Wright Justified

New Job!!!

noreply@blogger.com (Michael) — Wed, 21 May 2008 14:22:00 +0000

New job, same place. Yesterday I accepted the position, Manager of Software Development for CRM Solutions. After years of being in software development I decided to move into management. I am very excited about the move. I am getting a chance to work with a great team. The team is currently 24 developers across 4 products, and I will be adding more developers next month. It will be a big challenge, but that is what makes it so exciting.

New toy

noreply@blogger.com (Michael) — Thu, 15 May 2008 23:41:00 +0000

My HP DeskJet 940C finally stopped printing this past Saturday. I guess I cannot complain since I got the printer for free back in 2000. My kids were trying to print a Mother's Day card and the printer would only print half the page. So, what do you do? Buy a Mother's Day card from the Hallmark store, or go to Office Depot and buy a new printer? Buy a new printer of course. I have been wanting an all-in-one printer for some time. The kids always bring papers home from school that we need to photo-copy. So I got the HP Photosmart C5280 Color All-In-One printer.

It is a little noisy, but the quality and speed is nice. We will see how long this one last. And we got the Mother's Day card printed.

I Am Legend - Not

noreply@blogger.com (Michael) — Wed, 30 Apr 2008 12:01:00 +0000

We rented the movie I Am Legend. I thought it sucked, and wanted my $1 back. I think Will Smith did a good job in the movie, and the dog was good too. I just did not like the movie itself. I guess you cannot please everyone.

Dentist appointment

noreply@blogger.com (Michael) — Thu, 24 Apr 2008 17:40:00 +0000

I had a dentist appointment this morning. I am getting all my old fillings replaced with some new stuff. I had the right side of my mouth done this morning, and I am not sure I want to go back to get the left side done. I have not had a cavity in almost 18 years, so all my dentist visits since then have been for cleanings only. The numbness should start wearing off soon and I will stop drooling on my keyboard.

Shall we play a game?

noreply@blogger.com (Michael) — Mon, 21 Apr 2008 18:14:00 +0000

Almost 25 years ago, June 1983, one of the best hacking movies was released, War Games. AMC is airing the movie Tuesday night at 8PM. I loved this movie, and I cannot wait to see it again. You cannot beat a movie that has a 300-1200 baud modem in it.

Cooper River Bridge Run

noreply@blogger.com (Michael) — Mon, 21 Apr 2008 12:10:00 +0000

On Saturday, April 5th my oldest kid and I participated in the Cooper River bridge 10K run. We had a blast! This was the first time that either of us had ever run 10K before. Our goal was finish the race without stopping or walking. Note, we consider running anything more than a fast walk. So jogging is considered a run. ;-) Well, we made it, without stopping or walking. It took us 1 hour 17 minutes to complete. Okay, I know this is a terrible time, but I do not care. I got to spend some quality time with my 11 year old kid and we had a great time. We have already decided to sign up for next year, and improve on our time. Maybe 1 hour or less next year. We will need to wait and see. Here is a snapshot of the race route, and a link to an interactive version.

Leadership training

noreply@blogger.com (Michael) — Tue, 15 Apr 2008 12:12:00 +0000

I am in a leadership training class at work today. This is the 3rd of 4 classes. Today we will be discussing 'building team pride and purpose' and 'moving from conflict to collaboration'. So far the course has been really good. The classes last all day every Tuesday, but I think it has been worth it. Plus we get cookies in the afternoon. :-) You cannot beat free food.

Hello? Is this thing on?

noreply@blogger.com (Michael) — Mon, 14 Apr 2008 13:41:00 +0000

It has been a long time since I have posted anything, and a lot of stuff has happened: cool things at work, Cooper River bridge run, fishing, and more. I will try to post details this week. Maybe.

Shrimp anyone?

noreply@blogger.com (Michael) — Tue, 23 Oct 2007 11:57:00 +0000

A couple weeks ago my wife's dad invited me to go shrimping with him. Of course I jumped at the chance. Anytime I can get out on the water, I am there. The tide was not ideal that night but I had a blast.

We left out of Shem Creek around 6PM and headed out to the Crab Bank. Since we were just using 1 pole instead of 10, we anchored the boat and started throwing out the bait balls. It was the first time that I had ever used a cast net, and by the end of the night I was getting pretty good. We did not do too bad. We caught some really nice jumbo shrimp. We decided to head back in around 10:30PM. There is nothing like navigating in the dark on the water with just a spot light, GPS, and depth finder. Okay, there is not much to navigating on the water in the dark when you have a GPS and depth finder.

