Past Weekend's Haps

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The Chargers couldn’t lose because they had a bye week, JR and Veronica had their wedding shower, Adelle convinced me to head out to Disneyland before our pass privileges were set to expire, I got a chance to hang out with Dr. Nourani in Downtown San Diego, and I did a little work in finishing up my migration to my new MacBook Pro.

Disneyland was definitely a great highlight as the lines were short allowing us to ride what we wanted (California Adventures’ Soaring is still the best), the apple pie caramel apple was a delight and the biggest plus was seeing one of my college roommates as a Jedi Knight Instructing young Padawans on stage at a Disneyland show!  Mr. Stephan Oyoung, without a doubt has the best job.  Working 4 days a week teaching kids how to rid the world of the dark side with light saber techniques, what more could you ask in a post graduate occupation?!  Two thumbs up and kudos to you Jedi Oyoung.

On the day of voting, I got to witness a new dawn in Downtown with yet another college buddy, Dr. Nourani and was readily entertained with his residency stories.  I mention a new dawn only because it was about the time when Barack was making his acceptance speech and McCain ending his bid. Bobby's stories make me wonder where I would have been at if I did do a post-bac program in lieu of flight school.   We ate at Marsala (an Indian restaurant of course) which was tremendous but a bit overpriced then made our way to Altitude Sky Bar where we got to see the Madonna Concert without the Madonna.  Good times all around, but once again I find myself commuting back to work.  It’s been a while since I’ve been at the crashpad.  I can’t wait to get the band back together.  

On the Way to Kos-tah Ree-ka

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I'm on DL353 from ATL-LIR (Liberia, Costa Rica) travelling with Matty P in row 4! What an awesome way to start out the trip on first class with a short rib meal and New York cheesecake. We planned out a 3 day / 2 night trip on the whim and are basically just winging it. Should be a blast though as some of the plans are coming together slowly but surely. A captain recommended me to use a company called Aviapas which is owned by an American women and her Costa Rican husband so we thought we would give it a try. So far so good in that she found us a $45/ night hotel at Playa de Hermosa and their trips seem definitely doable budget wise. AT&T charges $2.29 per minute without the international rate plan ($5.99 month) which would lower the cost to $1.99 / min. Basically, you would have to break 20 minutes of talk time just to make it worth while. Text msging is defintely the way to go at 0.50 each way or better yet, I could find a wi-fi signal and try out fring! Data roaming is $0.0195 per KB which the operator told me would be quote a bit if I pulled up a YouTube video. She advised that one should turn off data roaming, push services, fetch services, 3G and any other extra curricular dealios on the iPhone in order to avoid any crazy charges. Oh yeah, I forgot to mention that you could "purchase" 20MB for $24.99 which I think is a ridiculous ripoff. I wish that they just had a plan skmiliar to the Blackberry International pacakge. Oh well, I guess try still have a lot to learn...hopefully they will listen.

Up in the Air Again

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I'm finding myself having to ride Mainline Delta quite a bit more these days as my AirTran options have diminished from 4 flights a day to San Diego from Atlanta to only one or two and even an occasional none.  It's a little frightening on how it will impact my commute as the Delta flights are pretty much always impacted and oversold, but I guess I'll have to make due.  My schedule for October is going to be as financially successful due to the lack of available trips to pick up and the fact that I had to cut one of my trips in half to an obligation in Fulton County.  If you forgot already, I'm set for a court appearance in relation to my speeding ticket that I got a couple of weeks back while driving to the airport. 

This is only my 3rd time using Qumana, a free blog editor for Mac OSX and I have to admit that I sometimes find the interface much more accommodating than the Windows Live Writer.  The reason for the transition back to using my Powerbook Ti is because I miss it.  It's the truth but the 667 MHz is sometimes just frustrating.  The battery life is long lasting and the size is great but the 30Gb hard drive also is a handicap.  I wish that I just had two good computers to use and stick with instead of being all over the place.  I have a broken HP dv1000 laptop at home that needs to be diagnosed (might need a new hard drive), a dual Pentium 3 1GHz tower that I've had for years which should still run, but I have no clue why it's not booting up and a box of parts sitting in Atlanta waiting to be put together. 

