Work Travel

One of the perks of my job is that sometimes there are manufacturers that want to show off their products and manufacturing plants in person, so the local sales representatives will often invite us to join them on factory tours or trainings.  I usually try and make sure that they also offer continuing education credits for my PE, but sometimes the offer is too good to turn down even without the credits.

The first trip that I took was in mid-October to Raleigh, North Carolina to visit a UPS manufacturer.  On the way, we flew over one of my favorite cities (see above).  Any guesses?

The highlight of this trip was when I accidentally peed in the hand-washing basin.  Oops.  It looked like a urinal to me... :)  (j/k by the way).  

The next trip brought me back to the Carolinas.  We stayed in Greenville, SC and Asheville, NC, while visiting a lighting manufacturer in Greenville.  After the classes were over we drove up to Asheville, NC which lies in the foothills of the Great Smoky Mountains.  I had offered to drive the big 15 passenger van that we all crammed into. That night, we ate a fancy dinner at The Grove Park Inn, which was incredibly beautiful and rustic.

In Asheville we went on a zip-lining excursion up in the mountains and it was awesome.  The trees were beautiful, the mountains were fog covered and it felt like we had walked out of Glory or another Civil War movie (except for the part about ziplining). 

The last trip was to the Fresno area, but we stayed at the fancy Tenaya Lodge at Yosemite.  Once again, I spent a day at a lighting factory while we welcomed the first snow of the year to the mountains around Yosemite. 

The next day was spent visiting Yosemite National Park.  It was amazing, but I was sad that Alison and the girls weren't there to enjoy it with me.

I went on a hike to the base of the Upper Yosemite Falls, which was a decent hike with over 1,000 feet of elevation gain.  The hike wasn't very long as it was stairs and switchbacks nearly the whole time, but the views of the valley were amazing.  I'll have to make sure that there is water on the waterfall for the next time that I visit.

More recently, I took a short trip to Denver to visit a couple of lighting manufacturers.  The highlight of this trip was going to a Rockies game (a 10-9 win for the Rockies).  It was a great game with a lot of runs, a Grand Slam (which apparently allowed me to claim free tacos) and a number of stolen bases including home.

Sometimes it is nice to get wined and dined a bit...

Work Drives

I love driving.  I don't love being stressed because I'm not getting any work done, but I enjoy listening to some good music, a good book on CD or the news and admiring my surroundings as I cruise along.

Last week I had to drive to Grand Junction, CO for a project that is just getting started at Colorado Mesa University (formerly known as Mesa State College).  Because the expenses for the trip are reimbursed, I decided to rent a car.  It doesn't cost me any extra, besides the time that it takes to pick up and drop off the car.  Even though it didn't cost me a dime, I reserved the cheapest car available, an Economy level car for $23/day (+ 1 day of airport parking).  It turned out to be a Nissan Versa, which turned out to be a bad choice.  The car was terribly uncomfortable.  It was so narrow that as I sat my butt in the chair, I was forced to lean towards the passenger seat as my shoulders were too broad against the door.  What made this so uncomfortable was that the seat didn't have an armrest and there wasn't a center console, so there was nothing to lean against and nothing to rest my right arm on.

The 582 mile drive was fairly uneventful.  I stopped at a project site at Novell in Provo and then continued on my merry way for my meeting in Grand Junction.  Once I got on the less busy roads, I was dismayed to find out that the car didn't have cruise control.  With just me in the car it always had enough power going up hills and it was a smooth ride.  After the meeting I grabbed some dinner at Famous Dave's, stopped by Best Buy to admire the new Microsoft Surface Pro and then got back on the road.

Note to self: Don't get the economy car and make sure that the car has cruise control before completing the rental.

This week I had to drive to Blanding, UT.  On Monday evening after work I walked to a car rental place downtown (Enterprise) and picked up another rental car.  This time I think that I chose a mid-size car for around $38/day (but no airport parking fees).  I had a choice between a black and silver Prius, which was a nice surprise.

Besides a little rush-hour traffic at the south end of the valley, the drive started out well and I enjoyed driving a much nicer car than the Versa.  It was quiet, it was comfortable, it had an awesome display and all the bells and whistles.  I think I even got up to around 59 mpg before I started up the canyon and hills.

Driving to Blanding is a long drive.  It's maybe 35 minutes and 19 miles further than Grand Junction, but it feels longer because even less of the drive is on the Interstate.  Unfortunately, most of my drive down was in darkness (although the moon was full) so I didn't see much of the beautiful drive between Canyonlands, Arches, Moab and Blanding, where I stayed the night.

I spent 2 1/2 hours at the job site the next morning before heading home.  This time I took a little longer route (past Hite and through Hanksville instead of directly north through Moab).  Between Blanding and I-70, I think that I only passed 3 cars.  I stopped and took a few pictures at a historical site and at the Hite overlook, because this is some of the most beautiful terrain in the world.

With such a quiet drive I may or may not have tried to see what kind of guts the Prius had.  I tried a few times, but I never could go any faster than 116 mph...  My Volt will only make it to 100 mph, but I've never confirmed this.

