This is beyond old

I'm back in Dallas this week.  Sunday through Friday.  It was supposed to be a kind of celebration trip for the official end of my involvement.  Well, that isn't going to be.  A problem came up last week and it has been a 24x7 effort to get it resolved.

I don't talk much about work but this project has really gone on way too long.

Did have an interesting lead fllight attendant tonight.  Have had a similar lead attendant before but I think it was on an entirely different airline.  The lead flight attendant "themes" the first class section.  She had decorated the bathroom, the food tray and even the walls of the first class cabin with "winter wonderland" items. 

There were snowmen in the bathroom and on the food cart.  She had snowflakes and snow covered tree pictures taped to the cabin walls. It was really kind of weird.  Tonight was the last night for the winter theme because it is Jan. 31.  Tomorrow being Feb. 1 means Valentines is the next theme.  I really hope I don't have to see that.

Getting spoiled

My travel this week was very last minute.  I found out around 3pm on Sunday that I needed to be in Dallas on Monday.  The corporate travel application got me on my usual Monday morning flight but booked the late flight tonight -- 8:40pm.

I figured I'd try to go stand-by on the 5:45pm flight.  Weather in Dallas was very bad for flying.  Thunder and lightening storms moved in right before the 5:45pm flight.

Being at the top level of American Airlines frequent flyer program is what is making me spoiled.  Because I am Executive Platinum I went to the top of the stand-by list.  The flight was late because of the weather but I made it on and in first class!  I've been upgraded to first class on every flight this year.

We were less than an hour leaving Dallas.  Huge thanks and congrats to the ground crews for the fast turn around.

So much for a week at home

Up until about 3pm yesterday, I was planning on working from home this week.  The client in Dallas called to say there were some "problems" and could I call into a conference call.  That is always a bad sign.

So now I'm on a plane flying to Dallas....again.

Snowy and getting cold at home so at least it should be warmer in Texas.  I already know that I'm flying to Dallas next week for the official go-live of my 2 1/2 year project.

US Pond Hockey Championships - rained out

Who would have thought that pond hockey would get rained out in January in Minnesota!?

It was nasty wet this year for the entire weekend.  They played yesterday in the mess but today's games were canceled.

Some birthday pics

Christine, Kay, JT and Amy

Linda and me.

Jen and Bruce

Lyndsey

Bunny and Kathy.

Home

I got a much earlier flight which required changing my itinerary.  Instead of flying through Dallas, I routed through Chicago.  It took 30 minutes and 3 American Airlines ticket agents to make the change!  Being top-level frequent flyer helped.

Flight left Bentonville around 1:45pm and I got home about half hour ago...8:00pm.  My other itinerary had my landing at 11:00pm.

I don't usually talk about my actual work very much but this one was a challenge.  Three of us were brought in to do talk with various employees of this company and then today, present our perspective on their situation.  Our presentation would be the basis of whether IBM would get contracted to do follow on work.  This week's work was a freebie.

The good news was we knocked it out of the park.  The client loved our findings and presentation.  The bad news is the client lover our presentation....which means I'll probably be going back at some point.

For now I'm just glad to be home.  As it looks now, I'll be home all next week.  Then guess what?  Back to Dallas on Feb 1.

Heading home today...finally

Boy what a long week.  Really long days of work with tons of meetings and discussions.  Our "findings" presentation is this morning.

Since I didn't know when the presentation would be, I booked an evening flight.  Going to try to get on earlier flghts and back to Minneapolis, friends, house and Frankie and Uno.

Saw nothing of Bentonville let alone Arkansas.  Dark and foggy nearly every morning driving from hotel to office.  Just go out briefly for lunch.  Have to walk across railroad tracks and wet strip of land between IBM office and client.

Client facilities are vast...and I mean vast...cube-lands.  Thousands of people working in cubes and at desks.  Everyone has been very nice but this gig has been a challenge for me.  So looking forward to going home.

