%%USERNAME%%    %%ACCWORDS%% %%ONOFF%% |
 |  I travel the country on business, sometimes the world. Come see where I've been. |
|
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 |
Well, as happens sometimes, there's a lull in my travel. Most say that's a good thing, but for me, I miss it. There just aren't any classes upcoming that I'm qualified to deliver. There are classes available this in August and September, but I was already scheduled for other things, so I wouldn't be put on those. It's the upcoming classes in the 4th quarter that are affecting my schedule. So I've been home here for almost a month <gasp!>, and will be for another six week it seems. There is a nice silver lining to that 'cloud' though. Remember those classes I'm not qualified to deliver? Being home gives me the chance to work on those. I've been delivering classes here in Schaumburg, so it's not like I'm idle. But when I'm not delivering, I'm sitting in classes, studying, and working on the 'hands on' portions of the classes so I can learn them too. There's really just 6 more classes I need to qualify, and I'll be able to teach every class we deliver. However, two of those are not taught all that often, and are not in the average instructors qualification path. So, four more, and I'll be done. Well, I'll never be done, lol, but I'll be where I want to be. So until mid October, when I go to San Diego for a few days, I'll be home.  |
| So here I am, thinking I'm doing fine here in this beautiful city, just to find out tonight that Thomas Jefferson's Monticello is here! Guess where I'm going tomorrow? But I'm not here to write about where I'm going. I'm here to write about where I went tonight. Specifically, dinner. I was looking on Google maps for restaurants to visit, and found one called 'Shebeen Pub & Braai', pronounced 'Sh-bean'. What drew me to it is the type of food served there. The food was inspired by the owners childhood spent in South Africa, and memories of the food his mother prepared for him. I've never been to a restaurant like that, so it was a draw to me. But going there, I couldn't possibly order anything American, so I looked over the menu well before ordering. So, for starters, I had glass of Smithwick's Irish Ale. My appetizer was Samosa's. These triangular delights bring back memories of an African childhood. Spiced ground beef and lamb in a fried pastry jacket served with mango chutney. My entree was Sosatie: Cubed local Retreat Farm lamb top round, skewered on sugar cane with dried apricots, marinated for at least twenty-four hours in mango chutney, tamarind & turmeric, grilled and served with samp and beans, yellow rice, mango chutney and a cucumber mint yogurt. I had something like the Samosa's while in Kuwait teaching classes back in 2004, so I was drawn to those. The dinner was very different, but excellent nonetheless. I wanted a dessert, but I went to dinner late tonight, and the kitchen had already closed. Maybe next time. |
| This week finds me in Charlottesville Virginia delivering a class for Nelson County. Funny thing is, Nelson County is about about 30 miles south of here, with the class being held in Lovingston. However, there are no hotels, nor much else in Lovingston, so I'm staying up here in Charlottesville. It's the home of the University of Virginia, the Cavaliers. The area is beautiful, the town not too large, with plenty of nice restaurants all around. Tonight was a Sushi night at Tokyo Rose, and I have to say it was excellent. I'm sure I've had better Sushi in the past, but I'd be hard pressed to say when. Teaching this week will be a little bit of a challenge; each class is really. You have to assess your students quickly, and decide how your delivery will be done to maximize the learning opportunity. This week is different though, because my students are more administrators than they are technicians, so I have to deliver it to their level. That in itself can be a challenge. I'm not saying they're stupid, far from it. But if I deliver it in 'tech speak', they'll learn little, so I have to watch how I describe things to them. I've already seen them get glassy-eyed at least once.  Oh, and I have 3 students total in this class, making it even more fun.After this, I'm home for three weeks before going to the Dallas area for a class. That one is still tentative, so I wouldn't be too surprised if it was delayed. Til then though, y'all stay cool in the summer heat. If you live anywhere in the Dallas area let me know. Maybe we can meet for a glass of Ice Tea! Or whatever your heart desires to have. |
| This week finds me in Pueblo Colorado for a class. The customer is involved in a huge project, working at a remote location about 20 miles from Pueblo. They are disposing of some pretty dangerous stuff. I'm not sure how secret the project is, so I won't say exactly what they are doing, but it's not something I want to be involved in. Since I'm on the road for 4 weeks in a row this time, I decided to take a little vacation. I flew back from Maui on Thursday last week, then turned around and flew to Denver on Friday morning. Then it was a 5 hour drive to Moab Utah. Why drive there? To see two National Parks I've wanted to visit for a long time, Arches National Park, and Canyonlands National Park. I've been many places in my life, have traveled quite a bit around the world, but I've not seen sights like I saw last weekend. To stand in the open desert and see huge rocks delicately balanced, to see holes in the middle of a rock, probably caused by wind and rain was awe inspiring. Canyonlands is justly named. Sadly, the public roads do not allow you to get anywhere near the center of it all, so I couldn't get where I wanted to be. I knew I should have gotten a 4-wheel drive vehicle this week! So Saturday was spent visiting the parks, with an overnight stay in Grand Junction Colorado. Sunday I drove through the mountains along Hwy 50, and once again I was treated to views that at times can leave you breathless. Of course, I have to share a couple of photos from this trip.    |
