First Day

Wow, it's been almost a week since I've been able to post. HECTIC! I've been everywhere, all over the place. The weekend flew by. Friday I was supposed to finish the old job work projects and be done with it. That got hectic and I didn't finish. Saturday and Sunday we were slamming out home repairs. Kelley has been working her tail off (bless her heart) to get the house ready to list. Cleaning, decluttering, we got a storage unit and moved a bunch of crap into it. Then clean and declutter some more. Then clean some more. Then declutter some more. So now half of the house is clean and ready to go. I had to skip the saturday long run and sunday bike ride to work on the house. It was exhausting!!!

Monday I almost finished the old job stuff. I think I'm abandoning the rest of it, but I might try to finish something when I can. Still, I worked. and cleaned some. and decluttered. and had no training.

Tuesday I packed up for the week and drove to Raleigh. Got all the paperwork filled out so I was actually an employee again. Went and checked out a house that looks promising. Planned my commute from Mickey's house (kelley's dad - staying with him until the fam can move up), and rode around town some just to get myself oriented. I don't know all of the back roads yet, heck I don't even know where most things are. But I know where the major roads are now, and how to get back to Mickey's from there.

I also joined up with Gold's Gym here. They have 5 locations including one that's really close to the office. And that one has a pool! So the plan is to cut over there for lunch and swim (Thank God), then head back after work for the run/bike workouts as normal. And the membership is good with all 5 locations, so wherever we end up buying a house at there is one near there. Going to have to get all of the workouts in while I'm here; when I'm back in Greenville I want to spend that time with Kelley and the kids. It's only been one night and I already miss my girls something fierce!

I never really thought Greenville was lacking in anything. It's not really a small town, there's over 1 million people there. You can get anything you want, get anywhere you want to go. Raleigh has 1.1 million people. But there are 3 major universities here (NC State, Duke, UNC) within a 12 mile radius, and Raleigh is the state capital. The ultra-conservatives in SC - which is 90% of the genpop - hates paying taxes. Now I can see why. They don't see any real benefit. Greenville county has one public access indoor pool. It's open from 9 am to 11 am 5 days a week. I've been paying taxes to support a pool that's only open for 2 hours a day while I'm at work? Gimme a break. The city of Raleigh has four public access pools open from 5 am to 10 pm 7 days a week. Pools might be just one example, but the NC government actually does something! Something that people can see and use! It's amazing. It really is a night and day difference that I am quickly developing a real appreciation for.

So last night I got in my first workout at Gold's after checking out a house and getting some dinner. Did 3 miles on the treadmill at a decent pace. Hip is still kind of tight. This pain has been going on long enough to make me concerned. But whatever, I'll just deal with it.

Today was my first day on the new job, stiff hip and all. First, I sat in on a meeting which was a great introduction to the product I was going to be working on. Felt great about the environment and the people. Then I got to look at the code behind the project, and it looked like spaghetti. And it was primarily built on two pieces of technology that I have never used before. Immediately I felt overwhelmed with the learning curve I was currently at the bottom of. But I remembered that they hired me out of hundreds of other applicants because I am capable of learning this technique, not because I already knew it. This new stuff is only about 10% of the total job, so I have to keep that in perspective. They only hire the best, I only get to work with the best. As long as I can keep my confidence up the gaps will all be filled in soon enough. Still, today started out great and ended up giving me a bad stress headache. Hey if it was easy then anyone could do it. At least my co-workers are really fantastic people.

Then I went back to Gold's for another workout after work. Wanted to get some time on the bike, and I walked in right as a spin class was starting so I jumped in. Turned out to be a fun class. Maybe not as many miles as I would have clocked by myself, but it was at least more fun.

So tomorrow I'm going to try the lunchtime swim, followed by some elliptical time after work. Might have to skip the gym after work to pick up supplies for the new living/work situation. Need some web cams for the fam, a new pillow for the bed here, and to meet with a realtor about the house I drove past yesterday.

But to summarize, Raleigh is awesome, the new job is killer but really tough, and I'm loving the new gym. Y'all have a great day!