different though. I had driven to the training site when I arrived Monday, and as expected, it was a huge place. So I called my customer contact and left him a voice mail asking where to be in the morning. He never returned my call until the following morning as I was leaving the hotel. It was then that I found out that the training site wasn't where the documentation had said it would be. I groaned, because I was afraid it would be somewhere pretty far away. You know Texas is a small state  , so it shouldn't have been too hard to get there. It turned out the the training site was a 45 minute drive from my hotel... Oh well, things could be worse, huh.I think Austin's a nice city, but it's getting bigger with each passing year. Plus, while I was there, a convention of some type was going on. Add to it that apparently Austin is a place quite a few people go to on spring break! That made it crowded, and with all the road construction going on, it made driving any where a real chore. Again, things could be a lot worse... Besides, there was so many good restaurants near me that I could have been there a month! I would have gained quite a bit of weight too, lol. Noteworthy Restaurants: Roaring Fork http://roaringfork.com/menus/RFSL_MenuDinner.pdf This place was so good the first time that I went back for seconds. Their 'Fried Avocado and Crab' was excellent, as was the 'Kettle of Green Chile Pork'. Can you say Yummm??In Closing This week (week of March 18), I am in Schaumburg cross-training my former manager on a new course (for him). Things might get a bit busier for us with a couple of instructors unable to travel for one reason or another. Til next time, be good to yourselves and those you love, and WRITE!  Jim Dorrell |
| Date: Week of March 4th Locale: Quebec City, Quebec This week finds me in Quebec City, Quebec for a class with the Canadian Coast Guard. Quebec was hit by a major snowstorm the week before I arrived, so it was quite cold while I was there, as well as being completely white. As a result, other than going to and from work, I didn't get out much. The class went well for the most part. For the most part? Yep, I'll explain in a minute. There was only one Base Radio and one Site Gateway/Router available for this class, so a lot of it was show n Tell. Except when this occurs, I don't do the showning n telling. I've done it so many times I can do it blindfolded. Almost. So I had them entering the commands to configure each piece of equipment. During the second day of class, one of the students asked if deleting the boot.cfg file would delete the IP addresses in the Site Router. I replied, "No, but rather than try and explain it, let's show you." I then directed the student who was doing the hands-on operations to delete the boot.cfg file. We then rebooted the router (since that was necessary), and imagine my surprise when it started to do what we call an 'Endless reboot'. What I mean is, the router would boot, then reboot, then reboot, etc. I was shocked, because I'd done this before, and it never happened. I knew what we had to do to correct this, but when we tried doing that, it didn't work. Now I was really puzzled. It was the end of the day, so they left, and I knew I wouldn't be able to relax that night until I had it fixed, so I went to my hotel and got my bag of cables and adapters. I came back, and within 30 minutes I had the router 'fixed'. I called a co-worker about this, and he explained that ever since a firmware upgrade had been done in a previous release, this would occur (the constant reboot), if the Boot.cfg file was deleted after the router had booted from it. The next morning I went over the steps I'd done the night before, so they would know how to correct this if it happened to them. It was about then that I realized the reason we couldn't correct the issue the previous night, was that they were using laptops with a French-Canadian keyboard. As such, even though the alphabet is displayed correctly, the numeric and special character keys didn't send the same ASCII text code when pressed. As I mentioned earlier, it was so cold while I was there that I didn't get out much. It wasn't below zero (other than one night), but the wind blowing across that snow made it feel a lot colder than it really was. I tried walking to a nearby Pub (less than a half mile away), but the wind cut right through my winter coat. I gave up after having walked maybe 300 yards.  Old Quebec City  Partially Frozen St. Lawrence Seaway In Closing I will spend the weekend at home in Central Illinois, then fly to Austin Texas on Monday. Til next time, be good to yourselves and those you love, and WRITE! Jim Dorrell |