| I am a very lucky man with the job I do, and this week finds me once again in the beautiful Hawaiian Islands, specifically Maui. I'll be teaching a class on radio maintenance to the County of Maui technicians, the same students I had in November on my first trip here. For this entry, I thought I'd talk about the Hawaiian language. Before Europeans arrived in the late 1700's, the Hawaiian people had no written language. Of course the Europeans and Americans found this to be unsatisfactory, and missionaries quickly came to the islands to establish a written English alphabet for them. The Hawaiian language is most closely related to the Marquesic language, which I'd supposed would be spoken on the Marquesas Islands. There are only 13 letters in the Hawaiian alphabet, but one of the consonants is a glottal stop. The letters are (in this order in the Hawaiian Alphabet) A, E, I, O, U, H, K, L, M, N, P, W, and ' (the glottal stop, or Okina). I love the language, and find it fluid to listen to. I just wish I could speak it some. I do pronounce many Hawaiian words fairly easily, and love hearing people who are not familiar with the language trying to pronounce them. Of course, one of the more famous words is the name of the Hawaiian state fish, the Humuhumunukunukuapua'a. Just repeat it over and over a few times, and see if it doesn't flow off the tongue. Another word I love in the language is the name of a Hawaiian Princess, Kalanianaole. Of course there are a few rules for words in the Hawaiian language. Every word must end in a vowel. A consonant can only be followed by a vowel, therefore a word like follow cannot exist as a Hawaiian word, the two ll's are together. You can (and frequently do) have more than one vowel together in a word, like Oahu, or the town I lived in during my time in the Navy, Aiea. There are many other rules and pronunciations of sounds, but I'm not qualified to write about them in detail. For example though, sometimes a 'k' can have a 't' sound, and a 'w' can have a 'v' sound. You have to be proficient in the Hawaiian language to understand those substitutions, and I am far from that. The Grand Wailea Resort leaves a small card in your room at night when they turn down the covers. Here is tonight's card: E moe malie me ka 'ala o napua 'awapuhi Sleep soundly with the sweet scent of ginger blossoms Now, on to other things. I mentioned in my notebook about meeting Annette in France   & Jeff  for lunch Friday, and here is a picture I took. I have to wonder why I'm the one with the messy hair, and not smiling! (Not the mention the excessive waistline!) This is the view from my hotel room last night as the sun was setting.  As the summer heat hits us, be careful, stay hydrated, and keep cool! Winter will be here soon enough, and we'll be fighting to stay warm, so appreciate the warmth while we have it. |
| This week's class is in Fort Irwin, California. The nearest town is Barstow, but it's a 45 minute drive from there to the base, It was 109 degrees yesterday, and about that hot today. Thank God I get to teach in an Air Conditioned classroom. Some of you might think, "Well of course you do!" But that's not always the case. I was here a few years ago (met Annette in France on that trip), and taught in a converted Quonset hut. It didn't have air conditioning, just a swamp cooler that couldn't be used much because of noise. There I was, shirt and tie, 98 degree heat, and a bit of humidity. But I lived, and will continue to do so. In 2006 I went to Omaha Nebraska to teach a class. I had heard of a large rock in Iowa called "Patriots Rock", and had to stop to snap a picture of it. A local artist paints this rock every year, each time a new Military themed logo on it. I wonder what it looks like today?  Being here in Barstow, I'm out in the desert quite a bit, can you tell by the heat? But near the main gate to the base sits a field of boulders/rocks. Many of them have had logo's for the base divisions/Army companies painted on them. Since I'd taken that picture in Iowa so many years ago, I had to snap more of these, didn't I? Interesting, beautiful, and in some ways, sobering. So many of our men willingly put their lives at stake in the name of our country. I'm sure some were stationed here.  I'll be here until Thursday morning before heading off to Los Angeles. I have a lunch date Friday with Annette in France and Jeff I hope to have a picture of the three of us to post here in my blog. Til next time, y'all stay cool in this heat, and avoid the storms! A good way of doing that would be to sit at your pc and write something! |
