What happens in Providence stays in Providence ... We went to some place where I believe I paid $10 for one beer.

...
  ¶ 5:49 AM 2 comments

  Week 4 Went bowling w/ the group, then had some drinks. Two guinness, two shots, more beers, then Bombs over Baghdad (red bull + hennessy). Now I rarely drink (you guys can vouch for me) so getting buzzed was interesting. This other guy had about two beers and was drunk immediately. Lots of people making asses out of themselves, but it's all good fun.

Then later we went back to play poker and I think I was doing pretty well but who can remember really. We were all playing pretty loose, usually Matt the poker shark cleans up but I won a bunch of pots. Maybe due to the fact that everyone was faded.

Training is getting better, we are going to break into groups now which will be fun. The consulting skills stuff was interesting as well, very Apprentice-like. We had 3 hours to figure out a storage solution for an airline company and present it to the class. Unfortunately our plan was BUNK but we winged it.

Heading into Boston tonite ...  ¶ 7:37 AM 0 comments

  Snow... We had a blizzard today, it's expected to continue until tomorrow. I thought it was awesome at first ... then it just kept snowing and snowing and snowing.

Such is the East Coast life...  ¶ 6:42 PM 1 comments

  friday ... mmm what to report.

Went to boston to play at a poker game. Lost $30 but it was a cool experience. These guys are really really good. Hard as hell to read, they all do pretty well at the casinos.

Then the following day, played a little friendly game among coworkers. Won the 2nd game on two consecutive all-ins. I can do the shuffle chip trick decently now.

Been eating sushi almost all week. They know our faces now. Love that Maguro and Sake sashimi.

Doing laundry now ...
  ¶ 9:34 PM 0 comments

  Boston PUB Went to the Wrentham outlets which are conveniently located one exit away. They have tons of stores there, all premium labels as well. Even a Burton store! (but discounts were on pare with Tri-City) Also, no sales tax. I bought a lot of clothes which I don't have room for.

At night we jumped into the rental cars and headed into Boston. We got split up for a while, and were stuck in this tiny little bar filled with way too many people. Finally met up at BoSTON ROCKS bar/club. Lots of fun, great music as well. One guy ordered an Irish Car Bomb for all of us. YES I downed it. As well as several other concoctions (i.e. John's cranberry vodka, although they didn't have Belvadere). I wasn't drunk but had a hard time keeping my balance at times. Don't really drink much, but when in rome ... BTW if you are into white women... Boston has a ton of great looking ones.

Good luck to Ambar for Monday's interview .... do it!  ¶ 5:07 AM 0 comments

  End of week one Went out to a place called LEGAL SEAFOOD. Ate hella shit, like $50 bucks worth. Lobster, mussels, mashed potatoes, oysters, CLAM CHOWDAAAAA.

So good. Oh yeah, got BUZZED today. Legal Sangria, 2x Guinness, one Long Island Ice Tea. Yes I am weak. One person got a bit too much to drink and it was fun to observe. Me and my friends talked about funny things, like rating the girls in the class, to a lot more.

And tomorrow we are going to Boston to get wasted. Such is the life.   ¶ 10:10 PM 0 comments

  more stuff... today's class was better. I was able to participate more because they actually talked about technical stuff, not "how to be a model employee" stuff. Made more friends, we are connected by AIM now, so inseparable.

Found out my group would be specializing in ECC or Enterprise Control Center (we special). Went out to eat dinner w/ a bunch of peeps. Had some drinks (what else is new). Been using my CC a ton but a lot of the stuff is reimbursable. Plus I get some cash back too from my CC.

Tomorrow going to hit up a local poker game (Rounders biatch!).   ¶ 6:39 PM 0 comments

  Boston day 2 SNOWSTORM!!!!

Tomorrow's commute will be a bitch.

Today was pretty tiring... it's hard to sit that long in a classroom. Death by powerpoint indeed. At least I got my FOB and VPN to work.

I went to the market and bought $55 bucks worth of groceries. Gotta take advantage of the per dium. California pizza kitchen, salad, drinks, chicken (yeah i plan to attempt to cook), sara lee cheesecake, laundry detergent (reimbursable), chips, mint milanos.

not healthy. Gotta hit the gym tomorrow.  ¶ 8:56 PM 0 comments

  Boston Day ONE Ok it is REALLY late and I have to go to bed soon. But I had to post some stuff.

- Changed the title of my blog to reflect current situation. I'm not actually in Boston but it sounds better than 'Lost in Franklin, MA'. Besides we'll hit up Boston on Friday nights.

- My hotel room is awesome. Basically I have a one bedroom apt. Two TVs, kitchenette, wireless internet access, cable ... I'm set. Only problem is that most ppl are on the 2nd and 3rd floors while I'm on the first. But they will just call me up if anything is going down.

