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It is hard being on the road over 200 nights a year...away from your family, isolated in many ways. It definitely isn't for everyone. This blogs represents the thoughts of just one such person. Read along and find out if the road is for you.
This is my new blogchalk:
United States, Georgia, Gainesville, Unity of Gainesville, English, John, Male, reading, RE Investing. :)
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Saturday, September 27, 2003
Filed under: Life’s Too Short
Julie and I have been fighting most of the week. What caused the fight? It really doesn’t matter today. Why, you ask?
Because while I am in Miami as part of a 9 day run here, Julie just called me and told me that one of our cat’s Artemus is dead. And to tell you the truth, I am devastated. Artemus was the first cat that I ever remotely liked. And I came to love him. And the fact that I am not at home when this happened is tearing me up.
Julie and I were on our way to making up anyhow, but this just makes me realize that things can happen in an instant. The only thing I am happy about is that Artemus is not out in the woods in pain.
But I have to tell you, that something inside of me died with him. This cat has always been a part of our family for the past 5 years. Yes, there is a new cat in the house. But that didn’t for a second mean that I loved Artemus any less.
So, today is a double gut punch. I am not there when an important part of our family died and I am also not there to help and to support. Hell, I need supported as well.
I gave a thought of flying back to Atlanta and then flying back to be here for the customer in the morning. But since it is presently almost 1 in the afternoon, that really isn’t realistic to be back by early morning.
Julie and I had traded phone calls all morning because Artemus didn’t come home last night. That had only happened a handful of times before, but the thought was that a neighbor had taken him in for the night as we did with a neighbor cat occasionally when we lived in an apartment. I assured her that he would be fine. I never thought for a moment of anything else.
When she called and was crying, “He’s dead”, I actually thought she was talking about her Dad who has had health challenges and is about to undergo by pass surgery. When she said it was Artemus, I just broke down and cried.
Screw it. I just called the customer and told him I needed to start late tomorrow. I am flying home.
posted by John Panico at 12:44 AM
Sunday, September 21, 2003
Terror at 25 MPH…
Today is Saturday and I am heading back to Atlanta from California. This has been a long week in so many ways that one blog just wouldn’t do it. Tomorrow doesn’t look a lot better as I will be heading out to Florida for a 10 day trip.
Suffice to say that professionally, it has been grueling week for the following reasons:
- Because of the set up work done for the customer by the Implementation Consultant for the customer on Monday/Tuesday, they are probably doomed for a less than successful go-live. Were they happy? Probably so. But I know what they need to get such a robust task completed and the first step was rocky at best.
- I got caught in a cross fire between Da Company and the California customer that I was at Wednesday through Friday. It ended peaceably enough, but it makes me wonder what I am doing for a living.
- I got a nasty gram from Lori because I was so tired a week back that I misbilled a customer for 8 hours (vs. 4) and one of the Big 4 (management suits) went nuts. You know that job offer of earlier in the week is sounding better and better.
And looking back, that was the better parts of the week. Travel was tenuous at best. Just a small recap would include:
- Our first attempt at landing on the flight from Atlanta to LAX on Tuesday evening resulted in an aborted landing due to a plane showing up on our runway when we were 50-100 feet off of the ground.
- In going to the Newport Beach HardRock on Thursday evening, my Dad’s wife, Sylvia gave me the wrong directions in coming out of the place which resulted in a 40 mile drive that wasn’t necessary considering how tired I was.
- While in a cross-fire conversation regarding the customer mentioned above with Lori on Friday morning, I went to pull into a parking lot by making a left turn and a bus pulled away from the curb at the same time. Yes, I do have hands free, but with on-coming traffic, it did get my heart beating a little quicker to say the least.
- But I save the best for last. I have been staying with my Dad all week. I make a few bucks from the hotel expense and I get to spend some time with him. Being that I don’t get to the Left Coast as often as I would like, it is a good thing.
I offered to take him and his wife to dinner on Friday (actually, I offered every night). My Dad doesn’t get around that well and either uses a walker or an electric scooter to get places. He had a bit of a tough time getting into the van to head out to dinner. He had just as much trouble getting back into the van after dinner, but I digress. We were traveling home in modest traffic and were coming up on a stop light, when my Dad yelled out that he had lost all feeling in his right foot and couldn’t tell if his foot was on the foot or the brake. Cars were stopped in front of us as he swerved out of the way of the first one. I thought we were going to rear-end the car that was stopped in the left turn lane when he jumped the center divide median and headed into the oncoming traffic lane. God was looking out for us because there wasn’t any traffic at that particular moment. He went into a commercial parking lot and I told him to put the car into neutral and we finally brought the van to a stop. After gaining everyone’s composure and manipulating my Dad into the passenger’s seat, I drove home the rest of the way without incident. Remarkably, the van wasn’t damaged at all. My Dad’s and Sylvia’s nerves were definitely worse for the wear and I have sternly instructed him to get controls on the vehicle (which I will pay for) at the beginning of the week.
- And finally, I just barely caught my flight back home. So all in all, this week has had more than its’ share of stress attached to it.
There have been a few highlights, but those will be taken up at another time.
Blog on!
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