This past Sunday my wife and I cooked some of the shrimp. We made a Charleston favorite, shrimp and grits. It was great! Maybe this weekend I will put some of those shrimp on the grill.

Brad Meltzer

noreply@blogger.com (Michael) — Wed, 17 Oct 2007 12:13:00 +0000

I recently finished reading The Book of Fate by Brad Meltzer. Very good book. If you liked the TV series The West Wing, then you should like this book.

I have read 2 other books by Meltzer: The Millionaires and The Zero Game. I would recommend any of these books. So far, The Zero Game book has been the best. Meltzer has a few more books out that I have not read, but I hope to pick those up from the library soon.

Do you shop at Wal-Mart?

noreply@blogger.com (Michael) — Tue, 16 Oct 2007 12:27:00 +0000

Lately it seems like every morning while watching the news there is another massive recall on toys that contain lead paint. Well, this morning I was not too surprised when I saw a commercial for WakeUpWalMart.com. I wonder how long before there will be a WakeUpTarget or WakeUpCVS.

Do not like Vista

noreply@blogger.com (Michael) — Mon, 15 Oct 2007 00:15:00 +0000

I was visiting my sister this weekend. She got a new computer, a HP Pavilion Slimline s3100n Desktop PC. Really nice machine. Only one major flaw with it, it came with Vista installed. What a terrible experience. I tried to help her set it up, but seemed like every time you tried to run or install something it would pop up a message asking you do you really want to do this. Of course, I did. I double clicked on it. Almost every piece of software she had on her old XP box would not install on the Vista machine. Had trouble getting the hardware (printers, camera, etc...) to work. After a day and a half fighting with Vista, I do not think I will be upgrading anytime soon.

Windows Live Writer

noreply@blogger.com (Michael) — Fri, 12 Oct 2007 17:33:00 +0000

I was talking with Corey last week and he told me about Windows Live Writer. I thought I would give it a try. I really do not like the Blogger editor. So here is my first test.

I won! I won! I won!

noreply@blogger.com (Michael) — Fri, 05 Oct 2007 00:22:00 +0000

Last Wednesday the company I work for had a health fair. They had a lot of different vendors there giving away small things. (pens, cups, note pads, etc...) They also had a drawing for bigger items, like a day at a spa, an iPod, and more. Well, I put my name in the drawing and I won the iPod. It is the new 8GB iPod Nano. I have never won anything this cool before. Now I have it loaded it with music and podcast. It is really cool.

Learning SSIS

noreply@blogger.com (Michael) — Wed, 08 Aug 2007 00:42:00 +0000

So one new thing I've had a chance to learn at work is Microsoft SQL Server 2005 Integration Services (SSIS). SSIS is a platform to build high performance data integration solutions, including extraction, transformation, and load (ETL) packages for data warehousing. SSIS replaced the old Data Transformation Services (DTS) that was introduced in SQL Server 7.0.

The project I work on uses several databases when processing client request. These databases range from 100,000 rows to over 170 million rows. We are using SSIS to make it easier and faster to load the raw data sources into these databases.

As I go through my learning curve with the platform I will post some things I have learned. Stay tune for the first sample.

Another big catfish

noreply@blogger.com (Michael) — Mon, 06 Aug 2007 00:22:00 +0000

Last weekend I drove up to my parent's to go fishing with my brother-in-law. Since I did not get there until late on Saturday we only got a couple hours of fishing. We did not catch anything on Saturday, but Sunday was a different story. On my first cast I hooked a nice size catfish (see below). I was using light tackle this time; 6'6" Shimano rod and Shimano open face reel with 6 lb line. I was fishing with my favorite fresh water live bait, night crawlers. It took some time to get this one in. Every time we would get him close to bank him would take off, taking 20-25 feet of drag.
After we got the fish out of the water it weighed in a little over 8lbs. I also caught 5 small (1/2 - 1 pound) catfish that day, but I threw all those back. I gave the big catfish to my brother-in-law, and he got 2 really nice flillets.

Deep sea fishing

noreply@blogger.com (Michael) — Thu, 02 Aug 2007 00:54:00 +0000

For father's day my wife gave me and her dad tickets on the Thunderstar. Last Thursday the two of us took our trip. The boat was crowded, but it was still a lot of fun. We both had really good spots on the boat. We left Shem Creek in Mt. Pleaseant, SC around 7AM and headed out 50 miles to the Gulf Stream.

People were catching a variety of fish, but most were Vermillion Snapper. I only caught Vermillion Snapper, and by the end of the day I was ready to catch something else. We both caught our limit before the day was over. When we returned we weighed the fish and had a total of 29 pounds. Now it was time for a fish fry, which we had Friday night. Here are a few photos from our trip.

