Jeff Billimek’s Journal

Today is my last day of employment at Turner.  I parked in the main garage at the Inforum since I'll be turning in my parking card today.  My desk was all cleaned out and I spent the day wrapping up some final tasks.  One of the things that I've been working on recently has been a performance optimization project and I was tracking the progress using Google Spreadsheets.  It worked out really well.

I cleaned up all of my personal things from the laptop and signed off for the last time.  I turned in my laptop and blackberry to Jeff H.  He took me down to HR and I turned in my ID badge, parking card, building access card, and SecurID fob to Rhonda in HR.  I left early around 12:30pm.

It didn't take me long to get home.  When I arrived I helped Jen pack up and we headed to the airport around 2:30pm.  This was my first time checking into a Delta flight as a paying passenger.  I wasn't sure how to use the Kiosk as a customer.  Jen and I figured it out.

We checked two bags and the ticket counter lady was very nice.  It turns out that we were at the airport super early and had about three hours to kill.  I found a power outlet near out gate so I busted out the laptop and checked to see if there is any free WiFi access in the Atlanta Airport. There never is but I check anyway.  So instead I made use of my cell phone's slow GPRS internet connection via a bluetooth link.

For some reason Gmail wouldn't work.  I think it is because it was trying to use a SSL connection and that is different than port 80.  The proxy I go through must not allow that service.  I had a sudden craving for a Chick-fil-A milkshake so Jen and I wandered around the airport until we found on.  Sadly this airport location didn't sell milkshakes.  Instead we split a small white chocolate moose frozen yogurt from another place in the same terminal.  It wasn't as good as TCBY.

We headed back to the gate and waited for our flight.  Jen read her book while I listened to my Wheel of Time audiobook.  It was very relaxing and I almost dozed off a couple of times while listening.

It was finally time to board the plane.  It looked like it was a full flight as the standby board showed only 2 seats open with seven standbys waiting.  We were in zone 8 so we boarded nearly at the end.  There was a huge amount of overhead space free - probably due to the new stupid liquid restrictions.

After the aircraft door was closed I looked around and noticed that there were several open seats.  That was odd considering what I saw on the list outside in the gate area.  The flight was super fun.  I was able to work on the laptop and had enough room to do so despite being in coach.  I spent nearly the entire flight working on my journal notes while Jen read her book.  This made the flight to San Antonio go by really fast.

It was still daylight when we arrived despite being about 7pm.  It took a while to get our luggage and then we hopped on the shuttle bus to the Avis place.  Once there we picked up a four-door white Pontiac and headed out.  I called up Craig and we made plans to meet for dinner at Sushi Zushi.

Craig was waiting for us at the restaurant when we arrived.  There was a bit of a wait but we didn't mind and sat outside.  It was great weather out today.  Craig ordered a bottle of Escansia Cabernet and I ran back to the car to change into some sandals.  Once seated inside, we had a really great time eating lots of different sushi along with pot stickers and edamame for appetizers.  It was a really fun night out.

We went back to Craig's place and began to watch the extended edition version of Dune.  Craig opened up a bottle of wine that Adam made and we had some of that - it wasn't my favorite.  Jen got tired and went to bed about thirty minutes after we started the movie.  I ended up going to bed about half-way through because I was really tired too and we have to get up pretty early tomorrow morning.