| Date: Week of February 3rd Locale: Phoenix, Arizona This week finds me in Maricopa County Arizona (Phoenix), for a class I haven't taught in over 7 years! It's changed a lot since then, and I put in a lot of time preparing for the class. As I suspected, the second week went quite a bit better than the first one! My struggles with one of the hands-on labs were gone this week, in fact, everything went pretty smoothly. At times, some of the students struggled with completing their hands-on activities, but I was able to answer all their questions, and assisted them in completing them. All in all, I felt everything went about as it should. I still have some areas to improve on, still need to gain more in-depth knowledge of this course, but I'm quite happy with this past week. Noteworthy Restaurants: The Original Blue Adobe Grille http://www.originalblueadobe.com/menu.html I dined here my last time in Phoenix, and was determined to return. Their Green Chile Corn Chowder is excellent, as was the Ocean Front, New Mexico. Shrimp Cocktail Relleno on a painted plate of Shrimp Cocktail Sauce, Lobster Tamale with Mango Salsa & Raspberry Chipotle. Red Chile Rice. Yummmmmmm! I'd say business for this place is going very well, when I came in (a Saturday evening), they had open tables, but a book full of reservations, and were ecstatic when I volunteered to sit at the bar. Hula's Modern Tiki http://www.hulasmoderntiki.com/menu You might wonder why I came to a Hawaiian style restaurant in Phoenix. Well, I was browsing Google maps looking for likely restaurants, and when I saw this one, the menu appealed to me. Their Tuna Poke was excellent! Their traditional Kalbi Ribs were good too, but I've had better in states other than Hawaii.... Historic/Interesting Places Visited: Tombstone Arizona Tombstone of course, is famous for 'The Gunfight at the OK Corral'. The gunfight was actually in a vacant lot next door to the corral./ As it turns out, I probably parked just a few feet away from where it all occurred. This is really a tourist trap at heart, but one I just had to visit. If you find yourself in the Phoenix or Tucson area of Arizona, you should visit it too.  'Downtown' Tombstone, Az In Closing I will spend next week home before going up to Schaumburg next Sunday to teach a class. Til next time, be good to yourselves and those you love, and WRITE! Jim Dorrell |
| Date: Week of January 27th Locale: Phoenix, Arizona This week finds me in Maricopa County Arizona (Phoenix), for a class I haven't taught in over 7 years! It's changed a lot since then, and I put in a lot of time preparing for the class. I knew the first week would be a bit tough, and it was..... Overall the class went decently well, but not as well as it could have, or should have. I stumbled over a one of the hands-on activities, and found myself a little on edge Monday and Tuesday. I talked to myself a bit Tuesday night, and by Wednesday morning I'd relaxed enough to feel good about things. Then came that stumble on Thursday.... The important thing is, I lived, they all lived, everyone learned something, and that little stumble won't happen again. I teach the same class to them (new students next week, and know it will flow much better than this one did. While Maricopa County is the customer this week, I'm actually in the city of Phoenix. As all of you know, this was a great week to not be in Illinois. It was -25 at home on Tuesday night, and below zero from that point, until mid morning yesterday. All in all, about 48 hours of below zero weather. Meanwhile, I am here in Phoenix where it's been in the 60's and 70's all week. Talk about being lucky! I made sure to thank the students for having me here this week, even though they had nothing to do with me being scheduled here. Noteworthy Restaurants: Bluewater Grill https://www.bluewatergrill.com/locations/phoenix#menu=dinner You would think that in going to an excellent seafood restaurant like this that I'd order seafood. And I did, in a way. Their New England Clam Chowder is excellent. Plus, I was in the mood for a salad, so chose their Seafood Louie Salad. Mixed lettuce, diced tomatoes, cucumber, egg, avocado with San Francisco Louie dressing, red rock crab and bay shrimp. Can you say Yummm? Richardson's Cuisine Of New Mexico http://www.richardsonsnm.com/dinner-menu/ There is no way I could be in the Southwest and not eat food from New Mexico, given the chance. I have to go back though, because all I ordered was their Roasted Garlic Plate. The menu describes it as this. With green chile, roasted peppers, cheese & dipping sauces. It doesn't say it's the size of a football field! Seriously, this was a HUGE platter, with about 6-7 full cloves of Elephant Garlic.. a thin flour tortilla on the plate was totally obscured by the green chiles, cheese, onions, and sauces (red and green, or Christmas as it's called in New Mexico). I have to go back and try something more, maybe twice more even? Anyone care to join me? Organ Stop Pizza https://www.organstoppizza.com/ I heard about this place while getting my hair cut Tuesday, and knew I had to see it. The food is good, not fantastic, but the highlight is the person who sits on a stool at the organ, and plays the largest Wurlitzer Pipe Organ in the world! Tonight, the organist played many songs, some hits, some soundtracks, all with no sheet music. It's all in his head! WOW.... Some of the songs were Mamma Mia, Bohemian Rhapsody, The Pink Panther, Take Five (Dave Brubeck Quartet), and others I can't remember. It's quite the experience to be honest. But you really have to be there to appreciate it. Historic/Interesting Places Visited: McCormick-Stillman