Perks

Recently, my company consolidated all the gifts, rewards, etc. (basically any non-monetary compensation) to this website where you get points.  There's a wide range of things you can get with your points for a very wide range of point values.

10 points = about $1 (shipping is included so it's hard to tell exactly). There are items from 50 to 50,000 points. I had accumulated 1750 points from the company Christmas gift and a gift with my promotion, so I decided to see what was worth getting...

Yes, that is my finger in the picture.  I took this with the camera on my phone and I'm too lazy to crop it out... so sue me... actually please don't because I don't think that actually breaks any real laws and that frivolous lawsuit would be a waste of money.

Now we can grill some meat and John has a nice place to sit while he makes sure not to burn the food I prepared. :)

Managing Milestones

When I graduated from Baylor in December 2007, a lot of people asked me where I wanted to be in 5 years.  I don't think I really had a good answer for that question.  I wasn't sure if I'd like consulting or if it would be a good fit for my skills and personality.

At some point in the early months of my employment at Hitachi Consulting, I did set a goal for myself to reach the Manager level at Hitachi.  I didn't know how long it would take, so I'm not sure if that was really my 5 year plan, but it's probably the closest I got to a 5 year plan at that point in my career... and after a year or two, my motives and focus changed a bit.  In the end, I found myself making decisions based on the ever changing working world... I didn't keep the "Make Manager at Hitachi" as a hard target for myself.

Now, it's a little over 4 years since I started at Hitachi Consulting, and despite the fact that my long-range planning motives have changed, I just achieved that original goal.  It's neat to meet the first career goal I ever set for myself.

Look Out World: Marleta's a Manager!


(PS I'm a little too proud of the title of this post... it's my first triple-meaning blog post title)

Going Sailing

Every year, the Hitachi Consulting Dallas office has a Winter Party.  We don't have a party during the holiday season; instead, the party is between mid-January and late-February.  My first party was 6 days after I started at Hitachi.  Yesterday, I went to my 5th Hitachi Winter Party. 

It's fun to get all dressed up and have a nice evening out.  Each year, the local VPs donate raffle prizes.  My first two years I won a couple gift cards.  The last few years, John and I have been targeting Beginning Sailing Lessons that one of the VPs donates each year.  At the party last night, we finally won those sailing lessons!

Get ready Sail Boats; here we come!  .... Later in the year, when it's a little warmer.  I'll be sure to post about that when it finally happens.  :)

Dante's Down the Hatch

One night in Atlanta, the team went out to dinner at a restaurant called Dante's Down the Hatch.  Dante's is a ship themed restaurant, the various rooms of the restaurant match area of a ship - We ate in a room called the Captain's Cabin.  One of the team members took some pictures of the interesting decor.

The restaurant owner also raises crocodiles to add to the experience.  The marker below is along the path in to the entrance.

You might assume from the crocodiles and ship theme that this is a seafood restaurant... that assumption would be wrong.  It's a fondue restaurant with live Jazz music 6 nights a week.  A little bit of an odd combo, but I like fondue, so enjoyed cooking and cheese-coating my food. (It didn't do wonders for my diet, but I just ignored that for the night)

Good Hotel, Bad Hotel

In my first week of traveling for work, I stayed at the Renaissance Atlanta Midtown.  It was very nice.  I like the location, everyone was nice, the room layout was good, and the only real complaint I had was that a temporary tent style convention next door to the hotel made a lot of loud noise one night.

For my second week of travel, I couldn't get a room in the Renaissance.  In fact all Marriott hotels that were close to Marta stations were booked up for rooms at the rate acceptable to my client.  (I have now booked well in advance to prevent this from happening again, but I just didn't have enough advance notice to save my second week).

So... for week 2, I was at hotel that I won't mention specifically by name (hint: It's a 1 letter name that matches my maiden name initial).  This hotel was at the Buckhead Marta stop, and met my requirements for expenses.  I figured it wouldn't be too bad to spend 1 week in a different hotel.  It was only week 2, so I wasn't really committed to the Renaissance yet.

I do not like this other hotel... and now I'll tell you why. These are my impressions from walking in the door to examining my room:

1. When you walk in to the lobby, it's slightly dark inside... What?  Are they too cool for full lighting?
2. The lobby was full of scented candles.  I like scented candles.  We keep wall flowers in house all the time to provide a nice scent.  But this was obnoxious.  It was the sort of smell that makes a statement - a big turn off for me.
3. The music playing in the lobby was a little too loud and unignorable.  It's was more than background music.
4. The decor in the lobby annoyed me too... it was going for that eclectic feel, but was completely forced: "Hey look: We have a ball and a jacket and a picture display casually in a display case" - It just screamed "I'm trying too hard to impress you with my eclecticism".
5. There weren't enough people checking in guests, so I had a ton of time to observe the lobby and form opinions 1-4.
6. When they did check me in, I went to the elevator to meet with much confusion.  On the first floor (no basement) there was only one elevator button with a triangle pointing down.  At every elevator I've ever used before, that means "I want to go down".  But there's no down to go and there's no up button.
7. I didn't have enough time to really assess the elevator button situation because an elevator arrived, and I took that opportunity to jump on without pressing the confusing call button. But I didn't get far, I pressed my floor number and it turned off before I saw the card reader.  I tried inserting my card to no avail.  I wound up taking 2 short rides up and down before a polite guest told me that their cards had not worked at first, and I probably wasn't doing anything wrong... I went back to the front desk.
8. The woman at the desk reprogrammed my cards and I returned to the elevator bank.  I took another inspection of the elevator panel and noticed that the front was held on with several pieces of scotch tap.  Scotch Tape?! This time I took the courage to punch the "down" button assuming that it would work since that's the only button they have.  Behind me I hear, "Oh, Sweetie, that won't work." Now, there are multiple problems with this:
1. It was a hotel employee that shouldn't be calling me "Sweetie"
2. The down button is confusing enough; say something more than "that won't work".
3. There's scotch tap holding on the panel, but you couldn't use a little more tape to put up a message explaining how to use the elevator that obviously has issues?  It's a hotel, there's got to be new confused people every day. - Put up a Sign!
9. It turns out that you have to mash and hold the elevator button for it to work. After doing that and getting on the elevator, I try my card again.  One of the 2 cards still didn't work, but luckily, the other card finally let me go to my floor and room.
10. In my room, I found an efficiency style bathroom that opens into the bedroom, and the shower just had a half glass wall (It didn't close completely)  The whole bathroom area is very compact, and just awkward and uncomfortable. 
11. I didn't like the decor, but I can recognize that some people just have different taste.  What I can't get over though, is that the TV on the wall opposite the bed is mounted in front of a mirror.  So you can't watch TV without looking at yourself in the mirror.  I don't dislike looking at myself, but I'm not so vain that I need to do it all the time.  That's just weird and off-putting.
12. The AC unit is a little weird, but I did eventually figure out how to make it quite down.  
13. There was a nature sound machine making noises when I got to the room... why?  

And those were just my first few minutes in the hotel.  Here's a couple pictures of the room:

Cramped bathroom... note the shower wall

TV and Mirror combo

Over the course of my 2 night's stay, I made additional annoying observations:

1. The shower is as dis-functional as it looks, and in ways that hadn't occurred to me until I had to use it:
1. Because of the positioning of the half glass wall, you can't turn on the water without standing in the blast of the shower head.  That would be okay if they had one of those spiffy instant hot water systems, but they don't.
2. The shower head was one of those big rain style shower heads, so I couldn't really point it away to turn on the water, and I never think those give enough concentrated water to rise well.
3. When I first saw the half glass wall, I thought it was weird, but I figured someone had worked out the mechanics, however odd and pointless, to make it so you didn't need full covering to enclose the water - WRONG!  It got water all over the floor... and on the toilet paper which was on the wall next to the open end of the shower.  Luckily (or perhaps from learning a small lesson) they hung a robe on the hook there to somewhat shade the toilet paper so it only got a light misting and wasn't completely saturated... I didn't use the robe though.
4. The water temperature steadily increased throughout the shower... to a point of scalding, which would generally only be a small thing, but when you add constantly adjusting the temperature to being weirded-out by the half wall, trying not to flood the room, and being unable to rinse well in the rain shower head, it's just too much.
2. The bed was not particularly comfortable... too soft and the cushion under the sheet was lumpy.
3. Everything started with the aforementioned initial that is the hotel's namesake.  None of the signs were straight forward because they're phrased in some convoluted way to incorporate that letter.  Too much!
4. Once I finally learned how to use the elevators, I looked around a little more and discovered that the floor mats in the elevator are changed out as the day goes on.  Saying "Good Morning" and "Good Evening" (and those are just what I saw).  As I add this to my list, I think if I didn't already have a list of reasons to hate this hotel, I might find that a cute touch, but it really just made my eyes roll.

All in all, this hotel was way too "hipster" and full of itself for me.  I'm glad I got reservations at the Renaissance for the other weeks of my travel.

Leaving on a Jet Plane

I've started a new adventure in the last couple weeks: Travel.

For most consultants, travel is the name of the game, but I have been lucky that in my first 4 years of employment, I traveled only 1 week for a new hire training class.  Now that's changed and I'm making frequent treks to Atlanta to work at my client's office there.  It's been an adjustment. 

