You Stay Classy, San Diego

One of the things I love most about the company I work for, is they are willing to send me to training classes for my job. Since I’ve been here, I’ve been afforded the opportunity to obtain certifications in my job field each year. Since I don’t much care to travel, I usually look for trainings in Reno, since it’s just a short drive. I like the convenience of staying at the hotel across the street from my training center so I don’t have to drive anywhere. 

This year, unfortunately, the certification class I wanted to take wasn’t available in Reno. The closest city they offered the training was San Diego. I was actually a little bit excited since I hadn’t been to San Diego since I was very young. The initial class I signed up for was for back in August, but got cancelled. The company offering the training rescheduled me for October 1 – 5^th. That was a minor inconvenience, but I just rolled with it. We were able to get my flights changed, but the hotel next door to the training center was already booked for that week. That meant I would need to stay in another hotel much further away. Since I didn’t want to deal with a rental car, I made the decision to still walk to my classes each day. It amounted to about a 15 minute walk, but it was worth it to me.  

My journey began Sunday morning. My flight was to leave Reno at 10:50, arrive in Las Vegas around noon, change planes, leave Vegas at 2:00, and arrive in San Diego around 3:00. The first hiccup occurred in Las Vegas. All flights going out were delayed for, what I’m told, the President being in town. I was finally able to leave Las Vegas around 3:00, so it was about a 3 hour layover. I landed in San Diego around 4:00, collected my bag and quickly found a shuttle service. There was a line of vans, and I just grabbed the first one I came to. The fact that I didn’t bother to take note of any details of that shuttle would prove to be a mistake later on. 

I was the only passenger on this particular trip, so I got to visit with the driver quite a bit. I told him what I was in town for, and he told me about the different local attractions in my area. As we arrived at my hotel, I paid him in cash, and he got out to grab my bag.  I thanked him for the useful information and proceeded to my hotel. I approached the front desk and gave the lady my name to check in. She then asked for a photo ID. That was when one of the worst feelings came over me as I realized I was no longer in possession of my wallet. Since I paid the shuttle driver with cash that was in my wallet, I at least knew I had it in the shuttle. I quickly ran out to the curb, but the driver was already gone. I did a quick search of the gutter and street in case I had dropped it out of the van, but it was nowhere to be found. 

I let the lady at the desk know what my situation was, and she graciously allowed me to check in without my ID. After I got checked in, I talked with the concierge who let me use their computer to contact the different shuttle companies. I couldn’t remember the name of the service, the name of the driver, or even what color van it was. The concierge contacted the surveillance department to see if they had any footage of the van. Unfortunately, the closest camera coverage was from inside the hotel lobby, and the only thing they could tell was that it appeared to be a dark colored van (the camera had a partial view of the front window). They could not, however, read the name on the shuttle. I went through the list of shuttle services and contacted each one to file a lost and found report. All I could do now was hope that the driver found it and return it to me, or that one of the companies would call me back. Until then, I was without cash, credit cards or ID.

Since my company had authorized me to charge incidentals to my room, I would at least be able to eat at the restaurant and charge it to my room. 

By the time I got done making all my phone calls, got showered and changed my clothes, it was getting a bit late. I hadn’t eaten anything since I was in Las Vegas, so I decided to stop by the restaurant. I approached the bar and explained my situation to the bartender. He was very nice, and told me it wouldn’t be a problem. He allowed me to order a much needed beer while I looked over the menu. I settled on the recommended brisket grilled cheese sandwich, finished my beer and ordered another. It was during that second beer that the bartender returned with a regrettable look on his face. Afraid he was going to tell me I couldn’t charge drinks to my room, I started chugging that beer before he had a chance to snatch it from my hands.  “Sir, I feel horrible to tell you this, but the kitchen has closed for the evening”. I began to ease up on my brew, but only slightly. The bartender appeared sincerely sorry, especially after I had told him this was the only place I would be able to eat until the morning. I asked if I could possibly nibble on some olives or maybe a cocktail onion, but I think he thought I was joking as he just chuckled and apologized again. After having had a few beers, genius struck me as it normally does after a few beers, and in an attempt to outsmart the bartender, I ordered a martini. It came with an inedible orange rind. By then, not only had I racked up quite a bar tab, but I was having trouble intelligibly communicating other drinks that may contain food, so I decided to pack it in for the night.  

