Back home – time to relax…

Posted on September 23, 2016 by

The trip back home to Calgary from the IT Conference was pretty routine.  We left Collingwood at around 3:30 and got to Toronto’s Pearson airport about 2 hours later.  Security was a breeze to pass though, very quick.  A group of us heading to various points in Western Canada had dinner together which was nice.

The flight was uneventful which, I guess, is how we want all flights to be.  I watched The Force Awakens for kill some time – the other movie choices didn’t appeal to me.

A friend of mine picked me up at the airport and we stopped for a quick bite to eat.  I was up early, 4am, my body of course thinking it was 6am.  I will get back on schedule this weekend, I hope.

I picked up Blondie and Hera at 8am and I had two very happy dogs.  Hera never whines and she was crying in her excitement.  I got quite a few doggy kisses and now the dogs are napping – I am sure the week was tiring for them.

So, now I have a long weekend to relax and back to work on Monday.  Enjoy your weekend.

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Blue Mountain Conference

Posted on September 22, 2016 by

We had our IT Conference this week in Collingwood, Ontario at Blue Mountain.  I took the red eye flight from Calgary, early Sunday morning and arrived in Toronto shortly before 7AM Sunday morning.

Met my new boss for lunch downtown, went to Mandarin and the food was, as always, amazing.  I spent the afternoon and had dinner with my Aunt, went to Red Lobster for Endless Shrimp.  Two buffets in one day.  Well, it started a week of eating WAY too much food.

The conference started Monday evening at Blue Mountain.  Eating, drinking and seminars filled the days.  It wasn’t a bad conference, a little boring though and not as good as 3 years ago.

I had to assist covering our help desk on Wednesday morning and had a tough of a hangover.  Not a lot of fun and not something that I am really used to anymore.

Today is the last day of the conference, it ends around 2:30/3:00 and then back to Pearson and off to Calgary.  I get back in around 10:45PM, Mountain Time and pick up my dogs first thing tomorrow morning.

All in all, a good week.  Working in a National company where we don’t see co-workers, the Conference is great for catching up.  Hopefully we won’t have to wait three years to get together again.

Thanks Ontario, it was a good week.  Back home now to Alberta.

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My monthly update?

Posted on September 15, 2016 by

There have been a fair number of changes over the last month since my last update.

I decided, after a lot of thought and chat with other parties, that I would not be continuing as the Club Manager for the Babe Ruth Rockies.  There were a lot of reasons for me to step down and I could only think of a few to continue.  I am going to remain on the Board of Directors so I will still be involved.  I may return to umpiring, I have not decided as yet.  I wanted to give the league plenty of notice so that they would be able to fill the role.  It is likely tough to find a non-parent willing to do this job.

My new job at work is keeping me very busy.  I am enjoying it.  I still get to work from home which is awesome.  No commute – no traffic, no people on the bus and train and a big savings since I don’t have to put out $100 a month on transit.

We have a work conference coming up, next week actually.  I have my regular dog sitter looking after Blondie and Hera.  It has been a year since they’ve seen her, Hera is much larger than she was, much sweeter as well though.  I know they are taken good care of when I am gone.

I am flying out on Sunday morning, having lunch in Toronto and dinner with my Aunt and then heading to the conference on Monday in Collingwood.  Should be a good week.  There have been a LOT of staff changes at works so it will be good to meet new people.

Also on the work front, I may be making an overseas trip in the coming months.  This is yet to be confirmed but it looks like I will be going to Mauritius in the middle of the Indian ocean.  I may find our more about this next week at the conference – guess I will see.  It would be an experience of a lifetime for sure.

 

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Keeping busy…

Posted on August 12, 2016 by

Well, it is almost the middle of August, so, what’s been happening?

Well, not a lot really.  I turned 45 this week.  It doesn’t seem much different, or any different really than when I was 30 or so.  I worked on my birthday, didn’t ask for the day off, why bother, work was busy, the day zoomed by.  Went out for dinner to Montana’s, good food, even had chocolate cake for dessert.  Thanks SS for dinner.

Baseball is done.  The Indians ended up winning the AAA Championship for Babe Ruth, clobbering the Angels two games straight.  In AA, the Giants cleaned up and I was asked to give out medallions for the A Championship and saw the Orioles blow away their competition.  All in all, some good ball.

I won’t be coach Fall Ball this year by the looks of it.  I may assist if I am around but I didn’t want to commit if I am going to be away.  More on possibly going away later.

Work has been busy, very busy actually.  The days go by quickly which is nice.  No boredom here.

It is the weekend, well, will be in a few hours.  Enjoy yours.

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You have to love Microsoft…

Posted on July 27, 2016 by

I have an older laptop, 4 years old now that I installed Windows 10 on some time ago.  I used to use it often, although it is slow since it only has 4GB of memory.  I have not used it since I have been in my new place, 8 months now.

So, I go to log in.  For those of you unfamiliar with Windows 10, you no longer have a local account, you set it up with an existing email address and a password that doesn’t necessarily match the email password…  I have no idea what password I used on it, I tried all of my standard ones, none of them worked.

So, after fumbling around Microsoft’s support site, I finally find how to reset it.  They can send a code to your cell phone or email address.  I get a code to my phone and type it into the form on Microsoft’s site, doesn’t do anything, the site just sits there.  I try a few more times, same thing.

So, now I am thinking it is because I am using Google Chrome since Internet Explorer sucks.  I try in IE, same issue.

I fumble around on their site looking for actual support.  I am able to open a chat with a tech and after waiting a few minutes, I get someone.  He’s fairly helpful, if not a bit slow in responding.

