Travelodge Mesa Suites - Mesa, Arizona

Ok, so it's pretty obvious that I'm not posting much anymore.. I apologize, it's just that with the way my schedule is I just can't fit it in. I am in Mesa, Arizona for ShoreTel training and I just want to share the pics of the hotel that I was initially staying at. I immediately found a way to get out of that hotel and moved to an Extended Stay America which is so much better. Here's the Pics:



As you can see, this place is not fit for human occupation.. So, if you're ever in Mesa, Arizona, avoid the Travelodge Mesa Suites at 4244 Main St. This isn't even half of it, there was hair that didn't belong to me on the towels and on the toilet and there was something gritty in the bed so I assume it wasn't very clean. The price for this hotel on Sunday night (due to the Super Bowl being in town) was listed at $400, the price my boss paid was around $270 and the cost per night for the rest of the week was supposed to be $89... With prices like that and the pictures that are on the hotel's website you would think that the hotel was a decent place..

To top it all off, I made a reservation with Discount Cab in Phoenix for 7:00 yesterday morning. I placed the call for the reservation on Sunday night so I assumed that the taxi would arrive promptly at 7am. As 7:15 rolled around I began to get worried because I had to be at training by 8:00am so I called the cab company and asked about the status of my cab. I was told that they were trying to get me a cab and that they were very busy because of the people leaving town after visiting for the Super Bowl. SO.. 7:30, still no cab, another call and the same answer. 7:45, STILL NO CAB.. Same thing when I called.. I started calling around to other cab companies and they all had a wait of 30mins to an hour and a half. 8:15, NO CAB... Called the company again, same answer, still trying to get a cab for me.. Finally at around 8:40 the cab arrived and I got to my training.. Needless to say, I made a reservation with a different cab company for the ride from my training to the new hotel. This cab company was called Union Cab Co. and they even called me at 4:30p to confirm my reservation for 5:00p and already had a cab on the way.. The cab was late due to traffic but it was a reasonable amount of time based on the time of day and the traffic conditions in Phoenix. The cab driver apologized for being late and I told her that it was nothing compared to the wait this morning. She immediately replied "who did you reserve the cab with, Discount Cab?", this tells me that it's a common thing to have that type of problem with Discount Cab.. She went on to say that she used to work for them and that they care more about serving the older people with medicare vouchers than they do about paying customers. She also told me that even if I were to place the reservation a week ago, the taxi driver and the dispatcher don't know about it until 15 mins before my scheduled pickup. The Phoenix area is pretty large and has a lot of suburbs so 15 mins is not enough time to get anywhere. To make a long story short, today I am renting a car because the cab rides are $30 each way and I can rent a car for $35 a day..

-Jack

#16 - Me...

So, like I said.. I didn't get out of the office much yesterday.. We actually had a guy coming in to interview for a sales position to sell the ShoreTel phone systems so my boss asked me to dress nice because he wanted to make a good impression. I'm all for wearing a button up shirt and tie and since I knew that I wouldn't be leaving the office much I didn't have a problem with it. My normal daily attire consists of slacks and polo shirts so I'm never really dressed "down" but I do feel more professional wearing a button up and tie. Unfortunately my job requires a lot of activity at times that would make wearing this clothing a pain.

The down side of having the guy interview yesterday was that he came around noon so my boss offered to buy us lunch and asked if I would pick it up. I'm not one to pass up a free meal and I wasn't going to leave him in a bind with needing to get the food to the office so I accepted his offer and went and got lunch for the 3 of us. We ordered from Pei Wei which surprisingly isn't terrible for you. Even still, I looked over the nutrition information to make my decision and wound up getting a meal that I wouldn't regret too much. Their meals are actually somewhat low in calories, the only thing is that every meal is 2 servings so you have to make sure you don't eat it all. I'm not sure about the sodium content because it's not listed (imagine that from an Asian restaurant) but I got the Teryaki Chicken bowl with udon noodles instead of rice because they seem to be the best for you.

I don't think I ever posted that I lost 10lbs last week.. The thing is, my weight normally fluctuates between 310 and 300 and I weighed in at 300 on Monday so it's hard to tell what my actual weight loss is but I did lose 2 inches in the waist. I know that 10lbs is huge and it won't/can't happen every week, my goal is actually 3lbs a week.