I like to keep my cruise control set as I drive and one of my biggest pet peeves is when you're in a no passing zone on a two lane road (say going up a windy canyon road) and you have to slow down for a slow car ahead of you (no big deal).  What irks me is when as soon as a passing lane appears, the car that has been cramping your style immediately speeds up so you can't pass them.  Once the passing lane ends they slow right back down to their slower speed.  This happened a few times to me today (you know who you are jerk in a black Honda).

One last interesting tidbit is that I passed the Amtrak train just north of Helper on my way to Blanding at nearly the exact same spot that I passed it coming home from Grand Junction the week before.  It was a weird sense of deja vu, although I was traveling in two different directions.

Below are a few pictures, with most of them taken looking out towards Hite Marina.  In better days, these pictures would be showing the water of Lake Powell, but the water is still way down.

Hopefully I'll get to stay back in the office for a few weeks, because it is hard to get work done on the road. 

Berkeley, CA

I think that one of the reasons that I don't blog very much lately, is that my brain has me convinced that every post needs to have something substantial (i.e. I can't just post a photo or thought).  I need to get out of that mindset, this post should do the trick...

In April, I went on a trip to visit a lighting manufacturer's design center in Berkeley, California. We flew into Oakland, checked into the Doubletree Hotel at the Berkeley Marina and then took the VIP bus to dinner.

The bus had a stripper pole that unfortunately went unused, but in a severe lapse of judgment, I touched that thing (obviously while pretending to put on my own show...).  I'm still not sure if my hands are clean yet.

The next day was spent at Peerless Lighting.  I enjoy visiting factories and manufacturers on these trips, they've got to be pretty confident in their products to give hands-on demonstrations and behind-the-scenes tours.

We flew home early the next morning.  It would have been nice to have had a day to spend in San Francisco, but we'll save that for another trip.

San Francisco from the flight home.

AM Radio

I'm sitting here in a hotel room in Riverton, Wyoming having just completed the 5.25 hour drive from Salt Lake City. Most of the drive was done in the dark and the skies were cloudy but not snowing. This all changed when I crossed the continental divide and began climbing up to South Pass (interestingly enough, you cross the continental divide long before the summit because there is a bit of a basin where the water flows neither to the Atlantic (Gulf of Mexico) or the Pacific (Gulf of California)). I didn't expect the weather to be any different at the mountain pass, but the wind kicked up, it was snowing and it must have been well below 0 degrees Fahrenheit (considering it is 1 degree here and I'm a few thousand feet lower in elevation).

As soon as the blowing snow started coming, I immediately couldn't see anything, not from the whiteout conditions, but because my car couldn't keep my windshield warm enough to keep the blowing snow from turning into ice on my windshield as soon as it hit. Luckily, the roads were generally pretty empty and I was able to find a place to pull over and defrost my window before continuing, although the problem never completely disappeared with the blowing snow.

I've always wondered why I-80 and other roads in Wyoming are often closed during snowstorms, because there never seems to be that much snow on the ground. Instead, what happens is that the snow blows so hard that you simply cannot see the road. I had no trouble seeing the marker posts on the side of the road, but the blowing snow made it virtually impossible to see the lines on the road. It was a beautiful sight, because the snow appears to just be flowing from one side of the road to the other. There is nothing that a snowplow can do in conditions like those. Luckily, as soon as I came down the mountain into Lander, the snow stopped and it was back to the beautiful, cold evening that it had been before.

I passed most of the time in the car listening to a biography of Albert Einstein, but I also passed the time trying to find the Jazz game on the AM radio. Instead, while driving on the plains of Wyoming, I was able to listen to radio broadcasts from Wisconsin x2, Illinois x3, Indiana, Texas, Iowa, Nebraska, Kansas, Colorado x4, Wyoming, Utah, New Mexico, Oklahoma and Southern California.

I was able to listen to the Spurs-Bucks game from Milwaukee or San Antonio, the Lobo game from Albuquerque, the Husker game in Lincoln, Northern Illinois, DePaul, Kansas State, Colorado State or Wyoming basketball games but not the Jazz. Go figure.

Back in the day, many AM radio stations were Clear Channel Stations where nobody else in the country was allowed to license the same frequency, which allowed the stations to increase their power after dark and thus reach audiences far away (Many stations still are clear channel stations, but radio stations further than 750 miles away are allowed to broadcast on the same frequency). Most of the stations that I was able to pick up from locations afar is because during the nighttime, the AM radio waves reflect off the ionosphere rather than dissipating out into outer space. The reflected wave can then be picked up much farther away than the daytime signal. Couple that with an increased transmission power and you can hear news from San Antonio, Los Angeles and Chicago in the middle of Wyoming during the early winter nights.

Unmoderated Thoughts

We just got back from a fun little family trip to La Verkin and Las Vegas (we tagged along with Morgan, Jordan and Brynlee) and I had a few thoughts that I wanted to post.

