Uebelhart . Net

Okay, a little bit of catching up:

1) Job is going great. I like it. Alot more pressure and responsibility, but it gives me a new challenge and I am adapting well. Still miss shorts and sandles.

2) Sam, our feline friend is gone. Dawn had Sam before we even met. Monday we had to have him put to sleep (his health had just fallen too far finally). We’ll miss him. We still find ourselves looking for him at odd times in places where he would usually hang out.

3) Hurricane Rita. Well this is a biggie, so I’ll devote a post just to that in a bit. I also plan to update this log as much as I can as we have power, kind of a storm-blog, with pics.

Well, I’m in corporate America again, and I’m not sure yet how I feel about it.

Pros: Steady Paycheck, Raise, Health benefits, 401K, exciting job and opportunities, no ties and jackets.

Cons: No shorts and sandles, lots of rules (way lots), little goof-off/free time, restrictive internet/email usage, no more long vacations for awhile.

So basically I am trading away freedom for security. As I said, not sure yet how I feel about that.

It’s been a busy time for us this last week, several things have been going on: work, bell stuff, and the hurricane.

First off, Bell Stuff.
Dawn has been working hard to get ready for the 2005 Annual Guild Meeting of the North American Guild of Change Bell Ringers. It’s in Houston this year and she and a friend (Deb Adams) were the two that pretty much got the whole thing together. It started Tuesday and ends Labor Day. I have hardly seen her the last week because she’s been dealing with this and all the out of town bell people involved in the meeting in classes. I did go to an Astros game with her and about 20 bellers Thursday night, so I got to spend some time with her then (but I also was working at the same time - see below). Also went to their dinners Friday & Saturday night (also involved working). Hopefully she’ll put up something here about her AGM stuff. I know she is wiped out.

Next Work:
Well work has had 2 prongs of overload: New Job and the Hurricane.
I’ll explain the Hurricane part in the next section.
New Job? Yep, it finally happened. I “Officially” start the new job on Tuesday with Air Security International (link). They have created a new division for investigations and consulting and has hired the staff of Paladin to build and run it. It’s a corporate culture (although it’s business casual, yipee no ties, but alas no more shorts and sandles), and a large company (about 100 at the Houston location). It also has several “sister” companies that we’ll be working closely with. It’ll be a challenge and adventure, but I am looking forward to it.

Hurricane:
Well, unless you have been isolated you know that Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama have been hit hard by Katrina. And alot (estimated now at 200,000) of the refugees from New Orleans have ended up in Houston. So the city is flooded with people, including many criminals and ne’er do wells (I am not kidding - near the astrodome there has been a rash of muggings, carjackings, thefts, and auto thefts).
Due to the nature of out biz, we have been involved in the disaster. We’ve assisted in consulting with some companies on stabilizing and removing assets from Louis and Miss. We’ve also beeninvolved in several cases of trying to locate some people from New Orleans that were reportedly evac’d to Houston. I got to spend 3 hours at the dome Friday morning looking for some, and it’s a scarey place. I had Chris do it that evening for a long time and he witnessed blatant drug dealing in front of the police while in the dome, and they did not do anything.
These searches and the consulting required almost constant phone calls and conferance calls. I spent more time on my cell in the last week than I have in the last 2 months.
There were also several close calls to where I almost had to go to Louisiana to assist in the work we are helping with, but managed to avoid it thus far. It’s just mentally and physically draining, it feels like I was in the hurricane now.