Sheep Guarding Llama

Neither Brian nor I slept very well last night although the hotel is great.  I had to be up pretty early dealing with work for the office as I am working from the hotel today.

I really like the Comfort Suites in Round Rock.  It is a very handy location for Dominica and I as well since it is really close to where we hope to be buying a house sometime in the near future.

Jarrad ended up not being able to join us this morning so Brian and I walked ourselves over to Round Rock Donuts and picked up four dozen of them!  Brian was pretty impressed by the line of cars waiting for the drive through winding out of the parking lot, down the side street and on to the main road as well as the line of people that filled the bakery itself and lined out into the patio area outside.

It took thirty minutes or more to get to the front of the line at Round Rock Donuts.  We bought our four dozen and then walked outside and sat down at one of the picnic tables to eat a few while they were incredibly fresh and hot.

From gathering donuts it was back to the hotel so that I could work for another hour.  I ended up having several servers down and we ended up being late for our brunch meeting.

It was just after eleven thirty when we managed to get to La Margarita where we were supposed to have been at eleven.  We had a nice lunch there with some people that I had met down at SpiceWorld last October.  I had fish tacos again.  The fish tacos at La Margarita were excellent.

I ended up being paged several times during brunch which was very annoying.  We ended up having to run around immediately after brunch to find good Internet access so that I could work again for a while.  We tried McDonald’s right next to the hotel where the WiFi is normally pretty good and, at least down here in Texas, free.  But after drinking some McCafe coffee and not being able to get online while getting paged and paged by people who couldn’t handle “don’t page me again until I get online – you are interrupting me from finding a way to get online to help you.”

We gave up on Internet access from McDonald’s and ran back to the hotel and were able to sit in the car outside of the hotel and get onto the Internet access from our hotel room.  That worked surprisingly well.  Wireless has come a long way in the last few years.  Once 802.11n is ubiquitous it will be really amazing.

We were stuck there for a while.  As soon as the servers were fixed we hit the road north to Temple, Texas to meet up with a friend of Brian’s that he has known for a decade or so but has never met.  Temple is very close to Round Rock, maybe twenty minutes away at most.  We are making good use of our trip this weekend.  Three meetings between Round Rock and Temple.

We met up with Sandy and Will in Temple without any issues.  Temple is a very small town so finding each other was easy.  We had been hoping to have had time to have headed out to their private shooting range and to have fired off some of their weapons collection including an AK-47 but we were getting late and did not have the free time that we had hoped.  So instead we just went out for a quick Mexican dinner at a little Mexican diner type place.

We were not in Temple for very long.  Maybe an hour and a half at most.  Then it was back onto the road to get up to Irving again.  The drive from Temple to Irving was well under three hours.  Maybe two and a half at most.

We got back to Irving, the drive went fine.  The whole weekend was really gorgeous with temperatures as high as seventy degrees!  That was a nice change from what we have been having.  It has been a very cold winter.  Can’t complain, though, with all of the snow that they have been seeing in the northeast.  I have managed to avoid what appears to be a record setting snow year up there.

So my alarm went off at five forty five local time this morning.  Oops.  It was late when I went to bed and I forgot that my mobile is set to Eastern time rather than Central time and I set it an hour early.  Argh.  So I only got about four hours of sleep.

A major earthquake, 8.8, rocked Chile’s second largest city this morning killing seventy eight people and generating a tsunami that is traveling across the Pacific.  At this time Hawaii and many other Pacific islands as well as Australia are under warning.  No major population center has been hit yet although populated islands have reported the tsunami already.

I worked all morning getting everything done that I could before needing to travel today.  I ended up not being able to get on the road until after one in the afternoon so I was cutting it pretty close for getting to the airport on the southeast side of Austin.  At least I got a bit of time to visit with the family before leaving for a day.

I got onto the road without having eaten all day.  I took I35E south and stopped in Italy, Texas to get fuel and to eat at McDonald’s.  The weather was amazing today.  Mid sixties as I drove down with bright sun.  Gorgeous Texas day.  It is snowing back home, of course.

I made decent time until I reached Austin proper.  There were tons of cops around Italy up until Waco or so.  Once I hit Austin traffic slowed to ten to twenty miles per hours and I had to creep most of the way through the city.

I was able to drive the entire way to the Austin airport, to which I have only been once before, without using a map or GPS at all.  That was pretty cool.  I am learning my way around Texas.  I got to the airport just five minutes or less after Brian made it out to the curb so the timing was perfect.  No wasted time at all.

We drove around Austin for a little bit so that Brian could see the city.  He has never been to Austin before so this was his quick introduction.  We drove out east and the west into the city from the outer loop.  We drove right through some cool neighbourhoods and then through the UT campus.

We did a tour around downtown Austin and got a good look at the city north of the lake and then drove north of the city and stopped off to grab a couple of beers and fish tacos at a local bar and grill chain.