Railroad Park https://www.therailroadpark.com/ This is one for Railroad Buffs, and anyone who enjoys interesting sites. This is a museum, a play area for young and old, scale model railroad in a good sized building, and more. For anyone who likes railroads even a little, this is a place for you to visit. I spent over an hour there. On the property is a couple of Pullman railcars. From their website: The Roald Amundsen Pullman Car was built in 1928 for $205,000. As one of the last cars built by the Pullman Company, the Roald Amundsen is best known for being used by every president from Herbert Hoover through Dwight Eisenhower (Harry S. Truman and Franklin D. Roosevelt were the other two) It was on this car in 1940 that President Franklin Roosevelt and Canadian Prime Minister W. L. McKenzie King signed the agreement that provided for the joint defense of North America, now known as NORAD. The car was donated to the park in 1971 by Mr. and Mrs. Franz Talley. The car has been placed on the National Historic Register. In Closing I will spend the weekend here and teach the same class next week to a new group of students. Stay tuned! Til next time, be good to yourselves and those you love, and WRITE! Jim Dorrell |
| Date: Week of January 14th Locale: Yakima, Washington This week finds me in Yakima, Washington for a class with the Washington State Patrol. Yakima sits in Central Washington in the middle of wine country. It's in a valley with small mountains surrounding it. This class was one of those short two day ones, and was pretty interesting. Let me explain I arrived on Sunday so the local Motorola Tech and I could meet with the customer to ensure classroom logistics were set, and we were ready for the class. I anticipated an hour long meeting or so, but it lasted 4-5 hours! Now, there was some time spent just gabbing, you know how people can be. But it was also good in that I learned how they are using this particular software, and realized I couldn't deliver the class as I usually did. So, a little thought, a bit of adjustment, and I delivered it with a new approach. This is because they have things set up a little differently than most customers. It's hard to explain without showing you the course, and I think most of you would be bored to tears quickly. The first day of class was 'interesting' to say the least. We were discussing the basics of the software before really diving into it. and one of the guys was having a hard time understanding a key concept. I listened to his questions and assumptions, and started to address each one. But every time I started to say something, he'd interrupt me. Finally he said he would learn it on his own, and that I should continue. I wasn't angry with him, but I decided I'd had enough of that kind of stuff, so I explained to him in no uncertain terms that I had listened to him very courteously, and that now it was his turn to listen the same way. Once again he started to interrupt me, so I told him to be quiet for a moment and listen. I don't like being that assertive with students, but sometimes you have to set limits, and make sure they understand who is the instructor, and who is the student. On the next break, at least three other students thanked me, explaining that his man does something like this every class. The rest of the class was uneventful, and went fairly smoothly. For some reason, as I was leaving them Thursday, most of them clapped. I still wonder if they were clapping because I was leaving, of if they clapped as a way of saying 'Thank you'.  Noteworthy Restaurants: Los Hernandez Tamales http://www.loshernandeztamales.com/41-2/ I've been craving authentic Tamales recently, tried some here and they just didn't measure up. This place has some excellent tamales though, I know I should have gone back. In Closing I will spend this week at home before getting out of the winter and spending two weeks in Phoenix Arizona!. Til next time, be good to yourselves and those you love, and WRITE! Jim Dorrell |
| Date: Week of December 31st Locale: Central Illinois I'm home for the third week in a row, and frankly, I'm going a little stir crazy. That's not entirely true, but I do feel an itch to travel again. A week from Sunday I will head to Yakima for my next field class, and teach a class on line here at home next week. Would send some of you the link to it (could log in with just your name provided), but I know my boss wouldn't like that, plus you'd get very bored quickly. I've spent the past two weeks (and this week) working on a class called 'Network Essentials'. As I've stated in previous entries, I haven't taught this in about 6-7 years, and it's been changed greatly since then. So I've been learning the new course materials, as well as familiarizing myself with the new equipment. We use HP 2620 switches, and Cisco 2811 Routers in this class. For those of you who aren't into this kind of thing, Switches and Routers reside in your Internet Service Provider (ISP) distribution centers. Servers and other devices connect to these. Servers contain the webpages (Like WDC) that allow us access to websites, the routers and switches router us around the Internet