-Jack

#15 - Ducks in a row

Sasha and I did a "photo walk" near downtown Waco this weekend and we took quite a few pics.. I saw all of these ducks sitting along the ledge and I instantly thought of the saying "All my ducks in a row"...

I haven't been out of the office much this week so not all of my pictures will be from the day of the post. I am going to try my hardest to post pictures that are from the day of the post, it's just that when I don't leave the office there's not much to take pictures of.. Today will probably be the same, I've got a 4 hour training conference (web) covering ShoreTel systems administration so I most likely won't be leaving the office much today either.

-Jack

#14 - Red Ring of Death

I know, I know.. It's a photo blog.. It's just that I got this great new toy (flip video recorder) for Christmas and I haven't had much of a chance to play with it.. When my XBOX 360 decided to give me the infamous Red Ring of Death (RRoD)I decided right then that it would be a good time to get to play with the flip.

Oh.. did I mention that my XBOX gave me the RED RING OF DEATH...

Here's the story.. I bought my first 360 in November of 2006 (1), it gave me the RRoD shortly after purchase and I was able to exchange it at Wal-Mart for a new one (2). Brought the new one home, played it for around a month or two.. RRoD.. Again.. Took it back to Wal-Mart, the service desk associate accidentally refunded me the money instead of offering an exchange. I told the associate that it was fine and I would purchase another one at a later date... I did this thinking that I could purchase one at Best Buy because I thought maybe they handle their freight better than Wal-Mart (Yeah.. electronics tend to get thrown around while unloading a Wal-Mart truck.. Trust me I used to work there).. Anyways.. I get a new one (3) at Best Buy, take it home, play it for about 6 hours and it actually gouges my Gears of War disk to the point of being un-playable, also RRoD quickly after that.. So I took both the console and the disc back to Best Buy and got them both replaced (4).. I was told that there was a man who actually tried out 3 consoles in the store before he left and got the RRoD on every single one.. So, I brought the new one home, played it for around 6-8 months and then out of nowhere RRoD.. Took it to Wal-Mart for an exchange (Best Buy probably wouldn't exchange after that long) got a new one (5) and it's lasted me until now..

I am fixing to be on my 6th XBOX 360 in a little over a year.. I don't abuse it, I don't MOVE it, it sits next to my TV and I play it.. That's all.. I hardly even change games because I usually stick to the same game for a while.. I hadn't played for at least a week before this weekend and then I played for a total of about 2 hours this weekend and got the RRoD.. Somebody please tell me why there isn't a massive recall on these machines.. Am I the only one with this much trouble? I have a few friends who've had 1 or 2 RRoD but 5?!?! Does the fact that there is a term for this problem not bother anyone?

-Jack

#13 - The Brazos Belle ... - - - ...

The Brazos Belle used to be a fancy restaurant on the Brazos River in Waco. Due to extremely high amounts of rain this summer, the Brazos River rose very rapidly and caused flooding of a lot of areas of Waco. The Brazos Belle actually has a system in place for allowing it to rise and fall with the River but the owner of the restaurant failed to loosen the ties which held the ship down and caused it to flood. Below you can see a picture showing how it stands right now... Here is an article explaining things about the ship a little better. It's kind of sad to see something that was once considered a very nice place to eat become just an eye-sore for people passing by on I-35.


-Jack

#12 - Sunset in Lorena, Texas

Sasha's aunt and uncle invited us to their house to eat dinner and play poker last night, this was taken out of their driveway right when we got there. They have an excellent view from their house and I wish we would have been there a little earlier so that I could have caught a better sunset. Either way, dinner was great and poker was very fun.. It was a little different than usual because usually we enjoy a few cocktails while we play, but 1 shot of Jack Daniels is about 65 calories and then you add the Coke and it's even worse.. Of course we could have drank it with Coke Zero or another diet variety of the cola, but even still it just wouldn't be worth it..

-Jack

#11 - Burnout - Paradise City Demo (XBOX 360)

I haven't played my XBOX 360 at all this week so today I decided to go ahead and play for a while.. With my schedule so full there's been no time for me to play and honestly I haven't had the desire to play instead of doing something more productive...

-Jack

#10 - New hospital, and mall..

Ok, I know, the date says 1-10 and I'm posting on 1-11.. I will be posting another picture later on tonight for 1-11 but this picture was one that I took yesterday and never got around to posting..

