The Holtonian

Christmas Pictures

Here's the wife with her new hair do and new specs courtesy of Aaron Thompson super Optical Guy at Brainerd Walmart

The center of attention

You'll notice that the AK has a little mark on her forehead.

That is because wifey put AK in the bed to wake me up... and AK did... with a head butt.

Christmas 2006

I figured it was time of an update, good gosh my screen is blank.

Christmas has come and gone and we had a lot of fun hanging out with my wife's family. I took a few days off last week and spent most of the time just enjoying being with AK and the wife. We really didn't do much of anything. Though Friday I went to Panera to sort of check in with work and just enjoy their free wireless and free refils of coffee. Their coffee seems to have improved also since I last worked there.

Side note: Starbucks needs to offer free wireless, I mean its pretty chachi that they make you pay to use there's. Granted I hear if you have a tmobile phone number you can use it for free, and we are thinking of switching to either T mobile… Verizon though is another possiblity. Starbucks is the ultimate in rip off, they charge a 1.50 for a small coffee charge, $5 for a carmel mocha, charge for internet, and most of all don't have free refils. Granted their coffee is dang good. Lousy free market economy….

Saturday we hung out with our college friends Liana and Brad and their baby Aubrey as well as wifey's high school friend Allison. It was funny to see the two babies interact as they are about the same age. AK was a little more mobile but Aubrey was about a foot taller.

AK has been walking with the help of coffee tables and couches for a good few weeks now. She's taken a good number of steps on her own as well, the farthest she's gone is 5 steps and she usually plops on her bottom. Its funny, everytime she walks I think of Steve Martin in Dirty Rotten Scoundrels when he pretends to be crippled and then gets out of his wheel chair and walks to the girl…

Christmas eve we went to my inlaws church and then had lunch with the inlaws and grandparents in law (the one's I'm staying with). Then we went to the Christmas Eve service later in the day. We opened a few gifts. I got my big gift from wifey… Pocket Yahtzee, which she wrapped 5 minutes before giving me, then gave it to me, I opened it, then she promptly claimed it for herself. Background: The crabb's gave us regular Yahtzee for Christmas a week ago and she's been addicted ever since.

Christmas Day was a little broken up/drawn out. We woke up, had breakfast, opened one gift or so, then got in the car and drove to Americus, GA where my wife's cousins live, then spent the day there, then drove back at night and opened the rest of the gifts.

To be materialistic for a second; the big gift I got this year was a new digital camera. I got a Cannon 6 mega pixel. It takes amazing pictures and makes me very glad that my sony broke as it was a piece of junk and never took a good picture. I also got a killer hooded sweatshirt that proudly states, "Cardinals World Series Champs" on it. Also got some running equipment, sneakers, shirts, socks, and a dvd.

The wife on the other hand, got pretty much clothes clothes and more clothes. Though I did break a cardinal sin for the wife gift… I got her a blender. But granted she needed one and uses it more than the average blender owner. Thankfully she wasn't mad or anything.

We also got a new lamp for a new house that hopefully we will have soon if our house sells.

AK got a lot of toys which she kind of needed, as much as any kid really 'needs' toys. She also got some baby einstein dvds and a travel high chair.

Mostly I was just happy to be with Janelle and Anna-Kate for a few days strait. But even more importantly I was just filled with joy and a sense of humility at the grace and blessings God has extended to us this past year. It was definitely a year of patience and waiting for us both with the baby and with my job. We'll need a little more to get us through the sale of our house, but we can reflect back on this past year and see God's providence and know that His timing is supreme and that He will provide.

Walker Fights with his Fists

So I'm sure some of you out there… well maybe just two of you, are wondering how my life in Atlanta is going. I've been down here two weeks, this is my third. So far work is good, real slow due to the holidays though my work will ramp up quickly with little time to adjust, sort of a sink or swim attitude here. I'd take the days off but I don't have any vacation and its fine just being here. I may work some remotely next week like on the 27th or something so I don't rush back to the office to sit by myself. The laptop pretty much works anywhere I can find a wireless network or wifi and I can connect to just about everything here which is cool.

My nights are spent either with Mana and Pappa (wifey's grandparents) or with the crabbs. Usually I go to the crabbs if there is something I want to watch on TV, like on Thursday nights for the office or something, though I missed the last one. When I stay at home with Mana and Pappa we watch pretty much one show, and one show only… and that my friends is Walker Texas Ranger.