Heading out to sea

Sunrise

The water was very calm that day

My father-in-laws catch

It's been a while

noreply@blogger.com (Michael) — Wed, 01 Aug 2007 01:20:00 +0000

It has been a while since my last post, but lots of things have been happening. I am learning lots of cool new things at work. The project I am working on is moving forward nicely. I have also been doing a lot of little projects around our new house. But most of all, I have been doing a lot of fishing.

One of the first fishing trips this month was over the July 4th holiday at my parent's pond. My parents live near Rock Hill, SC. It is a small pond loaded with catfish and bream. On my second cast I reeled in a nice 8 pound catfish. My oldest kid caught a couple nice catfish also. We were using night crawlers as bait. Nothing like good live bait. At the end of the day we let all the fish go to be caught another day. Here are a couple pictures from that day.

I will post about the other fishing trips later this week.

My weather radio works!

noreply@blogger.com (Michael) — Wed, 18 Apr 2007 00:59:00 +0000

The weather radio I bought works. This past weekend we got hit by the storms that moved across the east coast. About 1:15AM Sunday morning it went off. Tornado Warning scrolled across the display. So I got up and listened to the weather alert that NWS was sending out, then turned on the TV. About 20 minutes later a tornado touched down in the northern part of the county we live in (or so the local TV news channel said) It went off about 4 times during Sunday as the storms rolled through the area. Overall I would say it was a very good purchase.

Went Fishing Today

noreply@blogger.com (Michael) — Sun, 15 Apr 2007 02:46:00 +0000

I went fishing with my wife's dad today. He bought a really nice boat about a month ago. We were planning on fishing tomorrow, but the weather forecast is looking bad. So we decided to move up our plans and went today. We put the boat in the water here on Daniel Island and took it down a few inlets and the Wando River. He snagged a really nice fish, but lost it before we could get it in the boat. (The one that got away) I did not get any bites, but I was just happy to be out on the water fishing. I cannot wait to go back out. Now I want a boat, but that will have to wait.

Weather Radio

noreply@blogger.com (Michael) — Sat, 07 Apr 2007 15:06:00 +0000

Last week a bought a Midland WR-300 weather radio. Most of you know that I am a weather freak. This is a really cool radio. The radio has the "S.A.M.E. Digital Weather/Hazard Alert" (Specific Area Message Encoding Program Service) feature, providing constant monitoring of localized NWS broadcast. I can now listen to the local weather anytime I want. Now I am just waiting for a storm to come.

New blog link

noreply@blogger.com (Michael) — Sun, 25 Feb 2007 22:39:00 +0000

Checkout Peter Hirschberg's Journal! Peter is in the middle of a huge construction project. He has also been doing some other really cool projects. (small things, like making a movie)

Taxes, Taxes, Taxes

noreply@blogger.com (Michael) — Sun, 25 Feb 2007 22:31:00 +0000

Have you finished your taxes? I have! Normally I am finished way before this and already enjoying my refund of 2 new shiny quarters. But with selling a house, moving, buying a new house, switching jobs, and everything else it has taken me a little longer. (Plus I have been lazy). Well this year I will only get 2 new shiny pennies, but I guess that is better than nothing. It is amazing how complicated some of this can be.

Riding around the Island

noreply@blogger.com (Michael) — Sun, 25 Feb 2007 01:03:00 +0000

So my kids and I have been going on bike rides around Daniel Island almost every week this year. We have missed a few weekends due to traveling or rain, but for the most part we get out there for a couple of hours and rode. The last time we were out we took the camera and snapped a few photos.

One of the parks

Riding over the marsh

One of the many bike paths on the island

A small pond near our house

One way off the island

Not happy with Lowe's

noreply@blogger.com (Michael) — Tue, 09 Jan 2007 02:32:00 +0000

So a couple weeks ago we bought a new washer and dryer from Lowe's. The only reason we got it from there is because I had a 10% coupon, and if you know me you know I love to save money. (If you do not believe me ask the Boxely team about paying $1.01 for a Coke.)
We bought the Whirlpool Duet washer and dryer pair. We really like our washer and dryer, but I am very unsatisfied with Lowe's. They did not bring out everything we bought. They brought the wash/dryer, but not the pedestals. After many, many calls to them, and finally driving to the store and talking with the store manager we got everything. In the end it turned out they had deleted us from their system. They did not even know they were to deliver anything else. I am not too happy with Lowe’s right now. My advice to everyone, shop at Home Depot!