SKYDIVING!!!!!

This is something I’ve wanted to do for a long time and finally was able to. It was actually a birthday present from my parents. We had some extra fun with it because MP set AP up to do it (his birthday is in 2 weeks) with us and we surprised him with it that day! He did figure out where we were going before we got to the airport – even though MP was sure he new nothing – but he was still pretty surprised and thrilled when we got there. KS and RB also came along and proved they are as brave and crazy (if not crazier) than all of the boys. No one had any second thoughts or hesitated at any point we were all really pretty gung ho.

After an hour and a half drive out to Hutch we met the lady who runs the company (Skydive Hutch), she is about as crazy as anyone I’ve ever met. Not that I expected anything else. They took us into a room off to the side of the hanger and explained their safety record how things work and what to expect. Then we watched a really lame video from the inventor of the tandem system. The video is approaching 30 years old and the man giving the lecture is as ancient as they come. He had a long white beard that went to the middle of his chest and talked about the waiver we had to sign that kept us, or our heirs from suing the skydiving company or the equipment manufacture. After that we took twenty minutes or so to fill out the forms and read/sign the waivers.

Even though our appointment was at 11:00 no one from our group jumped for a couple of hours. They split us up into two groups AP with KS and RB and myself. There were only 7 people in the plane when RB and I went up; our instructors, cameramen, us, and one other jumper. I thought at this point I should be scared or at least really, really nervous but I wasn’t. Maybe having flown in small airplanes all of my life has made seem pretty normal but the flight up seemed nice and smooth to me. After about a 10 min ascent it we were at altitude (about 14,000 ft above see level – 2.5 miles or so). At this time they opened the door – kind of a roller door that works like a roller desk top – and the lone jumper leaped out and disappeared in less than the time it takes to blink.

That is when you finally understand you are about TO JUMP OUT OF AN AIRPLANE! First the cameraman climbs out the door and hangs on to the side of the plane. This way they can get photos of you actually leaping. Then you shuffle up to the door with the instructor attached to you back – I say shuffle because the interior of the plane is to short to walk or waddle to the door – at this point to hang your toes over the edge of the door cross your arms to your shoulders and wait. You have no control of when you jump the instructor takes care of it all. You just look out at the ground below and wave at the camera man and then…..then….you are propelled out the door and in freefall and on your way to a terminal velocity (yes that is a title of a crappy movie but it is also a real term) of 120 mph.

The free fall is amazing. It is nothing like you expect. You are moving at 120 mph straight down but you feel suspended in midair. In this case it lasted 90 seconds or so but felt like 10. There was no crazy uneasiness in my stomach. In fact the power tower at Valley Fair is more upsetting. It is more serene than anything. At this time you are in a crazy arching position, trying to kick you instructor in the rear at the same time you are raising your head and have your arms out in a w shape. The g forces make your skin press back on you face but it’s not much different then hanging you head out of a window on the freeway. The view is amazing – at least it was with a crystal clear sky – and the freefall was easily the biggest rush of the whole experience. Though, it is kind of weird to have this camera guy getting into your face for most of the time. After 90 seconds or so the instructor taps you shoulder and then you get jerked upwards as the shoot deploys and you start to slow down.

For the next four minutes or so we floated back to good ole terra forma. We did a few turns which are like a carnival ride you control yourself by pulling down on either control. This dumps air on side of the shoot and you spin one direction or another it is quite fun. I only got to do a couple because we spent a lot of our time actually heading back to the landing zone. RB jumped out closer to the landing zone so she had more time and got to do a lot more turns. It is absolutely an amazing ride coming down. You are still moving fast, I found the experience once the shoot open to be a lot like flying a glider without the glider. You have some control but you still have to be aware that you are moving forward and downward all the time. As we came toward the ground I was supposed to pull my legs up and hold them straight out in front of me. Unfortunately my harness was too tight and holding my legs down so I could only move them a few inches. This combined with my instructor coming down to fast and to soon kind of landed us on our hands and knees instead of on our feet. But that’s ok it was worth it.

