Take the quiz at dicepool.com
You are a four-sided die, a d4. Otherwise known as a tetrahedron, a "Caltrop", or (to a lesser degree) "Ol' Pointy". This crap bores you, so I'll get to the point. Others tend to see you as petty, conniving, manipulative, argumentative, defensive, greedy, and needlessly antagonistic. You see yourself as focused, effective, efficient, influencing, shrewd, tactical, and direct. Both points of view are in fact correct. You always know the best way to get things done, a fact that never wins sympathy with others. Whenever you manage to gain control of a situation, your solutions are swift and brutal. Unfortunately everyone else is convinced that granting you such power is, "a bad thing" and often conspire to keep it out of your hands. Such short-sighted fools!

You may recall my complaint about Delta Airlines last year concerning their inability to keep a schedule. They've got nothing on Northwest.

I sent my 11-year-old son on an unaccompanied flight to spend a month in Florida with his grandfather. (It's an extra $75 to send a minor by himself on an airplane.) His flight was scheduled to leave around 7:40am EDT with a 1 hour layover in Memphis, arriving in Pensacola at 10:55am CDT. We got him to the airport on time; his flight left a little late, but everything seemed ok.

I got a call from the airline at around 11am EDT. It turns out that he didn't make his connecting flight and they were re-booking him for a flight later that afternoon. In the meantime, he would be hanging out in the kids' area at the Memphis airport. This wouldn't have been nearly so irritating had my step-brother not already been at the airport waiting for him to arrive. His new flight was scheduled to arrive in Pensacola at around 4pm CDT. This is where things started to go downhill.

I got another call from the airline around 5pm EDT telling me that my son had been put on the wrong plane. Luckily, HE figured it out and they got him off of it before they sent him to Oklahoma. However, he missed his real flight and had to be re-booked on yet another later flight. For those of you paying attention, yes, this phone call came shortly AFTER he was supposed to land in Pensacola. So guess who was, once again, waiting at the airport for him to show up? Yep...trip number 2 to the Pensacola airport is wasted. They knew he missed his flight AN HOUR before they called me about it.

But wait...it gets better! They didn't just put my son on the wrong flight. They switched him with a little 9-year-old black girl who was supposed to be flying to Oklahoma. When my step-brother arrived at the gate to pick up my son, they tried to give the girl to him. "Where's Alex?" "She's right over there." "That's not Alex..." That poor girl was terrified. The airline was trying to pass her off to a complete stranger! What if my son had flown to Oklahoma? Would they have been trying to hand him off to that poor girl's family?

In the end, my son did finally arrive in Pensacola. 3rd time's the charm, as they say. However, my family and I are furious about this whole situation. This airline mishandled children. Alex is supposed to get back on a plane in July with this same airline to fly to Minnesota. I'm not particularly comfortable with this idea. Thus far, we have been unable to get ahold of anyone at the airline to lodge a complaint. I want some kind of reassurance that this situation is not going to happen again. In the meantime, I sincerely doubt I'll be buying tickets on Northwest again anytime soon. Sure, it was their subcontractor who messed up (Pinnacle Airlines), but I didn't choose them. Northwest did.

Edited to add:

I finally spoke to someone at Northwest. She told me she was "shocked and appalled" at what happened. She apologized profusely, lodged my formal complaint, told me that an internal investigation would be carried out which I will not be involved in, refunded my $75 child accompaniment fee, and offered me a $125 voucher for a future flight. I feel a little insulted by the offer. I turned it down. All she could tell me is that this is "the exception, not the norm". I find this utterly ridiculous. This shouldn't be a rare occurrence; it should NEVER happen. There's no excuse for it. Period.

I'm seriously considering sending this to the media.

I'm still here in Dallas being the tech support guru for a trade show. Since the system just isn't having many problems at all, I have a lot of free time over here. Some of that time has been spent reading the local Dallas newspaper, The Dallas Morning News.

There's an article on the front page about a guy in prison that the parole board has voted to commute his sentence. It's now in the hands of the governor to make the final decision.

At the age of 17, Tyrone Brown tested positive for marijuana while on probation. He was sentenced to life in prison. So far he has served 17 years.

The reason for his probation was a little rough: he robbed a man at gunpoint, making off with $2. Yes, you read that right. Two dollars. The man he robbed was unhurt and has, in fact, put forth his support of Brown's release. Brown had no prior criminal record.

It's very likely that Brown will be released. The NAACP is lobbying for it and the parole board voted in favor of it. Texas Governor Rick Perry has the final say, though. We'll see.