• We went to Church this morning in La Verkin and I counted no less than 11 men wearing bolo ties. No offense to the cowboys out there but...
• When we are in La Verkin we stay in my great-grandparents old house (that is now owned by my grandparents). We're so grateful to them for sharing their house and allowing us to take a cheap vacation. When we got there Wednesday night, the house had been toilet-papered and there was toilet paper all over the grass and in the trees and bushes in front of the house. wth? [what the heck, people]
  
• Last month we spent upwards of $1300 keeping our two cars running (25 years and "all most" 320,000 miles between them). We were nervous about driving home tonight because our car is suffering from a couple of misfiring cylinders (and our fuel economy dropped from 30 mpg to 22 mpg). Hopefully, the news tomorrow from the shop will be for an inexpensive fix.
• We took a pleasant drive up to Lava Point in Zion National Park (elev. 7,890). As far as I know, it's the only place in the park you can get to without having to pay the $25 entrance fee. I'll post a couple of panoramic photos that I took from the viewpoint in 6 months or so.
• We went to the Brick Oven in St. George for dinner on Saturday night and sat waiting for a waiter for 20 minutes. I found a manager who was embarrassed we had waited so long and gave us drinks and desserts on the house.
  
• When we got home this evening I checked our sprinkler controller and the date & time had been reset. I went to set the date and the default year setting is 1887 - so I had to scroll up 1 year at a time to 2010. I had no idea they had programmable sprinkler controllers back then.
• I'm reading The Death of a President, November 20 - November 25, 1963 by William Manchester and am loving it. The book essentially spans 5 days from the time President John F. Kennedy and his wife left on their Texas trip to his assassination and State Funeral. From reading this book and biographies or historical accounts of other presidents, I have come to the conclusion that to be president you have to be amazing and have qualities that allow you to connect with people on a personal level while maintaining the bigger picture in view. (I'm not sure if that makes sense, so let me know if I need to elaborate).
• Work is busy (I'm not complaining), but I am looking forward to slower days. Up until this last week, I had 8 straight weeks where I worked 52 hours+. From the looks of things, this schedule will have to continue for a couple more weeks. I'm blessed to have a job that I enjoy working at every day.

As Tigger says, ttfn (tata for now).

State of the Blog

January is the month to learn the "State of the (...city, county, state, union, blog, etc.)". I just thought I would join in on the fun before my chance passed me by.

The last few months have had a lot of blog-worthy events.

During the months of July, August and September I taught a series of 9 courses on managing your finances. I kept a blog where I posted information for the class including the handouts, slides and other course materials. While the blog hasn't been updated since I taught my last class, there is still a bunch of good information available there. The classes that I taught (using liberally the slides, handouts and information from the fantastic websites http://personalfinance.byu.edu and http://www.thesimpledollar.com) were the following:

1. Perspectives on Wealth and Setting Personal Goals
2. Creating a Personal/Family Budget
3. Understanding Credit
4. Understanding Debt
5. The Time Value of Money
6. Beginning Investing
7. Insurance
8. Money in Marriage
9. Frugality Tips and tricks

What managing your finances really comes down to though, is one thing, which is summed up in the following Saturday Night Live skit:


This fall I upgraded my work laptop and our home computer to Windows 7 and couldn't be more pleased. While I had very few problems with Windows Vista (on my work laptop) I have found Windows 7 to be extremely easy to use. My two favorite features is the auto-update of programs and drivers and the new taskbar. Every piece of hardware that I have connected to my computer has worked without fail once the software updates everything automatically. The new taskbar setup saves time by allowing me to place my most used programs and links across the bottom of the screen.

This fall I also got a new Palm Pre which I have also become very fond of. I most like that the phone is open source and can be hacked as needed. While not without its problems, the capabilities of the phone are essentially greater than the new Apple iPad in that it has multitasking, GPS, video and editing, full flash support and can handle programs written in C, C++ or using the Palm developer's kit.

Thanksgiving and Christmas were nice. It is always fun to spend so much time with family as we enjoy the various activities of the season.

Work is great. Have I mentioned recently how much I enjoy my job? Because I do. I'm working on interesting and challenging projects and am lucky to have work here with the state of the economy and construction industry in the state.

I have been serving as Elder's Quorum President in my ward here for the last two months or so and have enjoyed getting to know the members of our ward. It has taken an extra effort to organize my time and priorities, but is well worth it.

In other words, even though the glory days of this here blog may be behind us, there is still a lot going on in life and I hope to continue posting about the good things in life. As is usually the case, Alison has continued to update her blog with pictures, stories and information about our last few months.

April Flowers

I’m not usually one to do these marathon posts, but it’s been a busy month, I haven’t made a real post since April 1st, and I’ve got a lot to say.

