Travelling Diaries
2017 US Great Adventure / Day 0 - Travel Preparations
Previous and next: Day 1 - Travel to San Francisco
It's been a funny old week
They say that there are a number of life events that are the biggest causes of stress; examples are events to do with jobs, family, travel and marriage. This week I think I have been affected by all four.
Jobs
When it comes to jobs, the stresses occur when you are searching for, getting or changing employment. For me, the event was at the latter end of the life cycle.
This week saw me finally take early retirement from my job. After almost 22 years (man and boy) I have decided to re-arrange my work-life balance to tip it firmly in the direction of life.
Although I had enjoyed my working career and had been blessed with a variety of employment experiences, I had decided that it was interfering with my personal life too much!
This was a bitter sweet decision as you have to weigh up the cost of gaining free time to do what you want to do with losing colleague companionship and a regular income.
I had been planning my exit from the company for some time, off loading work to others and tying up loose ends. However, we all leave some things to the last minute.
On the last afternoon on the day I was finishing, I went for a late lunch with a few friends and then returned to my desk to send my final goodbye emails. However, when I tried to log on to my laptop, it crashed. I called out the IT help desk, they took one look at it and said that it was kaput and needed to be rebuilt. Oh no, the stress of it all. However, I took this as a sign, put on my coat, and left!
But that was not before I was given a great send-off. Some very kind words were said about me, wonderful gifts were given to me and we all ate cake!
That evening I had organised a farewell retirement do in the centre of Dublin. This was also stressful. Would the venue be ok? Would the food and drink be sufficient? Would anyone turn up? Anyway, it all went very well. I had invited a whole load of people I had known over the previous 22 years and it turned out to be a great night.
(me, post retirement having a celebratory meal down in Howth, with Karen)
Family
When it comes to family, I am blessed with a great partner and great children (and their respective partners).
For this particular vacation, we are joined by my daughter, Laura, and her partner Keith.
Laura and Keith are currently living and working in the UK, so they flew back on Thursday night before we all flew to the States on the Friday.
Now, as I like to be an embarrassment to my children, over the years I have worked out various ways to do this. Currently as they are all working in the U.K., whenever they fly back I pick them up from the airport. When I do, I wait for them to come through the arrival doors and then run up to them whooping and hollering, as if I hadn't seen them in years.
This routine is mortifying for them, but I get a good laugh out of seeing their faces (and the faces of the other people in arrivals). Also, in my mind, if it makes other people smile and puts them in a good mood, then that is an added bonus.
Anyway, on Thursday night I went to collect Laura and Keith. I was running a bit late so only got to the arrival gate just as they were coming through. As I saw them, I immediately started my whooping and hollering and running towards them only for Laura to say “Dad, no!” and point to the person standing next to them who seemed shocked, worried and a little scared. It was Enda Kenny, our Taoiseach, probably on his way back from some important BREXIT meeting in the UK, who, no doubt, thought his time was up! Thank god he didn't have armed security guards with him as they would have taken me out!
Travel
When it comes to travel, this vacation was mostly organised by Laura and Keith (thank you). As I had been planning and worrying about my retirement for the last few months I had been distracted and had not had a chance to do any real planning of my own.
In the days up to us departing I had been anxiously focussed on finishing up my work, and organising a farewell party, etc. So the first chance I had to pack and get ready was the day before we left.
On our holidays I am in charge of the IT. I bring all of the chargers and sockets and online entertainment. I also needed to bring a small laptop so that I could do this blog. All of this technology is bread and butter to me.
Having worked in the IT industry for over 30 years, I have come to rely on a steady diet of gadgets to get me through the day or to help me achieve a variety of tasks. A lot of this was fulfilled through my work experiences. However, with work about to fade into the distance, I needed to ensure that I wasn't bereft of technology at home (fat chance, says Karen).
The main technical tool of choice for most people these days is either the smart phone and/or the tablet. I have been a user of portable (or personal) digital assistants for the last 20 years; from my original Palm Pilot in 1996 to my current iPhone and iPad.
Before retirement my phone costs had been paid for by my employer. Therefore, as I was retiring I had to make sure that my phone number was transferred over to me as soon as possible, especially as we were about to leave the country on vacation.
The life story of my phone was similar in ways to the life story of my employment over the last 20 years. Back in 1995 I had started off working for and American mainframe manufacturer called Amdahl who later bought a Canadian consultancy firm called DMR Consulting. Soon after we we became Amdahl DMR, followed by just DMR Consulting, followed by Fujitsu Consulting, then by Fujitsu Services and finally just Fujitsu. For the majority of these changes I was in the same location (often sat in the same seat!).
When it comes to mobile phone providers, I started off with an Irish telco called Eircell. This company was sold to Vodafone. Not long after we changed to O2 Ireland who were then bought out by Three. All through these changes I had kept the same mobile number.
So when it came to taking over my mobile number before we travelled, I went to the local Three shop and they did it all for me. It seemed painless. Or so I thought.
The night before we were due to go to the US, when I should have been packing and getting the technology together, an ex-colleague of mine wrote me an email to say that she had been trying to call me but couldn't as the mobile number was not in service. I didn't think too much about that as I have very poor signal at home so put it down to that. Also, I had received other calls during the day from other people so the phone must be ok.
Anyway, just to be on the safe side I thought I would try ringing my phone from Karen's phone. Number not in service was the response. Something is wrong.
I contacted Three over their online help chat line. They tweaked a few settings and said that the phone was alright. But I knew it wasn't. I then tried ringing it from my second phone (why do I have a second phone? long story…). I also got the ‘not in service’ message.
This baffled the Three help person as they could contact me, no bother.
Then my problem solving techniques kicked in and I thought I would do an experiment. My second phone has two sims; an Irish and a UK sim (why? Another long story). I had tried to call my main mobile with the second phone and the Irish sim and it hadn't worked, so I switched it over to the UK one. This UK sim worked fine and it rang my main mobile phone ok.
So what was the common thread between the phones and sims that could not call me? They were all ex-O2 Ireland phones; my colleague at work, Karen and my second phone all O2 Ireland Sims. I then related this to the online help person, who verified that that was the case. At least they had something to work on to try and solve the problem.
On the way to the airport the next day I realised that everyone else I knew could call me (except ex colleagues from Fujitsu). The only other person who couldn't was Karen. Is this a problem, I mused out loud? Not a good muse to have in front of Karen who gave me that stare that only she can!
Which reminds me of the stresses of marriage...
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•