I haven't been at this long, so I'm sure my opinions will change over time.  However, I thought I'd take a moment to share a little about my experience thus far:

1. 7 am flights are really early.
2. Walking to and from the office, hotel, and Marta stations is helpful in meeting my exercise goals.
3. I don't like traveling when I need to pack a coat.
4. Hotel quality can vary widely... More to come on this one!
5. I think I make better use of my time at home when I know I won't be there all week.
6. It's very tiring on travel days
7. Thus far I've been content to relax in my hotel room... I wonder when I'll go stir crazy and look for other evening activities.
8. At the current rate we're traveling, I'll be AA Gold by May and Platinum by August - I've never had airline status before, so I'm excited for that - Though I'd definitely give it up to stay home. (I'd have to travel every week from now to the end of the year to make Executive Platinum, so I'm glad I won't be traveling enough for that)
9. At Marriott: I'll be Silver by February, Gold by July, and Platinum by October - I'm looking forward to a free vacation for me and John courtesy of Marriott and American points.
10. I enjoy reading books on planes, and I haven't quite gotten myself to put down the book to work on the plane.
11. Though I know it's unlikely, I still hope that our project work gets more remote work (from home, instead of traveling to the client site) in coming months because I just don't like be away from home.

When it boils down to it, I'd rather be home, but thus far, it's not too bad being on the road.  So that's my initial assessment of traveling for work.  I'm interested to see how much my opinions change after I've been at this for a bit longer.

One of the Perks of John's Job

Vendor Gifts!

In the spirit of holiday giving, several of the vendors that John works closely with have sent holiday gifts to his office... I particularly like John's vendor gifts because many come in the form of chocolate, and we all know who that's really for.  Though, John does get to eat some himself.

This Santa Stacker had goodies in each level - An assortment of mints, peppermint bark, white chocolate and peppermint covered pretzels, and peppermint - chocolate popcorn.

I particularly liked the Santa Stacker because it doubles as a new Christmas decoration that I can reuse in coming years... though I wish it could also magically refill itself with chocolate each year too. :)

$2 Across the Board on Horse #4

Before the Hitachi Consulting Dallas Summer Party yesterday, all I really knew about horse racing are things you could probably attribute to any racing... there's some set distance, they start at the same time, and the first to the finish line wins.  Oh, and having watched several horse related movies, I knew what a jokey is and a bit about what they do.

Now... I'm still probably not even what you would call "proficient" at horse racing, but I think I could make decent picks. Also, and maybe more importantly, I know how to make a wager. I had no idea going in that I'd be learning so much jargon in one day.

Our first bet.  John placed this one... it didn't win anything.

We made at least one bet on each race.  Hitachi gave each employee $10 in Lone Star Bucks, which was a nice starting point.  We dipped into our own money by about $5 at one point, but we got all of that back by the end.

Horse #2 taking the Win!

Our first winning bet: Race 2, $2, Across the Board, Horse #2 - #2 got the Win, so this was $7.90 payout on our $6 bet.

Our first win brought in $7.90.  Our biggest win brought in $16 - Across the board on a horse the handicapper put in 5th and ended up taking the win.  Our biggest loss was a race where we had 2 Horses Across the board (to Win, to Place, and to Show), but only only one of those horses Showed... meaning we got $4.40 for our $12 bet.

John in his "Studying the Numbers" pose

We had fun. I enjoyed learned how to place some bets... though we only place simple bets, I learned about exactica and other more exotic bets too. Since John is a statistics and numbers person, by the end of the day, I knew how to choose between two somewhat equally ranked horses by the identifying which one would have a higher payout if I won. Though, I never waiting to the very last minute to place my bet; I now understand why the pros would.

The starting gate.  Sometimes they started far away, so I liked when they were close to us.

We ended the day up $4.50... we thought it was going to be more because were going to get Show money for Horse #1 in the last race, but some craziness happened and the officials bumped Horse #1 back to 4th... no money for us.

All in All, a pretty fun day.  It takes a while, and you definately need good company to chat with between races.  But, I wouldn't mind going back some time.

Adulthood?

I had ice cream for lunch today...

The coordinator at my current client promised everyone lunch as a reward for everyone's hard work in some difficult situations recently.  After a couple weeks of not suggesting a lunch venue, someone finally suggested that we just go out for ice cream... How about Blizzards at Dairy Queen?  Okay, great.  Sounds tasty!

Photo courtesy of Dairy Queen

So... when is our Dairy Queen party scheduled?  11:30 am this morning.  I have no clue why we didn't have the ice cream trip at a more reasonable hour... like in the afternoon after lunch, but the Blizzard filled me up.  I had a busy afternoon, so I never ate a proper lunch.

Thus, my new definition of adulthood: No tells you that you can't eat desert if you don't finish your meal... Instead, we have work meetings that influence us to spoil our meal with ice cream in the morning.  :)

I had ice cream for lunch today... and it was good.