Audrey's Blog

Good bye Celerity – Hello <company which specializes in authentication technologies>!

For anyone who just wants the punch line, here it is.  Chris’ last day at Celerity will be September 14th.  He’ll be starting at a company which specializes in authentication technologies September 17th. 

But come on, you know I have more to say about it than that!

Several weeks ago, Chris was contacted by a technical recruiter about a mechanical engineer position with a company which specializes in authentication technologies.  Chris knew the company.  Years ago at Celerity (which was Millipore then), one of this bosses left to go to this company which specializes in authentication technologies and tried to get Chris to go with him.  At the time, he decided to sit tight where he was.  Have you ever heard the saying that opportunity doesn’t knock twice?  Well, lucky for us, sometimes it does!

A little history is necessary to put this move in perspective.  Chris has worked for Celerity since 2001 with only a slight detour for 14 months while he explored his creative side at a sweat shop called ReelFX (http://www.reelfx.com/) as a computer animator.  Except that Celerity hasn’t always been Celerity.  In the 6 years since he started there, they’ve changed names 3 separate times (Millipore -> Mykrolis -> Entegris -> Celerity).  Basically, his company is a supplier to the semiconductor industry (i.e., Texas Instruments, Applied Materials), and the SC industry isn’t exactly known for its stability as is amply demonstrated by the succession of mergers, buy outs, and spin offs that led to the multiple name changes.  Unfortunately, things at the Allen facility of Celerity just aren’t looking very good.  In fact, a layoff is taking place as I type.  The strange part is that Chris is probably one of the safest people in the building with respect to job security.  He has a knowledge of the design and manufacture of the products they produce that pretty much surpasses any other mechanical engineer in the building.  (And his boss as much as admitted that.)  But, as someone so eloquently put it to me – the captain went down with the Titanic, too.  If he stayed around, he could probably be pretty secure in knowing he’d have a job for the next 18-24 months.  Not bad, but not good enough when someone else has something better to offer.  And, that brings us to present day …

It basically went like this - After talking to the recruiter, the job sounded interesting.  He interviewed.  They loved him (as in they called 4 hours after he left the interview to offer him the job).  He was excited about the position, and they gave him everything he wanted to leave Celerity.  So, there you go.  The only downside is that the company is in Addison/Far North Dallas which means that his 10 minute commute to Allen is history, but it’s still not nearly as bad as it could be.

This company which specializes in authentication technologies sounds pretty cool.  From their website: “As global leaders in product authentication, (this company which specializes in authentication technologies) is committed to the detection and removal of counterfeit and adulterated products from our society.”.  Their biggest clients are banks, pharmaceutical, alcohol, and tobacco companies – all industries that aren’t going to be slacking off anytime soon.  Think of it this way – they makes their money off of fear and greed.  I'm betting they’ll be making money (and a lot of it) for a long time.  All I have to say is Whoop!

Footnote: For security purposes there is no mention of the company's name in this blog post.  It's not a secret or anything, but considering the type of work that this company does there's no telling what unsavory, web-lurking characters might find it fascinating Chris works for this particular company.  Capisce?

Back to the Gym & Oprah Worth Watching

After having been out of commission for most of last week with bronchitis and missing spin class Monday night for BFS (sorry Monica!), it was finally back to the gym on Tuesday for my fat butt.  And, gawd, did it feel good!  I was actually a little late getting there.  If I'm going in the afternoon, I usually try to get there by 3:00 so that I can be leaving as the after work crowd starts to fill in.  I got on the treadmill right around 3:40.  No big.  Except that when Oprah came on a 4:00, it caught my attention.  I got sucked in and ended up clocking in 80 minutes while I finished watching the whole show.  Ugh!  My legs were a little tired.  But, it turned out to be a well spent extra 20 minutes.  Read on ...

