Images from the apartment

I finally managed to upload the images I took of our new apartment with all the boxes. Now all boxes are emptied and just waiting for me to call the movers to come pick them up, and we've got a book case for most of the stuff in the living room.

Tomorrow I'll be off on another trip to Ikea, to pick up a few more book cases and a dining table. We can't get our head around what furniture we really want, and basically just need something. We should have brought more of our old furniture, and thus saved our selves from having to get most of it again, but on the other hand most of the stuff needed replacement...

At the moment I've really tired, after a few longer days at work. There's still no news on when I'll be going on site, but I've started working on more specific tasks. Today I started looking at some of the support issues, mostly to learn more about the system but also to help out with the outstanding tasks. I surely learned a lot, but it was a bit frustrating to use half the day just trying to recreate the problem. It wasn't only figuring out what to do to retrace the steps taken to find the problem, but also struggling with a server placed in Dallas. There's simply too much lag on something like that to keep me at peace :) I guess I've just gotten used to quick response times etc.

As soon as the tumble dryer finishes, I'm off to bed...

The joy of a different tax burden

I just got my first full pay check today - not bad considered what I got in Denmark :) The cost is a bit different here in London, but when all things are considered, it's really not that big a difference from living in Copenhagen. Except that a 45min commute to the center of Copenhagen would most likely mean a lower rent than what I'm paying in Wimbledon...

Anyway, doing a bit of math reveals that I've actually gone up about 37% in net pay! even though my salary before tax has only risen about 8,5%... I wouldn't say my salary in Denmark was all that bad, but if I take my net pay, adding what I would probably have paid in tax, this salary level would put me in the group of about 1% of Danes with an income over 500.000! Not bad for someone who just turned 31 ;)

Chocolate Filled Tortillas

I'm starting to feel at home at our new place, and have managed to unpack a few more boxes. Nothing is really "in it's place" yet, but it will probably take some time to reach that stage.

The only thing is, that I'm effectively broke at the moment. With the money I took out while in Dallas, and the money we've used on the apartment, I've crossed the magic 15000 DKK limit of my visa. This basically means that I've spent to much money in the last 30 days, and they won't let me spend any more. I can't use my visa anywhere, not even in stores, and I just spend my last 47p on a can of diced tomatoes for my dinner last night.

Don't worry mom, It's not as bad as it sounds :) I managed to buy some food before my cash ran out, so I've still got enough for dinner for a couple of days. I thought I had enough for breakfast as well, but for some strange reason I forgot to put the milk back into the fridge yesterday, so I had to throw it out last night. What that means though, is that I had to think of what else I could eat for breakfast, and that's why i ended up eating chocolate filled tortillas. Heated slightly on a frying pan and with a spread of really nice chocolate spread, it turned out to be not only filling, but also quite nice.

Even though I can't use my visa, I'm still not completely lost. On Saturday I took out about 2000 DKK and put them into my new bank account. I had expected to pay my TV license within a few days, and wanted to make sure there were enough money in the account, but apparently I don't have to pay it until the middle of March, so all I have to do is find an HSBC branch and get some money out. I tried yesterday, when I discovered that my card didn't work, but since I haven't yet received my debit card, I need to get into the bank where I can use one of their machines with a touchscreen so I can key in my account number. Now I just need to find a bank near by...

Oh yeah, I took some pictures of our apartment (or more likely the mess in our apartment) and will post them as soon as I can. This might not be for a few days, as I still haven't heard from Virgin Media about the cable and internet I ordered.

Blogging From the E61 Phone

My last post looks a bit odd, but that it because it's posted from my mobile phone :) Aparently I should have put in some HTML tags, but I can't find them on the phone's keyboard. On top of that, there's no spell checker build into the browser, so my spelling is probably awful...At least I could post something. Did I mention that there's no open wireless networks near the apartment?

