First, I just returned home from a last minute business trip to Canada to work with a customer. Being in technical service, I hate to say the problem is not our issue or that there is nothing we can do to help, but in this case it was actually true. The trip was last minute because I found out about it on Friday afternoon and left on Monday morning. I was not scheduled to return until Thursday but the customer realized there was nothing we could do for them and let us go. Besides that, the other supplier that was visiting decided they were done and left. Third, some of the equipment the customer needed to use for process validation (which was why we visited) was broken and there was no schedule as for when it would be repaired. And lastly, a snowstorm is scheduled to hit eastern Canada and the Eastern USA on Wednesday night and Thursday morning and I did not want to get stuck in a snowstorm... At least there was another coworker with me on the trip, but getting stuck somewhere that is not your home still sucks.
Because the trip was last minute, the flight schedules were not very good. Visiting this customer normally takes me into Syracuse, New York and then I drive up to Canada. The customer we were visiting is nearly half way between Syracuse and Toronto. Flying into Toronto is normally 2-3 times more expensive than flying into Syracuse. However, for this trip we flew into Toronto, drove a couple hours east to our customer, and then drove East and South to Syracuse to return home. Plus we had the pleasure of a one way rental from Hertz, that crosses a border into another country. The rental car companies always over charge for a one way rental, I think it is their way of discouraging the practice. It turns out that there was approximately a $200 fee for the one way rental. What I didn't notice until the second day of the rental is the car, a POS Chevy Cruze, had New York licence plates. I was returning a car back to the USA for them and being heavily charged for it.
In addition to the $200 extra rental fee, our customer originally requested we spend two days in the plant. So we scheduled Tuesday and Wednesday in the plant and travelling on Monday and Thursday. That meant two nights in the first hotel, Monday and Tuesday nights. Since we were scheduled to stay two days, and the customer let us leave a day early we went back to the hotel at 5:00 pm and checked out. Of course, we were charged for the second day because we didn't check out at noon as the hotel policy dictates.
All in all this was an expensive trip to go to a customer and not be able to do anything except hold their hand and shrug our shoulders. On the positive side, when we were staying Tuesday night in Syracuse, near the airport, we didn't have any dinner plans so I followed my custom of asking the hotel attendant what is good in the area. Since it is next to the airport, there is normally not too much within a 5 minute drive. This time we struck gold in the form of North Syracuse's Clam Bar. http://www.theclambarrestaurant.com/ It was one of the best seafood places I have eaten in a very long time. They have a great selection of seafood and steaks and are very reasonably priced. I highly recommend stopping in if you are in the area. We were lucky, we walked in and there was only one open table in the place. I even had the chance to eat something new, raw clams on the half shell. I have had oysters on the half shell but this was my first time with clams. They are similar to oysters but are a little more chewy and less slimy.
-
The next thing I want to discuss is shower etiquette. While I may not be an expert when it comes to etiquette, I have learned a little over the years. The showers at the gym for example are much better if there are private stalls. Of course this is not always the case, sometimes there are group showers and you have to make due or smell awful the rest of the day.
The gym that I visit over my lunch break during the week has the group showers. There is a room with 8 showers lining two sides of the room. Since I like my coworkers, I opt for the shower. A quick diagram of the shower...
There is an entrance to the shower on each side. My preference of shower heads is either number 1 or number 5. There is a swim suit spinner outside the entrance next to shower head number 1 and I normally swim at lunch and need to dry out my suit after rinsing it in the shower. The time during lunch is normally pretty busy at the gym so I don't always get my choice of shower. However, on one particular day that I remember when I finished my workout, and went to shower, the shower was completely empty. I had my pick of spots. Naturally, I chose my favorite, shower number 1.
After a short amount of time, a second person comes into the shower. Etiquette dictates that he should take shower number 8. Of course any selection of 5, 6, 7, 8, or 4 would be acceptable. One thing to note about this shower, heads 4 and 8 are lower than the others. So as a result I try to avoid 4 or 8 because I have to bow my head in order to rinse the top of my hair. Where did the newcomer pick?
-
No comments:
Post a Comment