African Safari

Brian and I watched two great movies over the last two days. We watched 3:10 to Yuma this afternoon. Yesterday we watched The Bucket List. Both were excellent movies in their own right.

Anyway, there was a scene in The Bucket List where Jack Nicholson and Morgan Freeman went on an African safari. It’s the scene where they are in the safari jeep singing that song from The Lion King, “The Lion Sleeps Tonight.” You know the scene. The landscape was just breathtaking. They were in that safari tent and it just made me want to go on a safari real bad.

Almost immediately, I hopped online and checked out flights to South Africa. It’s a shame that Brian doesn’t have any vacation time. Otherwise, that could be our anniversary trip this year. Not that we can afford to go or anything. We all know we have to finish working on the house still. But, whatever. It doesn’t hurt to dream.

Brian and I agreed that we are taking a major trip next year because 2009 marks our ten years of “togetherness,” so we have to do something big. Right? It’s got to be bigger than Jamaica. LOL.

Either way. Whether it be 2009 or later. An African safari is going on my own personal “bucket list.”

February 24, 2008 | Posted by Ching under Movies, Sponsored Post, Travel, Wishlist

Leave a Comment

Valentines Flowers

Sometimes I think I am the man and Brian is the woman. I didn’t get flowers this year, he did. I guess you can say I wear the pants in this relationship. =P

While he was away, I thought I would do something nice for him so I had FTD deliver flowers to his hotel. I had them deliver it on Tuesday instead of Thursday so that he would enjoy the flowers during his entire stay.

I picked stargazer lilies because they are my favorite and I figured that they would remind him of me. I thought it would make him happy and cheer him up, but it kind of backfired. The flowers reminded him of me and made him even more homesick (or so he said, anyway).

[ NOTE: This is the second time I've bought Brian flowers for Valentines. The first time was in 2000, when we first started dating. I had Tillies deliver a dozen red roses to his work. He worked at Intrust Bank back then. He said he felt special because he was the only one (out of everyone, including women coworkers) who got a dozen roses, but at the same time he said he felt very, very gay because only his gay coworkers got flowers. ]

Here are some other pictures from Brian’s trip to New Hampshire:

February 24, 2008 | Posted by Ching under Flickr, Life, Travel

Leave a Comment

VistaPrint and Graduation

Graduation time is upon us again and that means a new opportunity for my husband to design graduation invitations for me. Last time he designed invitations not only for me but for a few of my friends as well. This time it is just for me and, since this is my last time in school and this is the big degree (Masters in Business Administration), I need to make sure that these invitations are really special.

I think this year I am going to use VistaPrint to create custom postcards that I can mail to all of our friends and family. I learned that if you use the coupon code “BlogPostcards100” at checkout you will receive 100 free postcards. This will help me to save money because I can get like 100 for a little over $20.00. So its like getting two sets for the price of one. I don’t know if we have 200 friends and family to send these out to but I am sure that we can find some people that we have not talked to in a few years. We have family out of state and out of country and that should help to thin out the stack. We will also have friends of our family that I am sure our parents will want to give invitations too.

All-in-all I think VistaPrint will do a great job in offering high quality postcards at a reasonable price. And with the bonus code, we will be able to tell twice as many people about my achievement.

February 24, 2008 | Posted by Ching under School, Sponsored Post

Leave a Comment

Letter from Brian

Brian and I came across this sad letter while cleaning the office today. It’s sad for two reasons: Brian was uber sappy (I didn’t really count, but I think he said he loved me and missed me at least a dozen times in this letter; and check out the poem in the closing) and it’s handwritten, therefore, he couldn’t use grammar or spell check (notice the lack of punctuation). I’m really glad his writing has improved immensely. LOL.

Jokes aside, the letter is actually very sweet. It was written back in 1999, before we “officially” moved in together. He sent this to California where I spent a couple of weeks in November that year.

The significance of this letter is that it was the first and only time we’d been apart until Brian’s trip to New Hampshire. I moved in about a month after this letter. Brian and I haven’t been apart since. That’s a really, really long time… which is why the week he spent in New Hampshire was really difficult. Anyway, I just wanted to put his sappy blog postings in perspective. In almost ten years of being a couple, it was the first Valentines that we’ve spent apart.