With the exception of the jump the day was actually vary lazy. The drive out was uneventful though we were all excited. Then we lazily hung out at the airport for a few hours before suiting up to jump. After the jump we went to the VFW (yeah it’s a small town) and had a quick linner. Then everyone went home and took a nap. Well with the exception of KS who went to her old apartment to clean. Later that night RB and I met up again with AP and MP and went to the Cheese Cake Factory and saw a movie. The movie was hilarious but defiantly not the highlight of the day

Baseball, Baseball, Baseball

The Twins were on a roll. Key operator being “were”! They had one 8 of the last 10 games including sweeping the Chicago White Sox in last weeks series. Unfortunately the night I decided to go to the game with some friends there luck quit on them. We went to the Wednesday night game against Chicago and watched the Twins quit literally stand around as the Sox scored through out the first 3 innings. The next six were basically uneventful and then in the ninth, after most people – including my buddies from DC – had left the Twins rallied. All of a sudden they had scored twice, had a guy on third, and only two outs. But they lost anyway with the next two batters striking out. Bummer. But at least happy hour that day was good. It was also fun to spend the night with both new and old friends. It’s been probably 2 maybe even 3 years since I went to see the Twins so all in all it was a good time.

One thing I did think about while watching the game was how crappy the dome is for baseball. I really hope they build the stadium up in Anoka and move the team. For one thing it would help some of the traffic; not for most people but for me and that’s what counts right! Also then maybe they could lower the city sales tax (dome tax) though I don’t think they ever will, considering the dome has been paid off for years. I would however like to watch baseball in an outdoor stadium.

As if the Twins were not enough for one week, RB and I got to go to the Saints game on Friday night. I was nice; DC rented a tailgating area in the stadium parking lot and supplied us with beer and Famous Dave’s. They also gave us the tickets to the game so it was a fun and FREE Friday night. The Saints also lost. I’m beginning to think I am bad luck at ball games for the home team. But the Saints games are always a lot more fun because of the atmosphere. There are always side attractions going on, the stadium is outdoor like it should be, the fans are aloud to have more fun (throwing beach balls around and being more crazy), beer and food are a little cheaper, heck even the announcer is more fun cracking jokes and making fun of the players. I did have to teach RB about baseball but she caught on by the end of the game and enjoyed it a lot. It was also funny because I ran into people from both CSOM and high school. Some of them I hadn’t seen in years.

New Water Heater

While I was away at training for a month my water heater sprung a leak. That is actually an understatement, the water heater systematically failed. It started leaking from every seam both on the top and bottom. The entire basement had about 1/8” of water in it. – Fun – So for the first week or I ignored like any good home owner what else can you do. That as it turned out was a bad Idea and the water didn’t go away. So the second solution was even more fun. I cut the hot water off to the water heater. This meant anytime I wanted to use hot water I had to go to the basement and turn it back on. I’ll tell you this it was a ton of fun waking up early in the morning, walking into the cold basement, turning the water on, and then turning it off before I left for work. So after these wonderful solutions caused me more hassle then putting a new one in I broke down and bought a new one!

The old water heater lasted about 15 years and the longest warranty I saw at Home Depot or Menard’s was 12 years I guess buying a new one isn’t that big of a deal. Of course now I’ll be short on cash for an extra couple of pay checks but what can you do. Anyway with the exception of Sears there isn’t much of a selection in water heaters at home improvement stores. So I picked one with a nine year warranty that was 25% larger and 25% more powerful than the old one. So hopefully the supply will last a lot longer than the old one. I asked a friend of mine from work to help me out with it and the free labor cost me quite a bit. KW was a heck of a plumber – even if I need to practice sweating pipes – but that man can eat. It cost me 2 brats, 2 big burgers, a half dozen beers, a bag of tortilla chips, and jar of salsa. The grocery bill was pretty close to what a plumber would have cost (I kid, I kid, of course thank KW!)! But now that is finished so hopefully that is the last appliance for a long time.

What a dope.

I don't really have much to say. I just thought anyone reading this blog would be amused by a little story.

At one point in my life I was responsible for a fiber optics ring for a large retailer that included 26 sites thought out the Twin Cities. This ring was probably worth in equipment alone around $130 million dollars. Not to mention the cost to install, configure, run, and of the data on the ring. I've always been pretty proud of this.
I have also always been proud of my technical savvy. Creating the software, hardware, and set for this site and others. Trouble shooting expensive networks and so on.

Today however I was humbled.

For the past couple of months I have been frustrated on occasion because I was unable to log onto the web access of a new checking account I opened. I have tried maybe a dozen times to enroll and get online and never had any luck. Finally today I called tech support......
I had been entering my SSN incorrectly!
I was supposed to enter it xxx-xx-xxx, I had entered it xxxxxxx. No dashes.... All that frustration over 2 dashes!!! Well who knows technology now!..