On my way out of the restaurant, I noticed a small community had formed on the sidewalks up and down the street. There were tents, blankets, shopping carts, and most notably, homeless people. The restaurant was actually connected to the hotel, so the front doors weren’t more than 20 feet apart, yet somehow, in that 20 feet I met a vagrant. He politely asked me for change, and already having had my lips loosened by a few drinks, I proceeded to tell him my entire story, and therefore why I only had 68 cents in my pocket. I did give it to him though because…well, I hate having change in my pocket, and it wasn’t going to do me a damn bit of good. I’m sure the story took only a few minutes to tell, and my memory is a bit hazy after those drinks on an empty stomach, but it seemed like I was talking with this guy for quite some time. At the end of it, he offered me his roast beef sandwich. I told him I would be fine, thanked him just the same and returned to my room. 

I woke up Monday morning ready to go to class and reeling a bit from the drinks the night before. The continental breakfast no longer sounded appetizing, so I decided to skip it. I grabbed a quick shower, drank some water and set out on my 12 block journey to my training. The walk itself was actually a lot shorter than I thought it would be, and was not unpleasant at all. I arrived at the building, and reached the floor I was supposed to be on. Once I arrived, I notified the lady at the front desk I was there for my computer security class. There was no computer security class. I just laughed, and asked if I could take a look down the hall, which she let me do. I was able to find a server/datacenter room and asked the guy if he knew about my class. He said he didn’t, but he knew the company that was supposed to put it on. He called the company for me, and I was able to talk to the representative, who then says “Oh…you didn’t get my email? That class has been canceled”. I thanked him and hung up. I had no ID, no money, and now no training course. I began my walk back to my hotel room. 

The rest of the day was filled pretty much spent on the phone with my work as they were trying to figure out how to get me home without an ID. Annie’s boss did the research and found that since Annie had a passport, a social security card, and a birth certificate, she could fax it to the airport, and I would only have to go through additional security, but would be able to board the plane. It was actually really cool that my company was handling it like they were, and mostly that it was HR taking care of it. They were also going to wire me some more money. Things were starting to look up. I just needed to have the front desk print out the documents for me, and I should be home free.  

About then, my hotel phone rang. Thinking it would be the front desk telling me my documents were ready, I answered. A gruff voice on the other end spoke. The conversation went like this:

Me: Hello?

Voice: Jeffrey.

(Ok, not the front desk)

Me: Hey.

Voice: How are you?

Me: I’m doing good, how about you?

Voice: Are you sure?

(Oh no, did I give that homeless man my room number?)

Me: Yeah, not bad at all.

Voice: You didn’t lose your wallet?

(I told that homeless man I lost my wallet, this is the homeless man. Damnit, now he’s rubbing it in too.)

Me: Oh, yeah, I did do that.

Voice: Well, I have it.

(No! This is the shuttle driver! I can tell by his accent now!)

Me: You.have.to.be.joking.

Voice: Ha ha, not at all. I’m downstairs.

Me: I’ll be right there!

I got downstairs and noticed the man parked across the street. I ran across and he told me another passenger found my wallet. He went through it to see if there were any clues as to how to contact me. He then remembered me from the day before and dropping me off at my hotel. He must have called the front desk, and they transferred him to me. I opened the wallet, and everything, including all of my cash, was in there. I thanked him many times, gave him a 20, and hurried to let everyone know that I had my wallet back.

From that point on, everything went smooth. I was able to get on my plane, and made it home by 8:30 that evening.

When I returned to work today, I was greeted with this flyer: 

Healing Elixir

I'd previously written a short blog about, what is essentially the same story, just not in as much depth. I only revisit the story to explain my absence from what used to be one of my favorite hobbies. 

Much like a writers block, I feel like I've had a 'brewer's block'.  Unlike my writers block, however, it's not too hard to pin down the cause. The last time I brewed a batch of beer was, obviously, with my dad, and it was one of the best memories I have with him. We spent time out in his garage constructing what would be an untested and unproven brewing apparatus. Neither of us knowing if it would really work or not (it did), but (myself, anyways) not really caring either way. We were just having fun building something out in the garage. When it was finished, we tested everything out live - no dry runs for us. The style of beer to be brewed was initially to be an 'American Brown'. I wanted to tweak the recipe a bit, however, and make it a tad bit darker than the last time I brewed a brown - which was for wedding favors.

This wouldn't be a problem. I knew my styles, I knew my ingredients, and I knew my limits. We weren't going to over-hop it, and we weren't going to go with too much chocolate or black patent malt. I was shooting for the 'Brown', but a tad darker was fine. The whole brewing process was a complete blast. I'd never been able to explain the step by step process to anyone, and dad was eating it up. Watching him was like watching a kid at Christmas.  He was soaking in every bit of information as if I were going to be turning him loose on the next batch. He helped any time he could get his hands on a piece of equipment, and was there to offer the occasional words of encouragement. All in all, the process was over in the blink of an eye because I was having just as much fun as he was.  We ran into one little snag, however. The piece of equipment we built worked great, I just designed it with a minor oversight. It was a design flaw on my behalf, but it didn't ruin the batch.

