I spent Thursday and Friday in Rhode Island. My company has three locations; the main headquarters in New Jersey, a plant in Rhode Island and a plant in Georgia. The location in Rhode Island has a job tracking software package that they converted over from the DOS(!) version to the Windows version this past January 2000. The conversion was ugly to say the least - poorly planned by the people in Rhode Island, poorly supported by the software company. I joined the copmany in June of 2000 and inherited the mess. The main accomplishment this week was appending data from the old DOS database to the Windows database that the consultant from the software company couldn't import in the original conversion. I also wrote a few custom reports for various departments.
I rent a car in New Jersey to drive up and back to Rhode Island because my truck is leased and would add mucho miles for me to pay a penalty for at the end of the lease. Whenever I rent the car, the agent asks me if I am leaving the state and if I am, what states I will be driving in. Then they type the state abbreviations into their computer. After I told the woman that I would be driving to from New Jersey thru New York and Connecticut to Rhode Island, she typed "NJ, NY, CT..." and then she stopped and looked at me with a blank stare. I said "RI". She said, "Oh yeah". I mean, I could understand having a problem with Mississippi or Louisiana, but Rhode Island? It IS two words after all.
I love to drive long distances. When my wife was in med school in Washington DC, I would drive down to see her every two to three weeks. It was about 220 miles and was just a nice time to be by myself and travel. My house to Rhode Island (or RI as I will refer to it from now on) is about 212 miles and I always look forward to the drive up and back. Tuesday, before I left, my boss asked, "Can I ride up with you?". Auuughh. Not only will I not be able to listen to Howard Stern or loud music, I will have to make 3 and 1/2 hours of conversation with a person I really don't know very well. But ya know, it actually was much, much better than I thought it would be. I actually learned a lot about him and found out he is actually pretty cool. I found myself having a good time with him. The one thing I missed, however, was the feeling of freedom of being alone. Since we had only one car, our schedules were linked together. He has the habit of immersing himself in his work and letting time slip away from him (This is a common trait I have found in all my bosses. I guess that's what makes them bosses - enjoying their work so much, that they don't look to the clock to see when their recreation time starts. Their work IS their recreation). So when I was ready to leave at 4:30 after the RI staff was leaving, we didn't actually leave until 6:15. When we agreed Friday morning to leave at 2:30 or 3 PM to beat the traffic through CT and New York City, I actually waited around until 4:10 to start back on the drive. Oh well, I still made it back by 8:00 PM.
My wife's birthday is Tuesday, February 6th. You can send her birthday greetings at cellis@lsplace.com.