I'm not an Oprah fan.  I know people who are might take that personally, but please don't.  She just doesn't "speak" to me the way she does to others.  But, lucky for me, she wasn't doing much of the talking on Tuesday.  A likable fellow named Dr. Oz was the main mouth of the day.  Apparently, I've been hiding under a rock somewhere during the past couple of years, because I didn't have a clue who this guys was.  All I knew was that he was saying things that really did SPEAK to me.  For those of you that, like me, didn't have any idea why this guy deserved to be on a national talk show, it turns out that he wrote a little book called "YOU: The Owner's Manual".  It's all about how to take care of yourself and make the right choices that will enable you to lead a long and healthy life.  I know, I know ... every self-help guru out there has some formula that leads to this long and healthy life.  But, this happens to be the one who speaks to me. 

The whole show was pretty much just an overview of one case study.  They applied the principles in this book to help a woman whose "real age" (or body age) was 56 but her calendar age was 42 to bring the two more inline with each other.  Quiet simply, the results were amazing.  It was a 90 day case study, and she looked like an entirely different woman.  It wasn't just weight loss (although she did lose about 1.5-2 lbs/week).  It was how she felt and acted and how her skin glowed and her hair shone (now, I feel like I'm just waxing poetic about this woman, but you get the idea).  Suffice it to say that I was hooked by the concept. 

So, as soon as the show was finished, I hopped off the treadmill and beat path over to Half Price Books.  (I LOVE that store!)  And, sure enough, I was able to pick up "YOU: The Owner's Manual" (YOM) as well as "YOU: On a Diet" (YOD).  I've started YOM, and I'm even more enthralled with these guys (Dr. Oz is partnered with Dr. Roizen).  Their writing style is witty and easy to read, but they still conveying the gravity of the points they're trying to make.  If you care about yourself even a little, this book is a must read!

I'll augment this with a little more information that is mostly unrelated to the gym or Oprah.  Chris and I have a college friend named Tina.  Fitness and nutrition is a passion for her.  We coined a phrase years ago concerning food - "Would Would Tina Do" (WWTD - No disrespect meant to our Lord).  I'm pretty sure she never knew that, but maybe she does now if she's reading.  ;-)  Anyway, Tina and I were talking last week, and she pulled up my blog.  She was amused with my antics in the gym and shortly after we got off the phone emailed me some fabulous information.  She specifically guided me to 2 resources: The Eat Clean Diet and Oxygen Magazine.  From what I can tell (since I have the book on order), The Eat Clean Diet is mainly focused on eliminating all of the bad and processed junk put in our bodies that contribute to the "real age" vs "calendar age" problem.  Oxygen Magazine (which I have picked up and love!) is a cut-the-fluff women's fitness magazine that complements all of these healthy discussions beautifully. 

I hope this whole post hasn't come off sounding like I'm on a soap box.  It wasn't intended that way.  Mostly, I'm just excited to share the information I've been discovering.  If someone else happens to benefit, then all the better!  :-)

Bowling for Soup ROCKED!

Monday night, Chris and I along with our friends Jim & Angie ventured down to the Dallas House of Blues to see one of my all time favorite bands, Bowling for Soup (aka BFS), in concert.  The concert & venue were a wonderful culmination to what was dubbed the 2nd and final show in the Shnook-ukah concert series. (The 1st show in the series was Daughtry & Nickelback.)  We started the evening with dinner at the House of Blues restaurant which was pretty tasty and then we got to "Pass the Line" (as in the line of people waiting in the 100 degree heat outside to get into the concert hall ... hah!) to get in before everyone else and stake out what turned out to be pretty good seats for the night.  (I love a well laid out plan! See that's me smiling about such a well laid out plan ...)

Three bands opened for BFS:

Army of Freshmen - The best way to describe them was spastically energetic & oddly entertaining.  I’m certainly intrigued enough to investigate their music.  They have a very BFS sound and presence.

Quietdrive - I'll never be able to listen to their mostly mediocre music without picturing an emaciated beanpole who thinks he's the next Mick Jagger.  Their cover of Cyndi Lauper's time after time might have actually been their best song of the set.  What does that say about them?  I'll let you decide.

Melee - What's to say?  IMHO, they pretty much sucked, and all I felt like I could do I was pray for it to stop.

