Monday, May 30, 2011 - 10:00 am

Happy Memorial Day 2011 to everyone out there. Take some time out today to thank the military members of your family, both active and retired, and remember those who are no longer with us. It's because of their sacrifice that we are here today.

It's been about 8 days since my last update and I felt compelled to share what's been going on the past week. On the job front, my start date is not today (naturally, because I'm writing to you during what would be work hours.) My start date will most likely be Monday, June 6, 2011 with an outside shot of Monday, June 13, 2011. I should know for sure this week. Their is another class for a Level 2 Technician starting on June 20, and we are before them, so June 13 is the latest it could go, since they don't want to start us on the same day. The reason for the delay is two-fold. (1) They are trying to get this other guy's security clearance to go through and get the class organized. (2) Dell is super-slow, apparently. The job is guaranteed and they will not change their minds, but there is just a delay. I'll admit, it is an agonizing delay. The reason they did not start today is because of the Holiday. My liason from California sent them an e-mail Friday morning requesting a start date, trying to force their hand a bit, because my colleague has to move from Tulsa to start work in Oklahoma City.

10-years ago today on Wednesday, May 30, 2001, I was moving to my first college dormitory in Alva, Oklahoma - Fryer Hall - on the campus of Northwestern Oklahoma State University. I started my first class, General Chemistry 1105 with Dr. Steve Pilcher, that next Monday, June 4, 2001. I was just 8 1/2 days removed from my high school graduation when I moved to college (the evening of Monday, May 21, 2001).

That's all the news for this morning. This will be my last post for the month of May 2011.

Sunday, May 22, 2011 - 20:00

Good Sunday Evening to All,

Sorry it has been a while since I last posted, I've been busy with this thing called life.

Anyway, this is my last week before I start work on Monday, May 30, 2011!! I am going to try my best this week to get my sleep schedule ready to start work. This means I am going to try to be up by 5:00 every day this week. Since I am going to leave home at approximately 6:45 each morning, I need time to get up, get a good shower, read my Bible, and watch the news, so I'm going to set my alarm for 5:00, which still may not be enough time. I may need to push it to 4:45 or so. I'll just have to play with that this week and tweak it as necessary. Thankfully, I don't think I'll have to be at this 8-5 schedule for too long as in about 2-3 weeks, I could be moving to a 9-6 or 10-7 schedule. I'll just have to wait and see. So, in light of a 5:00 alarm in the morning, I'm going to have to go to bed immediately after the 10:00 News tonight. That still would only give me 6 1/2 hours, so that may have to be moved to 9:30 possibly. That wouldn't be too unsual, as my average bed time lately has been 9:45.

That's it for this update, I'll post again in a couple days or so.

Tuesday, May 17, 2011 - 09:00

Good Tuesday Morning,

I tested out the drive to work because I wanted to experience the traffic I would be facing. It looks like it will take me right around 30 minutes to get there, and if I want to be there 40 minutes early at 7:20, I'll want to be out of the house at 6:50. If I need gas, I'll probably leave around 6:43, to give myself 7 minutes. It's 11.8 miles one way to work or 23.6 miles round trip. I think the first morning, though, I'll probably try to be there by 7:10, so I'll probably leave around 6:40. I'll try to fill up Sunday night after church.

I'm really thinking things will start turning around for me. I'm hoping and praying I have found a career. I've heard many great things about working for Dell from all sorts of different people.

Monday, May 16, 2011 - 11:00

Good Monday Morning everyone, I was able to sleep in a little bit this morning. That's good because I spent 3 hours Sunday night/Monday morning crunching the numbers on my projected budget for the rest of the year.

I was going to test out the drive to work this morning, but I'll test that out tomorrow morning since I slept in today. Today, I have several things I need to do. I need to finish my laundry, clean my house, start studying up for my job and brushing up on things I may have forgotten since I graduated college 4 years ago. Tomorrow, I need to start going through my clothes and see which ones fit and what I need to buy. The rest of the week will be spent brushing up and keeping the house straightened up.

Tomorrow, again, I will test out the drive to work and Wednesday, I will probably test out a different route, and there's yet a third route I will test out on Thursday. I will pick the best route by next Monday and start figuring out what time I need to leave each morning for work.

Sunday, May 15, 2011 - 20:00

Good Sunday Evening to All. It's been a great, great weekend. Saturday morning my family and I started preparing for a June garage sale and then Mom, Dad, and I had a nice steak dinner at Logan's Roadhouse. The dust from the garage sale preparation stirred up severe allergies and sent me to bed pretty much from 2:30 pm Saturday - 8:15 am Sunday. I missed church this morning because of severe allergies and a pounding headache, but both of them eased up this afternoon and I was able to enjoy a thrilling Game 7 105-90 victory by the Oklahoma City Thunder to advance to the NBA Western Conference Finals against the Dallas Mavericks who are a week removed from sweeping the defending world champion Los Angeles Lakers. I felt well enough to be able to go to church this evening and I'm glad I did. I'm always glad when I can go to the house of the LORD and get filled up spiritually. It makes my week go so much better. Now, I'm just sitting and relaxing watching the Boston Red Sox vs. New York Yankees on Sunday Night Baseball.

My plans for this week are to save a lot on gasoline and drive as little as possible. Monday, though, I do plan to test drive my route to work that I will be taking two weeks from now on Monday, May 30, 2011. My goal is to figure out what time I will need to leave the house so I can get to work by 7:20 in preparation for an 8:00 shift start. My guess is I will need to leave by 6:40, but I'll find that out in the morning. After testing the drive to work, I will run by Walmart and stock up on a few groceries so I don't have to eat out this week. Then I don't have anything else to do Monday until a church men's meeting in the evening.

The remainder of the week will be largely spent trying to do things around the house to get ready to go to work.

Update Thread Revived

Let's try this for the update thread...