1. Spend-free April. You may remember a couple of years ago Alison and I had a spend-free April. At that time we did our best to not spend any money on pretty much anything but fresh produce and bread. Alison was on WIC at the time so we were able to pretty much go a whole month without spending. We didn’t think we were really in a position to duplicate the experiment again, but we did set a goal to cut spending on all variable categories by 80% (basically, we will pay our full mortgage, utility bills, etc.) We wanted to trim our spending on groceries, clothing and other household items. I haven’t calculated how we did, but I don’t think we quite made it. It doesn’t help that we purchased a 65” TV this month…


2. Yes. We bought a new 65” Mitsubishi DLP TV. We didn’t expect to get one so soon or so big, but we’re not complaining. Not that we need to justify this purchase to anybody but ourselves, but here are our justifications for purchasing it: We had enough money saved up to pay for a 52” LCD TV. As I was looking at them at RC Willey one evening the salesperson made an offhand comment that if we weren’t going to hang the TV on a wall we could consider a DLP TV (which is around 15” deep). We did and we purchased. We had planned on buying one at the beginning of football season in order to let the prices drop lower, and then we wouldn’t have to pay for an HD DVR until then… But RC Willey was having a good sale (and they paid our sales tax), we had free delivery and setup until the beginning of June and a $150 (or so) gift card to RC Willey that we wanted to use. We have not been disappointed with our purchase. It’s been fun to watch the Masters and the NBA Playoffs on the big screen. We put the TV on the RC Willey 18 month no interest plan because we had just paid off our last big purchase (remember this one?) and what’s not to like about making money on our savings while paying the minimum due for 17 months? But, it turns out that my payment to RC Willey was posted after we purchased the TV and they applied it to both purchases – thus leaving our interest-free purchase from last year not paid off and the TV paid halfway off. Because I don’t want there to even be a chance that there will still be a balance on last year’s purchase, we’ll pay the full remainder off this month.

3. Work. This has been a really good month for me at work. I still love my job and I was able to bill more than 100 hours the last two weeks to my principle engineer as well as many thousands of dollars on another project of my own. It feels good to work my butt off, but I still can’t believe how much I don’t know. I love my job because there is truly a lifetime of learning ahead for me. My company had an open house to show off our new office space on Earth Day. Fitting because we are going for LEED Platinum (no building is yet certified LEED Platinum in Utah, but when all is said and done, ours will probably be the third). We also changed our logo. The new one is shown below:
4. The Jazz. They’ve been a hard team to peg down all season. They’ve got great players and they have a cast that should take them a lot further than they made it this year. They just seem to have so many players that are inconsistent and don’t play hard every game. I definitely think that changes need to be made to the team this summer, but I have no idea what those might be. Part of me feels that a summer free from Olympic obligations and other injury causing activities may allow them to have an injury-free year together as a team and then they’ll go ahead and win a championship. I can dream, right?

5. The Malibu. The Malibu’s registration was due in March and I took it in on the last day of the month and it failed. There were three problems that showed up. I took it to one shop and paid for the diagnostic and they were able to take care of one problem. They told me that the second problem was intermittent and that the third would have to be taken care of at a dealer. I didn’t want to pay dealer prices so I found another shop that could fix the third problem (which they did), but they also told me that the first shop had fixed the entirely wrong problem and that the first problem code was still active in my car’s memory system. I then took it back to the first shop and they tried to explain their way out of what they fixed but they got the check engine light to finally go off. That same day I left work early to take the car back to the inspection point to get a retest done. As I was driving there the check engine light came on. Of all the rotten luck. The next day I was going to return the car to the shop that failed at fixing the first problem when I noticed the check engine light was off. I drove directly to the inspection place and had my car all checked out (but I never turned it off, so the codes wouldn’t reset). The car finally passed and as I looked through my emissions report I saw that the same problem code was still active, but that it wasn’t one that even mattered to pass emissions. $600 later, arrgh.

6. I am reading Amy Dacyczyn’s The Complete Tightwad Gazette – Promoting Thrift as a Viable Alternative Lifestyle. While many of the tips are too over the top for me or don’t apply, there are many that do and I will try to share some of them here. As always, I’ve got loads of new book reviews on my book review blog. Check them out if you haven’t in a while.

7. I befriended SeaBass on facebook. You should too. I can die happy.

New Office

We’ve been there for a month now, but I thought I should still share the news. My company (Spectrum Engineers) moved from the Historic [piece of crap] Walker Center (see picture above) on the corner of 2nd South and Main Street to a 5 story red brick building on the corner of State Street and 3rd South (the old location of Auerbach’s Department Store). At the Walker Center my company had 4 floors and we will now all share the same floor at the new building. In addition, our space is going for LEED Platinum (the highest possible honor, and only one other building project has been certified as such in Utah so far). Basically, this means that our new office space is about as environmentally friendly as is possible. The carpets are 70% recycled materials, the furniture is either recycled or made from renewable bamboo, the lighting is state-of-the-art (LEDs, daylighting and extensive occupancy sensor control), and all of the mechanical equipment is of the highest efficiency. The offices are quite a bit smaller (but they were really big at the Walker Center) and there is a lot more collaboration/conferencing space. Many of the employees were looking forward to moving from the Walker Center, but had a lot to complain about in the new space. Now that we have been there a month, I think that most of us like the new space quite a bit. So far, the downsides are that the bathrooms aren’t finished yet (we’ve got to trek down to the second floor) and a bunch of the other rooms and areas still have workers trekking through them. I also quite enjoyed having my 10th floor office overlooking Main Street. It’s more exciting than State Street. Did I mention I love my job?

My old office:

New office:

Almost Famous?

In the October 2008 issue of EC&M magazine, my company (Spectrum Engineers) was featured in a cover story about mentors and mentoring programs. Because I’m the best mentee they’ve got, they interviewed my boss and I for their story. Holding true to form (and always quotable) I made it into the article a bunch of different times both in picture and print. The article is available online here or a pdf copy of the actual article can be downloaded here (ok, my host isn't cooperating. I'll post links later, and yes, I do have a stupid smirk on my face in most of the pictures...).