Back in 1999, I didn’t have a cellphone so keeping in touch was actually more challenging. During the week Brian was in New Hampshire, we talked on the phone for several hours every single night. We even watched American Idol together on Tuesday and Wednesday. I think we talked more on the phone that week than we did in the last couple of months. Thank God for free mobile-to-mobile!

With Brian’s new job at Viega, this probably won’t be the last time he’ll be asked to travel. It will take some getting used to but I think we will manage.

February 23, 2008 | Posted by Ching under Flickr, Life, Travel

Leave a Comment

Dream Office

This is my dream office. I saw this and sported wood. I can imagine the long hours of World of Warcraft play that could go on here. I mean this guy has everything! at least 3 separate servers, 3 Hard Drive Towers for I assume back ups, an incredible sound system. I looked at his set up and just drooled. My wife says that I am too much of a geek.

If you are a geek then you can bow to this system of the geek gods! If you want to look at all the picks you can look at this guys page here.

February 17, 2008 | Posted by Brian under Wishlist

1 Comment

New Hampshire Visit.

Well, I have one more day of my New Hampshire visit and I am so excited. I can not wait to get home to my loving wife. She means the world to me and I feel so lost without her around. I fly out Friday afternoon and will be back in town around 9 in the evening. I have learned a lot about the company, the software that I will be using and myself. I had a mini melt down yesterday and my wife and parents talked me through everything. I am so blessed to have such a loving family, they are the best and are very proud of me, my new job and the direction I am going.

Even though this is a new job, this is not what I want to be doing for the rest of my life. This is just a job. I needed something to do to get me by because my contract was ending at LSI (better to have a job then not have one i guess). I am thankful that Viega took me in and is willing to show me the ropes but it has not been easy. Traveling is something that I thought I would be able to get over and be able to cope with but I learned real fast that this was not the case. I hate traveling, I hate being away from home, I hate being away from my wife and my family. I am lucky in the fact that I have a boss that is totally understand and after a very heartfelt discussion we hammered out some details and I think we have come to an understanding and hopefully my traveling will be very, very, verrrrrry limited.

Tomorrow I might get to meet one of the owners of the company. This will be my first billionaire ever! I was told that he normally just blows through, meets a few folks then blows out. So hopefully he wont be here long so that my boss and I can get back to some training. I am looking forward to learning more so that next week when I am in the office I am able to effectivly do my job with little to no difficulty at all.

I hope that my wife gets a great position in her company. She gets her masters degree in May and I am so excited for that day. She deserves it and I can not be more proud. If she can manage to swing a new position at her work then hopefully, with any luck, I can get into her old position which is what I really want to do. My passion for the longest time has been Supervising a cal center. Her work is very good and treats there employees very well. Viega is very much like that, they treat there employees very well, but in the end I want something that I know is going to be around for a long time and I know her business will be around for a long time and on the plus side, there is no travel.

Well, I think that is all for now, I will have pictures of New Hampshire when i get home, this laptop has been locked down so much that I can not even upload pictures because the USB slot only recognizes specific devices. German security for you.

I cant wait to get home!

February 13, 2008 | Posted by Brian under Family, Life, Travel

Leave a Comment

Everything is Changing.

Well for those of you that do not already know, I got a new job. If you don’t know why then let me give you a little back story.

Several months ago I was told by the company I worked for that there was a cap on Contractor Employment. Now this was not disclosed to me when I started, I was simply told that the contract would continually renew and I had nothing to worry about. However, this was not the case. There was indeed a cap on Contractor employment and I was unfortunately reaching the end of my time with the company. Now, just for a little mystery to this story, I learned in the time I had left that there were several people in the organization that had been contractors before me and they were there longer than 3 years! So this means that the cap is something recent that they failed to communicate to the rest of the Contractors, or the cap just involved me and I am just the biggest sucker in the world for believing it and not putting up a fight. Now, I didn’t exactly just lay down and die, no, I tried to get a position within the company. Unfortunately, I was told at every opportunity that there were no positions available. Yet I watched all my friends get promoted around me. Even as I was leaving I was told by one of my good friends that they were given there offer letter. This was un-nerving to me and I felt betrayed by the company and people that I had come to admire and love working for. It made me feel like I was nothing to them and that they just saw me as some tool to be used and discarded.

