How geeks do training
As I mentioned in my last post, I am being sent to Minnesota by the company I work for. Now, I would like to put some things in perspective here. My older brother works for a company that, when they send him someplace, that sent him to places like Brazil and Scotland. My father needed training on how to operate and repair a machine his company was buying so they sent him to the manufacturer's plant in Italy. Me? I get sent to Minnesota. I'm beginning to feel a bit like the family underachiever here. I mean, it even sounds bad when I say it.
ME: My company is sending me on a business trip.
MY BROTHER: Cool! Mine sent me to Scotland recently to set up a crash recovery system for their entire network and do a live test. Where are you going?
ME: Um. Minneapolis.
MY BROTHER: Ah, well, that's some place you've never been before . . . I suppose. So what are you doing there?
ME: I'm, uh, being trained on how to be a short term disability case manger.
MY BROTHER: Wait . . . isn't that the job you've been doing for the past nine months?
ME: Yes.
MY BROTHER: Well, I hear they have a mall there you might want to see.
I have yet to find a way to tell this story and make it sound cool. Even the 17 year old bag boys at the local grocery store are unimpressed and one of them thinks the best move ever made was Half Past Dead. Ja Rule and Steven Seagal's acting talents are a more interesting topic than me being sent to Minnesota to train on the job I am already doing. Okay, so maybe that is a bad example. Most people could go on at length about that topic and use colorful adjectives like "bleeding eyes" and "anal-cranium inversion" but talking about the merits seems a bit more difficult. Not with this crowd.
To add insult to, well, insult my company booked me on a flight leaving at 6 AM because they got a good deal on it. Keep in mind that modern security measures for flights require you to check in an hour before take off. So 5 AM. Except I don't live at the airport. 4:30 AM? You say. Yes, that's when I have to leave my house. Roughly. No, since my training starts soon after I land I am actually going to have to hustle directly there from the freaking airport to make it in time - actually, allow me to pause for a moment.
My company would not rent a car. Why? Because the airport has a shuttle to the hotel. The hotel is not where I am receiving training. I guess they figured I'd walk a lot. Yeah right. I rented a car myself. This is not the first time I have ended up stranded at a hotel. Sorry resumes below.
-and go directly to the place that they never even gave me the address for (but Google Maps did, hah!) just to make it in time for training, then that means I don't even have time to stop at the hotel to get dressed for the occasion. I've got to be ready for the event as I leave the house. So, I am waking up at 3:30 AM on Monday morning to meet people at Noon (one time zone behind me, though) to start training. That is ten hours I am going to have to be moving and shaking BEFORE I start my work day. What is worse is my kids fight me if I try to get them to go to bed before 11 PM. It may be midnight or 1 AM before they go to sleep and I can go to bed. So, I am looking at, optimisitically, between 2 and 4 hours of sleep. My flight will be longer than the sleep I get. Before anyone suggests it, I flew repeatedly from Hawaii to Tennessee back in the day. I found out the hard way I can't sleep on a plane. Those seats aren't built to comfortably accomodate somone my size. I am, pardon my french, Les Screwed. Ah hon hon!
So what am I doing about this? Well, the first step is acknowledging you are going to be in pain. It's like a fight. If you go in thinking you won't get hit that first blow is going to hurt like Dorthy just dropped her house on you. No, go in expecting to get hurt. That takes that worry off your mind. I am going to hurt. Enough said.
After that it is largely a matter of planning ahead to make sure your mind has something else to think about other than the flight or how tired you are. I used to carry a stack of books and my TI-85 calculator on flights. The calculator had been hacked and had the game Tetris on it. In those days my entire trip took 16 hours. Trust me, I've had practice. Also, today I have better tools,
My messnger bag will contain 1 laptop complete with movies I need to see but have yet to find the time (going to be in the hotel a few days too), 1 PDA which I am stuffing with about 12 books and about 1 gig of MP3s, 1 pair of active noise cancellation headphones (don't you just hate the noise on airplanes?) and a webcam. The last is because when I get to my hotel I'd like for my kids to see their daddy anyway.
Well, that is the first part and that's all well and good. But, let's face it, I'm older now. Bouncing from time zone to time zone as a teenager or early twenties is easier than it is on a guy in his 30s. So, I am in training for the event. Today I have gone over 24 hours without caffeine. Is it rough? Oh yes. But when that first drop hits me monday morning it is going to rev my autonomic nervous system right up there to the red line! I will be a caffeine junkie getting his first buzz after a weekend of drought. Oh yes!
I also went most of the day today without eating. Not sure if that will come in handy or not, but just in case I can't even find a snack machine Monday morning it is nice to know I can go the 12 hours until my lunch with the big wigs without ordering the left side of the menu and doing a Richard Donner impersonation.
This is how your standard geek does training. I am drinking a caffiene free cola at the moment because my body knows something is missing and the cola is almost fooling it. Still, today I can feel the mental gears sort of spinning in place and the teeth aren't meshing very well. For some odd reason going without caffiene makes me want to go to IHOP and get some pancakes and link sausage. Right now I could really go for a good western omlette and some sausage. I think this is my brain telling me that I skipped a vital step in its waking up process.