If I had any faith in our justice system to begin with, this story would have shaken it. As it stands, this just goes to confirm that justice is really only for those who can afford it.

It was short notice, but I love to travel, so it's not a bad thing. I flew out to Dallas, TX last night to assist in a trade show at the Dallas World Trade Center.

I got lucky, I guess. Dallas got some ice storms that morning, but all of the flights were still on time. MUCH better than my last experience from an airline!

When I got to the car rental agency, I had another pleasant surprise. They were out of the type of car I'd reserved (I had asked for a Compact). Instead I am driving a pretty blue 2007 Crysler Sebring with 367 miles on it.( Want to see it? )

The biggest surprise in this car was the little button on the radio labeled "Music type". Pressing this button cycled through a bunch of different genres. When you reach the genre you're looking for, you press the button next to it...and it scans the airwaves for a station of that type!

The first thing I noticed about Dallas (and, I assume, Texas in general) is the horrible condition of their roads. It's seriously something to be ashamed of. Cracks everywhere, quick and sudden rises and falls...at first I couldn't understand why the speed limit on the freeway is only 60 MPH, but I realized that it's just not safe to drive faster than that. Your car will probably fall apart by the time you get to your destination.

The next thing I noticed is how amazingly friendly the people are. I'm not just talking about restaurant waiters or hotel personnel. I'm talking about the people on the street. It boggles my mind. I'm sure I'll regret having said this by the time I leave, but I haven't met a single rude or abrupt person yet.

So, here I am at the Dallas World Trade Center waiting for the booth to be ready for me to set up the computers. The client I'm here to work with has an 8-booth area that they're assigned to and lots of boxes filling that area. Shortly they'll have room cleared away so I can start my setup. The computer system is for the salesmen. They all carry PDAs that they use to take orders with. The PDAs communicate wirelessly with my server which then uploads the orders to the home office in Michigan. Once I'm all set up, there's not much for me to do unless something goes wrong.

In the meantime I've been looking around a bit. This is a BIG place. We're up on the 12th floor of the WTC. ( Here's a view of the atrium )

I'll be here in Dallas until Tuesday. It should be interesting.

For several years now, my sister and I have been talking about trying to locate a friend of ours from high school, Adam Hansen. Last night she finally succeeded in making contact with his youngest sister, Tara. I was pleasantly surprised to receive a call from Tara while waiting for dinner to arrive.

The conversation started out lightly enough, but shortly turned for the worst. It turns out that Adam developed brain cancer a few years ago. In 2003 an inoperable tumor was discovered; it was too deep. He was given 6 to 12 months to live. He passed away in June of 2006.

I know I'm missing a lot of the details in this story. She told me a lot more; I don't remember most of it. The part that really stuck with me was how he made it a LOT longer than they said he would. In the end, he passed quietly and peacefully. I can only hope to be so lucky.

( So, who was Adam? )

Adam, you were a great friend and a wonderful person. You will be sorely missed.

Tonight, I have accomplished what I thought was impossible. I beat Guitar Hero II on Expert. I even got 4 stars on Free Bird.

For as long as I can remember, I've had strange dreams. I will literally wake up thinking to myself "What the heck was THAT all about?!" Within a matter of minutes, I am also completely unable to remember any actual details of said dream.

I woke up from one the other day...I believe it was Monday night. In typical fashion, I woke up thinking it was a pretty weird dream, and I don't remember anything at all about it. However, ever since then, an old acquaintance from high school has been stuck in my mind: Cathy Reay.

I never really knew her very well. She moved to Maple Lake around our 8th or 9th grade year. She caught my eye because she reminded me very strongly of Lea Thompson from Back to the Future. We weren't friends or anything; we might have spoken a handful of times, but nothing memorable. I ran into her again back in '96 at my friend's wedding. She was one of the bridesmaids. We reminisced about how horrible Maple Lake High School was, particularly how utterly mean the kids were to newcomers. I got to dance with her at the reception.

But that's it. I haven't seen her in 10 years. So, why have I been thinking about her now for 3 days straight? It makes me wonder what that dream was all about.

Back when I was in 11th grade, Bryan Adams came out with a CD called Waking up the Neighbors. This was one of my favorite CDs when I was in high school.

Somehow, just about any song by Bryan Adams reminds me of my friend Jeremy, known to some as astroliar. I believe this is because both of us really liked his music. We would listen to the CDs or hear the songs on the radio and sing along. Jeremy once pointed out to me that Bryan Adams yells "Yeah!" at some point in almost every one of his songs.