My new job is with a company called Viega! They are a plumbing and heating company from Germany. They have been in business for over a hundred years and are now expanding there market into the United States. To give you a little detail on how I got the job, I simply applied for it on Career Builder. I was applying for just about anything because I was wanting to make sure that I had something lined up before I got laid-off. I figured anything would be better than nothing, but for the first time in my life every opportunity that came around was met with the same response after the interview, “We feel that you are over qualified for this position”. I had never got that before. I was always met with, the standard weed out messages or the no reply at all process. I finally get a call from Viega and I had forgot all about applying for there position. I was a little surprised and accepted the interview.

I showed up for my interview and was met with nothing but kindness and accepting people. They were very outgoing and eager to hear about my experience. After a few weeks I heard back from them and they wanted to offer me the position. I was excited but a little worried about the job because I did not know how to operate the systems that they use. I was told by my new boss that I would be trained on everything and that I would not have to worry about the lack of knowledge because they would work very hard to get me up to speed. The company is very exciting and they are growing larger and larger every day. I am still a little worried about my job because I do not completely grasp what it is that I am exactly supposed to do. I assume I will learn as time goes on but its a little unsettling to not know. I am a control freak and I like to have insight into the direction that I am going in life and currently I have none.

As of 2/11/08 I will be making my way to New Hampshire for training on my new job. I assume that I will travel a little in the beginnig because my boss is based out of New Hampshire and I will be based out of Wichita. With technology the way it is this shouldn’t be too much of a problem. I am not looking forward to the traveling because I am one of those people that find traveling to be a hassle and try to avoid it as much as possible. My wife is the traveler in the house, she loves to travel. If it were up to me I would never leave my house. I would have a job that I could work from home, I would have a nice house and never leave. I have everything that I desire here at my house. I have my movies, games, cats and dog and most important, my wife!

I hope that everything works out with this new job, I am sure that after this week I will have a better understanding of what I am going to be doing but we will see. Like I said before, this seems to be a great company and I am looking forward to the new start, but I am not looking forward to the travel. I will always be looking for that perfect job (I am hoping that my wife will be getting promoted at her work and then I can apply for her job) I know that its out there, this is not the job that I want to do for the rest of my life. This is just another job to pay the bills. Maybe I will get lucky and win the lottery, then I can just spend my time helping people and spend time with my wife and make her happy.

February 10, 2008 | Posted by Brian under Life

Leave a Comment

Flowers Make Great Valentines Gifts

When Brian and I first got together many, many years ago we used to really look forward to Valentines Day. It was probably the biggest holiday of the year for us, second only to Christmas.

We would make a really big deal out of it. We would get each other extravagant gifts (remember that this was before we had our financial epiphany) besides going out to a special dinner date and all of that. He would get me valentines gifts and I would get stuff for myself, too. Most of the time it was lingerie to wear on our special date. Valentines is one of those events where the women really making a killing. LOL!

These days Brian and I don’t really get it each other anything. Normally, we will go out to dinner and then maybe schedule a couples massage for the weekend. That’s pretty much it. If I’m lucky, maybe I’ll get flowers delivered to work. I remember I did that one year for him, back when he worked for Intrust Bank. I had it delivered to their office downtown. It really took him by surprise. Only a handful of people got flowers delivered that day, and the only other guy to receive flowers was gay. He didn’t even get a dozen like Brian did. LOL.

I really splurged that year because I did some other things besides the flowers, which back then cost me $80. When you’re getting paid less than $8 an hour, that’s a full days worth of work. It was worth it, though, because it made him feel special (and a little gay). That’s okay, though. We have always been somewhat unconventional.

I hope you all have a wonderful Valentines Day!

February 9, 2008 | Posted by Ching under Life, Sponsored Post

Leave a Comment

Bowl for Kids’ Sake 2008

I’ve decided to bowl in the Big Brothers Big Sisters’ Bowl for Kids’ Sake event this year. I haven’t participated in it in a few years so it should be interesting. I hope I can still lift my ball.

Anyway, I’m hoping that you all will help me raise money for this very good cause. Please sponsor me. You can make a pledge or donation by clicking this link. You can make a flat pledge or you can pledge on a per pin basis. If you choose per pin, then it will be based on my highest game.

Thanks very much for your support, it means a lot. Both Big Brothers Big Sisters and I thank you in advance for any support you can give.