So, there you go. Hopefully Monday evening I can tell you how the training regiment went . . . also, hopefully, Now, if you'll excuse me, it seems the nearest IHOP to my hotel room is 15 miles away. I need to do some additional planning.
ME: My company is sending me on a business trip.
MY BROTHER: Cool! Mine sent me to Scotland recently to set up a crash recovery system for their entire network and do a live test. Where are you going?
ME: Um. Minneapolis.
MY BROTHER: Ah, well, that's some place you've never been before . . . I suppose. So what are you doing there?
ME: I'm, uh, being trained on how to be a short term disability case manger.
MY BROTHER: Wait . . . isn't that the job you've been doing for the past nine months?
ME: Yes.
MY BROTHER: Well, I hear they have a mall there you might want to see.
I have yet to find a way to tell this story and make it sound cool. Even the 17 year old bag boys at the local grocery store are unimpressed and one of them thinks the best move ever made was Half Past Dead. Ja Rule and Steven Seagal's acting talents are a more interesting topic than me being sent to Minnesota to train on the job I am already doing. Okay, so maybe that is a bad example. Most people could go on at length about that topic and use colorful adjectives like "bleeding eyes" and "anal-cranium inversion" but talking about the merits seems a bit more difficult. Not with this crowd.
To add insult to, well, insult my company booked me on a flight leaving at 6 AM because they got a good deal on it. Keep in mind that modern security measures for flights require you to check in an hour before take off. So 5 AM. Except I don't live at the airport. 4:30 AM? You say. Yes, that's when I have to leave my house. Roughly. No, since my training starts soon after I land I am actually going to have to hustle directly there from the freaking airport to make it in time - actually, allow me to pause for a moment.
My company would not rent a car. Why? Because the airport has a shuttle to the hotel. The hotel is not where I am receiving training. I guess they figured I'd walk a lot. Yeah right. I rented a car myself. This is not the first time I have ended up stranded at a hotel. Sorry resumes below.
-and go directly to the place that they never even gave me the address for (but Google Maps did, hah!) just to make it in time for training, then that means I don't even have time to stop at the hotel to get dressed for the occasion. I've got to be ready for the event as I leave the house. So, I am waking up at 3:30 AM on Monday morning to meet people at Noon (one time zone behind me, though) to start training. That is ten hours I am going to have to be moving and shaking BEFORE I start my work day. What is worse is my kids fight me if I try to get them to go to bed before 11 PM. It may be midnight or 1 AM before they go to sleep and I can go to bed. So, I am looking at, optimisitically, between 2 and 4 hours of sleep. My flight will be longer than the sleep I get. Before anyone suggests it, I flew repeatedly from Hawaii to Tennessee back in the day. I found out the hard way I can't sleep on a plane. Those seats aren't built to comfortably accomodate somone my size. I am, pardon my french, Les Screwed. Ah hon hon!
So what am I doing about this? Well, the first step is acknowledging you are going to be in pain. It's like a fight. If you go in thinking you won't get hit that first blow is going to hurt like Dorthy just dropped her house on you. No, go in expecting to get hurt. That takes that worry off your mind. I am going to hurt. Enough said.
After that it is largely a matter of planning ahead to make sure your mind has something else to think about other than the flight or how tired you are. I used to carry a stack of books and my TI-85 calculator on flights. The calculator had been hacked and had the game Tetris on it. In those days my entire trip took 16 hours. Trust me, I've had practice. Also, today I have better tools,
My messnger bag will contain 1 laptop complete with movies I need to see but have yet to find the time (going to be in the hotel a few days too), 1 PDA which I am stuffing with about 12 books and about 1 gig of MP3s, 1 pair of active noise cancellation headphones (don't you just hate the noise on airplanes?) and a webcam. The last is because when I get to my hotel I'd like for my kids to see their daddy anyway.
Well, that is the first part and that's all well and good. But, let's face it, I'm older now. Bouncing from time zone to time zone as a teenager or early twenties is easier than it is on a guy in his 30s. So, I am in training for the event. Today I have gone over 24 hours without caffeine. Is it rough? Oh yes. But when that first drop hits me monday morning it is going to rev my autonomic nervous system right up there to the red line! I will be a caffeine junkie getting his first buzz after a weekend of drought. Oh yes!
I also went most of the day today without eating. Not sure if that will come in handy or not, but just in case I can't even find a snack machine Monday morning it is nice to know I can go the 12 hours until my lunch with the big wigs without ordering the left side of the menu and doing a Richard Donner impersonation.
This is how your standard geek does training. I am drinking a caffiene free cola at the moment because my body knows something is missing and the cola is almost fooling it. Still, today I can feel the mental gears sort of spinning in place and the teeth aren't meshing very well. For some odd reason going without caffiene makes me want to go to IHOP and get some pancakes and link sausage. Right now I could really go for a good western omlette and some sausage. I think this is my brain telling me that I skipped a vital step in its waking up process.
So, there you go. Hopefully Monday evening I can tell you how the training regiment went . . . also, hopefully, Now, if you'll excuse me, it seems the nearest IHOP to my hotel room is 15 miles away. I need to do some additional planning.