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The October Schedule

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I finally converted to using Google Calendar and Nuevasync with sully, the name of mi iPhone blaco, and with that, my schedule will be posted and updated on a regular basis (<-- whatever regular means).  Nuevasync offers a free solution in competition with Apple's MobileMe (failure) but since it is in its infancy, certain features such as multiple calendars and colors still have yet to be implemented.  It's an awesome application and setup was a breeze.  Check out the link to the right or click here for my calendar.  If you have an Apple iPhone or iPod Touch, I would highly recommend checking out one of the best "how-to's" at theiLife.com written by Kevin Hobin.  If you follow all his set directions, I don't see how you could go wrong.  Be forewarned though that all your current contacts and calendars will be erased and replaced with the information on their servers.  Backup first and be sure to read the full instructions on how to do it without the sacrifice of your data. I'm not sure if I mentioned that I finally got my first speeding ticket in the Atlanta area, but because of my recklessness, I have to appear in court on October 9 somewhere in Fulton County.  I was, of course, going with the flow of traffic and was in full uniform on my way to work.  What makes things a little more difficult is the fact that I have to work on the day of my set appearance. 

Apparently, the state of Georgia or Fulton County what have you, doesn't mail you anything in terms of instructions or any corresspondance in accordance to the ticket/fine.  It is up to you to look up your fine, get a cashier's check and mail it in or visit the court house in person.  That's pretty backwards really and I can see how a lot of citizens could simply become tardy in that manner.  From my friend's experiences in California, you at least get a formal letter / citation telling you and giving you much clearer instructions.  It's just all a mess down here.

The 100 Credit Month!

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I'm commuting on Delta Flight 1038 from SAN to ATL trying to get to my last two day trip of the month.  September concludes with my schedule being completed @ 89% on-time arrivals and departures and the awesome fact that I was able to break the 100 hour credit mark!  The Captain was an awesome character to fly with as we always went out and enjoyed the town.  We always had some lunch or dinner with great conversation and even visited some random places like the mall in downtown Stamford, Connecticut or Orange Country Choppers in Newburgh, New York.  It was one of the best months that I have had here at ASA.

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The paycheck on the 15th of October is something that I'm really looking forward to!  I've been working hard with the commute and all so hopefully it will it will pay off in one way or the other! :)  You have to realize that I usually get credited about 70-80 hours a month and with the extra ~20 hours, it's going to boost my pay about a third of my usual.  I'm young right so I should be trying to do this each month, but it just really depends if you could hack it.  Exhaustion is something that I hate feeling, but when you fly with a good crew and have good trips, it only adds to the pleasure. 

Being back home in San Diego more and more helps out in the "being grounded" feeling department but with the split of our crashpad in February, finding another place in Atlanta is up in the air.  I'll have more on the living situation later but being with friends during the weekend in San Diego helps in recuperating the lost time. 

With the impending launch of a new Macbook Pro, rumored to be announced on the 14th, my paycheck is going to be accounted for.  I've been waiting for almost 7 years now and am in bad shape with my Titanium Powerbook 667.  (I've been mainly using my IBM T43p on trips though so it hasn't been that bad)

Preposterous-ness of My Flight from ATL-MCN

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So check this out.  My flight tonight was scheduled from Atlanta to Macon, Georgia: Flight ASQ4222 operating for Delta Connection.  It's a quick 18 minute flight from takeoff to touchdown for a total of 75 miles to the southeast of Atlanta.  Of course, we end up blocking about 40 minutes for total flight.  That time includes the taxi time around Atlanta and Macon thus concluding that the taxi time is longer than the flight by about 2 minutes.  That's normal for some of our quick hops, but now get this. MCN sleepinn_mcn

The van ride from the Middle Georgia Regional / Macon Airport is approximately 24.2 miles back to the north west for a total of 30 minutes in van ride!  Granted it was a nice Honda Odyseey and not a Ford Van that absorbs no shock or bump whatsoever, so it really wasn't that bad but tell me that's just not right!

So, now I have about 8 hours until I have to wake up (aorund 6:15 and be downstairs by 7:15 ready to go in the hotel lobby for a 30 minute van ride back to Macon Airport, followed by 5 legs concluding at 1600 then take a flight back to San Diego.  It's going to be a doozy!

Over Exertion

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Sometimes I do go overboard and my mind and body cannot keep up with one other causing me to become out of sync.  To others, I'm just lifeless or much slower than normal but inside my head, my mind spins rapidly creating scenarios and ideas causing me to just take in life (present reality) without response.  Not the usual me but I have to learn how to deal with it.  Instead of giving up and continuing the funk, I need to just wake up the next day and try to get back up on the high horse.  Drowning out the my own thoughts is the best way that I can figure out how the heck I get back to myself. 

Today was a rather slow day, kind of nice, but there is a whole bunch of things that I need to take care of.  Too much clutter we have made in this life. 