P.S. I’d like to express my deepest gratitude to the following people for their generous donations.
Brian Brubaker	$100
Achita Muthitacharoen	$50
Esper Tejano	$50
Josephine Alonso	$30
Peggy Loyd	$25
Jennifer Cannady	$25
John Withers	$25
Donna Brubaker	$25
Jennifer Alonso	$25
Denise Fundis	$20
Richard Miner	$20
Nikelia Dickson	$10
Etaf Shaban	$10
Mary Clavo-Rodriguez	$10
Angie Childers	$10
Darcy Cook	$10
Jill Frasco	$10
Irene Linn	$10
Annette McKernan	$10
Michelle Mapel	$10
Vicki Huskey	$10
Michael Caylor	$10
Barney Bernhardt	$10
Sandy Goseland	$5

February 8, 2008 | Posted by Ching under News

1 Comment

Tomorrow is Promised to No One

Jan and I drove to Hutchinson, Kansas yesterday to attend the funeral of Brian Rush. Rush worked with Brian at Cox Communications before working with me. Brian left Cox shortly after Rush left Cox, so they only worked together briefly.

My fondest memory of Rush is how we kinda-sorta met, but didn’t meet. I initially met Rush online in 2005, playing OGame. Everyone at Cox played OGame. Naturally, when Brian worked there, he played OGame too. Since he was playing it, I started playing it too. Rush was one of the highest ranking members of the Cable Mafia, our OGame alliance. He was a great ally in OGame. He, along with a few other players, sent me some resources to help me build up my planet. It wasn’t long before I beat Brian. I couldn’t have done it without all the help, though.

Anyway, as things got busy with work and school I quit playing the game. As luck would have it, Rush got hired on at work so instead of playing together online we began working together. I didn’t ever meet him face-to-face until his first day of work, though. We were buddies on OGame for a while without ever having met.

Rush was a really cool guy. He was well-liked by everyone. People had a tough time at first because he was hired from outside the company, but he turned them all around. He made everyone realize that if you hire the right person it doesn’t really matter where they come from, whether they’re coming from inside or outside the company. Before long it seemed like all the CSRs wanted to be on his team. That’s how great of a guy he was.

Just as he was a great ally on OGame, he was a great ally at work too. We both pushed for friendly competitions. Before his cancer returned, we competed with each other. We would often ask each other how our respective teams were doing in terms of stats. He was always trying to beat me. I’m lucky because my team always had great stats. I have an outstanding group of CSRs. He had his work cut out for him. Each week he’d make progress and he would proudly tell me his team’s average availability and then he would ask me mine. Of course, I knew where he was at already. Eagerly, I’d tell him my figure and burst his bubble.

It’s tough to burst his bubble, though. Rush was always so positive and optimistic. Each week he would make progress, while my figures pretty much remained the same. After a while my figures started to dwindle and his team eventually surpassed mine in terms of availability.

He fought cancer with the same gusto. He sought treatment of all kinds — experimental, traditional, what have you. It didn’t matter. He was willing to try anything. Each week we would receive updates. Whether it be good or bad news, Rush stayed positive through it all and kept his sense of humor.

He passed away of cancer at around 1:30 am on January 29th. My only regret is that I never got a chance to visit him before he passed. He inspired me not just to become a better supervisor, but a better person overall. I never had the chance to thank him for the positive impact he has made in my life. He made a tremendous impact on the lives of many others. I already knew this, but hearing others speak at the funeral yesterday only confirmed it.

I didn’t speak, but I wish that I would have.. I didn’t have the courage to… Maybe they have computers in the after life and he can read this blog entry in his honor, and he’ll know how very grateful I am for the opportunity to work with him and to know him.

I leave you with a PPT slide show that I created at Kasey’s request. I got the pictures that Kasey selected on Thursday evening. I didn’t get a chance to start working on it until Friday because scanning the pictures, which were all in hard copy, took a lot of time. Thankfully, Darcy helped with the second part (the family section) of the slide show. Without her help, completing the slide show before the funeral would have been an even bigger challenge (specially since I had to go to the doctor with Brian on Friday afternoon).

My section is set to the tune of Ozzy’s “See You On the Other Side” song, one of Rush’s favorites. Kasey said he specifically requested for this song to be played at his funeral. Garth Brooks’ “The Dance” is the background music that Kasey selected for Darcy’s section. The clip above doesn’t have music, unfortunately, because I couldn’t figure out how to add it.

Here’s one that I made through Slide.com with music. Except I couldn’t find the “See You On the Other Side” song. All I could find is the YouTube video. I hope this works.