And then there was Bowling For Soup.  Eeeeeee!  (That was my excited squeal.)  I’ve been listening to them for a little more than 2 years.  They completely won me over with their down to earth lyrics combined with an incredibly upbeat punk-rock sound, and I’ve been a raving fan every since.  It doesn’t hurt that they’re good ol’ Texas boys (hailing from Denton County – just north of DFW) who happen to be just about the same age as us.  They opened with Punk Rock 101 (very apropos I thought).  I had no idea what to expect from their live performance, but let’s just say I was bowled over (oh, I know – that was just bad, wasn’t it?).  Their sound was incredible, and their stage presence and rapport with the audience was by far the best that I’ve ever seen.  The smaller venue was definitely to their advantage.  I don’t think they’d do quite as well in a large area setting. Their stage presence is such a huge part of their appeal and that would be lost in a larger venue.

Anyway, I digress.  They played an hour and 15 minute set which seemed to fly by.  They played most of my favorites: 1985, High School Never Ends, I’m Gay,  A Friendly Goodbye, and, of course, Ohio (come Back to Texas) during which they unveiled the BFS Texas flag.  

Part of what I love about their music is that you just can’t help but want to sing along, and this is one of the few times when a band pulled the “let us hear you sing it” that I wasn’t totally ticked off (feeling like they had completely copped out since I had paid good money to hear them sing it!).  It was awesome to sing totally off key but as loud as I could (considering my throat/voice still aren’t 100% after that bought of bronchitis last week).

I will definitely pay good money to see them again (and again and again and again … well, you get the idea).  ;-)

A Photography Studio in the Making

One of my most neglected hobbies is my photography.  I love playing with my camera, but I quite simply haven’t had much time to devote to it in a quite a while.  In fact, it’s probably been more than a month since I’ve actually had possession of my Nikon D100.  My girlfriend Angie has been putting it to much better use documenting her travels this summer.  (You can check out some of her handy work @ http://angieflinn.typepad.com/photos/summertime_2007/index.html &  http://angieflinn.typepad.com/photos/2007wcps/ .)

A while back, I had a brainstorm to put the “children’s retreat” in our house to better use until it lives up to its name.  It would make a great photography studio.  There is a long wall where I could hang sheets as backdrops and a wonderful set of north facing windows which are great for natural light photography.  After visiting which our neighbors Matt & Aimee who recently had their 4th child (Yikes ! And when asked they do admit to knowing how it keeps happening.  Go figure.) and perusing the photos they just recently had taken of the kiddos, I was inspired once again to convert the children’s retreat into my photography studio. 

Having a rare free Saturday night, I decided that now was as good of time as any to get started on the conversion.  Of course, the first step is to clean up the children’s retreat.  Unfortunately, it had become somewhat of a catch all for all kinds of random crap.  Thankfully, when I put my mind to it, I can tear through a project like that in a fairly short amount of time.  The result is a mostly empty room that just needs a couple of hooks in the wall from which to the backdrops.  I really should have taken a before picture, but if you’d like to hazard a guess at what it might have looked like, you can check out my last post (My Dirty Little Secret).  That’ll give you a small clue.

My goal is to have the studio ready so that I can offer to take Meredith’s 2 month pictures (Matt & Aimee’s new little girl) on 9/17.  I’ll keep you posted on my progress.

My Dirty Little Secret

When you come to visit us for the first time, we'll probably offer to give you a tour of the house.  We're pretty proud of it.  We built it from the ground up a little over 2 years ago.  We spent 5 months of our lives obsessing over every detail.  Okay, we obsessed over every detail we thought about.  After having helped several clients build homes, I've since realized that we overlooked a couple of things, but overall, we did a pretty good job.  But, I digress ...

There is one room that we might not immediately offer to show you and will probably vaguely wave at and say "that'll be the nursery when we get around to it".  That's what we affectionately now call "the box room".  Truth be known, it's the room where I store all of the empty boxes that I can't bare to part with (it's a strange quirk, but to know me is to love me, right?) and where we throw all the crap that we don't necessarily want to deal with when it needs to leave its current home and should be either (1) thrown away, or (2) found a proper home but we're too lazy to figure out where that is.  That room, my friends, is my dirty little secret. 

