Hawaii Revisted

In April, I had the pleasure of meeting my mum for a 10 day holiday in Hawaii. We went to Honolulu for a day of shopping and then off to Maui for a week of relaxation and fun.

Enjoy our photos:

Hawaii with Mom

An oldy but goody

A year ago Alicia and Bob came to visit. This holiday was adrenalin filled.

For a glimpse into some of the adventure, here is a video of Paul and Bob on the Bungy Swing. Perin and Alicia did the same thing as well.

For some reason, the blog cuts off the side of the video. I recommend for best viewing that you click on the link in the top right of the video where it says "Sky Swing" and it takes you to Youtube to see the full picture.

Holidays, Son.

I wanted Perin to post these, but she delegated the task to me... Her skillz are superb. We didn't even make it to the zoo, but we did get some pictures put together for you.

Our first trip was to Kaiteriteri with our friends James and Antonia (and Max).

Kaiteriteri

The next trip was to Sydney, Australia. No Over Proof Brandenburg Rum* on this trip...

Sydney

*Over proof. It's a rum with a 150 proof rating or so (Bacardi 151 for example)-- and it's at least 75% alcohol. Normal Rum is 80 proof (40% alcohol.)

Monthly Update

So I quit my last job and got a new one. The last job had me sitting on a floor by myself and I'd see my boss for 15 minutes a day. With the new job, I sit on a floor of 140 sales and sales-support people who all have high energy and are enthusiastic. So the process of going in to work alone is far superior.

However, any company that has 140 sales people is a large organization with much bureaucracy. But I'm still so new, the mind-numbing complexity and bureaucratic hassles haven't crushed my soul yet, because I don't know any better! Anyway, I'm making a positive contribution and I'm quite enthusiastic about being able to close some big deals.

They just released the results from an employment satisfaction survey and it said that employee satisfaction climbs rapidly for the first six months. Then it drops through the floor and plateaus at a very negative bottom for three years. But after three years... then it slowly starts to climb up again. Almost to where you were when you began. Glad they could share that with us.

We had some HR lady come talk to us about "interpreting the results" and said that people are initially excited but don't know how to operate in the company's bureaucracy. And it takes three years to figure it out. And then once you figure it out, you can really start accomplishing things and your satisfaction improves. However, I chose to interpret that as "Who is going to stay three years before they start liking work?" Everyone who hated the company left within three years, and all that's left are people who don't mind.

Anyway, I'll only be there for ten months (eight to go), so it's perfect. Then we're outta here Feb 2011. More on that later in this post.

I completed the ACL reconstruction of my knee and that seems to be going well too. The doctors saw some meniscus damage in the cartilage they had planned to removed at the same time, but it had healed itself by the time they cut me open. That's nice because it will delay arthritis in that knee a little longer.

The physiotherapist and surgeon were impressed with my leg strength before going into surgery and I've made pretty good progress so far. I have almost full range of motion and I can put all my weight on that leg and walk around the house. I still use a single crutch when I leave the house for balance, but I should be done with that by next week. I'm off all the opiate drugs too, so I'm much less itchy and more regular:) Just Tylenol a couple time a day now.

Before the surgery, I went out to dinner with a bunch of soccer friends and we ended up getting some drinks at the bars afterwards. Which led to dancing whereupon I was attacked by a vicious cougar! She was fifty-ish and telling her I was married only made her more aggressive and she cornered me. Fortunately, my frantic signalling to one of the soccer girls paid off and she rescued me. The cougar was angry then and gave many mean glances after that. It was time to leave.

Most people would have gone home then, but it was my last night out. So my wingman and I went to the karaoke bar where I ended up singing a duet with a Samoan tranny. THEN it was time to leave. So I walked home and went to bed around five in the morning.

When I was younger, I used to think it was stupid that bars couldn't stay open past 2am. Now I believe that's the perfect time. You can feel wild about staying up after midnight, but you can still get [close to] a normal night's sleep. Now I'm of the opinions that bars that don't close are stupid.

Perin and I are focusing on our world trip. The itinerary is now (subject to change of course): Japan, Seoul, Hong Kong, Bangkok, Cambodia (Siem Reap -- Angkor Wat), Moscow, St. Petersburg, Istanbul, Israel, Petra (Jordan), Cairo, South Africa (safari), and then all over Europe. We're working on our plans and trying to save as much money as possible.

Perin's health is good too. We have to look into immunizations and see which ones she can get before we go (which may affect some of the destinations we may travel to). So that's this week's activity.

I'm taking time off from improv while my leg improves. I'm excited to get back to it though. Hopefully in another week or two.

Right now, I'm reading two books - Goddess of the Market: Ayn Rand and The Decisive Moment: How the Brain Makes up its Mind. First off, Ayn Rand was crazy. That book is a fascinating biography. But the point of this paragraph is that Ayn believed in the all-importance of rational thought. The second book is about how we use emotions to make most decisions, even when we think we're being rational. So it turns out they contrast each other nicely.

Perin and I are off to the zoo today. It's hazy and pretty cold, but it's not raining and it's not windy which means we have really nice weather. They have free wheel chairs, so I'll get one of those. And if we're extra motivated, we might end the day with the planetarium. That's just big talk though; there's no way we doing that after the zoo. We'll probably just get some hot soup and come home.