bjarvis | Headquarters, Day 1

Nearly everything about this trip is vastly easier than the last one: navigating SFO, getting my rental car, driving to the hotel, getting around the bay area on municipal transit, and such. This includes, as of this morning, getting to work.

Knowing when the main doors would be open, where my team sits and where I could likely find an empty desk, I was working away on my laptop by 8:30 AM PST. I'm still more formally dressed than 90% of the very casually dressed people here but that's my personal eccentricity and one seems to mind or care.

I went out for lunch with my director and another manager at a nearby texas bbq restaurant. That wasn't quite the largest hamburger I've ever seen in my life, but it was in the top three. No dinner for me tonight. *burp*

On a more professional note, I got nearly all of the SAN configuration information & procedures I was hoping to get this trip. The key guy I wanted to talk to was out sick this morning but others were able to fill me in with the key items and I was able to explore on my own for most of the rest. Yay!

I also got a tour of the Foster City ~~data center~~ ~~server closet~~ over-glorified dumpster. My DC facility is the production system and was built out only a few months ago; by contrast, the Foster City facility is non-prod and grew gradually with no discipline or planning over the course of several years. I'm told the FC facility, even in its state of disarray, is a vast improvement over what they had only a year ago, thanks to the efforts of some folks hired last fall.

I've also submitted a stack of expense reports for reimbursement. These have been accumulating for a while, a small postage charge in January, ethernet cables a week after, two crossover cables, a serial adapter, etc.. In all, it came to about $260... it will be nice to have my money back.

I'm going to wrap up today's stuff and go for a nap now, I think.