What a wretched mess.

So. This is what happens when the Army corp of engineers is allowed to do something that, while it may be technically possible superficially, had to have had people saying things like, " Now let me see if I've got this straight, you're going to build walls, and install a few pumps so you can then go in and build a city that will be not only be located on the coastline, but will also be 20+ feet below sea level?"

Well. Here's one of those "count your blessings" moments.

I was right. This area didn't get hit with shit. The storm here in Zachary was no worse than any Nor'Easter I've been through in Torrington and I didn't have snow to shovel afterwards.

Lots of problems for the communications grids though. The phone service is barely iffy at best and the Sprint cell phone I have hasn't worked except once since the storm and then I got an answering service. Oh well.

The hotel I'm at didn't even lose power. My biggest inconvenience, (Other than the absolutely depressing people sobbing every morning at breakfast as they pick out their neighborhoods under water on the TV) is that I have only a dialup AOL connection to the internet. Otherwise, I'm fine, my job is starting well, and everything here is loking pretty good.

I'll update when I can, but I'm not going to get my hopes up too much.

I hope I'm right...

Not that this isn't a serious situation, but I think The Weather Channel is overdoing it. Kinda like the Nor'Easters that are going to dump 28" of snow and then drop 8". Comparing the National Weather Service forecast and the Weather Channel forecasts, I'm seeing a 20+mph disparity in estimated wind speed for Zachary. 30-45mph from the NWS and 50-70mph from TWC. That's a big damned difference. Of course, the National Weather Service isn't trying to sell ad time.

Unfortunately, this storm is so hyped now, if it by God doesn't cause any true carnage, the locals are going to say, "Look, you got us all packed up and moved out for nothing again." and it will be even that much harder and will require even more ludicrous hype to get them out next time. So, TWC is banking on major destruction to make money.

Off we go.

Finally starting to see some sprinkles. Still nothing too impressive. I think this area is going to be fine. New Orleans, however, may have a problem.

Cell phones...

Also am noticing some difficulty on the cell phone today. My guess is that all the locals are jamming the circuits checking on their relatives so calls from me will be sporadic at best until this silliness passes.

So far so good.

The internet access at the hotel is excellent. Just plug the computer into the wall and away you go. One strange thing though, I can receive all my Email, but I can't send out. Once the hurricane weenies leave and I finally get into the correct room, I'm going to figure this out. My guess is the hotel has some sort of firewall but I'm not sure. The unit worked at home, so I'm pretty sure all the computer settings are correct. Oh well. Small details.

Good grief

I just ventured out again. Stopped back at the Walmart to pick up a few supplies. Still a zoo, just no bread, milk, batteries, or bottled water to be had. And now all of the gas stations in town are out of gas. Watch this thing miss us completely.

Drove to work and back. From the hotel, it's 8.3 miles and about 16 minutes to the entrance of the plant. Perfect. Now to find a house in the general vicinity to keep the miles low.

Why Louisiana?

I was a little trepidatious about moving to the deep south. I'd lived in the south (Paris, TX) for over three years, but never the deep-south.

I already think my fears were unfounded as the further south I drove, the more I liked what I saw and heard. The roads down here are generally excellent. Actual posted 70mph speed limit on the interstate, so everyone does at least 80. 55mph speed limit on the backroads which are kinda like RT 202 back in Torrington, but much wider, flatter and straighter. I did notice a Hazzard County-type speed trap heading into a little town on the roads to Zachary from the interstate. The speed limit went from 55 to 25 at a single sign. No step down. It was pretty comical, but if the local cops sit just past that sign, I'd bet they snag a few good ones.

Also, the radio stations are better here. Lots of country, a couple "Classic Country" station that only play stuff from before Garth Brooks showed up and ruined the genre, and a couple heavy-metal/hard rock station that play a decent mix of metal.

First impression, I like this area better than Paris. More trees. Less open soybean fields. Closer to a main city. (Hopefully, it stays that way and the cities aren't washed into the gulf.)

