Showing posts with label Snelling stafffing. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Snelling stafffing. Show all posts

Monday, August 19, 2013

Debugged - Sun., Aug. 18 & Mon., Aug. 19

No, I'm not changing my name from TravelBug, no our RV didn't have to be swept for bugs (a la spy novels), and no, Bob isn't bugging me; we had to use a bug fogger to de-bug our 5th wheel. Here's why...

It seems last year while we were gate guarding in South Texas we picked up some crazy ant hitchhikers, and then at McKinney Falls State Park we picked up some other small, fast, beetle-like bugs (I call them disintegrating bugs because when you smash them they disintegrate into little black specs), and I had to kill four spiders in our 5er on Saturday! Ewwwww. Anyway the time had come to do something about the little pests. (I could picture an ant farm in our walls. No, no, no!)

We made a stop at Home Depot and found the baddest bug fogger of the lot. Because we would have to evacuate our home and remove the kitties for a number of hours, and because Texas is so hot later in the day, we decided to get up at 4 a.m., put the kitties in carriers, start the fogger, do our laundry, and eat breakfast at Taco Cabana. We actually got out the door closer to 5:30 a.m.

After two hours of fogging the 5er, we had to go in and open all the windows, vents and doors on our rig to air it out. We turned on our fans and the air conditioner. Then we sat in the car and waited. Two hours later was the absolute earliest we could go back in. The directions said if we could still smell the fogger, to go back out until we couldn't smell it.

You guessed it...after two hours we could still smell it. So we waited another hour and a half, then re-entered. We left all the windows open with fans and air conditioners on. The cats seemed fine.

We left to see Blackfish, a documentary about a killer whale trainer's death at Sea World in Florida a few years ago. The movie tells the story of how killer whales come to be in the water parks. What a movie. We give it five stars.

If you see this movie, be aware it isn't sugar coated. The documentary is well researched and well told. Be prepared to hear about deaths of people and see bad injuries from other water parks throughout the years.

This movie will make you sad, and maybe mad, and maybe, just maybe, enough people will stop going to parks like Sea World and stop the demand for marine mammal shows (though I'm realistic enough to know that probably won't happen). You will be appalled at the small habitats the huge killer whales have to live in. The movie opened our eyes to what goes on behind the scenes. It's not pretty, but worth seeing.

Back at the 5er, I got to work washing countertops, cupboards, dishes, glasses, mugs, and silverware that had been exposed to the fogger. That took up the late afternoon. Plus we watched 60 Minutes.

Monday, Aug. 19:
Bob headed off at 7:30 a.m. to get routine lab tests before his physical this coming Thursday, then went to work. I got up and vacuumed the 5er, and replaced cardboard scratch pads in our cats' scratchers and replenished the catnip on them. ("Thank you very much," said the happy cats.) The rest of my day was to include scrubbing the floors and washing pots and pans which had also been exposed to the fogger.

The best laid plans and all that...at 9:00 a.m. I got a call from Snelling asking me if I could work this afternoon from 12:30 to 5:30 p.m. Why, yes, I could. So I finished vacuuming, ate breakfast, took a shower, and headed off to be a receptionist at State Farm for the rest of the day. My duties included answering the phone, taking messages, picking up the mail, and greeting customers. They liked me and requested to Snelling that I return for full days on Tuesday and Wednesday.

This evening I took Bob to dinner at 54th Street Grille at City Base. We had never been before and loved their menu! I had Coyote Chicken and Bob had a Maui Jim salad. The dinners were excellent and were served with warm honey wheat bread with honey butter. We'll be back to try out more items that's for sure. Here are a couple of photos of the interior.

Lots of ceiling decor at 54th Street Grille.
Bob after he just stuck his tongue out at me.
Wall decor at 54th Street Grille.
No signs of any ants since yesterday!!! However, I did kill one disintegrating bug since then.  : (

Travel Bug hopefully out of bugs in the rig. Good night.

Tuesday, June 25, 2013

ISTE Convention Work - Sat. to Wed., June 22-26, 2013

Here's what I've been doing for the past four days: working at the International Society for Technology in Education Conference at the Gonzalez Convention Center in San Antonio, Texas. This is a temporary job for Snelling doing Exhibitor Booth Registration - we check exhibitor I.D.s and print their convention floor badges.

Here's where I work. Pretty nice; we even have chairs!
My view of the huge registration hall. Attendees register across from us.
Outside the convention center - Riverwalk below.

Early number of registrants was 11,000 for classes and 4,500 exhibitors. Exhibitors include Dell, Microsoft, Panasonic, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, Renaissance Learning, Samsung, CDW-G, graphite by commonsense media, MDR, Pearson, SMART, Intel, Lego Education, Promethean, AT&T and many more.

I have been so busy working that I could only squeeze in a five-minute zip through the exhibitor area and saw a fraction of what's there. Amazing new educational tools! Many booths had huge HD TVs up on the walls where games could be played, lessons taught, and curricula planned. One demonstration showed a classroom layout with virtual furniture that could be re-arranged digitally. A teacher could try different classroom layouts without physically moving the tables and chairs around.

Tomorrow during lunch I will try to get back in the exhibit hall to take more photos. Some of the exhibits are so colorful. Only thing is tomorrow is the last day, so exhibitors may start breaking down their displays. I'll see if I can go in the morning.

So much to report about my work and the conference. I will write more later, but now I've got to get some sleep!

Travel Bug out.