 

While we were in the garage after having poured the wort into the lauter tun, a leak sprung in the new spigot apparatus we just made. The wort was a piping 170°, so trying to plug the hole with 170° liquid shooting all over my hands was a bit uncomfortable. We were able to get everything fixed though without losing too much of the liquid. It was because of that one little mishap that I will forever look back and laugh about how fun that day really was. It didn't go perfect, but it you couldn't tell by drinking what eventually be our 'Porter' (it was just too dark to call an American Brown anymore).

We brewed it, waited out the fermentation period, bottled it, and waited out the carbonation period. 4 weeks later, it was finally time to taste the finished product. I can, to this day, remember my dad's reaction to tasting the beer he had a hand in creating for the first time out of that frosty mug. If the entire process of making the beer wasn't perfect enough, watching him enjoy our hard work certainly was. Those that knew him, undoubtedly know the one word he said after taking that first drink. And outstanding it was. Smooth, but packed full of coffee, and smokey chocolaty flavor. It had decent foam retention, and the carbonation wasn't too much. This was by far the best batch I'd tasted since I stared brewing, so I was pleased.

To this day, there are still quite a few bottles of those beers at my mom's house. I'm not sure if they're any good or not anymore, but the one I had last year was still drinkable.  I just could never bring myself to drink them all. I don't know why, and I understand it's pretty silly...it just didn't feel right.

Since then, I've all but forgotten about brewing. It was what dad and I would talk about when we would smoke cigars. It wasn't something that I did on my own for the sake of doing it; it was something I did so that we could share it.

So here we are, a little over 3 years after he passed, and I have finally decided to blow the dust off of the equipment. I think this time around, I'm going to chronicle the process a bit better. I'll be certain to post my results when it's finished.

Letter to Liam

At long last it’s here. This piece definitely took me longer to write than any other that I’ve written. I don’t know that I’ve ever written and deleted so many lines from one of my writings before.  I must admit that I’d wanted to write this quite some time ago, but today was the day it felt like it fit. I definitely didn’t mean for the time to slip too far without having written this letter.  As we know, I’m getting older, and my memory isn’t quite what it used to be.  Liam is already 6 months old to the day today. He was born on Friday, January 13, and I am writing this on Friday, July 13. Once again, I’ve attempted to compile this story/letter completely from memory. There are times that my memory isn’t the best, and I end up remembering details a bit differently than they happened. That isn’t an attempt to purposely lie about the events, it’s just the way I remember them. I’m pretty certain Annie will have corrected any major discrepancies long before this hits The Unsound anyhow.  Again, knowing my son will someday read this is my motivation to ensure it sees the light of day.  Liam, enjoy your story. 

It should have been an early indication – everything will be exactly as it was last time, only opposite. Wait, what? Let me back up a little. 

By now, Lilah was a year and a few months old. She’d already developed her incredibly spunky personality that, I hope, she will never lose. Obviously this story is not about Lilah, but I wanted to highlight that fact so I may return to it later. Now that Lilah was over a year old, we’d started talking about trying again. We knew we didn’t want the two kids to be spaced too far apart, and we’d also remembered it had taken us a long time with Lilah.  We’d decided June or July would be a good time to revisit the idea, but fate had other plans. I’m told things happen for a reason, and certain things aren’t coincidence. I suppose I’m open to that idea, as this one was pretty strange.

We’d just finished another day at work. Actually, we’d finished another week at work. It was Friday evening, and we went to the store for some odds and ends.  We returned home, and I put Sesame Street on for Lilah (our regular after work/daycare routine), while I got on the computer to check my various regular websites. Annie had disappeared, but that was normal, as she normally changed after work. About 10 minutes later, she returned down the hall. Never the one to be subtle, she once again bluntly proclaimed “I’m pregnant”. This time it was about as matter of fact as if to say “It’s Friday”, or “I’m hungry”. “I’m pregnant”. I sort of just looked at her and laughed. I thought she was joking. I mean, of course she was joking. I may have even said “whatever”. Then I saw her face, and knew she wasn’t joking. Annie never has had what I would call a poker face. She is about as easy to read as a Dr. Seuss book. 

Now, if you’ll remember, we found out that we were pregnant with Lilah on the same day that my mom found out my dad’s cancer was to the terminal stage. That day? May 13^th, 2009. This particular day?  Friday, May 13^th, 2011. Pretty hard to make this sort of thing up, and I wouldn’t want to. Who would believe such nonsense? 