I'm not sure how they got into it, but Pappa loves Walker. Its two episodes back to back, 7 and 8 o clock on the Hallmark channel, which I was unaware of a Hallmark channel even existing. So after watching Walker for about 2 weeks or so I have determined that it is the best show in history. The guy is a machine, I mean he always wins. The plot's are simple and easy to follow so if you fall asleep during the show you can wake up and feel like you didn't miss a thing.

Here's the typical plot: Bad guys up to no good. Walker and Trivet stumble upon there no goodness. Trivet and sometimes CD charge in and get tied up. Walker goes in and round house kicks everyone and rescues Trivet and CD. Walker, Trivet, CD, and blond Assistant District Attorney lady go to CD's bar and celebrate. Perfect plot everytime.

Last night's episode had Walker, Trivet, and CD fishing in the Bayou. They stumble upon Pappy O Daniel making meth in the bayou. Walker proceeds to have Vietnam flash backs as he hunts down Pappy O Daniel's gang. Trivet and CD got tied up, Walker rescued them. He round house kicked the gang, blew up the meth lab and hauled Pappy and his men into jail. Then he got back to fishing and a few days later showed up to CD's Bar for drinks.

Walker is the perfect combination of Ninja and cowboy… in fact he's a ninja cowboy.

So that's about what I do. Some nights I read, though I feel like I read all day at work so I'm a little tired of it when I get home.

Baseball notes

Quick cardinals notes. I'm feeling ok with the cardinals moves this offseason. Frankly, I think it is nearly impossible in today's MLB to repeat as champions with the competiveness of the entire league. So I think the cards have realized this and done some addition by subtraction as well as just adding key pieces that will give a good foundation for a few years.

I'd be happier if they traded Encarnacion but they'd have to eat most of the salary and not get much in return for that to happen.

It will be funny to see how the birds match up with the cubs this year. I hope they shell Marquis, that would be classic.

The rotation is setup pretty well I think: Carp, Wells, Reyes, Wainright (I think Izz will be back and ready). They kind of gave Supp the Morris, Gruz, Sanders treatment, which was really disappointing. Granted Supp is a great number 3/4 guy and a soso number 2. I see him settling with Pittsburgh, though if I were him I'd take less to stay on a competitive team, but that’s me and I am not a major league baseball player. I hope they land Mulder too, after we gave up so much for him it would be nice to try and get something out of him.

I think the cardinals should make a play for Willy Taveras, who just got moved to Colorado. His speed and outfield prowess would be a great pick up. And maybe its just me, but I've always looked at Colorado as a team that you can just make an offer to and they'll take it, they never seem to be all that astute on the trades and additions. Granted they got the better end of the deal with Houston, but that's because Houston tends to make a lot of dumb decisions: Beltran, Petite, Clemens last year, and this latest one.

The cubs have made a few good moves but still lack pitching. Zambrano is their only really good pitcher, Lilly is overpriced average, and Marquis will be Marquis. Their lineup will be tougher for sure, especially if they all stay healthy, and I think the motivation will be up with Pinella but they need a few more pieces before they contend for the Central Division Championship.

The Astros really are not even close to the same team they were a few years ago. They still have Phil Garner who is probably one of the more under-rated managers and they still have Berkman who is just a great player. But no pitching will leave them close to the bottom this year.

I think its funny that the two most improved teams in the NL Central this past year--Brewers and Reds, did zilch this offseason. The reds have dismantled their once powerful line up to get more balance on pitching and what not but I think that will leave them right where they started. The Brewers… well they added Mr. Chorizo the new sausage mascot, which will be a great addition for the fans, other than that there isn't much else to watch there.

Pittsburgh? They have a team? Who knew? That's why I am like, "Suppan, go ahead and go there and have a nice time at the bottom of the barrel of the NL central.

So I think the cardinals have made the best moves in the NL central, granted they had the most to work with. The Dodgers got better and really will be this year's Mets, I think the Mets will struggle with pitching yet again unless they land Zito, who they apparently don't want. I don't get the Mets, they need pitching and really haven't gotten any. I think their old timers… Glavine and Pedro are just getting worse every year. Maine might get better which would help. I think with a closer the braves will give the mets a bigger challenge this year and

Workin away

Not too much is happening down here in ATL, just enjoyed my morning French Roast… tasty. I am keeping busy at work, still adjusting to the entirely new and different culture, one where downtime is filled with training and learning, not socializing or internet surfing. Most of my time is spent just researching so far. I've researched some potential projects I am most likely going to be staffed on, researched how Deloitte views the "health care crisis," read a few online books from their library (One about consumer driven health care, which was as boring as it sounds, and one on SAP… which I am just reading for the heck of it), and I've also taken pretty much all the training that I was supposed to have done with in the first six months.

