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Seeking advice on using US phones in Europe

To my European friends and my more traveled friends, my son heads off to London (7 days) and Paris (2 days) this weekend. My next quandary is cell phone. My plan currently allows my son unlimited texting and sending of pictures over SMS internationally. However, it does not include data or voice. What I learned today was that if he received a phone call (and doesn’t even answer it), he incurs international roaming charges.

So, do I:

  1. make him leave his phone at home?
  2. let him take his phone but remove the sim card so he is forced to use wifi?
  3. Have him jump into an EE store and buy a 30 day prepaid phone? I presume the tour group isn’t going to stop to waste an hour in an EE store letting everyone buy prepaid phones. — does the airport have these in vending machines?
  4. Beg a friend or relative to drop a prepaid phone by his hotel?

Are there other options?

1st person to post a Liam Neeson meme gets 10 points.

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A programmer’s nemesis

Rabbit holes!

A rabbit hole is a reference to chasing a problem, rather the solution to a problem, or allowing a feature to creep, that simply consumes an enormous amount of time for either little or no gain. I’ve just spent an hour in a rabbit hole and am not backing out every change I made in that hour. I’d like a refund please.

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What’s your verbal motivator?

Everyone has a verbal motivator. Some sort of spoken tick to get you to do something. For instance, I need to be programming but I’m hungry. Cereal has become disgusting to me but I can eat Frosted Flakes if only we had some. Frozen waffles are pretty quick and easy but they are downstairs in the deep freezer and I don’t feel like walking. Besides, if they aren’t homemade, surely they are full of crap I shouldn’t be eating…but it’s okay for my kids. My doctor says I should avoid meat and eggs but that’s about all that is left in the kitchen right now. So my choice, eat coffee or….here’s the motivator…"eeeh, fuck"…cook bacon and eggs.

So yes, increasingly, my verbal motivator to myself is "eeeh, fuck."

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Lame Dad

There is a rare snow in Knoxville. I’m working from home. I type on my keys and see others posting pictures of the snow men they are building with their children and the sledding for their kids. I type faster instead of going outside with my children. While I feel lame, I look to my left to a stack of bills and know that the choices I make are to avoid being even lamer.

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Knoxville is a small town

I was born into a city of 30,000 people. So, Knoxville’s population of 182,200 (or 441,311 if you include Knox County) should seem large. However, you cannot point your finger around here without pointing at someone that is more connected to you than Kevin Bacon.

Today I went somewhere where I should have seen no one that I know, and in three separate parts of the building, I was recognized by 3 people I knew.