28 June 2008 Update
Sat Jun 28, 08 2:30 pm
I seem to write these updates on planes, airports or trains lately. I do enjoy the travel so that is great. My time in Atlanta was very fulfilling and rewarding. I arrived back in Carlisle after a nice flight and good rest.
***Atlanta Update***
I knew that OM USA was having some issues with their IT infrastructure. I did not realize how badly it was until I arrived. Their systems for managing the computers and users in the office are sorely lacking. I know that I was able to make a huge, gigantic, enormous difference during the short the time I was there in automating many of the everyday systems they use to manage the computers in the office.
There were some blatantly obvious things wrong with their office server that I was able to correct immediately. Some issues will not be resolved until they can do a full server migration. Unfortunately, that was not in the scope of my work for the time I was there. They have wanted to perform the server migration for some time (and it would reduce their work load a ton), but they have not had anyone technical enough to perform the migration. I was able to provide that knowledge.
OM USA is running much better now. Before I arrived they were not even able to keep up with common daily administrative tasks. I automated most of those tasks and the OM USA IT department are now able to do more for their users while at the same time reducing the time spent on that work drastically.
Shortly before leaving for the US I was asked if I could make a trip to OM Ships Partner Ministries office in Florence, South Carolina to work on their computer systems. It is only a 9 hours round trip drive from Atlanta so I went there for a Friday and Saturday. I used my time well and was able to migrate their office server from very old hardware (that was getting close to breaking) to new hardware. The new server hardware had been sitting there for nearly a year waiting for someone to get there and do the migration. The migration went flawlessly as far as I can tell. A picture of me hanging on a large anchor in front of their office.
I am negotiating with a company in North Atlanta to manage an international Exchange server for OM. While in Atlanta I was able to meet with them in person, get some questions answered on the proposal and see their data centre. It was massive. The floor of the data centre was 200,000 ft2. Google are using about a 1/3 of the data and have a few of their servers (a couple hundred thousand servers) there. The data centre was pretty cool because of the high security that was in-place - CCTV's ever where, guards everywhere, thousands of servers in cages and locked cabinets. The security of the place was nice especially if we decide to put our server at their data centre.
***Wedding and Bloomington***
It was nice being able to stand up there on the stage with my brother as he got married. They will be a lovely couple. Many of my relatives made it to the wedding so I was able to see them for the first time since leaving for England (3 years.)
The bachelor party that I planned was great. We had a video scavenger hunt with silly things that needed to be videotaped. They were really silly things. Here are a few of the clips.
After the wedding we had people around to my parent's place for dancing and watched the bachelor party videos. I really enjoyed the weekend even though it was manic. I will post more pictures later, but here are a few on a friend’s blog. After the wedding some of the guys stayed around and I was able to catch up with them on Sunday afternoon and evening. Having fun with Lucas' lawn:
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***Personal Life***
I have been so busy lately that I have not had much personal life and activities outside work. At OM USA I worked from early in the morning until late at night (normally 12 hour days) when I walked to my accommodation on the OM base and chilled out until the next day when I started all over again. Here is a photo of the OM USA office.
My ankle does not bother me any more except that it is weak. When I walk on uneven ground I can feel that it is weak and could be easily re-injured. Other than that it is fine. I am starting physiotherapy on Monday to work on that.
I knew that I would be moving accommodation shortly, but did not know when or where. While here in the US I learned that I am moving at the beginning in August to new accommodation just a bit north of where I currently am located.
The friends from Edinburgh that I visited last month will be coming down to Carlisle for the 4th of July and the weekend. I plan on taking the day off and resting. I look forward to getting some rest after the busyness of my schedule the past 3 weeks.
***Prayer Requests***
1. Get back into things in Carlisle after being away for 2.5 weeks
2. My ankle will strengthen
3. General rest after the busyness of travel, wedding preparations and work
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