Fundamentals

As anyone who reads Alison’s blog already knows, I took the FE (Fundamentals of Engineering) exam on Saturday. Many universities require a passing score on the exam in order for students to graduate (mainly in the mechanical, civil or industrial engineering disciplines). The only time that an electrical engineer (like me) would ever take the exam is if they ever wanted to become a principal engineer and be able to stamp and sign drawings. I estimate that less than 5% of all EEs work in this field. If I had taken virtually any other job as an electrical engineer, then I would not have needed to take it. The test was held in a big room at the Salt Palace and I was surprised by how many people were there taking the test. There had to be around 350 people. I was assigned to sit in the front row, seat #7. I was a little disappointed that I wasn’t in seat #6 (my lucky number), but I tried not to let it distract me from the matter at hand.

I was pretty stressed about having to take the exam, but not stressed enough to start studying for the test really early. I purchased some study material a couple of months ago (with the best intentions) but I really didn’t start hitting the books hard until about the week before the exam. What made studying difficult was that my boss was out of town all week and all questions and e-mails on his projects were coming to me. In addition, we had a huge addendum due Friday on the Utah Museum of Natural History project. I came to work each day around 7:00 AM and left between 10:30 and 11:00 PM. I tried to start studying each evening at around 6:00 PM. It was difficult to only see Ada I bed for a few minutes each day but, I feel lucky that the test was scheduled during the Utes bye week. Another testament as to the divinity of the Utes…

The test is split into two sections. The morning section is 4 hours long and is a general test for all examinees. The morning test consists of 120 questions taken from the following topics:

• Mathematics (including calculus, differential equations, vector analysis, etc.)
• Engineering Probability and Statistics
• Chemistry
• Computers
• Ethics and Business Practices
• Engineering Economics
• Engineering Mechanics (Statics and Dynamics)
• Strength of Materials
• Material Properties
• Fluid Mechanics
• Electricity and Magnetism
• Thermodynamics

I needed the full four-hours to get through the morning questions. While I couldn’t answer all of the questions, the majority of them were easier than I expected. There were a couple of questions that I just started laughing at after I had read them. I couldn’t believe that they would ask something so simple. By the time I was done with the morning exam, I was looking forward to the afternoon section because everything had gone so well. They are pretty strict about what you could take into the exam. There is a list of 6 calculators and aside from that you can only bring drinks or snacks. They wouldn’t let you in with anything other than a zip-lock bag and they took away any unauthorized writing utensils as well.

The afternoon session was 4 hours long as well but only had 60 questions. Examinees could choose from General, Electrical, Civil, Mechanical, Chemical, Environmental or Industrial tests. I took the electrical section and found it to be more difficult that the morning section, but not too bad as well. The topics on the afternoon exam were:

• Circuits
• Power
• Electromagnetics
• Control Systems
• Communications
• Signal Processing
• Electronics
• Digital Systems
• Computer Systems

The afternoon exam was slated to go to 5:35 but I finished my part by 4:00. It was nice to leave early and to be free of the stresses that these tests cause. There were still plenty of questions that I didn’t know the answer to, but I guessed on them and knew that any additional time spent trying to figure them out wouldn’t benefit me. Alison met me downtown and we used a coupon for a free meal at Tucano’s Brazilian Grill in the Gateway. Is there a better ending to a day full of testing than a gut full of meat?

I think not.

Monday Photo

Does the Devil live in the Capitol?

I've had the chance to visit the State Capitol a handful of times for my job. We did the electrical design of the capitol and I've had to check the work of the electrical contractors (to ensure that things were installed correctly, clean, in good working order, etc.). I've been down underneath the capitol building where all the huge stabilizers are (in case of an earthquake) as well as in the underground tunnels and up in the walls of the rotunda. On the main floor of the capitol there is an image in the marble that is slightly disturbing:


As an added bonus, here's a picture of the rotunda (yes, it truly is your lucky day):

I'm also doing a study for the state as to the viability of solar panels on the roof of the capitol (I also did a similar study for Salt Lake County for a couple of buildings, including the Salt Palace). I visited the roof on the same visit to take pictures of possible locations for solar panels. Here's the view of downtown from the roof of the capitol:

Daytripper

Yesterday I took a quick trip to Grand Junction, Colorado for work. There is a classroom building at Mesa State College that my company did the electrical, audiovisual, security, fire alarm and lighting design for. I went down to "punchlist" the building, which is basically just checking up on the work the contractors have done and ensuring that they are following the approved plans.

The most exciting thing about the trip was that we flew down in a little top-wing, four-seater Cessna. The architect had hired a plane and pilot out of Logan and they stopped at the Salt Lake Airport #2 to pick me up. It was sure nice to not have to deal with any security, lines or crowds but to just walk up to the plane on the tarmac and jump in. Here's a picture of our little plane:

The plane ride to Grand Junction wasn't too bad. It took us about an hour and a half to get there. It was my first time in a little plane and I was a little nervous for the ride. Aside from when we crossed over the Wasatch mountains and the Bookcliffs, the ride was pretty smooth.