After chatting for 10 minutes, I am told that there is an issue with the site, since yesterday apparently and he doesn’t know when it will be fixed.  So, essentially, the only way to reset the password to access my computer is not available and you don’t know when it will be fixed?  Thanks.

I now have Ubuntu on my laptop.  Fuck off Microsoft…

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The off season…

Posted on July 21, 2016 by

It is now officially the “off season”.  It is weird, it is only the middle of July and baseball has wrapped up.  Now, had we made the playoffs and gone deep, we could be playing until the end of the month, but still, early when compared to ball in Ontario.

We start around the same time, outside that is, end of April.  Season kicks off in early May and runs 2 months.  The season flew by, that’s for sure.

So, I will have the rest of the month off, as well as August.  I need to decide if I want to coach Fall Ball.  That is a possibility.

I also have to decide what I am doing next year.  I am sure I will return to the Board, I would like a different job though.  If I don’t coach, I know, or am pretty sure anyway, that I will miss it.  There are other coaching options in the city, for sure.

Team parties are upcoming, no firm plans as to what we will do as yet.  Coaches meeting is scheduled as well.  This year and the future needs to be discussed.

I suppose I will try to enjoy my off time.  More time to take the dogs to the park and take it easy.  Sounds relaxing…

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AA’s wrapped up…

Posted on July 20, 2016 by

The AA Rockies made the playoffs this year, they lost their first game in a rain shortened affair on Sunday by a score of 5-3.  Last night, a rare double header was scheduled so the pressure was on to win back to back.  It didn’t quite work out that way…

They dropped an 8-3 decision ending the season.  It was a good run and the first AA Rockies team that has made the playoffs in the three years that I have been club manager.

So, now the off-season officially starts for us.  It is early in the summer for sure, but that is how it works in Alberta.  Back in Ontario, we’d still be playing ball for another 6 weeks or so.

I have not decided if I will be coaching Fall Ball this year or not.  I haven’t actually decided if I will continue on to next year at this point, although I am leaning towards returning.  Decisions to be made for sure.

All that is left for this season will be wrap-up get-togethers with the players.  I think the AAA team will be having a BBQ, not sure what the AA’s plan on doing.

All in all, it was a good season.  I think everyone enjoyed it, haven’t gotten any complaints as yet, anyway.

Until next season…

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End of our season…

Posted on July 15, 2016 by

I last blogged that the AAA season came down to one game versus the Dodgers, that was on July 3, nearly 2 weeks ago.  In that time span, we’ve been rained out a total of 4 times.  We played a total of 3 innings in that time span as well.

Well, last evening, we finally got the game in.  We didn’t have much, if any, rain during the day and the forecast wasn’t calling for any rain until after 9pm or so.  The skies didn’t look overly friendly, but we didn’t get any rain.

We had a slow start.  We got rocked for a bunch of runs and trailed 8-1 in the game.  Although we did make a valiant attempt, we fell short and lost by a score of 8-5, thus, ending our play-off hopes.

All in all, it was a very enjoyable season.  The guys on the AAA club were great, got along with one another and even though we didn’t have a winning season, I think everyone enjoyed it and we had some good player development.

The travel clubs are now away for a week and then we’ll get together for a team party.  Not sure where, but we’ll get together.  And, as they say, there is always next season.

On a more positive note, the AA’s won their elimination game versus the Indians by the a score of 6-1.  Weather permitting, they start their first round of play-offs this evening.  The weather forecast for today, and the weekend, does not look good.

Hopefully they will come alive and go deep into play-offs.  Best of luck AA Rockies.

I haven’t made a decision about next year, but I am leaning towards returning.  Of course I am, baseball is part of who I am and what I do.  I think I’d be pretty bored if I don’t return.  This was my 25th year coaching, between fastball and baseball.  It has been a pretty good run.  Let’s do another 25 maybe…

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All comes down to one game…

Posted on July 3, 2016 by

The AAA Rockies lost in extra innings, for the second time this season, to the Angels making our route to the playoffs a little more difficult. We play the Dodgers in our final makeup game on Wednesday. It is a do or die situation. Should we win, we still need plenty of help to make the playoffs. The Dodgers have 3 remaining games (including the one against us) and they’ll have to lose at least one other the other two. I don’t like that our fate isn’t in our hands, but we’ve had our chances.

So, Wednesday all of the chips are on the table and I certainly hope our season does not end.

Nothing going on this long weekend, no baseball, no nothing. Had a couple of relaxing days. Hope your Canada Day was a good one and for those of you who are American, Happy 4th of July tomorrow.

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Baseball and Canada Day

Posted on June 28, 2016 by

The weather this past weekend did not cooperate for baseball.  It rained Friday night and into Saturday morning and the park was closed.  Our (meaning the AAA Rockies) last game against the Dodgers was rained out, postponed.  This game, when replayed, will likely determine who finishes in fourth place and makes the playoffs and who finishes in fifth place and is out.  We both have some games remaining which may change the outcome as well, it’ll likely come down to the wire though.  I am guessing that the game will be made-up early next week since the travel teams are away for the long weekend.  We played Sunday, an exhibition game, against Edmonton and won 14-4.  Nice to keep the momentum going with two wins in a row.

The AA’s did play Sunday evening against the Giants.  It was a great game with the good guys coming out on top by a score of 13-3.

This is the Canada Day weekend.  No ball for me, I will enjoy some time off.  The weather forecast doesn’t look great though, which sucks.  I hope we don’t have anywhere near as much rain as it looks like.  This is quite the change from when I coached in Ontario and would undoubtedly be at a tournament over the Canada Day weekend.  In all honesty, I don’t miss travel ball.  I like having no more than a 20 minute trip to the park.

Enjoy your long weekend.  To the travel teams head to the US and to Medicine Hat, best of luck.

 

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