Seeing as he's a friend on LiveJournal, it's safe to say that I'm still in touch with him. He's one of the few people from high school that I am still in contact with.

I followed this link from a friend of a friend's livejournal. I was actually surprised since I'd heard there was one other person on the East Coast somewhere with my name about 6 years ago. Maybe he died? *shrugs*


Incidently, my wife's name comes up with 18.

Did you?

I've been listening to a radio station here in Columbus called The Brew. It plays a lot of music from around the time I was growing up. The strange thing about music is that it tends to stir memories up in me. Those memories typically revolve around the kinds of things I was doing back when I listened to the songs while growing up. Those things range from activities I was doing to books I was reading to people I hung out with. This all got me thinking about the people that I knew back in High School.

I decided that I wanted to start jotting down the people I knew back in high school. The purpose of this exercise is to bring up the ones that I remember. No cheating: I won't be opening up my yearbooks. I'm curious where it will lead.

Last night on the radio I heard Steelheart's "I'll Never Let You Go" on The Brew. This song always makes me think of Jennifer Maine. The song reminds me of her because it was one that we used to talk about. I remember that she liked the rhythm that the drummer did between the chorus and the second verse. Later I realized that Def Leppard's "Love Bites" used that very same rhythm in the same place.

I met Jennifer in the advanced math class that I attended in 8th and 9th grade known as UMTYMP, the University of Minnesota Talented Youth Mathematics Project. The summer after the first year in the program I got a letter from her. That letter started a friendship that lasted, on and off, through the rest of high school. I lost contact with her after that. The last thing I heard about her was when my sister told me she ran into her at a party. I wonder what she's doing now?

I hope to continue this theme. It's been on my mind a lot lately with all the old songs that I keep hearing.

In case any of you were wondering, yes, I am still alive. Considering the sheer size of my friends list, though, maybe you weren't...

My new job is turning out splendidly. I found out on my second day that my immediate supervisor had put in her 2-week notice the day before I started. So, 2 weeks into my job, they hired a new guy to run the department. Since it's just the two of us, we get to organize the department exactly the way we want it. We've been working together for about a month now and I think we work together very well.

On a side note, we just finally got all of the boxes and miscellaneous "stuff" moved from our old house to the new place. We still own the old house; we're thinking about selling it to someone using a land contract also known as a "contract for deed", depending on where you're from. She is very interested in the house, but has no credit history whatsoever and can't get a bank loan.

Other than that, we're just plugging along. The new place is an absolute disaster; we need to figure out where we're going to PUT everything now that it's all in there. We have a very large basement which I have a feeling is going to be very full.

After getting the job offer almost 2 weeks ago, I went in to work and told my boss about it. He asked me to put it off so he could see what he could do about my situation there. A lot of people at the corporate level were involved in this, but unfortunately the 2 key people who were required to make the decision were on vacation. Strangely enough, my prospective employer was ok with this. He gave me all the time I needed to hear back from my current job about what they had in store for me. I finally got my answer yesterday, and it was underwhelming, to be honest.

After talking it over with my wife last night, I decided to take the new job. It really was a no-brainer. I start on 9/11.

So, as you can plainly see, I now have an icon.

I asked my wife to come up with something for me since she seems to love doing icons and, well, I suck at them. Knowing how much I've always loved the game Star Control 2, she decided to make one from HER favorite race in the game: the Orz. I have to admit, some of the things they say are downright hysterical.

So, yeah. I have an icon now. Yay.

For the past 3 years, I have been working for a large window manufacturing company in a quasi-technical capacity. The official position has nothing to do with network administration or programming. However, I have really engineered my own job for the most part. The problem has always been that I don't really get paid enough for all the things I do for them.

On and off for the past 2 years or so, I have been talking to the higher-ups about a corporate position in the MIS department. With the recent addition of my MCSE certification, I've been informed that our Vice President of IT is very interested in me and that I should be hearing from them Soon™. That was 2 weeks ago.

Fast forward to yesterday. I got a call from a consulting company down in Columbus who got my resumé from my school career services department and was interested in having me come down to do an interview. He was apparently very impressed with my resumé and had already had a lengthy conversation with our career services rep at the school about me. All that was left was to meet me in person and make sure my personality was a good match.

I had already taken the afternoon off from work to go down to Columbus to pick up my son from the airport, and I had padded that time by a few hours to make sure I was waiting at the gate when he got off the plane. So I stopped by the office for an hour or so and had an interview. I think I spent more time asking questions than they did! The bottom line is that the position they want to fill fits the description of my dream job to a T. And, at the end of the interview, they offered me the job. My official offer will arrive early next week.