Just for kicks, I'll show you what it looks like so that the next time your over to our house you'll know what's in the "nursery".  :-)

 

Recovered - Almost.

After 5 days of antibiotics, the worst of the bronchitis seems to have passed.  The cough still lingers but isn’t nearly as bad as it was.  I almost felt human Thursday.  Close enough that I ventured back to the gym on Thursday afternoon for a Zone 2 workout.  It felt pretty good.  I was a little more tired than usual afterwards but that’s to be expected.  What I didn’t expect was to wake up on Friday (yesterday) morning with a headache so bad that I could barely pick my head up off the pillow.  Ugh!  I took a handful (not really!) of Advil & Tylenol and went back to bed for an hour or so.  When I got up, the headache had receded enough that I could get dressed and get into the office.  I had a relocation proposal that had to get submitted that day.  I got the proposal done and came home mid-afternoon, but the headache never fully subsided.  I took another combo hit of Advil & Tylenol and went to bed.  And, guess what – I woke up this morning with the same blasted headache.  Needless to say, I didn’t make it to spin class this morning (if you’re counting, that’s 2 classes I missed this week). 

I wish I understood if these headaches.  Are they the lingering effects of the bronchitis, maybe the antibiotics (which I finished yesterday), or totally unrelated???  Thankfully, today’s headache has subsided a little more quickly than yesterdays.  If I’m feeling better this afternoon, I’m going to venture to the gym for a light workout.  Wish me luck!

I still feel like crap!

Warning - this is simply a big fat pity party for myself.

I was supposed to get a good night's sleep last night with that lovely narcotic cough syrup, but oh, no.   Apparently, that was too much to hope for.  It didn't quite knock me on my butt the way I had hoped.  Instead it just made me woozy enough to be sleepy but still alert enough to jump at any odd noise around the house.  Ugh!  And, so much for the "suppressant" part of the cough syrup.  I *still* woke up coughing my head off at 3am.  Which did absolutely no good for the headache that I went to bed with (did I mention that wonderful additive to this little recipe of misery?) that was still raging strong when I woke up sweating at 7am. (Oh, yeah - we lost power around 6:30.  Just freaking great.)

So, here I am - aching chest, sore throat, and pounding head - praying for the antibiotic to kick in soon and trying to get some work done.  (For anyone who has ever felt resentful of working for "the man" - at least be grateful for sick leave.  The lack paid sick leave/vacation is one of the few pitfalls of self-employment.)  Wish me luck.

Daughtry & Nickelback

It's been a very long time since a concert has come to town that could entice us to fight crowds of people, damage our hearing,  and having spent a good chunk of change to do so.  But, when I heard on the radio that Daughtry and Nickleback (2 of my favorite bands!) were coming to Pizza Hut Park in Frisco (about 15 minutes from our house) just a week after my birthday, I knew we HAD to get tickets.  It ended up that us and 10 other folks (including Jim and Angie) got tickets together.  The concert didn’t start until 7pm.  It was a little warm when we got there around 6:30, but the sun was quickly setting.  By the time the warm up band was finished and Daughtry took the stage, we were being treated to a beautiful sun set (since we were facing west) and a light breeze was picking up.  Not a bad night for a concert!

Puddle of Mudd – These guys were the warm up band, and I was completely unimpressed.  Their sound was okay, but the lead singer was far more impressed with himself than we were.  His feeble attempts to energize the audience were met with only the most luke warm of reactions, and at one point, he even forgot that it was Daughtry coming on after him instead asking us if we were excited for Finger 11.  Geez.  I’d say they’re destinted to be the “warm up band” for a very long time.