Moving In

Yesterday was a good day. The movers came with all our stuff, and i could finally move into the apartment. Though dinner was really simple, just tortellini with creme cheese, it was a nice feeling to be able to cook again. Now i just need my wife here so I can cook together with her. I also managed to open a bank account and hopefully I'll also get a credit card. I had tried to open an account with Allience & Liecester in one of their branches, but was told that the process would take a couple of weeks! I can't wait for that, as I can't order internet and TV before I have an account... Luckily HSBC was much more helpfull. Not only could I get an account that actually pays interrest (and has travel insurance etc.) but they created it in about 15min and at the same time offered me a credit card. I know credit cards can be the root to all evil, but as I'll be spending money that I will later get be expenced, I would like as much credit on that as possible. I can tell from our savings that i haven't yet recieved compensation for my trip to Dallas, and it would be nice to have our private funds seperate from my work expenses. This morning was my first trip to the office from Wimbledon, and naturally it took me longer than expected. The train from Wimbledon to Waterloo was completely packed, and I had to stand up all the way. Not that it was bad to stand up, as I sit down most of the day now, but there were barely room to read the paper. It's like that on the tube, but I hadn't expcted it on the regular rail services. Then again, it is the fastest way to get tio central London, so it shouldn't be a surprise that the trains are packed. I found a bus that would take me the rest of the way towards the office, and got there only 5min later than i had wanted to. The only problem was that I seem to have emptied my oyster card once again. It's not exactly cheap to travel in London, but it seems that the company will pay for local transport into the office, so I'm getting a travelcard when I get back to the Wimbledon. That should also cover the bus ride from Waterloo to the office, which my daily round trip ticket doesn't, and that way save me 5-10min on the entire jurney. It's still not clear how long I'll be in the office, since the project I was schedules to be on has been postponed even further. I might get a few weeks in Dublin, before going to Gloucester as planned, which could be nice. Dublin is one of those places I haven't been to yet, but really want to see. Only time will tell where I end up.

The Last Week of Training

I completely forgot to blog about my last week in Dallas. It wasn't only because of most classes ending late, but also due to our increased drinking :)

Last Saturday we went to an Irish pub in Mockingbird to watch rugby. one of my new colleagues used to play professional rugby and wanted to see the match between England and Scotland. Luckily for us who joined him, he explained what was going on during the game, and why various things happened. It's a really tough sport, with none of the theatrics of football (both American and soccer). If someone goes down, they just keep playing, and if the blood doesn't stop flowing from an injury, the player is temporarily replaced until he's stitched back together. Actually a really great sport to watch, as the speed of the game is almost unrivaled. Only hockey is faster I think.

Anyway, we get to the bar at 9am, given the time difference, kickoff was at 10. I choose to start off with a cup of coffee, but later joined the others in having a beer. We got a few beers each before the match was over. Since the bar wasn't going to show any more interesting events, we decided to head home, and meet up later for dinner. Dinner brought a few more beers, and since there wasn't anything else to do, we went to a pub and after that a bar. When the two others decided to meet up with some of the other people from the office at a place far from the hotel, I gave up trying to keep up and went back to the hotel. Apparently they both got really plastered, and didn't look all that hot on Sunday.

Sunday was Superbowl Sunday, which we naturally had to see - not for the game but rather the commercials. The game started out really good, we were Bears fans at that point, but even the commercials went downhill from there... We didn't have that many beers, as we were all fairly tired - the two others more than me though :)

The last week of training was filled with business topics, and very little time in the application. It didn't matter that much, as I think we've been through most of it anyway. All topics were naturally fairly light, as it would have taken weeks to go into details with every single subject. That's why we have a few weeks before we're sent to a client; then we have time to go into details with the areas of the system and business that we will be working with. We had a few late night as we all had to do a small demo of part of the system, and there wasn't any room in the regular schedule. But hey, we didn't have anything better to do.