Going home was another story. We were mainly flying into the wind, but there were also some storms rolling in over Northeastern Utah (the Uinta and Vernal areas) which caused a bit of a crosswind. This caused the plane to bounce and swing quite a bit. It felt as though you were fishtailing on a roller coaster. I've never really been prone to motion sickness but I had to concentrate on my breathing. You can't just "watch the road" because there is no road and the plane is bouncing up and down. The other problem was that it was very hot. There is no AC in those little planes and the sun is just beating down on you. I was never all that close to puking but I was sure glad when about 10 minutes outside of Provo the ride became as smooth as could be. Even though we were bouncing around during the flight it was never really scary. I can't really explain why, though.

About 5 minutes after takeoff on the way home the pilot let me fly the plane for about a half hour. I brought us up to 10,500 feet (our cruising altitude) and tried to keep the plane steady. As it turned out even the autopilot wouldn't be able to do so (see previous paragraph). It was a cool experience. I spent more time watching all of the dials and gadgets than I did the sky ahead of me. I loved being able to see everything on the ground so clearly. Flying in a small plane also felt so much more like floating in the air. Commercial airliners are so solid that it's not much different than being on the ground - but there was a big difference in the Cessna.

In other news, Alison is due Friday. We were a little nervous about me leaving town so close to the due date but, we both felt that it wouldn't be a problem. She had her membranes stripped earlier today. Keep your eyes on the twitter feed above for the latest and greatest!

Changes (2)

Probably the second biggest change that we're experiencing is that I've recently started working full-time for my new employer Spectrum Engineers. I signed an employment contract with them about a month ago and I got my first salary paycheck this last weekend. I think that we're going to be able to get used to this.

Can I just tell you how much I love my job? Every day I get to do something different. Just this week I've been down to UVSC for some punchlisting on an almost completed Student Life Center (dedicated by Governor Huntsman yesterday), my boss then took me to lunch to Braza Grill (a lot like Rodizio Grill) and I finished up the day working on a Salt Lake County Solar Study.

Yesterday I got a quick job from an engineer in Texas. He needed a licensed Utah engineer (my boss, not me) to run the calculations and sign off on them. I ran the short circuit analysis and prepared a quick report and collected the whole fee (I won't tell you how much I made on that job, but let me just say that I was paid about 1 1/2 weeks of an intern's wages for 3 hours of work).

Today I spent the morning running some more calculations for the County report before riding up to one of the former Iomega buildings in Roy with another engineer (who also bought me lunch). Our client is going to remodel the building and turn it into a big call center. I field-checked the building and we attempted to determine the existing electrical service and equipment in order to begin our design.

The biggest downside to the job is definitely the hours. I've been working from 7:30-8:00 to 5:30-6:30 every day. I knew this job would require more hours than most other engineering jobs. There is so much for me to learn to get up to speed and I want to learn it all as quickly as possible. I really, really do love my job.

Numbers

• Last week during the Priesthood Session of General Conference, I volunteered to help clean. I wasn't sure what to expect and when I got there I was assigned to an employee and we were in charge of keeping a few bathrooms on the balcony floor clean and stocked during the session. Because only men are invited to the Priesthood Session, they change many of the women's bathrooms to men's for the session. After initially stocking the bathrooms, we spent a big chunk of the rest of the remaining time emptying the 'female waste receptacles' in each of the stalls. At least I was wearing a pair of gloves, the dude I was working with had no shame and went glove free. Most of the bathrooms had 24-28 stalls. The last bathroom we worked on had 46 stalls! Not what I expected to be doing during Priesthood Session...
• I love my job. I've been working around 30 hours/week because I'd much prefer to be working than at school. I can't wait to start full-time. What's most exciting is that there is so much to learn. I've been working on some energy calculations for the newly remodeled Utah State Capitol. In the capitol there are 4,679 light fixtures (of which around 750 are incandescent). There is almost 1/2 MW of lighting in the capitol!
• We went to the Bees game on Saturday (which they won 11-10 over the Portland Beavers). They are now 10-1 and on track for a pretty decent season. The biggest problem about the minor leagues, though, is that the better you are the more often your parent club will call up your players. I love baseball.
• To prepare myself for a hike that I'm going on later this week (I'll give a full report later, don't sweat), I walked home from the Bees game in my new hiking boots. While walking on pavement doesn't compare too well with with hiking over rocks and dirt, the 4.2 miles I walked should help my body to be ready.
• I've only got 3 tests left before I graduate.
• I've only got 3 days of school left before I graduate (because I'll be gone most of this week on my little trip to Supai, AZ).

Real Life Nears

As I mentioned in an earlier post, I quit my job at Rocky Mountain Power and decided not to accept the offer that they had extended to me for a job in field engineering. Instead, I took a job with Spectrum Engineers in downtown Salt Lake City. I had planned on trying this job out for the next couple of months, but I knew that this was the job for me after being there just a couple of hours on my first day.