| Just a brief entry for now, about the start of this trip. It's hot here in Phoenix, but y'all know that already. It was 95 today, but at least it was a dry heat. I know what y'all are saying, humid vs. Dry heat, but I grew up in Albuquerque. I remember playing basketball at the local park in the middle of the summer. Outdoors, temps in the mid 90's. We didn't care. We had water, we played, we rested in the shade, and cooled off. But that's the thing with a dry heat. In the sun, you bake of course. But get in the shade, and you cool off. You don't sweat because it's so dry out. In humid heat, you get in the shade, and you sweat as much, if not more there than you do in the sun! Sadly, I'm only here for 2 days, delivering a class on what's known as a 'Base Radio' for the city of Phoenix. I arrived at 11am this morning, and briefly considered driving 3.5 hours north to the Grand Canyon. However, with my back the way it is right now, and the length of the drive round trip, I decided against it. It was a good decision too, because I'd be very tired trying to teach class tomorrow. Instead, I went north about 1.5 hours, to Montezuma's Castle National Monument. It's an old Indian ruin set in the hillside. It was inhabited from about 1000 to 1400. I found it amazing to look at, even more so when you considered living in something like that. A picture taken today is below. See what you think. If I have a chance, I'll go back Wednesday, or some other Indian site, we'll see how things go. Stay cool in the summer heat everyone. Hopefully I'll add more to this after the trip is complete.  |
| This week finds me in Manassas Virginia, with the City of Manassas my customer this week. Since Memorial Day was Sunday, it was only natural I visit Arlington Cemetery. I took the tour bus up to the Tomb of the Unknowns, but on the way, I saw something, and decided I wouldn't be seeing the changing of the guard today. I saw a woman sitting next to a grave; the scene was one out of a book or movie. I got off the tour bus, and walked down hill as fast as I could, hoping I could find her and snap a shot. Along the way, I decided I should ask her permission first, and I'm glad I did. Fortunately, my homing instincts (Yes, I can find my way almost anywhere once I've been past it, or visited it) worked, and I found her without having to look long or hard. I approached her, and apologized for intruding, and asked if I could take her picture. To make a long story short, she asked that I not take her picture, but she'd love it if I took one of the grave she was visiting. Turns out, the man was one of Doolittle's Raiders, and a relative of her husbands. I know a lot of you probably never heard about Doolittle's Raiders, so here's a short history lesson. After the attack on Pearl Harbor in 1941, the American Military wanted to strike back at Japan to show them that they weren't all that safe, despite the distance from the US. They trained in secret in their B-25 bombers at Air Force Bases on the west coast, getting their planes to take off from shorter and shorter runways. Seventy Six men in sixteen planes trained for this secret mission, and didn't even know their target until the planes were on the carrier USS Hornet, and the ship at sea. They had to take off 2 days early due to a Japanese fishing boat seeing them, and being unsure if the boat had alerted the Japanese mainland of the carrier's presence. As a result, they took off one by one, and flew towards the target area. Each bomber completed the mission, but only one landed, and that was in Russia. The others crashed on the China mainland, or when trying to land. Before it was all over, 11 of the 76 men were captured or killed, but the mission was a huge lift to American spirits. The man honored with this marble marker was captured by the Japanese. He was executed by them about six months after the raid (the raid occurred on April 18th, 1942.). I explained to her why I wanted her picture, but she asked me not to take any of her, nor mention her name (which I never asked for, lol). The American Flag in this picture was placed by 98 year old Lt. Col. Richard Cole, the co-pilot for General Jimmy Doolittle on this raid, and one of four raiders still alive. Last week the Doolittle Raiders were honored by their country by being awarded the Congressional Gold Medal, something that's about 60 years overdue. General Doolittle himself is also buried at Arlington, in section 7A, plot 110 (I visited him today too), not too far from Joe Louis. Below are two pictures from my visit.   |
| This week I'm in Buffalo, NY with the City as my customer. It's a custom designed class that required a lot of work on my part up front. I'm actually delivering 2 courses, and a portion of the networking course I teach. The first two courses were written by me, one about two years ago, the other was just finished last week! So in a way, they're my test audience, what we'd call my pilot class. But their manager knew that up front, and asked that we deliver this since they know so little about this new product. The problem is, it's also new to us, so I learned it while I wrote the course. With Buffalo sitting on the northeast end of Lake Erie, and Niagara Falls emptying into Lake Ontario, you know where I went once I arrived on Sunday. I'd also mentioned wanting to snap a good photo of Nikola Tesla's statue, and I'm sure many of you thought I was nuts for wanting that, or terribly geeky. But if you Google him, you'll see he was at the forefront of working with alternating current, and invented the induction motor. Before the induction motor, everything was DC powered, requiring carbon brushes, which created a lot of dust, and are a lot harder to maintain. The induction motor is widely used in every day applications, such as your vacuum cleaner, garbage disposal, fans, and almost any simple AC motor application. Admittedly some of his ideas were a bit 'out there' (a death ray?), but he was pure genius through and through. The falls were beautiful of course, but I was surprised to see ice in many places. I know the falls froze over this past winter, but I'm pretty sure that water kept flowing under the ice. For the first time, I went on the Maid of the Mist, and saw the falls up close and personal. It was a good time, once I'm glad I did. I spent most of Sunday afternoon there before driving back to Buffalo to settle in. I'm at a Hampton Inn, and they upgraded my room this week, so I'm in a 3 room suite. The bathroom is HUGE, so big that if I talk loudly in there, it echoes. The living room is bigger than the one in my house, and the bedroom as big as mine at home. There's a 48" flatscreen TV in the bedroom and living room, so i'm being terribly spoiled this week.  