After taking a few minutes to wrap our heads around the extremely eerie coincidence, we decided to load up and go tell our parents in person.  They were the only ones we told (again) until after Annie was 12 weeks along.  

Annie’s pregnancy seemed to go about as opposite from her first as could be this second time around. She was plagued with constant nausea and heartburn from early on. During her first pregnancy, she experienced a constantly kicking, moving baby. This time around, she would have to push, poke and prod at her belly to elicit any type of movement.  It was fairly obvious from the beginning that this pregnancy was going to be very different from her first. We just didn’t know how much, yet. 

It wasn’t until August that we got to learn the gender of this particular baby.  Of course, I was going to be happy no matter what gender the baby was going to be. All I wanted was for the baby to be healthy. As long as our baby was health, I could care less what we were having. That was until we found out we were having a boy. Then I was ecstatic.  We were going to have a boy. Lilah was going to have a baby brother.  We were going to have one of each.  It just seemed so perfect to be having a boy this time around. 

Subsequent ultrasounds, however, revealed that there may be a bit of a problem. Nothing serious, we were told. Just something to monitor. It appeared that his kidneys were not doing what they were supposed to do; something about them being dilated.  We were told that it was nothing to be too concerned with, and that it was very common for boys, but something to keep an eye on. They said it was usually something that would most likely correct itself.  Later, we would also learn that Annie supposedly had gestational diabetes (we were and are skeptical that she ever had it in the first place).  That was mostly controlled with a strict diet, which Annie did wonderful with. 

Pretty much everything that could have been different from her first pregnancy, was.  We had constant checkups in Reno to ensure his kidneys were still doing ok. They never did return 100% to normal, but they did get better, and by the time he was born, pretty much back to normal. Because she was diagnosed with gestational diabetes, the doctor was worried the baby could get too big. Because of this, they didn’t want Annie to go too far past her due date, so they scheduled an induction for Wednesday, January 11^th.  

Yet again I waited until the last minute to finish painting the nursery. Since Lilah had her own room, I would prepare the spare room for the baby boy.  Little did I know what kind of a job I was in for.  The previous occupant of this house had a son themselves, and his room was this spare room.  They had, in their typical fashion, painted the top boarder of the walls with an oil paint stencil. This one was dinosaurs.  Not only did these dinosaurs run around the entire room, but there was glow in the dark paint on two of the walls and the ceiling.  I had no clue of the job I was in for. Those walls required multiple (like 4 or 5) coats of primer and paint to cover. The stencils weren’t so bad as the glow in the dark paint was. Just when I thought I’d had it covered, I’d turn out the lights only to see the glow through my fresh paint job.  Eventually I was able to get the paint to cover, and the furniture put together. We had a new nursery that would not be empty for long. 

The evening of the 11^th, Annie and I dropped Lilah off at my mom’s house to stay the night. We wanted to have one final good meal before going to the hospital, so we went to Mazatlan to have a nice dinner. After that we made it to the hospital, and Annie was given whatever medicine they give her. I was more or less occupied with work emails and the 49ers message boards. You see, Saturday would be their first appearance in the playoffs in like 10 years, so I had things to keep my mind off the waiting. Oh yeah, I was also keeping Annie company and doing husband things…or something. 

That evening was pretty routine. We watched a little bit of T.V., then went to bed, trying to get some sleep knowing it may well be our last evening of real sleep for a while. I didn’t do too bad, but I don’t know that Annie got much rest. They pretty much mess with her every half hour or so. She was a good sport that first night, though. I probably would have lost it on them multiple times, but she knew they were only doing their job. 

The next day was supposed to be the main event. In fact, I made sure to get up early enough to take a shower and shave real nice so as to look refreshed and clean for all the pictures with my new son. I knew that he would be born on Thursday, we would be in the hospital for the night, go home on Friday and get to enjoy the playoff game on Saturday. I had it all planned out. Someone forgot, however, to inform my son of said plan.  Thursday wasn’t spent having a baby. It was spent (by Annie, anyways) in pain and frustration. It was spent in what I like to call, for lack of a better word, purgatory.  There was no advancement on the baby’s part. So we spent it visiting with family, watching t.v., and monitoring my work emails and 49ers message board. Oh and being an attentive husband…or something. That evening Annie wanted me to get some real food, so I went by Susanville Supermarket and smuggled in some chicken strips, a salad and sugar cookies for her.  That evening was spent like the previous, until it was time to “go to sleep”. This time, the nurses decided they were going to work on what they could tell was our last remaining nerve by showing up every 20 minutes to poke, prod and “check” Annie.  The culmination of no baby, no sleep and constant harassment by the nurses finally pushed us past the breaking point. I think I may have snapped at one of the nurses, but by that time I was starting to live in a big blur. 