We got checked into the hotel, the Comfort Inn and Suites in Round Rock right on i35 where Dominica and I stayed the last time that we were in Round Rock the weekend after SpiceWorld in Austin back in October.  It is a great hotel although it was far more expensive this time than it was that last time.

We only had a little while in the hotel to relax before going out to get drinks with Jarrad at a bar called Twin Peaks not too far away.  We knew that we would be there for a while so Brian and I grabbed a taxi to take us down there.  We got there maybe an hour before Jarrad so had some drinks.  I was very happy to learn that Twin Peaks carried 512 from Austin – my local beer of choice.

We had a good time and ended up drinking till we closed the place down.  Then back to the hotel.  We are scheduled to meet again tomorrow morning at nine thirty.  We are going to walk over to Round Rock Donuts (and Lonestar Bakery.)  I am very excited to be getting Round Rock Donuts again.  I am delivering a load of them to the office on Monday as well.

It was an uneventful morning.  Got up and went into the office.  I was able to walk today, the weather is a little chilly but not too bad.  Still just wearing a fleece.  Back “home” in the northeast everyone is getting pounded with snow and wind.

So in legal news today, SCO – the company that has been bankrupt for forever and just runs around suing anyone and everyone claiming that they own the entire universe and constantly losing horribly in court and being unable to settle their legal debts – has now decided to not pay their attorneys.  Now honestly, can we feel bad?  These lawyers were aggressively attacking innocent people and companies on behalf of SCO and working to keep a parasitic  and evil company functioning longer in the attempt to lash out and hurt the American public.  So no pity from me.  And really, who couldn’t see this coming?  Did these lawyers really think that SCO was going to pay no one else but would pay them?  Ha ha.  That’s not how this game works.

Work was pretty busy today.  We still had “visiting dignitaries” at the office today so instead of casual Friday it was “dress up” Friday.

For lunch three of us went to Schlotzsky’s Deli to which I have never been before.  They have a veggie sandwich that was pretty good.  Nothing really special for a vegetarian but it was decent.  Now I know that that is a place that I can eat at from time to time.  That is always an issue being a vegetarian.  You never know when you will find something to eat at a new place.  It makes you think twice before trying out a new place.

This afternoon was very, very busy.  Hardly a free moment at all.  It was crazy up until a quarter after five and then everything just died down all of a sudden.  By six I decided that things were so slow that I could head for home.

I got home and discovered that the apartment was empty.  Dominica had neglected to tell me that she was going out shopping.  That would explain why there was no answer when I called home to find out if she wanted to go out to dinner this evening.  I was home for probably forty five minutes or so before she called to find out if I was still at work or not – her plan had been to pick me up and go out to dinner.

I was already in my pajamas for the evening but I changed back into normal clothes and then the family picked me up and we went out to get On the Border.  We decided that we just wanted to get take away (I probably should have just stayed at home now that I think about it) and while we waited for that to be ready we ran over to PetsMart and go Oreo’s toenails trimmed which he desperately needed to have done.

We came back home and ate dinner and watched some Netflix on demand movies.  It was a pretty slow evening.  Nothing eventful.  Liesl stayed up way too late tonight.  It was around midnight or later when she finally was able to fall asleep on my lap.  I have to be up early tomorrow so I had been hoping to get to bed quite early tonight.  That never works out for me.

Tomorrow I have to be up bright and early to do deployments again.  My Saturdays are really just an extension of Friday night.  So no extra rest for me.  My alarm is set for six forty five.

Tomorrow afternoon, after work is done, I am driving down to Austin where I will be picking up Brian from the airport and getting a chance to go out drinking a little on the town.  We are staying there on Sunday night and then driving up to Irving on Sunday afternoon after stopping at Round Rock Donuts to stock up on the world’s best fried pastry treats.

Well I am now officially thirty four years old.  This is also my tenth birthday to have been announced on Sheep Guarding Llama.  I have been blogging for almost one third of my life.  I have been blogging for more than one third of my life during which I knew how to write.  Someday there will be a large percentage of the population who have been blogging for their entire lives but I was blogging before the term existed so for people of my generation this is a really impressive figure.

I got a good night’s sleep last night.  Went to bed nice and early and did not get interrupted too much.  I didn’t get up until a quarter till eight this morning.  Then it was off to work.  I walked again today.  The weather is pretty nice.  Still a little chilly but the sun is out and the day is gorgeous.  Great weather for walking to work.

This morning was pretty slow and I managed to get my latest article “In House Email for Small Businesses” posted on SMB IT Journal.

Dominica made lunch on the early side today so just before noon I left the office and walked home and joined the family for lunch.  Liesl was awake which was a nice change and we spent my entire lunch break hanging out together at home.  That made the walk home well worthwhile today.  That was a lot of time with my daughter that I do not often get and that is good as I am going to be out of town this weekend and not get to see her all that much other than Saturday morning and Sunday night.

Work was pretty slow this afternoon.  All of the guys who are here from New York and New Jersey are snows in today.  The weather is great in Texas but the northeast is getting blasted with a “snowicane” – tons of snow and incredibly high winds.  Not fun at all.