Decompressing

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After another one and half weeks of shifting around life, I find myself pulling an all nighter in Springfield, Missouri playing around trying to turn on my stupid iPhone 3G.  Because of the hassle, I wake up.  To no avail, I'm forced to schedule an appointment at the Genius Bar so that they could issue me a new one and or diagnose my problems.  It's more than just a hassle but not having the utility of a phone is quite a handicap.  Of course while waiting forever for the boot cycle, I reorganize, got into cleaning and putting things in order and felt a lot better.  When I say a lot, I mean exponentially better!

I'm finally able beginning to find the ground that I need in order to function on the high that I want to stay on and as long as I keep that in the back of my head, I could be much more useful and quite the go getter.  I hate having the feeling of restless sleep, endless seconds upon seconds and the boringness that sometimes over shadows and clouds my thoughts.  The fact that grays surround my thoughts shouldn't hamper my potential, but the blessings that envelop me should provide the fuel alone to keep on charging 110%.  Here's to the beginning of September. 

On and Off Again...

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It really sucks to be "on and off" in terms of mindset.  It's like one day I'm on automatic and the next requires so much mental capacity and thought process that I just sit and vegetate.  I haven't opened up my computer in over a week and just have been absent when around friends or colleagues.  I'm sure that this week will pose to be a lot better being that I'm back in action.  I guess just getting into the rhythm of things is something that I have to stay atoned to.  Here we go!!!

The Good Feeling

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Over the last few weeks, things have just been going a little too well.  It's definitely been a little bit since a major stretch of bliss, but I'm able to recognize that things are good again.  At least for the most part, the flying has been tremendous and the commuting hasn't really been all that bad.  I've been updating trelijah quite often as it's really easy to upload / email pictures to the site and the format is actually what I have been looking for in terms of quality.  The photos are almost full resolution!

I'm once again on the commute back to San Diego on AirTran enjoying the exit row eagerly awaiting the dry weather.  I'm about to head out tonight with one of my friends Joe who is back in town for a week vacation prior to starting up his last year at dental school in Boston.  Should make out for good times. 

I watched the Olympic Women's Beach Volleyball finals match last night which was amazing!  It's crazy to see that the two-some has won a total of over 100 matches in a row!  I haven't been on top of the olympics really this year as I've been preoccupied with some personal stuff including flying my butt off an going right to bed. 

Knowing and Missing Out

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Life is precious.  The people around you that love you, that do the small things that sometimes you may overlook, really add that extra little spice.  We may not know it (as we probably don't), but without those little additives, our souffle that our life is would just soften up and sink. 

Over the last couple of days, I've spent a lot of time hanging out with one of my buddies who just had his mother pass away.  With enough lamenting and reminiscing, one can't help but think about an imminent possibility.  It's truly saddening that it takes something of this magnitude to realize life's lessons and sort out one's priorities but I guess, it's what makes us humans. 

The language of our love varies from one individual to another, but all we can do is take the time to patiently learn, understand and listen.  I have been blessed with a mother that has been selfless throughout her trials in the recent years and I know deep in my heart, she lives on for us.  A mother's love is stronger than anything known to man and I can attest to that. 

I've been flying back and forth quite a bit and of course, after all this, it's more than worth it.  Now, only if I could just start to organize the family's move and get going with sorting and throwing things away.  It'll be a lot of work, but I'm sure by Halloween it'll be what I've been imagining since the beginning of this whole summer mess. 

 

I love you mom. 

To Commute or Not...Most Likely Will

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In the next few months, I will be slowly transitioning to being more of a commuter and force myself to always fly home no matter what.  In other words, even if I have two days off, I will be flying back home to San Diego.  You see, the lease on our awesome Loxford Lounge Crashpad is due this up and coming February which leaves just under 7 months to slowly move.  Being that I haven't been around lately, doesn't really leave me that much time to pack up and go.  As long as I make it a habit to pack at least one box a week or month, I'll be all moved out by year's end making my reliance on the crashpad wither down to zilch. 

It is hard though now that I have been doing it a lot lately, but it really just takes will power.  I'm now able to concentrate on coming home since the fact my parents moved back to San Diego which cuts the drive home by almost 75% and is a lot more convenient all together. 

I was able to catch a flight on Delta Mainline this evening which is actually a rarity since I have been using the competition due to their availability.  Delta has always been full to and from Atlanta so my dependency has risen on Airtran thus enabling my frequent trips back home. 

The necessity for a crashpad in Atlanta would be only for the days that I am stuck in ATL due to weather or the times when I have training, but I guess that doesn't amount to more than what I would ben spending a year of keeping a place within the airport limits. 

I'm going to do it!  I really am and I feel more confident than ever because of my desire to surf a lot more and just swim and get more physically fit.  I have till end of the year to really achieve what I have been aiming for and that is normalcy.