- although the hotel has really crappy exercise and pool facilities, apparently we will soon be able to sign up for the exercise facilities at the local EMC sites. A lot of us want to be able to work out soon.

- The ppl here are really chill. And they like to drink. A LOT. Everyone drinks. So I have to up my game. We are already planning trips into Boston to get drunk (will take the train to Boston then rent a limo service to drive us back).

- They are trying to freak us by saying the training will be a huge bitch. We have exams and stuff to pass. I'm going to have to study like a mother. They threw a lot of information at us and I definitely do not want to fall behind.

- The weather isn't bad SO FAR. But it will get worse. I need to get a black jacket since everyone has one and my is taupe colored.

- Met this cool guy Matt from Boston who knows how to get a Treo 650 for $49.99 after EMC discounts and reimbursements. I'm definitely getting that now. We are setting up an AIM list so my contacts will basically double. Plus we get everyone's contact info and whatnot. My group is looking good, the Boston guy, one guy from Phoenix, two asian girls (both apparently taken, both cute...), and more.

- The 'Intro to EMC' and 'Intro to EMC products' were very yawn-inducing. One of my friends actually fell asleep and only woke up when the presenter was literally standing right next to him (made the mistake of sitting in the very front).

- People paid the most attention to the benefits and reimbursement overview. We can reimburse things such as toll fees, dry-cleaning, mileage from home to airport, etc. We even have to tip the housekeeper of our hotel rooms $20 a week (which EMC will reimburse).

- finally got issued an interesting device called a "FOB key." Yeah, F-O-B, FOB. It's used to gain access to VPN and other intranet services. Basically it's a security device that cycles through a six-digit number every 5 minutes.

- Alcohol. Although we get $30 per dium for dinners (breakfast and lunch are covered), it was so funny when the operations manager specifically specified "NO LIQUID DINNERS." i.e. if you order 5 drinks for dinner they will flag the expense. Also if you buy stuff from the supermarket, ALCOHOL IS NOT COVERED. A bit of a bummer for most people. I have to save all receipts and figure out how to write up expense reports.

- Again with the meal allowance. Everyone had a ton of questions regarding the per dium and how to spend the $150 per week. The operations manager also specified "Do NOT stiff your waitress if your bill is $29.99." Everyone had a good laugh at that.

- After the first day, they took us to an Irish Pub where they basically encouraged us to drink (gave us vouches for 3 drinks). I had a Heineken and a Guinness, then stopped cuz I was going to have to drive. After everyone had been drinking, we were all buzzed and said a lot of funny stuff. Alochol really does make getting to know people easier. I know that my volume was definitely amped up. After that we went to the supermarket, THEN to another liquor store to buy MORE alcohol. My
friends actually called me up to their room to drink so more. I poured too much rum and now I should really be getting to bed.

To be continued ...  ¶ 9:31 PM 0 comments

  day THREE ... Since I didn't have an Clariion install/config to observe, Thursday "appeared" to be a free day. My manager was supposed to be header to Irvine and no further instructions were given to me. I gave him a call but did not hear back by Wednesday night. By then plans were already in motion.

While we were picking up Chinese take-out, I asked my cousin what she wanted to do tomorrow. Somehow I ended up saying something like "think about something you really want to do so you don't have any regrets when you leave." This led to her thinking really hard then saying "TAHOE." Keep in mind that this is 8-9 pm on Wednesday. While it totally caught me by surprise, after talking it over and thinking about the logistics, I realized I had to go. It was most likely my last chance to go this year, plus I would get a chance to test out the boots that I had bought previously. Not to mention that my cousin was dying to go, AND it would be on a weekday meaning that less people would be on the mountain.

After dinner I checked a few web sites and decided on the Sierra@Tahoe resort. It was the closest one to SF, plus I'd get a chance to check out a non-Boreal Tahoe resort. Another issue was whether or not to tell my mom that we were going :) I decided not to, mostly because John had fractured his clavicle while boarding. Ironically it was at Sierra too IIRC. I had mentioned something about going to Monterey Bay Aquarium the previous day, so our disappearance would not have been too shocking. The spontanity of the situation required extreme stealth to be able to leave undetected. I quickly packed everything that was necessary including extra winter gear for Amy. The plan was the wake up at 5am and head off, but I decided to set the alarm for 4:30, figuring that we might need the extra half hour. I also had to screw in my bindings since I'd removed them and listed them on Ebay, figuring that I wouldn't hav e another chance to use them this year. They actually sold for about $45 more than I'd paid for. At 1:00am I headed to bed, thinking that this was a crazy, spontaneous idea and hoping that everything would go according to plan.