Bentonville, Arkansas

Work has finally taken me to a different town.  I flew today to the hometown and headquarters of the largest retailer in the world.  One bit of irony was that I had to fly through DFW to get here.

I landed around 8pm.  Got my rental car.  And didn't see a thing.  It is incredibly foggy.  Thank goodness it was fairly easy to get to my hotel.  I'm hoping I can see more tomorrow.

This week is all about meetings, meetings, meetings.  I'm figuring I won't see much of the area.

The Long Goodbye

Today is technically my last day in Dallas on my current project.  I say "technically" because I've learned that this type of project has a hard time coming to a conclusion.  It has also been discussed that the whole team may get together one more time for an official "go-live" gathering.

But since I'm considering it my last day I've been saying "good-bye" to my peeps
...Donna and Soledad in the Executive Lounge at the Hilton Anatole who put the breakfasts together and are always so friendly.
...Lillian at the Hilton Anatole gym desk who helped me with my Spanish.

And today I'll be saying "good-bye" to all the folks at the client site and the IBM team members.

Drinking at the Anatole

Lisa, me, and Asha in front of my elephants in the Hilton Anatole lobby.

We were using up my pile of free drink tickets and heading from the lobby bar called Gossip to the atrium restaurant called The Terrace.

We had drinks and dinner at The Terrace then headed up to the Nana bar on the 27th floor.

We went through quite a few drink tickets.

Reunion Tower

My boss and I went to the Five Sixty, a Wolfgang Puck restaurant, in the Reunion Tower, Dallas, Texas.  The restaurant is called Five Sixty because it is 560 feet up at the top of Reunion Tower.

The tower is ths concrete phallus on the southern side of the city.  It is an odd thing.

The restaurant rotates as you would expect especially since it is associated with a Hyatt Hotel.  The view would have been fantastic but as we rotated around, fog rolled in.  We didn't really notice as we talked the entire time.

The food was just okay.  We had the bar appetizers which were good but the sushi was just mediocre.

Home and the snow is piling up

Got home last night with only a bit of delay.  Flight was about half hour delayed leaving Dallas.  Pilots made up most of the time and we landed around 15 minutes late.

There was more snow than I thought there would be on the tarmacs and around.  You can tell it has been windy because the snow has blown in every crack and cranny of the jet way.

Got home and the snow drifts in the backyard are getting really big.  The path from garage to house was geting drift-filled.  The snow was so light that when I tossed it, it just blew everywhere.  But it wasn't super cold...at least not by Minnesota standards...it was above zero.

Next week is to be truly last week in Dallas on my project of 2+ years!  It will be a full Monday to Friday week as the client wants to get all they can out of me.

Back in Dallas

When I left my house this morning it was 10 degrees below zero!  The MSP parking garage is above ground and open-sided.  It is always kind of windy so this morning it was a bitter walk to the elevator lobby.

The line was long at security but I don't think it was from any tightening or "elevated" checking.  It was just Monday and there was only one ID checker.

Dallas is only in the mid-30's for highs so not all that warm though several degrees warmer than Minnespolis is going to be this week.

Uno and PBS' Nature

Uno loves to watch the Nature program on PBS.

Winter Home Improvement Project (dining room)

Thought I needed something to keep me busy and pull me out of my winter funk. Decided it was time to paint the interior....way over due. I haven't painted since probably 1992.

Starting with the dining room because it seemed it would be the easiest. There is long crack in the middle of the wall shared with the kitchen...thanks to my brother, Spade, for whamming on the kitchen side when we worked on my kitchen in 2001.  There are a few spots where the paint has cracked and needs to be scraped to a solid spot and then spackled. There are also a few small spots where the plaster has deteriorated and needs deeper patching with plaster.

That done and spots primed and/or first coat of new color.

The new color is from Sherwin-Williams historic collection. It is called Classic Gold. It has a warm butter look or even old-style harvest gold. It looks fantastic with the dark wood trim.

The original color was a rose tint that had dramatically faded. The first picture doesn't look like the color at all.

I haven't decided if I'll put the same pictures up or something different.