Daughtry – OMG, they ROCKED the park for almost 40 minutes!  They sounded incredible live (which is always a huge fear of ours – spend good money to see a band live only to find out that a sound board in a recording studio is their only salvation).  The band put on an awesome show, and (bonus!) Chris Daughtry (the lead singer of the band – for those not familiar) looked seriously HOT.  When he launched into one of their biggest hits “Home”, I was reminded of one of the reasons I find him to be so incredibly sexy – He is reported to be a devoted husband and father (to one step-daughter and one adopted son).  In this age of celebrity misconduct, it’s refreshing to be able to admire someone’s talent AND character.  Does this mean that I have to admit to a certain degree of maturity?  My Chris pointed out one other interesting thing about his performance … he didn’t feel the need to curse once during the entire set.  Not that cursing at a rock concert bothers me, but I choose to believe that his abstinence from cursing says something about him.  He also had a better talent for working the crowd that the Puddle of Mudd dude.  Overall, I was thoroughly thrilled to have finally gotten to see them live!

On a side note – It was a definite sign of the times when the lights dimmed at one point during the show and the crowd would have normally taken out lighters in a quintessentially concert moment most folks instead reached for their cell phones to create the effect.  Good that so many people have apparently quit smoking, I guess?  But strange none the less.

Thankfully, none of the set changes took more than about 20 minutes. (We have waited as long as an hour for a set change at a concert.)  So by 9:00, the headline act was taking the stage.

Nickelback – The show opened with most of us almost crapping our pants – seriously.  They decided that they way to catch out attention in an otherwise dark venue was to crack off something sounding way too much like a gun shot.  When it happened again and the band took the stage amid some impressive pyrotechnics, we were relieved and excited all at once.  They opened with a pounding rendition of their hit “Animals”.  The entire show was a phenomenal compilation of stellar audio/visual compilation and energizing pyrotechnics.  Oh, and the band wasn’t half bad either!  ;-)  Again, we weren’t disappointed.  They sounded incredible!  Chad Kroeger was awesome on lead vocals and guitar (and not just strum-along guitar … we’re talking some riff-rippin’ guitar!).  I’m beyond impressed with anyone who can excel at what I can only image is the musical equivalent of rubbing their belly and patting their head at the same time (and I can’t even do that).  Chad isn’t the cutest thing to ever grace a concert stage, but he obviously has the charisma to charm and energize the crowd at the same time. 

Note to Monica – During Animals & Too Bad my legs were twitching!  They were trying to pedal as fast as they could, but there were no pedals.  Hah!

The only damper on the evening was the fact that I was steadily feeling worse and worse.  I started with a slightly annoying cough last Wednesday that just got worse through the week and weekend.  I woke up Sunday morning with almost no voice left from coughing all night, but I just couldn’t bring myself to give up the outing that we had been looking forward to for weeks.  So, I rested up most of the day and held up pretty well until the concert was over.  Then I realized that I had only made things worse.  (A trip to my MD today confirmed a case of bronchitis.  Ugh!  Z-Pac and narcotic cough syrup here I come.)

All of this can be summarized very simply – Daughtry and Nickelback ROCKED!  Given the chance, I’d pay money to see them again. 

What does 60 minutes on a treadmill look like?

Well, a little something like this:

• 2 bottles of water – 60 minutes is a long time! 
• Crackberry – Who knows when that Million Dollar call/email will come in?  It is a Zone 2 workout (easy breathing/easy talking).  I could take a call if I had to. :-)
• MP3 Player – In this case, Chris’ Sensa.  It has an FM tuner on it (where as my iPod doesn’t).  I can listen to Russ Martin (a talk radio show to which I am secretly addicted) if I’m there in the afternoon or listen to one of the tv stations broadcasting in the gym.
• Book – Thank God that I don’t get motion sick!  I can read and walk without wanting to toss my cookies.  It’s a great way to satisfy my obsession.