The water feature you see in the foreground of the picture is part of a new shopping center that is under development. Legends Crossing is being built by Trammel Crow, the largest development company in America. The new shopping center will bring new restaurants, retail stores and hotels as well as office space. To tell you the truth, in my opinion Waco is growing way to big for it's britches and with all of the vacant buildings around town (I plan to go out one day and take pictures of them all) it doesn't make sense (IMO) to bring in more development. Right across the highway from this shopping center is a shopping center that was built a couple of years ago called Central Texas Marketplace. There are still tons of vacant spaces available in that marketplace and there is a vacant building from a restaurant that tried and didn't succeed (Smokey Bones).

The hospital is going to be Hillcrest Health System's new 471,000 sq. foot community hospital and Women & Children's facilities. This hospital will have nearly 400 beds and the company that I work for is actually set up to do a proposal for the VOIP phone systems for this facility. This could be a huge job and while I am very excited, I'm a little scared that taking on a project of that size could be extremely challenging. You can see a live video of the hospital here

-Jack

#9 - 20 questions, it knows what you're thinking!

I didn't leave the office almost at all today so I didn't have much to take pictures of.. This is called 20 Q and it's a hand held game that asks you questions to try to find out what you're thinking. You first think of something (animal, vegetable, mineral, other, or unknown) and by the 20th question it will try and guess what it is.. The first thing that most people do is think of something dirty.. It won't guess things that are dirty but if it suspects that you are thinking something dirty it will tell you.. It's a good way to kill time and it's really pretty fun..

-Jack

#8 - WHY DO YOU TEMPT ME?!?!?!...

I love food... Simple as that... Certain things, like this cherry turnover, are constant reminders as to how much I love food.. Sasha got these on her break at work last week and brought the ones the leftovers home.. They have been staring me in the eyes all week and I can't tell you how many times I've thought "It's ok, I haven't had much to eat today", but I always stay strong and deny myself the pleasure of indulging in the cherry filled goodness.. Today I decided that I've had enough.. There's no reason to keep these around to tempt me and I don't plan on breaking my promise to myself to "Stick with it" so I threw them in the trash.. I don't like to waste food, especially something that tastes as good as a cherry turnover, but it was a must in this situation and they most likely weren't that good anyways (wal-mart bakery food *blah*)..

Working out has been awesome so far.. Even the getting up at 4:30 am isn't such a bad thing.. The hardest part about the whole thing is that I am starting back studying for MCSE and I have a plan to do 2 hours a night in order to try and get a test out of the way before Februrary.. That makes my schedule very tight and with very little down-time..

4:30a-6:00a Workout
6:00a-6:30a Down-time (check email.. etc)
6:30a-7:00a Drive Sasha to work
7:00a-8:00a Get ready/go to work
5:00p-6:00p Eat dinner/wash dishes
6:00p-8:00p Study and try to get to bed before 9..

I guess I could cut a couple of more hours out of my sleep time, but around 3:00p I usually get very drained if I haven't had enough sleep.. Not complaining, busy days = quick days and I'll be an MCSE in no time..

-Jack

#7 - Tucker...

I'm a day behind in my postings but I have actually been taking pictures.. I'll catch up today..

This is our cat, Tucker.. It almost looks like he posed for this picture.. lol.. He needs to go on a weight loss plan as well, I believe he weighs about 12 lbs.. We've tried feeding him less, but he still maintains his weight (kinda like me haha)..

-Jack

#6 - I'm gonna get ripped...

Ok, not really, I just want to lose some weight... Sasha and I have been talking about joining a gym all we finally did it... It was actually pretty cool because Sasha's soon-to-be sister in-law had been thinking about it as well and when we called Sasha's brother to ask if he wanted to tour the gym with us, he said that they had planned on doing the same thing today... So, we all met up there and actually got a really good discount since it was a group of 4 of us signing up. The gym is called Gym-x (gymx.com) and there are only 3 of them (Waco, Temple & Killeen) but the facilities are really very nice and the one in Waco is in the old Best Buy building so there's plenty of space.... The really nice thing about it, is that they have a room that's dark, quiet and a really nice place to relax while working out... I'll admit, I'm very self-conscious when it comes to working out in front of people so the dark room is right up my alley... The other nice thing about Gym-x is that every machine has a TV screen mounted to it so you can zone out watching a TV show and your workout just passes by like nothing..

