Still in a hotel

... but at least it's closer to the office, and the rooms are in slightly better condition! It still takes two buses to get to and from work, though. We should be in more stable accommodations by next week.

The downside? The wireless network here sucks! When I walked into the lobby, a bunch of people were huddled over their laptops. The signal out there is the strongest. It took over an hour to send a file to my boss from my room last night, because my connection kept dropping. My room is just off the lobby, though, so I now have the garbage bin propping the door open, and I've scooted myself as close as I can to the door (I'd already changed into my pj's when I thought about going into the lobby, and I thought it might be in ad form to pad out there in flops and nightshirt). Not pretty, but it works. Better an inconvenient connection than the strong connection that didn't work correctly at the Hyatt.

I'm in Bristol

The redeye from Miami to London was thankfully not full, so I wasn't boxed into my seat, and my arrival in London Tuesday morning was uneventful -- wait for interns to arrive, wait for CEO to pick us up and take us to Bristol, check out office, check into hotel, eat dinner, zonk out.

My week was dedicated to finding housing. I thought the US had a lot of extraneous fees! For each application, we pay a credit check fee of at least 205 pounds, which we can't apply to other applications or dispute if it doesn't come out in our favor! Then there's a Council Tax, which tacks on another several hundred pounds to our monthly fees. Plus, the office is in Aztec West business park in North Bristol, too far from City Center, where housing suitable for our situation is abundant (commute would suck), so pickings are slim. In the meantime, 'home' is the Premier Inn Filton. No frills, but it's clean and the staff have been friendly.

So far, I like the office at Aztec West. The property management staff are friendly and helpful whenever I bombard them with questions. I share an office with the two interns, which is a nice change from Burlingame, where I sit in a huge suite by myself (our lease there is up in December and we'll downsize then). The COO took that photo of me today. If I'd known he was doing it, I would have made an effort to not look so goofy, but what the heck. The original he sent was a 1.3M file and when I opened the email, all I saw were wrinkles and age spots... aaahhhh!

No big plans for fun yet, although my friend is coming out from London in the morning. She's looking at one house with me and then we're heading to a pub. Well, I guess the pub part is fun!

Miami

Well, I survived 3.5 days in Miami with my family and my niece's wedding! I arrived disgustingly early Friday morning so I wouldn't miss the rehearsal dinner that night. When I walked into the Hyatt Regency Coral Gables somewhere around 6:30am, plunked down 4 huge bags filled with 2 months of junk, and started sifting through them and muttering to myself so I could drop off my bags and find somewhere to work until check-in time, the clerk very graciously allowed me to check in early, probably so he could get the muttering street urchin out of his lobby!

I walked into my room, a suite that does double duty as a conference conversion and was hit with a slight mildewy smell, probably due to the fact the bathroom fan was broken and I was in a hot, humid state. But I was exhausted and didn't care, so I climbed into the Murphy bed and zonked out for an hour or two. I worked a few hours that day and took the afternoon off to do the family thing, and then went to the rehearsal dinner that night.

Saturday I just relaxed and went for a little run, lifted some weights, got my nails done... and discovered my internet connection didn't work correctly -- I could send and receive plain text, but not hypertext. I spent over an hour on the phone with the hotel's computer support company, who concluded that everything was right on their side and the issue had to be my Macintosh. So I thought okay fine, I have to transmit paystubs anyway, I'll just use my Windows machine... except of course, it had the same problem! When I tried to get the support people back on the phone, they were gone for the day. Evil jerks.

My job on the day of the wedding was to keep my sister from stressing too much, because when she did, it stressed my niece. So I tried to keep things light and keep my sister distracted and help out when I could.

After hair and makeup, I looked at my niece and for the first time realized just how much like my sister she looked! My sister also had her hair done, pulled back into a loose bun that made her look like an asian Eva Peron. That's my sister and niece in the photo. My niece normally looks more like her biodad in terms of individual features. Go figure.

The ceremony was refreshingly short and the reception generous with the booze. It was fun! I met my niece's oboe teacher, snapped candid photos, did a little drunken dancing and of course, spent quality time with family, including my other niece I only see maybe once every few years (she lives in Puerto Rico and has a small child).

My flight from Miami to London wasn't until Monday evening, so I spent the day with family again. This time they wanted to take a bus tour of Miami and boat tour of "Millionaire Row," neither of which were really on my list of things I wanted to do before I die, but spending as much time as possible with family was, so I tagged along.

The tour people let us out of the bus in Little Havana and I ran away from the tour group to use the restroom at the McDonalds, then continued down the street to a little tienda to buy candy to bring on the plane with me. On the way back to the bus, a man on the street called me 'chinita,' and I gave my usual response to that remark, 'yo soy japonesa,' and the next thing I knew, the guy was walking back to the bus with me! His name is Santos, he's from Cuba and he thinks either Japanese women or my hair is pretty, or possibly both. That's about all I could get from the Spanish I know.

Our shuttle driver, Alfredo, dropped me off at a local hotel with a free shuttle to the airport (the Hyatt didn't have a free shuttle). Alfredo rocks! And the security people at MIA rock! Wow, they are so much nicer than the security people at SFO! Everyone was friendly and courteous, and because their attitude put the passengers at ease, they were also very efficient. Security agents at other airports should be trained by the folks at MIA.

Quick Update

I didn't have http access in Miami, and I'm paying something like 8 gbp per hour for access here in the hotel in Bristol. So... will catch up with everyone when I'm no longer homeless and have a reliable connection, or maybe if I have time during the work day this week!

Remembering

This coming Monday is Memorial Day in the US, a day commemorating those who died in our nation's service.  It usually takes the form of decorating the graves of those who died at war.

This morning I heard a story on NPR (National Public Radio, which isn't TRULY public, because they can receive large sums of money from private sponsors, but since they're non-profit they can call the sponsors "donors") about a man whose father took the time to remember people who had made a significant impact on his own life.  This was back in the day of canned coffee, and during the year, he would accumulate his empty cans in his garage and as the day approached, he'd decorate the cans and fill them with silk flowers.  On Memorial Day, he visited the graves of these people, many of whom no longer had friends or relatives alive to visit, and cleaned the graves, leaving one of the decorated cans at each.

After hearing this story, I thought about the people who have come in and out of my life, each leaving their mark, some large, some small, some full of joy, some pain, some I think of often, others not at all.  While not everyone has made a huge impact on me, they've all been significant to me in their own way.

But what I took away from my ruminations is that I need to focus on appreciating people while they are still in my life and letting go of those who have moved on.  Sometimes I wallow in regret, fret over situations beyond my control and care about the well-being of those who don't care about me a little too much.