I think I'm going to have to accept the job. Even if my current company DOES finally come through with this new position they're trying to create, I sincerely doubt they will ever pay me what I'm worth. Factories tend to follow the logic of "we already have him at X salary, why should we pay him more?" I have the opportunity here not only to make much better money in the near future but, as a Microsoft Partner and a consulting company, they will assist me in keeping up-to-date with evolving technologies. My current company is HIGHLY unlikely to do that. The new company will start me a little higher than I am now with increases throughout the year so that, after the first year, I'll be making A LOT more than I am now.

Accepting this position would also mean staying in Ohio. One of the benefits to staying with my current company is that I would most likely end up moving to New Jersey to the corporate office within a couple of years. This is a benefit because it would help my wife out with her opera career to be that close to New York. She will be home on Sunday; we will be able to discuss it at length when she gets here. I don't think there's going to be much of a choice here, though. This is too good of an opportunity to pass on.

My friend gaiyrah posted this link in her journal. It's a music video by Tally Hall. It was so hysterically funny that I just had to re-post it here for posterity.

http://www.tallyhall.com/video.php?v=1133570630.mov#theater

For many years I've wanted to learn to ride a motorcycle and get my license endorsement. The process always seemed difficult to me, though. It's just like getting your driver's license: first you pass a written knowledge testto get your learner's permit, and then you pass a road test using your own motorcycle to get your endorsement. The advantage is that you are legally able to drive a motorcycle by yourself with just your learner's permit.

A friend of mine recommended the Motorcycle Ohio Basic Rider course. You use their motorcycles and they teach you everything you could possibly need to know to pass the road test with confidence. In fact, they administer the road test themselves as the final test of the course. If you pass, you can take your course completion card to the deputy registrar and get your endorsement on the spot.

I took the course this weekend. It was a lot of fun. I'll go over to the BMV this afternoon and get my endorsement. Now I just have to convince my wife to let me buy a motorcycle...

I had heard good things about this game some time ago. By "good things" I mean that the guys at Penny-Arcade couldn't get enough of it. I happened to see it set up for play at Best Buy today, so I tried it out. It was pretty fun. I ended up buying it.

I just spent the past 4 hours playing it. My hand hurts like hell. But I must say that it was easily the most fun I've had playing a video game in a LONG time. I beat the game on Medium difficulty and unlocked all of the bonus tracks, so I can now go into Quick Play and try any song in the game on any difficulty. Just a hint: Hard Mode really is, and Expert Mode should have been called "Insane Mode". On the easier difficulty, you play the general rhythm and approximate the harder parts. On Expert Mode, you actually have to play every note in the song, including the solos. If you've ever heard Ozzy's Bark at the Moon, you'll understand just how insane that is! Sure, that's the last song and is supposed to be the hardest one, but still...

Yes, I absolute love the game. However, it's a hard game to recommend to others for one simple reason: it really is a niche. It appeals to my deep love of music (rock and roll specifically) and requires some SERIOUS hand-eye coordination on the tougher songs. I don't think I've ever felt this much of a sense of accomplishment after completing a level in a video game as I did when I finished Bark at the Moon and Cowboys From Hell. And I never got frustrated at the parts I couldn't do. Yes, I think I will be buying the second game when it comes out in November.

For the past several months, the career services rep at my school has been sending my resume out to places and is continually shocked that I never receive any calls. Well, today I finally got one. There's a web hosting company looking for a System Administrator. I scheduled an interview for Friday. Good timing: I have a mock interview with the career services rep scheduled for tonight!

I sincerely doubt I'll take this job; administration really isn't my thing. But it's about time SOMEONE called me back!

I passed my final MCSE exam this morning (70-297), making me an official Microsoft Certified Systems Engineer for Windows Server 2003. Wow...that hasn't quite sunk in yet. Give me time.

I'm considering working toward a security specialization next. It consists of two exams, one for MCSA (70-299) and the other for MCSE (70-298). Well, both are required for MCSE, but you know what I mean. From what I've heard, the 298 test is HARD. I thought 293 was hard...I scored the lowest on that one. I sure hope 298 isn't much harder than that...

Anyway, I have the rest of the day to myself now since I took a vacation day for my exam. I don't know what I'll do with it. My friend Noelle is taking me out to Hooters tonight to celebrate my achievement. She thinks it's some kind of a crime that I've never been there before and has made it her responsibility to make sure I experience it at least once.