Tuesday we went for happy hour in the downstairs bar. Wednesday there was the usual happy hour at the hotel, so we had a few beers there before we went our and had a really nice steak. Probably the best stake I've had. Thursday we went downstairs for the happy hour again, as there we a couple of people from the training class who flew home Friday. On Friday a couple of us had talked about trying to have an easy night with time to pack - the Canadians had to leave for the airport at 8am on Saturday - but somehow we ended up downstairs again. This time a few people from the office joined us as it was our last evening in Dallas. Having had quite a few beers each, we drove up to the pub at Mockingbird (people from Dallas doesn't seem to take all this about not drinking and driving all that serious) where we continued drinking. I got back to the hotel together with another Dane and the two Canadians, who still hadn't packed, around 12pm and was glad that i didn't have to get up in a few hours to pack :)

I've already told you about the flight home, so this was just a quick summary of the week before that.

P.s. this was written on my E61. It was a bit fiddly to start with, but after a while i got used to the keyboard and typed away fairly fast. Not at fast as on a regular sized keyboard, but fast enough that I didn't mind writing a full blog story.

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Back in London

I'm finally back in London. No more eating at the same four or five restaurants, and no more hotel room/cabin fever. It's nice to see people in the streets again, and the coffee shops are both open in the weekend and until after 6pm! The difference is as apparent as Dallas is boring, which probably says more about Dallas than the difference ;) With the prospect on having to eat out until our stuff is delivered to our new apartment, I'm also glad to be back where there is a new (and larger) selection of restaurants, fast food joints and a total of three larger-to-huge supermarkets within 10min walk. Plus, I feel much safer walking to the 24-hour supermarket at 11pm than I did walking to the small one in Dallas, which closes around 6-7pm.

Even though we haven't gotten our apartment yet, and my wife won't be joining me until Thursday, this already feels like coming home...

The flight was close to being nice. The plane wasn't full so i had an empty seat next to me, I saw a good movie with Robin Williams and actually managed to get some sleep. Only after we landed did I realize that the row behind me was empty, so I could actually has lied down most of the way.

In terms of my birthday, it mainly included lounging about in various places, reading my book. Not entirely a bad way to spend a day, but I would much rather have been with my wife and my friends. With my body on Dallas-time I feel tired and hung-over so at least the day after is similar to what it would have been, had I been with my friends on my birthday.

Now i "just" need to stay awake, so I've gone for coffee and a muffin - unfortunately I'm no longer on per diem, so I guess I should try and brake my starbucks habbit :)

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iHome iH6

I got an iHome iH6 from the Apple store in the North Park mall on Friday. I've used my iBook as an alarm clock for a while with the Aurora program to set wake-up times etc. The only problem have been, that the sound is awful from the tiny speakers in the iBook.

The alarm clock at the hotel is one of the usual am/fm clock radios that not only sound awful, but also has trouble tuning a channel. not that I've been able to find any channel I wanted to listen to, but theoretically I still wouldn't use it as a way to listen to music.

I've been thinking about getting a DAB radio, that can also play some of my own MP3s, but they seem oblivious to the technology over here, so that was out of the question. I considered a range of different brands and models, but given that there isn't any computer or hifi store within walking distance of either downtown or the DART rail system, I ended up in one of the only places I knew would have something I might want; The Apple store.

Having checked the selection from my hotel room, I'd settled on either the iHome iH6 ($99) or the Luna ($149) depending on their sound etc. I got to the store, and found both clock radios available for testing, and played around with the controls as well as the sound of various types of music. The design of the Luna is much better than that of the iH6, but from what I could tell, the sound was about the same. It was hard to tell, as there was a bit of background noise and other people trying out iPod speakers, but given that both systems are fairly small it would be limited how much sound they would be able to generate anyway.

Having gone back and fourth between the two models, I decided that I wouldn't pay the extra $50 just for the design, and picked up an iH6. At that point something dawned on me. I'll primarily be using the unit in the UK, so I had to make sure that the power brick would be able to handle both 120v and 230v. Unfortunately the guy at the store couldn't tell me if it would be able to handle 230v, and he even tried to look it up on the web. Apparently this isn't something they specify in the US - my guess is that it's due to their usual ignorance of an outside world...

Anyway, I bought the iH6 unit, having decided that I'll probably be able to find a US->UK transformer once I get back to the UK (I've found that they're about 5 quid on eBay). Unpacking the unit confirmed my suspicion, as I dug out a huge power brick which could only handle 120v.

