June 4, 2009: Happy Birthday Dad

Today is a big, busy day.  I was pretty tired this morning since it was a short night.  Work was busy today but I decided to put several things on hold because I just don’t have enough time to deal with them today.  I did managed to get the new DL185 G5 checked out.  It is looking awesome.  I can’t wait to get the remaining parts and to be able to start really working with it.  That will be really great.  This server is going to make my life a lot easier (in theory.)

I was hoping to have been able to have wrapped up work by five thirty but that just didn’t happen.  I ended up being stuck at the desk until after six twenty.  Dominica had packed the X3 during the day so we were ready to go as soon as my work was done.

We grabbed gas and horribly stale donuts from the Dunkin Donuts (which we are not going to do again) and hit the road, for the final time, towards Scranton.

It is about a two hour drive from Peekskill to Scranton.  That part went well.  We arrived in Scranton as the sun was getting low.  Just after eight thirty.  More or less on time according to our original plans.  I had told the data centre that we would be arriving between eight and eight thirty so we are just sneaking in under our original plans.

The dr-racking process at Scranton went well.  I was quite relieved by how smoothly it all went.  I was worried that we would have some rail difficulties and not be able to get everything out quickly.  It was probably no more than half an hour there before the two remaining servers, the router and the switch were loaded into the car.  I worked in the data centre with the onsite tech getting everything removed from the rack while Dominica worked on getting the rear of the X3 reorganized so that we could fit everything in.

From Scranton we drove up to Clark Summit.  Dominica and I both came up with the idea of getting dinner at Waffle House.  I was like “do you know what we should do” and she was like “get dinner at Waffle House”; so that is totally what we did.

This was Liesl’s very first trip to a Waffle House.  Dinner was awesome.  We both got waffles and eggs.  Delicious.  And very convenient.  Few things are as convenient as eating in Clark Summit, PA.  If ever there was a town designed for travelers, this is it.  Hotels, restaurants, easy access to several highways, on the way to everywhere and grocery stores all in a row.  Very, very handy.

It was just ten after eleven when we pulled in to Apalachin, New York to stop in to see John “The Surfing IT Wizard” Stephens.  We stayed there for roughly an hour.  We spent most of that time looking at SpiceWorks as I got him logged in and showed him what he could do with the software and with the community.  We almost never get to see each other so it was nice to get a little time to visit.  I got to meet Lilly, his new cat, who is adorable and very sweet.  And John got to meet Liesl for the first time.

From Apalachin it was straight on to Peoria.  Several more hours of driving putting us at dad’s house around two thirty in the morning!  What a long night.  Dad was still up waiting for us too.  So no one was getting any sleep tonight really.  It was after three when I finally got into bed.  I have to be up tomorrow at normal time so no serious sleep for me.  I am going to be really exhausted tomorrow.

We didn’t technically make it to dad’s house on his birthday but we were still awake from him birthday so it kind of counts.

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