so we can view these millions or webpages. People with far greater skills than I have modify these webpages (Think The StoryMaster   here). In this class, we teach the basic knowledge of networking. What's a MAC address, IP Address. What is DHCP, and a routing protocol called OSPF. We don't go in depth on anything though, because we're not teaching these technicians to a CCNA level, just how to perform basic tasks. So, I've been teaching myself how to do everything in the lab book for this class. Along the way, I've learned what not to do, and what is seen when you don't do tasks correctly. In the end though, I've done everything in the lab book, and completed the steps correctly. I only had one thing I couldn't figure out, and have asked the instructor who wrote this manual for help. I'll have an answer soon I know. He has real life family issues right now, so it may be a couple of days. What couldn't I get to work correctly? I configured each router (I have three I'm working with) for OSPF (Open Shortest Path First). What's that mean? It means the router will send out (broadcast) Ethernet packets, advertising it's 'existence', and what paths are on it. I verified the paths exist, I can see the paths when I run a command on the router, but I cannot ping the other devices like I should be able to. I am not too concerned, I've been through the lab manual and the Powerpoint slides in detail, and know I am ready to deliver this class.In Closing I will spend the week finishing my studies on this class, teach a different subject on line next week, then another different subject in Yakima the week of January 13th. Til next time, be good to yourselves and those you love, and WRITE! Jim Dorrell |
| Date: Week of December 10th Locale: Schaumburg, Illinois Well, nice to be back home again, though I don't think I've ever thought of the Chicago area as home. The Motorola campus has changed so much in the last 2 years, hard to call this home now. 'Our' campus was sold to developers, only the building we're in (the old Corporate Tower) is the only one left that Motorola Solutions occupies. The others are slowly being demolished, and who knows what this whole area will look like in five years? I am here teaching a 'resident' class, and it's nice to see people I rarely see now. It's a class I haven't taught in 19 months, but it went well. Amazing how things come back to you so easily once you've done them a few hundred times. I have to relearn a few things, and improve my knowledge in others for an upcoming class in Phoenix the last week of January, and the first week of February. Yep, right in the middle of winter, I get two weeks in Phoenix! We also had a Pot Luck Lunch for the whole floor on Thursday; I contributed a Pork Green Chile Stew/Soup that was really very good. Many people loved it, and I had less to take home than I thought I would. Like all pot-luck meals, there was more there than you could shake a stick at. I had fun sampling on my lunch hour, and felt it was a good thing I was teaching, so unable to be upstairs all day munching! In Closing I have the next FOUR weeks to spend at home, and will spend some of my time studying/preparing for those Phoenix classes. The course I will teach has been changed quite a bit, new equipment added, so there's a lot to learn. Luckily, they let me bring home three HP switches, and three Cisco routers (the kind of things that make the Internet work!), and 'play' with them getting used to their command line interface, configurations, and how to back up and restore them. The switch isn't a problem, it's the Cisco stuff I really need to learn. Til next time, be good to yourselves and those you love, and WRITE! Merry Christmas To You All And Those You Love. May you be truly blessed this holiday season, and every day in the coming years. My Love to you all. Jim Dorrell |
| Date: Week of November 26th Locale: Mildenhall, England This week finds me staying in Mildenhall, England while working at the nearby RAF Lakenheath. It's been quite the experience this week, in more ways than one, The class itself was a good one, excellent students and a lot of hands on activities that technicians like this love. The journey here was quite different, as has been my stay. Let's look at each of those individually. First things first. The flight here. All was well, even with a 1.5 hour delay at O'Hare for a minor mechanical problem. When we travel internationally like this, we have to book our trip through American Express Travel instead of making the reservations ourselves. A nice added bonus, is that since the total travel time was over eight hours, I could be booked in Business class. A very nice thing! Then, reality hit when I arrived. I had decided not to rent a car, I just couldn't see me driving on the 'wrong side' of the road, sitting on the 'wrong side' of the car! So I used trains to get me to Cambridge, which took about 3 hours. From there, a cab to my beautifulspaciousancient, but perfectly 'old world', hotel. And I do mean old world. Secondly, about that hotel. My parents always said that if you can't say anything nice about something, be quiet. So I won't bad mouth this