Now I just have to find a good house. (I guess I'll see what the ones for sale are made of after this week.)Shouldn't be too hard.

Camille, Katrina, Tomayto, Tomahto....

So. First impression of Louisiana from someone just moving here from a state that sees its fair share of storms, generally winter storms, but still nasty? CHILL the Frig OUT!

It's a frigging hurricane. Not the God-damned rapture people! I can understand the citizens of New Orleans being a tad edgy, all that sub-sea-level stuff, you know.

But even if this thing hit us directly, the forecast is only calling for 50-70 MPH winds and heavy rain. Sheeeeiit. Try that with 24" of snow. Then call me with the complaints.

Every hotel for 100 miles is packed with weenies trying to annoy me. And they act as if the hotel is at fault for being booked up. I can't believe the attitudes of these people. I was hoping the clerk would tell this one bitch to STFU and cancel her reservation for being nasty. She was complaining that the toilet in her room made noise when it flushed. (No, I'm not kidding.) That must be some plumbing she has in her house that is utterly silent even when water is flowing. She wanted the clerk to move someone else out of their room and give it to her because she made her reservation last week and these people just made their reservations today. It was all I could do not to tell that bitch that I was in a smoking room because they had mechanical issues with the correct room for me and since my reservation was booked over two weeks ago, and I'm staying for at least a month, if she was in a non-smoking double queen, I'd take her room and she could have mine.

While the hotel was trying to sort out my room, I went to gas up the car and pick up my hurrican supplies. (Read: Case of Busch Light.) I had to drive to Fred. (That is the next little town) The Zachary gas stations were all totally packed with worried looking frantic people. Then I made the mistake of going to the WalMart supercenter to pick up the beer. PACKED. The locals were stripping the store of every loaf of bread, gallon of milk and battery. I thought I was back home and they had just announced >3" of snow.

So, I guess people really are the same all over. Good thing that's not what I was running away from with the job change.

First impressions: Drive from Torrington, CT to Zachary, LA

Not a bad drive overall. Only two significant road construction zones. One in Virginia and one in Alabama for a total of less than 20 miles. Right around 1520 miles. 51.439 gallons of 93 octane. 29.6 MPG for the whole trip. With an average speed, not including the 1.5 hours lost in Bessemer, AL that I'll explain shortly, of 69.09 MPH.

The Motel 6 I stopped at in Athens, TN was great. Less than $50 for a clean, quiet room right across the street from a Hardees. I finally had the chance to eat the "Monster Thickburger". OH. MY. GOD. I linked to this burger when it first was introduced. For this exercise, I had the Monster combo with a chocolate shake. I totaled it up on the Hardees site and just this meal had 2310 calories, 153 grams of fat, 334 mg of cholesterol, and 159g of Carbs.

I thought I felt a little full after that.

It was interesting heading through VA and TN as NASCAR was at Bristol Speedway last weekend. The traffic was just starting to get heavy as I went screaming past.

Anyway. I got started bright and early on Day 2 of the drive. Drove for a couple hours and stopped for breakfast at a CrackerBarrel in Gadsden, AL. Nice restaurant with good service. There were a bunch of hotrods in the parking lot. Steel 32 Ford with matching trailer, chopped and slammed 67 Chevy short-wide, 63 Chevy II, that kind of stuff. I watched the owners leave while I was eating. They were all in the seventies at least. These people were OLD. It was kinda cute.

So I got back on my way after breakfast and right around exit 125 on I-20 through Birmingham, I hit something with the left tires on my car. I didn't see it but Jesus did I hear it. Nothing happened immediately so I thought I escaped unscathed. But about five miles later the car started to feel squishy on the left rear so I pulled over and stopped just outside of Bessemer. Sure enough, the left rear was down. So I started changing it. An Alabama DOT safety truck stopped shortly and helped me change the tire. He actually had the equipment to plug it but the chunk missing from the tread was large enough that even two plugs wouldn't stop the leak. So I got the spare on and proceeded to the local WalMart in hopes that they would have a tire. They don't carry 17's. Luckily, right next to the WalMart, in the same parking lot was a "Big 10 Tire Center". They did have a Bridgestone Fuzion HRI in the correct size in stock. So, $123 and 90 minutes later I was on my way. Learning here is; all you ricers out there with 18+ inch wheels? Better hope you don't have a flat and need a tire in a hurry. You don't have a shot in hell.