Our offices are located in the Walker Center on 2nd South and Main. Spectrum leases 4 floors of the building, and I am located on the 10th floor. When I got there my first day, I expected to work in one of the cubicles on the floor, but instead I get this big office overlooking Main Street (a nice perk). By my estimations the office is almost 200 square feet - about the size of our family/living room.

I really like what I am doing. Spectrum is a consulting engineering firm that specializes in the electrical/mechanical/acoustical/lighting/etc. design of large building projects. They have done everything from the airport redesign, to the capitol building, to the new Intermountain Medical Center. A few of the projects that I have been working on are the new district courthouse in St. George, the Farmington commuter rail station and mall and an office building near the University of Utah. Maybe someday we'll land a contract for buildings like these in Dubai.

I never expected the decision of where to work to be so difficult. I guess that I always envisioned it to be cut and dry and that I would "know" when I had found the right place. Calling Rocky Mountain Power and turning down their offer was one of the most difficult things that I have ever done. It's not easy to turn down a guaranteed salary that more than triples what we currently make.

Most of the things that I loved about Rocky Mountain Power were duplicated at Spectrum Engineers. Both companies have great benefits plans (Spectrum's is better). Both companies have plenty of room for advancement. Spectrum offers the possibility of making more money in the long run, but working for the power utility is obviously a more stable job. I would have gotten an office and a car at Rocky Mountain Power but the office would have been on the first floor overlooking the parking lot and Spectrum has told me that they will "more than compensate" for having to use my own car... Most importantly, the Walker Center has a see-through mail chute. How cool is that?

So far I have loved going to work, I am enjoying what I'm doing and I'm looking forward to doing this every day. One of the biggest things that turned me on to Spectrum Engineers was that there is so much to learn. I can literally envision myself learning new things every day for the rest of my life in this job - and that excites me to no end. Right now everything that I'm having to learn is a bit overwhelming, but I expect to get my feet under myself before too long.

Here are a couple pictures of my new digs (the photos don't do the place justice):

Job Status

This last week has been a wild one for me. Along with the two tests that I had I got a job offer from my current job. I guess I should rewind even a bit farther to explain myself. A couple of weeks ago I interviewed with Spectrum Engineers. They are an engineering firm here in downtown Salt Lake City that specializes in the electrical system design for large building projects. They are set up a lot like a law firm and once you get your PE (professional engineering license - which you can't get before being in industry for 5-7 years) then you can become a partner in the business. They pay extremely well (they've told me numerous times that nobody has ever left over money - they've even got engineers making up into the $300,000s, but of course they are workaholics). I think that their average salaries for PEs are in the low to upper 100s. In short, the way that I see it right now I have 4 options with where to work.

1. The first option is with Rocky Mountain Power. Like I mentioned, they gave me an incredibly generous offer earlier this week. The offer is for a field engineering position in the Salt Lake City Metro - the job that I would probably most enjoy doing there. They have an incentive (i.e. bonus) plan that pays up to 12% a year, I would get a car and work in an office with guys whom I get along with extremely well. The problem is, power engineering is nothing like the other three types of jobs I am considering (If you want to know what my offer was, just ask. I've got no shame and don't really care if others know what I'm making - as long as that information isn't used directly as a bargaining chip. Just know that if you ask me what I'm making, then I'll probably ask you!).

2. The next option is with Spectrum Engineering. As I mentioned above, I interviewed with them a couple of weeks ago - and I was actually offered an internship - that I ultimately accepted. This internship only lasts through the end of the school year - but obviously I'll have the opportunity to sign on with them once school ends if I so desire. I don't see accepting this internship as turning down the power company in any way. It's a chance to try something else and see if I like it. Working for the power company or Spectrum Engineering mainly requires on the job training - none of this stuff is taught at the U (they don't have a power engineering program (or even a class); the closest ones are Idaho State University or New Mexico State University). The stuff that Spectrum Engineering does as well is also quite unique for EEs. Very few EEs go onto being professional engineers because it is required in so few jobs.

3. The next type of job that I have been pursuing (although not as actively as I could be) is with defense contractors. These companies (such as L3, Raytheon, Northrup Grumman, Lockheed Martin, Boeing, etc.) have stable, interesting jobs and pay very well. They would give me the opportunity to easily work all throughout the United States because they are all located in the majority of the 50 states and some have divisions in all 50. I've also had a couple of interviews with Hill Air Force Base. This wouldn't be my dream job, but they do a lot of really cool stuff up there. I would not sign on making nearly as much at the other jobs but the opportunity for speedy advancement is available. They would offer me a 25% signing bonus and write off up to $20,000 of student loans (I don't have nearly that much, so I would have them pay off my credit card - and then go buy a $10,000 plasma tv...).

4. The last type of job that I am most seriously considering (I once again haven't been too actively seeking) is with semiconductor design and/or manufacturing companies. These are jobs that I am most qualified for because of my schoolwork. I have designed numerous chips, had a couple of semesters of lab in the University's microfab cleanroom and feel very comfortable with this type of work. My adviser has been trying to recruit me for a couple of these companies. This is the type of work that I feel most passionate about - but I haven't had the chance to do any of the jobs mentioned above.