Dominica went shopping at Kroger this evening and picked me up from work just after six.  Then we went out to Rockfish for some dinner since it is my birthday.

After dinner we came home and just relaxed.  I played with Liesl and Dominica played some Dragon Age: Origins.  I often prefer watching her play video games rather than watching a show because it doesn’t require very much of my attention and I can easily go read with Liesl or clean around the house or do whatever task needs to be done.

Liesl asked to go to bed for the first time ever today.  I said “Do you want to go to bed?” and she emphatically said “Yes” and so I carried her in and put her in her pack and play and she curled right up without any complaints at all!  Now this is some serious progress.

Unfortunately Liesl woke back up fifteen minutes later and stayed up for another two hours.  But at least there is progress and she is starting to learn how to communicate her need to go to sleep to us.

For my birthday I got a gift certificate to Casual XL Male (I desperately need more work clothes after more than a year or working from home!!) and Dominica ordered me Final Fantasy XIII from Amazon which is due to arrive on release day which is March 9th.  We got the PS3 version of the game since no one has listed a reason to get the XBOX 360 version yet but the PS3 version fits all on one BluRay rather than three DVDs.

Today Akio Toyoda is sitting in front of Congress expected to explain and defend his and his namesake company’s actions involving the lack of safety and lack of responsiveness to customers and US safety commissions resulting in many American deaths.  As the cited article mentions, facing down a Congressional Oversight Committee likely means the end of Toyoda’s nepotistic career.  It likely means an end to Toyota’s reign as the master car maker as well (technically it was surpassed by VW in December anyway.)  It would take a very foolish person to buy a Toyota vehicle today now that so much is known about how Toyota treats its customers and how little they take safety into account.  Toyota’s are not cheap and they will not be a status symbol again for a very long time.  This is a blemish that hopefully the company will never live down (although the populace has legendary short memory retention so we will see.)

Toyoda is also facing questioning from the US government as to whether or not Toyota was treating American customers differently from their Japanese counterparts.  This is the same question that came to my mind.  Had deaths been occurring in Japan would Toyota have looked the other way and allowed the dangerous vehicles to remain on the road?  Is it only because the deaths are Americans that it does not matter to them?

Toyoda did admit that the company’s focus had become “confused” – since he claims that the focus was supposed to be safety he clearly admitted that safety was no longer the focus.  Not the same as not caring at all, but it is the first step.  Toyoda also belittled the deaths that have occurred by claiming that the “…vehicle can be controlled with firm and steady application to the brakes.”  Thanks, so he is placing the blame on the drivers rather than accepting responsibility.  Nice Toyoda, real classy.

At the end of the hearing, representative Marcy Kaptur said she was “disappointed” with Toyoda’s testimony and did not feel he had shown sufficient remorse or had taken enough note of the amount of complaints over the last decade.  The fact that Congress is pointing out that Toyota has a terrible safety record for a decade is extreme.  Toyota is definitely faced with having put Americans at risk and now has to face the music for getting caught selling us substandard, dangerous crap.

Yahoo! Finance ran a good story highlighting the cultural differences exposed in today’s hearing.  Toyoda, with his name on the company, failed to take responsibility for his and his company’s actions.  In Japan this is, we are told, acceptable.  In America, it is not.  Apparently in Japan no one has to take responsibility for corporate actions.  Corporations, perhaps, are considered to have greater rights than real people have.

What really came out of the hearing can be highlight thusly: Toyota and Toyoda just don’t seem to be too concerned about American lives (or possibly any lives) and they don’t see safety as a concern of their business, Toyota even today continues to claim that their cars are safe even when clearly they are not and Toyoda admits that they have no idea why the cars are killing people making his previous statement that some or all of their cars an obvious lie.  Bottom line is – don’t buy Toyota.  Ever.

It was super cold this morning so I drove to Jamba Juice and picked up the morning oatmeal.  Of course, they were not able to handle the order even though I do this every week, so it ended up taking an hour to get the oatmeal.  I’m thinking that it isn’t worth doing this any more.  The oatmeal might be really, really cheap but the effort necessary to get it is pretty extreme.

I dropped off oatmeal for Dominica and Liesl on the way to work and then went in to the office.  We have some people in from New Jersey today that I have not seen in quite a while.

For lunch today, as it is national tortilla day, John and I went to Mi Cocina and ate a large amount of tortilla chips.

Work wasn’t too bad today and I managed to head for home around five thirty which surprised Dominica as I am never home at that time.  Liesl was very excited to see me.

We did pretty much nothing tonight.  We ordered in sandwiches and watched a few movies via Netflix OnDemand and I played with Liesl all evening until she went to sleep around ten.  I was pretty tired and decided to turn in myself at ten thirty.  I need to catch up on some sleep.  Dominica stayed up for a while after I went to bed watching her Australian television show McLeod’s Daughters to which she is now addicted.