Riding with the Muggles

I’m starting on a bit of an adventure today. I’m taking the bus to work. I know this isn’t probably a big deal and loads of people do it, but it is something I am starting to do.

Dan, my co-worker who I catch a lift with has selfishly (kidding) moved out of where he was living to set up a bachelor pad of his own. The result of this being that when the car is needed by Sarah to run errands and scoot kids around etc, I need to find a different way to get to work. I am seriously seeing this as blessing in disguise. I mean, there will be no excuses for doing not doing exercise. It is really easy to fall out of bed into your car, drive up to the office door and do the same in reverse at the end of the day. I have just spoken to the bus driver and he says that it is fine to put a push bike underneath the coach, so I will be able to cycle to the bus stop and then take it from there.

I helped Dan move on Saturday, which was a good laugh. He even bought us lunch to say thanks.

As I write this I am actually on the bus. I love the fact that I can hook my laptop up to my phone and get in the internet while moving. (that said I will need to put it away if anybody come near me… he bus is quite empty just now.
Zack has this box car race today. This is where they have a race wearing cardboard boxes decorated to be like race cars. They called it the kindy500… you know, like the Indy 500 race. I thought I may have over done it in helping him because we sprayed it and did some really cool things we card and hot glue. When I took it in the other day there were some there how had gone all out and put sponsor stickers on them as well. I didn’t feel too bad after that.

Having all this extra glue around gave me an idea. I peeled back all the duct tape that was holding the bumper together and used hot glue. I have to say it worked a treat, and isn’t as ropey looking as the tape. It is really solid now. The down side is that I got bitten by a few bugs while I was fixing it.

It is sooooooo hot here just now, with high humidity. You know when you go on holiday and they open the doors of the plane, and it feels like an over door opening… well that what happens each time you go out of an air conditions shop door (I love it).

Our air conditioning is out at the moment. Apparently the kids stuck a stick in the fan and a puff of smoke came out. Sarah was very cross with the kids as they have been told hundreds of times not to go near it. The guy came out to look at it, but I’m sure I will find out what the upshot of that is sometime today.

We are off to St Louis on Friday and I am really looking forward to having a break from work. Its good and all that but it I looking forward to seeing a bit more of the country/culture and spending time with the family away from the damn TV. It is quite a long journey but I got some of those DVD players that strap to the back of the head rests (that I fully Intend on taking back when I done with them).

One thing that is really good here, is that if you pay by card and you return the goods in “original packaging for resale” they will take it back now questions asked. Result!

changing my vocabulary

I am sure that this wouldn’t be a problem in most professions, but when you are an interactive developer (or at least that’s what it says on my business card) there are certain things you are used to that suddenly become, well, different. The first shock is the keyboard. The pound sterling sign is gone, the@ sign is now above the 2 and the enter key is half the size as there is a button with a \ on it just above it!

OK, I get it. A mountain out of a mole hill right? I’m just moaning about a stupid keyboard… I have managed to get used to the keyboard is not the main problem.

When I worked in the UK I knew that:

• # is called a hash
• ( ) are called brackets
• { } are called curly bracket
• [ ] are called square brackets
• ! is called an exclamation mark
• . is called a full stop

The first time this came to bite me in the arse was when I was setting up my phone. “When you have entered you 4 digit code press the pound key” came the automated voice. I go looking for £, but see nothing. I ended up googling what a pound looked like to find out it is the # sign.

On Thursday last week I was (nerd alert) shouting across the room what code needs to be written. “You need to type this dot that open then close brackets.” What was written was “this.that{}” when what I was meaning is “this.that()”.

It turns out that in America:

• # is called a pound
• ( ) are called parentheses
• { } are called curly brackets
• [ ] are called square brackets
• ! is called a bang
• . is called a period

I think I have got my head around it now, but I does catch me off guard every once in a while. I was told a password the other day that was something along the lines of “wi!!son” but as I wrote what was being said it came out as “wibangbangson”.

I’m getting it now… It only took six months! (bang)

DQ Fun

So today I thought I would give myself a little treat. I have been working on two projects that went live this week. The Tropicana mobile site (seen by going to Tropicana.com using an iPhone, or similar) and the rice-a-roni.com website.

There is a Dairy queen just at the top of the street where we live. I guess you would describe dairy queen a bit like McDonalds, but instead of a large selection of burgers, there is a selection of ice cream. They have savory stuff too but it is mainly ice cream.

As I came home today I could see it was busy, and thought to myself I might pop in there and have an ice cream…. But I’ll do this after dinner. Doing it that way I will only go if I am not full. I love the idea of going out for ice-cream. It is not something you generally do in there UK, but it is quite a common occurrence here. My rule of thumb is this: If you are willing to walk (not drive) the ice cream place you can have it. If you’re not you don’t. At the very least, doing it this way you force yourself to do some exercise to get it.

When I got in the there it was heaving! There was a line of about 10 people in front of me, as well as the people who had ordered and where waiting for the food to be prepared to take it away… Not to mention the line of car circling the building waiting at the drive thru window to get served. The way it generally works is that one person takes the order and the cash and somebody else preps the food.

It was really loud in there and the lady taking my order could hardly hear was I was saying.

“I really sorry, I don’t hear so well. I’m Sikh so it is difficult to understand” she says.

“Don’t worry about it, I’m British and nobody understands what I say either. It sounds like we have a common problem” I say as she is taking my order.

“I much prefer your voice to the yap yap of….”