A couple of co-workers asked me why I am here so early and late as well. Frankly its because my family is up in Chattanooga and I don't have internet at the grand-parents-in-law's house. I get here early mostly just to beat traffic, the closer you get to traveling around 8 to 9 AM the worse your drive is going to be. I'd rather wake up dang early and have a short commute than wake up later and have a dang long commute. Plus when the fam and I are finally down and settled I'm going to want to get home at a decent hour which means putting in early here to achieve an early departure.

Proper family time is important. At CIGNA a few times I had some late nights during the busy season and it was depressing coming home and spending 30 minutes or so with the baby before her bed time, not to mention not seeing the wife as much. Proper wife time is of the utmost importance as well.

The travel time that they communicated with this job so far has not materialized, I don't even see any on the horizon. Healthcare seems to be a good niche as its pretty standard and predictable, plus most of my clients appear to be in the southeast, thus hopefully no travel to Minnesota in the middle of winter, hopefully.

Week One in Atlanta

So week 1....

The new job is pretty fantastic... so far, but then what job isn't good its first week?

My favorite thing, free coffee that is actually decent! They got this crazy coffee packet system where you pick your coffee, Sumatra, French Roast, Columbian, French Vanilla... all the way to teas and chais, so you stick it in this machine press a button and BOOOM, coffee. And its not crappy, it actually tastes pretty fantastic. Some co-workers of mine asked me to go out for coffee and being new and needing to make connections I obliged... though as we were ordering at the Caribou Coffee counter I thought to myself, "Why am I paying for this stuff when its upstairs for free?" Granted I got a caramel mocha, which we don't have upstairs.

Also...all you can drink Coca Cola products.... free, how cool is that? It’s a good thing I usually limit myself to a diet coke a day otherwise I'd be drinking it constantly.

I work downtown in the heart of the beast of Atlanta. It’s in the Marriot Towers pretty high up. The job is intense, like no other job I've worked. I don't really have a supervisor and its all about projects, which is totally different than CIGNA. At Cigna I had a book of business I worked on, at Deloitte I could be working on tons of projects all year long that are all totally different. A lot more is expected from the workers than I think CIGNA expects out of its employees, not to sound snooty but the pace and workload is a lot more.

I also seem to be the only worker with my kind of experience. There's a friend of mine who has a similar background from an insurance perspective but he did more contracting and is in a totally different area than I am. So that being said I think I have the potential to do really well there, hopefully I won't fall flat on my face.

But I enjoy it; I got a snazzy laptop that really I haven't used out of the office since my grandparents in law (who I'm staying with in ATL till our house sells and we can move down there) don't have internet. If they did I could work some from home but so far I don't have tons of work, mostly just online training.

Parking's not a huge problem, I thought it would be but most of the lots downtown are pretty cheap, 6 bucks a day and 80 bucks a month or so. Then the garages are about the same, and if I ever get a nice car I'll put it in one.

The sentra... well it’s made it this far, but I really am surprised. I'd go get a new car tomorrow but I really don't want one till I can put it in a garage, which at my grandparents in law I can't do. That and really to be frank I can't afford one.

Traffic? Not bad really at all. I mean you just gotta realize, it’s going to take you a bit of time to get home. The inlaws live up 85 off of Clairmont so its pretty close to downtown. When we move down we'll probably live in Smyrna/Mableton which I've talked to a lot of people I work with that live around there and they say the commute is 25 to 30 minutes if you go at good times, which I usually do. The worst part of traffic is my car, the sentra is a stick and its generally awful to drive a stick in Atlanta traffic.