Fun in Chi-town

RB (my GF) came out to Chicago last weekend. She flew in Friday night and out last night. We had a blast. Of course some people would think we were crazy because we went basically non-stop from the time she came up to when she left.

Starting with Friday night we ended up taking a scenic drive down Harlem St… Hmm it wasn’t really by choice though. We – I should say I – missed the correct turn so I thought I bet this road will get us to where we are going. And sure enough it did – after an extra ½ hour of driving. But it was all fun anyway because I like exploring and RB didn’t seem to mind. We finally got to the train station and found out we needed change (three dollars in quarters) to feel the parking system. So we spent some time asking cabbies and strangers to make change out of a few dollars. We finally got into Chicago around 9p thanks to our misadventures of the night. Honestly though it was quite fun so far and we hadn’t even done anything!

For the rest of the night we dined at Harry Caray’s restaurant and met up with some of my Coworkers at the Fulton Lounge. Harry Caray’s was a great experience, steeped in Cub’s history it is a Steak Chop house with an intimate décor, great service, good food, and it was totally enjoyable; we didn’t even have to wait because we got there so late. Fulton’s lounge was also fabulous. It is located in an old meat packing district that apparently has some of the hottest clubs in town. Very off the beaten path Swinger’s style you have to find this place. Being a swanky place it was very laid back with good music and comfortable couches for hanging out.

Because we had been out so late the night before, we didn’t get into Chicago ‘til around noon on Saturday. So we started our day with lunch at the Billy Goat (a dinner that the SNL skit cheezeboorger, cheezeboorger, cheezeboorger was based on). We – like every other dinner at that meal – got a double cheeseburger and chips whether we liked it or not, but that is the fun of that place. We spent the afternoon at the Shedd Aquarium. That was a lot of fun and now I only have to go to the Planetarium and I have seen it all (along the museum district in Chicago anyway). After the aquarium we took a water taxi up to the Navy Pier. That was fun but a little wet. The man selling tickets reminded me of a young James Earl Jones. He was crooning a dozen different lines to entice potential customers using a very distinctive voice. Navy Pier was busy hosting several weddings and the usual tourist. We took a good look around, walked up and down the dock and then moved on. Navy Pier is easily the most touristy attraction (tourist trap) in Chicago.

We walked around river north (one of the Chicago neighborhoods) for a while then went to Gino’s East for some original Chicago Style Pizza. It was a lot of fun. We had to wait in line for around 40 minutes but they had people come out and entertain everyone. The magician wasn’t all that great but it beat waiting in line with no entertainment. Gino’s East is fun because every inch of the restraint is covered in graffiti. You are actually encouraged to write on the walls, hell they’ll even give you the pen/marker or whatnot. We didn’t finish dinner until around 9p, it just seems to take awhile to get around town and do most things. After dinner we caught an L south to head back to the park and hopefully see some fireworks.

On the way through the park, while headed toward Lake Michigan we noticed a lot off people gathering around Buckingham fountain. We stopped for a while to try and get some photo’s of the fountain all lit up at night when it suddenly went dark. After a moment some music started playing and the lights came back on and a show started. The show was not quite the Bellagio’s Fountain show but it was very well done. It lasted about 20 minutes, consisted of four or five different tunes with coordinating lights, and the various features of the fountains surged and came on and off in a spectacular display. As the last song finished we heard some loud booms and found that the fireworks were being launched over the Lake. After the show we headed over to Buddy Guy’s Legends Café. This is a must see Blues Club just south of the loop on Wabash. We stayed there the rest of the night and watched a show by John Primer, the same bluesman I was lucky enough to see last March while in town with GM and AL.

As if we hadn’t seen enough we finished our weekend on Sunday by dining at my favorite Italian Restaurant The Italian Village. The service is always great, the food is good, and you can’t beat the ambience. It has been built to recreate an Italian Village outdoor dinning setting complete with a night’s sky and white strung lights. They are always playing relaxing music, many times including Dean Martin and Frank Sinatra. The service never stops; if your glass is half full it will be refilled before you can even notice the server. The same can be said for bread and used plates disappear in literally seconds. This is the third time I’ve dined here and plan to do so again the next time I’m in town. After lunch we walked around the Loop area of Chicago then headed out of town. Once out of town we took a detour through a small city center in the city of Downer’s Grove, walking around town and having a nice ice cream cone. After that weekend we needed a rest so we spent a few hours hanging out at the hotel, then RB was off – heading back to Minnesota. Though it was a lot of fun I’m almost glad to get back to training just to get some rest..