“CAN I HAVE THE ONE WITH THE ORIO TOPPING” I say, interrupting her before she gets a chance to finish her sentence since we were stood in a full restaurant.

The next thing I do is pay. Let me introduce you to a very childish game I like to play in take away restaurants. When you pay the cashier asks you your name. The first time this happened to me I though the girl was being a bit forward, but then I realized that it was to call it out when my food was ready. OK, so here are the rules of the game:

1. Pay cash. If you have a credit card they can read your name right off it, and it can cause problems (trust me on this, I learnt the hard way)

2. Make sure the restaurant is busy

3. Say it quickly, but spell it slowly.

When you food is ready they call out your name. So far I have got away with the posh English double barreled name of “Harry bool-larks” but bollocks doesn’t mean much here (made me laugh though) and “Paul Mikeoc” that a few people looked up at.

I’m going to up my game and give a Russian name of “Oliver Clothsof”.

Louisville Kentucky Trip.

I want to take advantage of seeing as much of the states as I can. So far we have been to Illinois, Ohio and of course Indiana. Today I wanted to head south to Kentucky! Home of the… well… colonel sanders and KFC (although technically he was from Indiana, but they don’t shout about that much).

We went to a place called Louisville which is right on the other side of the Indiana/Kentucky border. Once we got there we headed for the Louisville Science Center where they had a robots exhibit. Zack loved it.

It was a nice sunny day with an experience at a place called white castle that left me thinking we really were the other side of the tracks.

Gradually and gradually we are going further out to experience the different parts of America. We have booked for a holiday in North Carolina, so I think it will be a real challenge entertaining the kids for more than 10 hours of sitting in the back seat of the car.

Dora The Explorer... Bullets... Dora the Explorer... Bullets

This is what happened in WalMart yesterday.

Roll a six to start

It seems that over time credit is starting to build. More specifically, credit card companies and insurance companies now have our address and are bombarding us with junk mail. So far capital one has sent out 8 letters in 6 weeks. That is just taking the piss.

Luckily there is an unsubscribe number you can call to stop them sending this crap in the mail.

I rang it to unsubscribe and I was told that it was a voice activated out of hours automated system.

"Hello, Press one for English ... Para Español, por favor, pulse dos." - The voice says

"1" - I Press

We have detected you are calling from a land line. Would you like us to look up your address based on your phone number? Say press “1” or say “Yes” alternatively say “no” or press “2”

Yes

I didn't catch that

1

Your address is xxxxxxxxxxxx

Say yes or press 1 to confirm

1

Stay the name you wish to unsubscribe followed by the spelling, for example for John you would say John – J. O. H. N.

Sarah – S. A. R. A. H.

Sharron ?

Sarah - es - ay -are - ay - haytch

Sorry I didn't catch that

Sarah - eeesss - aaaaayyy - aareee - aaaayyyyy - aych

Sarah?

Yes... Get in!

Gretchen?

No no no - it was fine before.

Gretchen spelt – G. R. E. T. C. H. E. N.

NO - it's Sarah

Sharron spelt – S. H. A. R. R. O. N. is this correct? Press 1 for yes or say no.

No -

What name please.

Sarah - es - ay -are - ay - aytch (without the h sound. Remember they say herbs like erbs here)

Sorry I didn't catch that

Sarah - eeesss - aaaaayyy - aareee - aaaayyyyy - aych!

Sarah?

Yes

Thank you.... Sarah has now been unsubscribed.

Have a nice day!

Click

Job eventually Done

You can hear it in my accent when I talk… I'm an Englishman trying to rent a property

On my run around Carmel at the weekend I found a little house that looked, well, ok. There were some bits that needed fixing up bur I figured it was worth give the number a call. Last Monday I rang the number to see what the deal is. The voice on the other end of the phone was a Hispanic lady who said it was a three bed house with a rental price that was in our budget.

Result! I arranged to see it on Tuesday. Before going around I rang her up to be told that she had to go to hospital with her kids and she couldn’t make it. Fair enough let's do Thursday at seven.

Today we went around at seven and it was hammering down with rain. Not a sprinkling, but rather a full on down pour. I kind of figured that this is the best time to go because if there are leaky roofs or things wrong with the property, today would be the day that they would show up.

The first thing we noticed was a lack of drainage in the garden and the four of us found ourselves jumping on these raised stepping stones to get to the main porch. I thought to myself “it’s a bit odd them leave all the building equipment on the porch in the rain, but there you go I guess.

Ding dong - WOOF bloody WOOF.

I turn to look at my darling daughter looking into the window as a Great Dane dog slobbers all over the window that she is standing next to. "Come away, too don't want to scare it" I say to K to distract her as the drool from this huge animal slides down window.

" sí" says the little man who answered the door

"Hello, I'm here to look at the property as we are likely to rent it out" I say

“Er, I am laying floors at the moment and it is a real mess in here.” Says the man.
Well we have an appointment with Daniela at seven... don't worry I'll give her a call.

I ring her number while stood in the pouring rain to be told that she has rented it out to her brother.
Great! Thanks for the heads up on that one... Silly cow.

I have to say this is becoming a bit of a common theme here. I ring up an agent or private owner and they take my details and don't get back to me. I'm starting to think it is due to the way I talk.

I think I might have to get one of my coworkers to ring to pretend to be me to get me the appointments.

I guess in hindsight it was a good job that we didn't go for this house. I mean if she is this scatty before anybody moves in, can you image the trouble we would get in if we had moved in and we were unable to get hold of her if there was no hot water or a flood.