Friday rolled around, and when I woke up, I looked at Annie and said “Don’t worry, one way or another, our kid is being born today”. I knew this was taking an emotional, as well as physical, toll on her. It certainly was on me, so it had to be.  Friday was another long and trying day for us, as the nurses kept checking Annie to see if she’d progressed any. Finally sometime in the afternoon, the doctor decided she was far enough to break her water. This was good news for us, since that pretty much guaranteed we were nearing the end. We were only somewhat right. After he broke her water, it was still quite a long process (or so it seemed at the time) before she was in full labor.  The anesthesiologist came around and gave her the epidural, but it didn’t quite work like her last one. This time she was still feeling a lot of pain through it. They re-tried it, but still couldn’t seem to get it right. Eventually, she just ended up having to push through the pain (which she did, and did well I might say). 

It all happened so fast, but I remember holding her one minute, and the next she was telling me she had to push. The doctor made a dramatic entry just in time to catch the baby. Annie didn’t push but for a couple minutes, and before we knew it Liam Kade was born at 4:21 p.m. on that Friday, January 13^th.  There was no staging like last time. There was no theater lighting, and no breaking the bed down into a chair. It really did happen that fast.  

When Liam came out, my first thought was “Wow, he looks just like his sister”.  The doctor suctioned him out, got him to cry, and then the nurses took him over and laid him on the warmer bed to clean him up. By that time, he had stopped crying. I remember thinking that was odd that he wasn’t still crying. I stayed with him until he was all cleaned and wrapped up, and then took him over to Annie to meet her son for the first time. We wanted him to try to nurse as soon as he was born, which he did very well.  I was amazed that he still hadn’t cried much, but figured he was just happy to be out of there and getting some food.  

After he ate, our families got to come in and meet him. We also got to see Lilah for the first time since we dropped her off Wednesday night, which was quite a treat for us.  After a brief visit with our families, they moved us across the hall to our other room for the night. I was happy to be over there, because I knew we were only one short night away from being able to go home.  

We were ready for what we figured was going to be the longest night yet. After all, when Lilah was born, we got zero sleep. Lilah cried all night, and when she did fall asleep, the nurses would sense the quiet and come harass us/wake up Lilah. Surprisingly, however, that wasn’t the case.  Liam made it through birth, his first bath, and pin pokes without much more than a few fusses. I would be lying if I said I wasn’t at least a little concerned. It was just honestly so different from what we were used to. I even asked the nurses if we should be concerned, to which they laughed off as if I were joking, assuring me that he was perfectly healthy.  That night was probably the best night of sleep we had since we’d gotten to the hospital. The nurse was fantastic, and let us rest. Liam pretty much slept as much as a newborn baby can sleep on his first night. I woke up to breakfast being brought into the room, and started to panic that I hadn’t woke up before then. I felt guilty that I’d slept through the night and that Annie had to take care of Liam all night. That’s when she told me that she also got a full night’s sleep.  

After feeling refreshed and relieved, the doctor came in to give us the go-ahead to leave. It never felt so good to be home as it did that day. It had been a long three days, but it was well worth it in the end.

From the day he was born, Liam has been the exact opposite of Lilah. That’s not a good thing or a bad thing, but it certainly is nice to have two opposite personalities. Now that Liam is getting older, his favorite pastime is to lay around and smile. He doesn’t get too worked up, and is very content to occupy himself. One of my favorite things to do is watch Lilah interact with him. Sure, we can make him laugh, but not like his big sister can. She can merely walk into his line of sight, and he lights up. It truly is one of my favorite things to watch.  I can’t imagine what I did to be so lucky, but we certainly do have a perfect family.

Knocking The Dust Off

I can't believe I've left this blog stagnant for so long. I feel horrible for neglecting it. To be honest, I've had a serious case of writers block lately. I can't say an increasingly busy lifestyle hasn't contributed, if even only a little, but for the most part it's been my lack of motivation to actually write anything.

One of the main reasons I'm trying my hardest to break through that block is knowing I still have my letter to Liam to finish. When Lilah was born, Annie asked me to write a "letter" to her so that later, when she's older, she would be able to read the story of her birth. It's only fair that I do the same for Liam, of course. I've started the story, but encountered so many different blocks. I've started and scrapped it at least 3 different times now. My hope is that I can break through that wall by at least posting something.


So if nothing else, this post is to say - stay tuned. I will be posting the story of Liam soon. Now that I've decided to take the story and approach it from a different angle, I'm hoping it will become easier to complete. We will see...