So after getting back on the road, my paranoia kicked in and I thought I was feeling the same thing on the right rear, so, I found a Walmart in Meridian, MS and stopped to check the tire pressure. I figured that if there was a slow leak that lasted this long, I could buy a plug kit and a small compressor at the store to get going again if I had to. Anyway, the tires were actually overinflated because of the heat. It was in the upper 90's compared to the 60's when I left. So I dropped the pressures down to 33 from 38 and got back on the road. Much better.

From there, I made it the rest of the way without stopping. The only other odd thing was, as I was heading south on I-55, I heard on the radio that at 4pm the state was going to convert the road to all lanes going Northbound to help evacuate New Orleans. I think there must be some weather coming, or something.

So. Here's the news.

It's been an interesting last coupla months. In June, after returning from our Playa del Carmen trip, which, as I've said before, was wonderful, I was contacted be a couple of technical recruiters. I get several of those calls per year and have never returned them. Until now.

I'm not too sure why I called them back this time, but I guess I felt it might be time for a change. The company I was working for had been doing some things over the last few years that I didn't really understand and I was concerned that they are looking to outsource all of their engineering. Anyway.....

In early July I had a phone interview with the engineering manager of a competitor's #1 site. That interview went very well and even though the job I was interviewing for had just been filled, (By an engineer from the same company I worked for as well,) the competitor decided that I should have an on-site interview to see if it would be worth their while to hire me.

On July 14-16 I flew down to Baton Rouge for the interview. It was a substantial interview. These people are sharp. I have not seen as many technical savants in one place at my old company. I took lots of notes on that trip and once I get my iPAQ hooked up, I'll post them here.

Suffice it to say, the interviews went very well and I received an offer of employment on August 17. I accepted immediately. And, after passing the drug screen and background check, here I am, in Zachary, LA. I start my new job tomorrow at 7am.

More posts to come.

Environmentalists, please feel free to kill yourselves...

"We have set up this exhibit to highlight the spread of man as a plague species and to communicate the importance of man's place in the planet's ecosystem," London Zoo said.

A quote from this article about the latest BS at the London Zoo.

Positive Incremental Chromatics are the Devil's Handiwork.

That is all.

And now for something completely different...

First, A couple things that were recently presented to me as fact. (I haven't checked, so sue me.)

1) Lung cancer research is significantly underfunded compared to other types of cancer research.

2) Female nonsmokers have a higher than average risk of contracting lung cancer than male non smokers. And this is not well reported.

My question is as follows:

Since the health nazis are so wrapped up in ruining the tobacco industry, would research that showed other causes of lung cancer serve to weaken their case against Big Tobacco? And if it did, would it be in the health nannies best interests to let women die to prevent their lawsuit funding from being cut?

Where would we be if not for them?

The village in which I grew up has an interesting claim to fame. Moosup, Connecticut has held, and continues to hold, the longest running annual V-J Day parade in the world. (That's Victory over Japan Day for you history buffs.) This year, the second Sunday of August was the fourteenth and coincided exactly with the date of the first Japanese surrender. I remember as a five-or-so year old, watching the dozens of local World War Two veterans marching or riding down Main street. I didn't really understand all the ceremony then, other than to know it was a good place to be if you wanted to have candy tossed at you. Now, having attended what will probably be my last V-J Day parade for quite a while, and seeing the six or so remaining veterans fading away, I think I understand it a bit better. The greatest generation is nearly gone. But we are building a new one. I just hope that in the future we can all drink beer and clap and pay homage and thanks to our brave soldiers as we attend the first annual V-T Day parade.