As you can tell, I've got a lot going through my head. All throughout the day I'll decide to seriously commit to any one of the mentioned areas but I'm all over the place throughout the day (and Rocky Mountain Power wants to know by the end of the week - they may have to wait). I feel a little bit of extra pressure with these decisions because they are difficult industries to move between. Moving from the power company to a fab engineer at IMFlash (flash RAM semiconductor company) would be very difficult because there are almost no similarities between the two types of work - and the same goes for Spectrum Engineering and the defense contractors. Anyone that made it through this long post deserves to be commended - but instead why don't you just share with me your thoughts?

More Snow?!

A few tidbits from the last week:

• The few days before today were just beautiful. Today it snowed heavily from 2:00-8:00 and driving home from work on the interstate my undercarriage was dragging along the snow in the middle of the lane. Another good reason for me to try and lose a few pounds. We've had at least 3 storms dropping 8-12" of snow and many more dropping fewer inches.
  
• I've had 3 job interviews this week.
  
• I'm excited to have another girl (if you didn't read that on Al's blog, we found out Monday that we are having a girl). Hopefully Ada and Baby Who Shall Not Yet Be Named will enjoy playing with each other.
  
• I've had a miserable cold the last few days. I think that I have a pretty high pain threshold (I stayed at school all day after I broke my arm in 4th grade in 1st recess) but I'm a huge wuss, pansy, wimp, etc. when it comes to body aches and chest/gut pain.
• I often wonder if Ada isn't a prodigy.
  
• I saw this article the other day about the coldest places in the world. I lived in Russia (and it was cold) but I was in a comparatively warm part of Russia. Send this article to anybody complaining of the cold (unless they live in Yakutsk).
  
• I drive through 23 lights going to work and 24 lights coming home. If they're not timed very well it can take a long time...
• We went to dinner yesterday at Romano's Macaroni Grill for Valentine's Day. They've got good bread.
  

Round 2

I interviewed again last Friday with my current company. It was a really interesting interview. It was set up by my bosses boss and there were 6 guys in the room from all different parts of the company. Between them all, they interviewed me and another intern for 8 or 9 different openings. After the interviews, they asked us to rank the jobs in our order of preference. While I haven't received an official offer yet, I was told today that I would be getting an offer for the job that I ranked the highest.

This intensifies my search for a job. I've applied a handful of other places and interviewed with a few (none recently). I'd like to have a few offers from which to choose - but that requires work (and a bit of luck). Now I appeal to you, gentle readers, if anybody knows of anyone hiring entry level (or Master's level) electrical engineers and could give me a referral, then I would be much obliged.

Poked

I gave blood today. I don't mind donating, but there was a bit of a problem this time. The blood drive was at work and I went down in the afternoon. I read through the book, answered the questions, got my finger pricked and was ready to donate. The girl that was going to draw my blood cleaned my arm, and prepared the site before giving me a poke. As far as I could tell, everything went fine - until another worker jumped up and grabbed my blood bag and held it up (to keep blood from entering the bag). Apparently, the tube has to be clamped when the needle is inserted into the body. The girl had forgotten to clamp it and they had to now draw my blood from my opposite arm. If the blood had made it into the collection bag, then I would not have been allowed to donate at all. I didn't mind getting poked on both sides (the second draw was done by another guy), I just relaxed in the chair reading my book (War and Peace for those interested - I don't normally get to read much at work) and squeezing my fist. The poor girl that messed up though was pretty distraught and felt really bad. And she should.

Austin, TX

Alison and I just returned from a quick visit to Austin, TX. We were sponsored by a fantastic company that I interviewed with last Friday. They were kind enough to fly Alison and myself there, give us a rental car, put us up in Embassy Suites and give us a per diem for the days that we were there. We left Ada home with her grandparents and had a great time.
Friday was a stormy day so poor Alison was stuck in the hotel all day. I spent the day interviewing (5 total) with the company. I also had to give a technical presentation. That night we were treated to dinner at The County Line (all-you-can-eat Texas Bar-B-Que). It was fantastic. We had most of Saturday all to ourselves and we used it to get to know Austin a little better. We went down to the Lyndon B. Johnson Library and Museum on the University of Texas campus. Lucky for us, it's the only one of the 13 Presidential Libraries that is free for visitors. It was very interesting. After the library, Alison and I made our way to downtown Austin. We stopped by the capital building and walked down Congress Street to 6th Street where we ate lunch at a sports bar. That night we were once again treated to dinner by the company. This one was at Abuelos.
The best part of the trip was that we actually came home with more money than when we left. With them picking up our tabs on both dinners (at least $100 total), breakfast buffets at the hotel and the per diem we were given things went very nicely. The biggest problem was that almost all of our meals were all-you-can-eat. I gained 6 pounds in 1 week because of this trip. If Alison knew she would kill me...
I think that the interviews went pretty well. They made it a very non-threatening place to interview. I was actually with a group of 20 candidates from across the country. I expected most of them to be electrical engineers but, there was actually a huge variety. There were CS majors, computer engineers, mechanical engineers, mechatronic engineers and chemical engineers among others. I know that I would enjoy working there. We should know if they are going to give us an offer one way or another by Christmas.

On another note, I have an interview for a Park City Field Engineering Position with my current employer on Wednesday. Wish me luck!