Tuesday nights, from May 3rd to mid-October are Food Truck night in Buffalo. They gather at a small square on the SE side of town (Larkin Square), and sell their stuff. Additionally, a small local band plays their hearts out, making for a nice evening. The band tonight played everything from Stevie Wonder to Led Zeppelin, The Beatles to The Who, and almost anything in between. It rained a little, but not one seemed to mind. Tomorrow night at Larkin Square is a gathering of local authors, all there to sell, and sign, their books. Any guesses on where I plan on being tomorrow night?? That's about it for now, till next time (two weeks from now in Manassas Virginia), y'all be good, and continue to write your stories and poems. |
| This week I was in Jefferson City Missouri delivering a class to the State Police Radio Technicians. I had decided to drive to this location also because it made more sense. Flying would have taken just as long, and I wouldn't get to see the countryside like I wanted to. I also decided to detour on this trip, and see a couple of places I'd read about as a child. It was during the drive there that I took the first detour. I drove south to Springfield Illinois, but instead of continuing south to St. Louis, I detoured west along I-72, and ended up in Hannibal Missouri. Of course, this was the home of Mark Twain, my real 'tourist destination' for this trip. Hannibal is a small river town on the Mississippi River. A lot of the town is centered around their famous writer, Samuel Clemens, who we know as Mark Twain. If you've never heard how he came to use the name Mark Twain, read up on it some. It's an interesting read in itself, and a bit short if I'm not mistaken. I saw Tom Sawyers childhood home, with Becky Thatcher's house right across the street, along with the wood fence that Tom convinced his friends to whitewash for him while he watched..... Wait a minute, weren't Tom, Becky, Huck Finn, and the rest all fictional characters? Makes one wonder, huh. That, or good touristy marketing by the town to cause people to stop there and explore some. Getting to Hannibal was pretty boring if you ask me. Central Illinois is very flat, making for a pretty monotonous ride. However, depending on the time of year, you see different things. Being spring, there were quite a few farmers in the fields turning the soil, getting things ready for planting.  The class itself was a 'typical' Networking class. A lot of what I teach in this class cna be applied to the technology used on today's internet. But the material itself is centered around the equipment used in the Motorola Solutions ASTRO Radio systems. I've never talked much about what I teach, mainly because I didn't want to bore you all with it! Since some of you might be a little interested, there's a brief explanation of this week's class. When I left Jefferson City, I decided to drive along Hwy 94 to the St. Louis area. What a beautiful drive that was! To my right was the Missouri River, its flood plains clearly visible, though dry at the moment. As I got close to Augusta Missouri, the road began to twist a bit, with a few hills here and there. This made the drive beautiful and fun, and I also knew I was approaching my next 'tourist' activity. I had decided I would stop at a couple of wineries and sample their wine, perhaps buying a couple of bottles. Sure enough, I found a nice semi-sweet white wine at the Blumenhof Winery, as well as at the Louis P. Balducci winery. I would have gotten more, but didn't want to overspend. So I arrived home in Illinois late yesterday afternoon, and one of the bottles of wine is already gone.  Now I have to make a road trip there to get a few more! For the first time this year, I'll be home for three weeks in a row. A week from Monday I will have minor surgery to repair an Umbilical Hernia. After a week in recovery (at home), I'll work a week in Schaumburg before leaving on my next trip. Right now, it's scheduled to be in Buffalo, NY. I'm a bit excited about that for two reasons. Seeing Niagara Falls from both sides of the river, and seeing the large statue of Tesla. He was instrumental in the early years of Electricity and Electronics, a bit of an eccentric, and an amazing mind. Till next time, y'all be good, and don't work too hard in your gardening. Whatever you do though, keep writing! |
View Portfolio
Visit Notebook
Send Gift Points
Awards
Badges
Send Email
Community Newsfeed
General Discussion
Sponsored Items
Book of Trinkets
Static Items
Books
Groups
Interactive Stories
Audio
Campfire Creatives
Community Notes
Crossword Puzzles
Documents
Folders
Images
In & Outs
Madlibs
Photo Albums
Polls
Product Reviews
Quizzes
Survey Forms
Web Pages
Word Searches