hotel, but I will tell the truth. The room is small, very small. The TV is mounted on a bracket in the corner, and its screen is barely larger than my laptop. I've not used it. The room itself is quite warm, it is clean, relatively so. Freshly vacuumed every day, bed made, all that. It's just that there's barely room to walk around the bed to get to this desk. It too, is small. Can you tell I'm spoiled by past travels?? The kicker is the bathroom. A triangular shaped tub, it sits about ten inches off the floor. All electrical in the bathroom is turned on by one of five pull strings. Yes, there's even one to power on the box for the shower. It really is quite the set up. Fortunately, there are several restaurants around town, and the food is good. So I've not gone hungry at least, though since I'm trying to lose some weight, maybe I shouldn't find them, huh! The awakening moment really came on Monday when I started to head to work. I went downstairs (no elevators in this 300-400 year old hotel), and the lobby was completely dark, with all the doors bolted shut. I called several taxi services (it's five miles to RAF Lakenheath), but all were busy on school runs? I finally found one, and got to work on time. Still, it was very strange having that much trouble getting a taxi to pick me up. Luckily one of the students took pity on me, and drove me to and from after that. Other than that, it's been a great week!  In Closing I will spend the weekend at home, then be in Chicago for a couple of days. One of my friends just celebrated his 35th year with Motorola, so the boss is taking us all to his favorite restaurant Wednesday night. The following week, I'm in Chicago for class. Til next time, be good to yourselves and those you love, and WRITE! Jim Dorrell |
| Date: Week of September 19th Locale: Home! This week is Thanksgiving week here in the U.S., and as usual, I'm home. That's fine of course, can't think of many other places I'd rather be during a week like this. Of course, there's Hawaii (was on Maui for 'business' the week of Thanksgiving in 2013. Wonderful!) Not many others come to mind immediately though. While I am off this week, it doesn't mean I'm not working. I'm not working hard, nor a lot, but I am working. Will count this week as Paid Time Off (PTO). I have a lot to be thankful for, always do. But this time of year, I sit back and relax, and think of what I'm thankful for. First and foremost, my health. I suffer from typical ailments that a 64 year old person suffers from, I take too many medications for my comfort, but am told (I'm not totally convinced on some of this), that they are necessary. Secondly, my career. I was very lucky to get this job almost 18 years ago, especially since I really wasn't fully qualified for it. I'm even more thankful though, because we were told last week that we'd lost two of our instructors to a 'forced retirement'. I wasn't one of them (Thank God for that! I'm not ready to sit back and relax yet), but really feel for whoever it was. Yep, that's right, we don't know who was asked to retire, we only know that two of us were. We'll find out eventually. I have my suspicions on the names of the instructors, but that's all they are. We'll see if they are correct suspicions or not some day, huh... So why am I working during a week I will mark down as PTO? First, I get five weeks PTO each year, but for us, it's take it, or lose it. All too often I lose about three of those weeks during a years time. How you ask? Well, for me, traveling is like a vacation. I'm somewhere else, I'm on their dime, I'm treated well, and get to see new places/meet new people! So it's like a mini-vacation Secondly, things need to be done, studying has to happen, preparation for upcoming classes needs to be done. I'm home, so does it really matter if I'm on my home PC or my work PC? Not in my opinion. I have two courses I'll deliver in the next couple of months that I have not delivered in quite a while. Changes have occurred to the course materials for each of them, so I have to become reacquainted with them. I'm doing that this week, I will do it for a couple of days the first week of December, and will do more over the Christmas/New Years Holiday weeks. Like I said at the start of this entry, I'm healthy, so life is good. What's ahead in 2019? Right now, I'm scheduled to go to Washington State the middle of January, Phoenix Arizona the last week of January and first week of February, Montrose Colorado the last week of February, and somewhere in Texas the first week of March. Sandwiched in with all that, is a class in Schaumburg, and a class taught on-line. But, my schedule can change at the drop of a hat, so I may find myself in different places when those weeks actually get here. We'll see what the future holds, huh! In Closing I get to spend Thanksgiving at home, but will fly to England on Black Friday for a class at RAF Lakenheath next week for the US Air Force. No shopping for Jim that day! We'll see how well I do driving on the other side of the road! Til next time, be good to yourselves and those you love, and WRITE! Jim Dorrell |
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