Driving home last night I experienced the worst traffic and where was it? In freakin Ft Oglethorpe... that place was bumper to bumper and all those stinkin lights are timed terribly. I ended up turning around and going back to the highway because it took me 30 minutes to get from the highway to Lowes and it was evident that I wasn't going to get home in the next hour if I continued on highway 2. I thought taking highway 2 in would be quicker during rush hour but apparently Ft O is the new place to be around 6PM. It was a nightmare and that city needs to do some serious development as the side roads that run parallel to highway 2 are either not accessible at most points of the drive or don't exist. I tried to access Cloud Springs and took a left at the walmart(this was when I was going back towards the highway)... but this took me to a storage facility, it was rediculous. I was so mad last night, I was like, “Of course I make great time until I make it to po dunk Ft O…. Atlanta the biggest city in the South East I get through fine, but Ft O…”

The worst part of being down in ATL is being away from wifey and AK. That actually has been really tough but hopefully the house will sell soon so we can move down and be one family in one place. Also not having a place to run as its too cold and dark to run outside. When we move I'll probably spring for a treadmill. We thought about a gym membership but I know I'd rarely go, and the last thing I'm going to want to do is drive through ATL traffic, get home, and then go back out to workout. But that's far down the road, we need to move first.

Speaking of the Fam, AK is crawling around now and getting into all sorts of trouble, thus making wifey's life all the more difficult while I'm away. She is so adorable and if my digital camera worked I'd post a picture but its dead, officially. I put new batteries in and it still doesn't work. I'll probably get a new one after Christmas.. which was when I got this one. But we'll see, its not a huge priority. Baby crying, gotta run.

Test Drove a Fit Today

So today I got to test drive the FIT by Honda. Now I'm not a big test driver, I just want to take it for a quick spin, see how it feels and then I'm pretty much ready to roll. The car overall ran well, had decent pickup for such a small car with such a small engine. It was really really roomy, made my sentra feel like a coffin. Tons of head room which isn't a huge deal for me because I'm short but way more head room than the accord or civic.

Great interior, nice console, great stereo system, good cup holders that are easy to get to. They didn't have a sport model to test so I had to do the basic, but the basic seemed pretty non-basic to me. The really only feature I want that's not on the basic is alloy wheels. I had a bad experience with wheel covers on the sentra... it has zero wheel covers as of now. So I vowed to never get a car again that didn't have wheels. The fold up seats in the back are pretty amazing, they just pop up so simply that its just genius.

Overall I thought it was great, kind of ugly on the exterior but not enough so that it takes away from the overall utility and economy of the car.

But as I mention economy I move onto the big problem I had with the car... or more in general car dealers. The Honda.com website lists the Fit basic starting at 13,850... the one I drove was 16,000 or more. The sport is listed on the website as 15,170... the one they had on the lot (which was sold) went for 18,500 or something. It ticked me off. Here I find it on their own website for one price and the dealer jacks it up.

I recall when I looked at Elements I had the same problem. I saw 15K something on the website and went to Economy Honda and didn't see anything close to 15K on any of the cars. I asked the sales guy why the discrepancy and he gave me some BS that the website is never right.... hello its the freakin HONDA Website, how can it be wrong? Now, in my opinion Economy Honda is the worst Honda dealer in the south east, Pye in Dalton has way better prices and I hear the same is true for Honda of Cleveland. So that being said I wasn't too surprised to see "Economy" jacking up the prices of an economy car. I mean how is 18K economical? For that price you might as well pony up a couple extra thousand and get a civic or used accord. The Fit's entire purpose is cheap transportation and I think once you go over 15K on a car its no longer considered cheap.

So the conclusion I've come to is to look for a civic if possible. I'll still see if I can finagle a Fit... if I can go in and say, "Hey, this is the price I found on the website and I want you to honor or I'll go to Toyota or Pye Honda... or some used car lot." We'll see how that works. I'm a motivated buyer as I need a car so we'll see how motivated they are to sell to me. Otherwise I'll just go to a used car dealer, find a year or two old civic that still has a decent amount of warranty on it and just get that. The Civic is more professional looking too, so that might be the best route anyway. Though I really like the new style of Civic and to find one of those used I'll have to wait a few months.... which who knows if the Sentra will make it that long in Atlanta.

The Scion XA is also of some interest as its the same car as the FIT, so I'll keep my eye on that one as well. I'll try to look around and see what I can find in Atlanta and Dalton. But overall it was just disappointing to see that sticker shock because its nothing but pure profit, they know it and I know it. At least do a better job of hiding the profit. It was annoying they had the MSRP price (which is what is on the website) and then they had "Economy of Honda Processing Fee---$700" OH bull, give me a break. "Economy of Honda Floor Mats---$500" Again Bull! And then a bunch of other crap that was just rediculous. Car dealers, they're like the tax collectors of the Bible times.... its hard to love them.