Besides the problem with the power brick, and the strange fact that it can only switch between the three US time zones (come on! how hard can it be to put in all time zones!), the iH6 performs fairly good. The sound is okay, considered the size of the speakers, but it doesn't do something like Linkin Park justice. It's possible to set up two different alarms, but for some reason alarm 1 can only be either iPod or buzzer, and alarm 2 can only be radio!?!. It seems wrong that you can't set both alarms to use the iPod, and are forced to change alarm 1 for a weekend setting, and then back again for a weekday setting. I know it's probably a kind of luxury to be able to manage two different alarms, compared to a regular clock radio, but since they've put it in there, why not give the user a choice? All in all, it's a nice unit, and i use it quite a bit now; both as a clock radio and as iPod speakers. Now I just need some more music and audio books on my iPod. There really isn't enough to fill more than an hour or two.

Training

Well only one a week left of training now. It's still very interesting, but I'm definitely ready to go home now. The weekends can be bad, but the nights at the hotel are also boring. I've pretty much tried all the restaurants in the West End that I care to try, and I've reached a point where I just want a simple home cooked meal. Preferably together with my wife, but that is still a few more days away.

This week we've had risk, gas and power scheduling, property management and equity production. I'm fairly sure that I need to read up on the area that I'll be working with on my first project, as all that information is difficult to remember. Luckily the various types of scheduling and trading are similar, so some of the courses were just as much a refresh course as an introduction to a new subject.

One of the big things last week was our risk test. From day one, we've been warned that we would have to take a test after having gone through the risk course, and that the test had been derived by the owner of the company. He also used to teach the class, which I guess have historically added to the stress factor of taking the risk course, but everyone was like "So, have you had you risk test yet?". One of the first questions we got when meeting a coworker was about the course and the test, so naturally an amount of tension started to build up. The test was only a multiple choice, so I felt fairly confident that I should be able to get through, if not by remembering the correct answer, then at least by finding the wrong answers.

The day arrived where we had to do the test, which was scheduled to be at the end of the day, and we started out with the remaining half day of the risk course. The guy teaching us is very good, and definitely knows what he was talking about, and he was nice enough to go through a few test questions with us. It turned out that some of these questions were actually in the test, so there were a few easy points :) Anyway, we got the test, which was 40 multiple choice questions, and we were given 30 min to finish the test. I got through the questions in about 15-20min, and decided to go through my answers just once more, in case I missed something. It turned out to be a good decision as I found about 2-3 really stupid mistakes. Having finished the test, most of us went downstairs to the bar located on the ground floor of the building, and had a few beers. It turned out to be happy hour, with $2 a beer, so we had quite a few...

I haven't gotten the test back yet, but i was told I got 29 out of 40 right, which is okay considering the average was 28 point something. We weren't the class with the highest score, they got 29 point something, but we still did pretty good. Rumor has it that someone aced the test, but no one had admitted to this yet.

The test was Tuesday, and Wednesday was happy hour at the hotel with free beer and food, so we got slightly drunk that night too...the beginning of an unhealthy week. On Thursday we were supposed to meet up with a bunch of coworkers at a bar in Uptown, for an improvised company happy hour (at hour own expense naturally). Unfortunately the weather turned on us once again, and no one wanted to go outside, so we ended up in the downstairs bar once again. Luckily Thursday is also happy hour day with $2 beers...see the pattern?

Friday was property and equity production, which hadn't been taught in a while, so the class was full of coworkers who wanted a refresher course. It gave us a fairly good overview of what happens from gas, oil etc. is taken out of the ground until it's ready to be shipped and sold. This sort of tied everything together, so we've now been through all the processes from a hole in the ground to the product being used. We were all fairly tired after a long day and a couple of days of drinking, so I ended up lounging in my room reading and watching TV. Well after having been a trip to the mall to get an iPod clock radio...I needed something better than a pair of tiny laptop speakers to liven up the room.