I currently weigh in at around 310lbs.... I'm not really embarrassed to share that, I know I'm a big guy and I know I need to lose some of that weight.. My goal is to get down to about 200-220 lbs which is right about where I should be for my height (6'4")... I will most likely post my progress as the time goes by... Our plan is to go every morning at 4:30 am and work out until between 5:30 and 6:00.. The reason that I'm posting yesterday's picture, today, is that I wanted to get in bed last night so that I would be able to get up at 4:30 am... We got up as planned, went and worked out until 5:30 and then came back home and Sasha got ready for work.. So far, so good, it feels really good to work out and I think sticking to it will be no problem..

-Jack

#5 - Clean that garage!!

This was the scene when we decided that today would be a good day to clean the garage.. As you can see it's been in need of a good cleaning for a while.. It's almost embarrassing to show the "before" shot. We bought this house a little over a year ago and still have yet to unpack everything since the move. A lot of the stuff was here in the garage, but we still have a few closets to go through as well... This took us about 3 hours, but it was time well spent and it was a nice day to do it.. It's been cold all week, but today it was 76 degrees... Anyways, below you'll see the "after" shot..

#4 - Bah.. Better pics next week (I promise)

I had a very busy day today and wound up working late so I got this picture on our way home from getting something to eat. Nothing special, I thought that the never-ending stop lights would make a cool pic, but the camera didn't want to cooperate and focus for me.. Once it did I didn't have enough time to compose the shot or even take more than one pic.. I may buy a good quality point and shoot in the future, having my 300d available at all times doesn't seem to be feasible. There's tons of great things I'd like to take photos of, the problem is that I am also at work when I drive by most of the things I'd like to take pictures of and most of the time I'm going from one place to another and don't have time to stop.. Next week I'll be sure and make time..

-Jack

#3 - My Office

Didn't get out of the office much at all today, so I figured that this would be as good of a time as any to show off my office.. Notice the phone in the bottom left corner of the picture? That's a Shoretel VOIP phone. I've been working on learning about setting up Shoretel systems and so far it's been incredibly easy. I set up the system in a test environment with virtual servers a couple of days ago. Today I set up the whole system (including connecting to trunks and installing server 2003) in just over 3 1/2 hours. I'm excited to be able to work with this stuff. Making a phone call to another extension for the first time on a system that I set up was pretty awesome... I can't imagine what it felt like when Alexander Graham Bell made his first phone call. I didn't even invent this system and it was amazing to make the first phone call from it lol...

-Jack

#2 - Drive A:?!...

One of my tasks for the day was to install Windows Server 2003 on a machine that we will be using to run our office phone system.. During my initial attempt at installing the OS I got a message saying that no hard disks were found.. Ok, so I thought "Ahh, setup must need drivers for the PCI SATA card... Not a problem.." So I get on another machine, download the drivers and put them on a USB flash drive... I reboot the machine, go in to Windows setup, press F6 (to install 3rd party RAID or SCSI drivers) and I'm presented with this wonderful message... Isn't it ironic that I was trying to use a piece of newer hardware and yet it required the use of hardware that I haven't used in probably atleast the last 7 years... To make a long story short, I wound up having to go out and purchase a box of 3.5" floppy disks because there were none to be found anywhere around the office or at my house... Even after putting the drivers on the floppy disk and setting up Windows 2003 Setup to use them I still received the message saying no hard disks can be found.. The system BIOS doesn't even list SATA drives so there's the problem, but the hardware is all the original configuration from the factory (eMachines) and the BIOS for the SATA card does load and detect the drive during startup... I'm not sure where to go from here but, hopefully google will help..

-Jack

Update: I found a utility called nLite that seems to possibly be the answer to my problem. I will have to test it tomorrow but basically nLite allows you to build a custom Windows installation package and add drivers, remove default windows components..etc.. It can be found here.

#1 - Black-eyed peas! Mmmmmmm...

Pretty much, ever since I can remember, it's been a tradition to eat black-eyed peas on January 1st to bring good luck throughout the year. When I was younger I didn't care for them as much, but now I find myself saying "Why is it that we only eat these 1 day out of the year?"...

All I know is that I ate them on New Year's day last year and wound up landing a job in the IT field which will kick-start the career that I've been dreaming of all of my life. I took a massive risk by quitting my job of 8 years to become a freelance web designer/developer and it was mainly the fact that I was able to learn web development/programming so quickly, that I was hired for the position that I am in right now.

So, that being said, I will continue to eat black-eyed peas on New Year's day in hopes of having good luck all year long! Besides, they just taste good...

Happy New Year!
-Jack