Seriously, this whole “base” workout thing has really made a difference in the way I look at my trips to the gym.  I wasn’t “scheduled” to go to the gym today, but a little bit after lunch, I was thinking about what else my afternoon held, figured that it wasn’t anything that couldn’t wait, and decided that a trip to the gym was what I needed.  That hasn’t happened in years – if ever.  It’s amazing what a little understanding can do for a person’s frame of mind.  Now that I understand that I don’t have to leave the gym feeling whipped to have actually accomplished something, I feel freer to go on the spur of the moment.  (“Freer” isn’t quite the right word, but I can’t figure out what it should be, so “freer” it is for now.)  Again, let me emphasis if you haven’t had an O2 Map Test (or whatever they call it at your chosen place of sweat), do it!  You owe it to yourself!  It is quite simply the best thing I’ve done for myself in a very long time.

Getting back in the speaking saddle

For several years, Toastmasters was a very, very consuming part of my life.  Honestly, a little too consuming, but I learned many wonderful lessons that have served me well since then.  I'm still a member of the original club I joined back in 2001 (Word Wranglers) and try my very best to make it to and participate in meetings on a regular basis.  However, one thing I have not done recently is given a prepared speech.  I simply haven't made the time to write or practice a speech even though I've had several speech topics in mind. 

For this week's meeting (we meet every Wednesday at 11:30), Chris was the Toastmaster of the Day which means that it was his job to put together the agenda and run the meeting.  At the very last minute, 1 of the 2 speakers for the meeting backed out.  I had originally intended to volunteer to speak but, yet again, didn't make the time to prepare.  I'm not sure what possessed me to do it, but I raised my hand and proceeded to volunteer to give a speech completely off the cuff.  Okay folks - imagine this - volunteering to speak for 5-7 minutes with only the vaguest thought of an outline of what you want to say.  More than a little terrifying, right?  Well, that's exactly what I did (and being able to confidently do that is one of those tremendously useful skills that I've learned during my time in Toastmasters).  Here's the real kicker ... While not trying to sound egotistical, I'm considered one of the better speakers in my club (sad, huh?).  I've been in the club for 6+ years and have earned my Distinguished Toastmaster award (the highest educational designation in the program).  I've competed in a few speech contests and have placed at the district level in 2 of them (out of 3500 members in our district).  To say that I have a little bit of pressure on me to perform when I speak at our club feels like a bit of an understatement.  (Is it possible that I might be getting to the real reason why I haven't spoken in a while? Hmmmm.)  Anyway ... I digress. 

The speech topic I had rattling around in the void between my ears was titled "RTFM".  The speech opens with a story about me trying to upgrade my laptop to Windows Vista from XP and botching it up severely because I didn't RTFM - Read The Factory Manual.  (And, yes, that was good for a loud laugh!)  I go on to talk about the value of reading whatever "factory" manual might be out there for your particular project, problem, or challenge.  I think the way I put it was it doesn't matter if it's the Bible, the Koran, or the latest self-help best seller it's highly likely that in the history of humanity *someone* has gone before you in your endeavor and we'd be foolish not to learn from their successes and mistakes.  I inject several other anecdotes of things that have happened to me and things that my audience might have encountered in their daily lives.  Over all, not a bad message if I do say so myself.  And, aalthough I was waiting very impatiently for the green timing light to come on (indicating that I had met my minimum of 5 minutes), all in all I feel like it was a good effort of getting back in the proverbial speaking saddle. 

Unfortunately for me, the hard part was still to come ... accepting the complements of my fellow club members.  I think the problem is that I understand that I'm a proficient speaker.  Probably even better than average.  But everything is relative.  When you have friends who make part of their living as professional speakers and hold titles such as the 2003 World Champion of Public Speaking (i.e., Angie & Jim), it's hard to not make seemingly ungrateful comments (like "oh, trust me, my speech wasn't *that* good) in response to the complements of the less experienced Toastmasters.  It's an insult to their judgment and came seem falsely humble. Our goal in Toastmasters is to build people up and to never tear them down.  Insulting them like this is definitely not constructive.    To them and relative to the speaking abilities of the members my club, I really am that good (again, with no ego intended).   

So, accepting the praise of a job well done is definitely a skill that I need to cultivate.  I guess that just goes to prove that all still have something to learn.