My cousin would later say that I seemed to be freaked out about going. I did have legitimate concerns though. First and formost was that I wasn't too clear on my job duties for that day. My worst fear would be that I'd get a call from my manager and he'd say "I have something for you do to, go to the Mountain View office." 2nd was safety issue. I didn't want to drive up in a pouring rainstorm which would increase the possibility of an accident. Plus the John thing. If one of us got injured, my mom would definitely yell at me (getting injured sucks too). After thinking about these caveats for a bit, I decided that I HAD to go. This kind of opportunity does not present itself too often (Getting paid on a weekday to go boarding).

I woke up at 4:27am and promptly woke up my cousin. To my amazement she woke up quickly and got ready in record time. She really wanted to ski :) The biggest problem was opening the front door quietly since the rain and cold had expanded the wood. Eventually I got it open and got everything into the car. We were both pretty giddy about sneaking out. The weather was not an issue driving up. The only trouble spots for me was hitting a patch of snow and skidding. I freaked out a bit since I wasn't used to driving on snow. My cousin was more like "Pssshhh. I drive on 2 inches of snow everyday in ND." We talked a lot during the drive which is nice because there was a real chance of me falling asleep. We reached Sierra at around 8:50 which was ideal since the lodge opened at 9. It was lightly snowing and the conditions looked perfect.

Getting ready for boarding took more time than I had liked but eventually we hit the slopes. Funny thing was we both lost track of each other immediately since she headed down right away while I was still strapping in my right foot. Eventually found her again. Sierra has some great runs, way better than Boreal. There were few people on the mountain as well, which was nice. Initially I was constantly adjusting my boots and bindings, trying to get the most comfortable fit I could. I was able to carve a lot better this time out, having more faith in my boots. Observing other boarders gave me insight on some of the nuances of carving. So my carving improved but I still wasn't able to take the next step and hit the jumps. I bailed on two attempts just to go over a really steep bump. So I'll wait till I get peer-pressured into attempting more jumps (getting a helmet would be nice).

Lunch was really bland and forgettable. Then four more hours of boarding. This is one of the typical runs. My cousin would wait for me to get strapped in. Then I would zip past her on the steep parts and take a break to wait for her to catch up. Then she'd need to take a break. Then the cycle would start again. Sometimes she'd pass me while I'd be taking a break looking for her. I think snowboarding is the most fun when you have someone to keep up with, carving into the midst of the wake they leave behind. So everyone get really good!
  ¶ 6:29 AM 0 comments

  Day two ... Yesterday night shopped at Gilroy outlets. I bought some pants, but I will do more shopping in Boston (no sales tax!). People in Boston apparently have a lot of fashion sense so I will have to attempt to keep up :p My cousin bought a ton of clothes which she promptly wore right away.

Ate at Olive Garden. Waitress was nice and friendly. Saw Ocean's 12 w/ my brother. Fell asleep halfway through. Disappointed the heist wasn't more elaborate. Amy didn't like it too much. Meet the Fockers was better.

I have a bunch of stuff to get done before I leave. My credit card bill is going through the roof :(  ¶ 10:28 AM 0 comments

  First day of work .... Haven't had much time to post, been busy showing my cousin Amy around.

Day ONE: It didn't help that the night before I was in SF w/ Ambar's friends and had a few drinks. The first shocker was that I had to report to the Pleasanton office. I had been expecting to report to the EMC/Legato building in Mountain View. This would add another half-hour to my commute. I left very early, just in case I wouldn't be able to easy locate the office. The drive up 680 was rather scenic. I had some time to kill and was semi-nervous about starting a new job. Lots to learn, new people to meet.

Funny thing was I meet my fellow co-worker just as he was walking into the elevator. His name is Karthik and we got along well immediately. Mostly cuz we were in awe of the nice benefits we were getting. $200 a month for cell phone plan, plus $100 reimbursement for a new cell. Probably standard for most big companies but cool for me. We also get all our gas money reimbursed as well.

Then we met with our manager Mike, who also interviewed the both of us. He turned us over to Andrew, who had gone through the training program before. Andrew explained a lot about what we'd be facing in Boston. I mostly paid attention to the important details... company issued laptop, each person assigned their own hotel room, expense reports, etc. Woot! Mike then took us to lunch and we talked (surprise) about the Warriors and local bay area sports teams. Seems that Karthik is a big-time Warriors fan. :p

Since our laptops had not arrived and would have to be shipped to Boston, the day was pretty much over at 1:30pm. Since there were no Clariion install setups to shadow, the rest of the week is pretty much free as well. I just have to go to Legato to get a badge, get briefed on one of the test machines, listen to the HR guy go over the benefits packages, and touch base with my manager on Friday. And I still get paid for this week, hehe.   ¶ 9:04 PM 0 comments