Cats and the Beach

Finally. I have a cat free living space. It is wonderful. I can leave doors and windows open with out worrying about the dumb animals getting out. Now all I need to do is clean all of the cat hair off all the furniture, out of all the nooks and crannies, and anywhere else it lurks. This will probably take a few weeks. For now though I am in a good mood about them being gone. I don’t think I will ever live with an indoor cat again. I have decided pretty defiantly that at the least I don’t like cats at the most I hate them. Oh yeah and there owner also moved out with them so now for the next week or so I am the only one in my house. It’s kinda quite.

Now I need to get the house ready for KS to move in. If it stops raining I’ll go up on the roof and put in a vent for a fan in the bathroom. I’ve only been putting off for five years. I also need to clean that room up and maybe touch paint up. No biggie the paint held up pretty well over the last couple of years. Now that the cats are gone I finally poly some of the woodwork I finished restoring a few weeks ago with out worrying about them stepping or climbing in it. That will be nice I need to finish the rework on the stairs before winter so I can seal the windows. I read today natural gas is going to be through the roof today so I’m going to need to find everyway possible to save energy.

Work is very different this week. They use two different terms for what my fellow new hires and I doing in the office right now. The first term they use to describe our status is being on the bench this term implies that we are anxiously awaiting our turn to get out there and get some billable hours in. The second term used for the same status – this term is used more often – is that we are on the beach this term implies that we are just relaxing in the sun with out many worries. Interestingly enough both of these terms explain the situation quite nicely when looking at the situation. I finished training last week in Chicago and flew home. I came into the office around 8:30a on Monday – though no one set this time it just seemed right – and have been just doing very light administrative work and online trainings all week. There is no one to report to and no one is checking up on us. So we are taking it pretty easy, however everyone is really anxious and some are attempting to get work. If this goes on much longer I think I will ask for some proposal work so I have something more productive to do! Ahh what a crazy job.

More Vendor Training, Crazy Hours, and Wonderfully Lousy Service

After a brief weekend at home I’m back in Chicago. The second week of vendor training is pretty similar to the first. The only real difference so far is that everyone is running low on energy. Next week I think people will really be dragging. Having all these people in one place is a mixed blessing; you meet so many people but you spend so much time socializing no one gets any sleep. I think everyone is going to be glad to actually get into a project. That being said last night we took an architectural boat tour of Chicago. We rushed downtown right after class and met up with people from the other two training centers. The first half of the tour was really interesting…. the second half is a little hazy due to the open bar! So I guess you could say that the work week went well.

After the boat ride most of the SAP crew went to dinner at a place on the Chicago River. Unlike most bars where the rule is polite and helpful service Dick’s Last Resort has built its reputation on the opposite. You have to get your own drinks, the waiters insult you, yell at you, and they make fun of you so that everyone else in the bar is supposed to point and laugh. As intimidating as this sounds – it is actually a lot of fun. The wait staff also creates these tall white hats out of paper with obscene slogans written on them. As you probably guessed these hats are put onto the patrons at random intervals, and everyone again points and laughs (though not to hard because yours is coming too). I would try to remember a few of the quotes here but they are not at all family friendly! The service was so lousy it wonderful. The restraint is basically a crab house with an attitude. So the food was pretty good to. They also had live music but it was too loud to talk to anyone and too early in the night for that kind of scene so most of the fun came when the band was on break.

Last weekend was a little weird though. One of my roommates moved out. That wasn’t the weird part though; it was the hours that she moved. I had been woken up at around 7:30 in the morning having heard her and a friend moving stuff out of the house. I thought she was just starting so I went back to sleep. Apparently she was finishing up though because when I got out of bed a few hours later all of her gear was gone. I’ve never heard of moving at such an odd hour before, but I guess I have packed up friends late at night and then driven across several states overnight so it’s not the odd. Soon I will be roommateless. This is only going to last ½ week and then I get a new roommate. I still haven’t decided if I’m going to look for a second roommate yet. I guess that will all be decided once I’ve tried to make the bills for a few months.