Went to the mountains this weekend to get away and relax. Pretty funny to me that Brazilians, who can be warm pretty much all year long, actually pay (quite a bit) of money to go out of town to be cold. I cannot tell you how many people were taking pictures next to the giant temperature sign at night when it reached 7 degrees C on Friday night and 5 degrees C last night. It was pretty funny. I was in a North Face shell and everyone else I saw was in hat, gloves, and parkas running for hot chocolate and coffee.
Anyway, on the drive home today there were tons of police cars, roadside assistance trucks and about 20 cars all stopped as traffic came to a crawl for about 500m (just over 1/4 of a mile). Thought there was a big accident, NOPE, turned out that a beer truck had turned over on the highway and all the cars were stopped to pick up free Skol. I about died laughing. I guess those 40 or so people are well stocked for the game tomorrow.
Three more days until I head home and see friends and family. Getting excited, but also a little stressed with all the work and traveling I have to do when I get home. Off to relieve some stress by running 8k and then figuring out what to do for dinner in between loads of laundry. An exciting Sunday night!
Cheers
Adam
Sunday, June 27, 2010
Friday, June 25, 2010
My luck continues.....
So my luck with rental cars while traveling for business continues. For those that don't know when I used to travel to Philly every week for work I would have to rent a car, and during that time I came close to totaling one of my rental cars. Let me tell you, you think dealing with a rental agency is bad when you have to just rent a car, try wrecking one and telling them you don't have insurance with their company but are covered by your company. Another side note here, most company policies DO NOT cover loss of rental income for the rental company if you wreck one of their cars (ie the income they lose while the car is being fixed). I was told of course after the fact that the simple $5 per day coverage would have negated the $1k bill my company got for loss of rental income. So next time you rent a car it might be wise to ask about simple loss of income coverate for a rental car, in my opinion worth the $5 per day.
I was at the foundry this week for work finishing up some things before I head back to the states next Wednesday and I have been noticing that one of the tires on my car has been low on air. I stopped to get gas, had the car washed real fast (free with gas) and then put air in my tires. As I am heading back to Campinas (where I live) I went through the toll and as I am shifting into fifth bear, BOOM, hubcap goes flying off the tire out in front of the car, I hit the hubcap in mid air on the left side of my car and then of course the car is lobsided as my front passenger tire has gone flat. Only by God's grace was a Sao Paulo roadside assistance guy driving behind me and saw this awesome spectacle and pulled over to assist me in changing the tire. Thank God I had a full size spare in the trunk as well so I was able to drive normal speed to make it home. I am currently having the spare tire fixed as I am supposed to travel out of town this weekend to the mountains so hoping that it will be fixed in time.
On top of all of this, I got home last night to check emails, FB, etc before going for a run and my computer wouldn't load my profile and connect to my network for work. AWESOME! Let's just say yesterday was an extremely long and I am ready for the weekend. The office is supposed to close at 10 am today for the Brazil match at 11 am but I am going to be here all day before heading out for the weekend.
Bom fim de semana.
Adam
I was at the foundry this week for work finishing up some things before I head back to the states next Wednesday and I have been noticing that one of the tires on my car has been low on air. I stopped to get gas, had the car washed real fast (free with gas) and then put air in my tires. As I am heading back to Campinas (where I live) I went through the toll and as I am shifting into fifth bear, BOOM, hubcap goes flying off the tire out in front of the car, I hit the hubcap in mid air on the left side of my car and then of course the car is lobsided as my front passenger tire has gone flat. Only by God's grace was a Sao Paulo roadside assistance guy driving behind me and saw this awesome spectacle and pulled over to assist me in changing the tire. Thank God I had a full size spare in the trunk as well so I was able to drive normal speed to make it home. I am currently having the spare tire fixed as I am supposed to travel out of town this weekend to the mountains so hoping that it will be fixed in time.
On top of all of this, I got home last night to check emails, FB, etc before going for a run and my computer wouldn't load my profile and connect to my network for work. AWESOME! Let's just say yesterday was an extremely long and I am ready for the weekend. The office is supposed to close at 10 am today for the Brazil match at 11 am but I am going to be here all day before heading out for the weekend.
Bom fim de semana.
Adam
Saturday, June 12, 2010
Copa do Mundo 2010!!!
I realize that it's been over a month since my last post so I will do my best to give all the updates possible. I do have a long story to share about a weekend adventure last weekend to the beach, but I had to let the week pass before I was able to post about it because I was so annoyed at the time. I digress......it's Saturday afternoon now and I finally got a chance to catch up on some sleep and am getting ready to head out into the city and take some pictures of everything they have setup for the Copa do Mundo 2010 (World Cup 2010). The closest thing it reminds me of is the 4th of July decorations or Christmas decorations in Chicago. The whole city is decked out in yellow and green and they have setup some huge tents and big screen TV is in the city circle where they will be showing the Brazil games for the next month. Not sure what my plans are for Tuesday's game yet so I still need to figure that out. The bars around here of course take advantage of the games and its costing guys between R$70 and R$120 just to get in to watch somewhere. That doesn't include any food or drinks so it's a pretty steep charge to watch 3 hours or so of TV. First things first though, the US v England game is today so I am going to head out and watch that. Being one of the few gringos in Campinas has it's advantages because no one will really be out watching this game so I will have my choice of where to go. (quick side note here it's now Thursday morning when I am finishing this post) as I have been side tracked by a visit from the boss and am finally getting back into my routine.
Weekend was good and as I mentioned I watched the game with some friends on Saturday and then Sunday I came down with some 24 hr bug. I spent most of the day in bed resting and did some work off and on and made it to the store real fast to pick up some food, water, gatorade etc. My boss from the US was in town this week and Monday we were in SP for meetings and a dinner with a customer and man that was a long day. We went to one of the original Fogo de Chao's for dinner in SP and the dinner went until just after midnight then I had an hour or so drive home to my apartment, finally went to bed at 2 am and was up at 6 am work for since we have different hours for the World Cup. Tuesday we worked from 7 am until 1 pm and then went left work to watch the game. We have to make up the hours during the next couple of weeks and the next World Cup game is at 11 am and the hours that day are 5 am until 10 am. Office closes at 10 am for the game and then we come back the next day.
Tuesday was pretty crazy for the game, but it was awesome to see how the whole country shuts down during the games. There is NO ONE on the streets because everyone is inside watching the games at either a bar or their homes.
So the past month has been good but very busy. I have been mainly working out of my main office which is about 20 km from my apartment, but I was at the foundry for two weeks in a row and I think I will be heading there again next week for a couple of days to make sure I have everything wrapped up before I head back to the states. I was finally able to do some traveling to some of the beaches here and I went with a friend to Ubatuba, Sao Sebastiao, Ihlabelha (island off the coast), Maresias, and Juhquey. I know I misspelled some of the places, but if you look at the map of SP state if you find Ihlabehla you can easily find the other beaches. We hit so many because they are in a row and we started at Ubatuba on Friday night and then spent the rest of the weekend driving down the coast. The main reason was to go Kiteboarding but when we called on Saturday morning there was no wind, and when we showed up on Saturday afternoon there was too much wind. It turned out to be an extremely long weekend of driving for me and I spent close to 17 hours driving over the course of three days. For those that really know me, know that I LOVE driving so it was a lot of fun for me (hopefully you detected the sarcasm here).
The past couple of weekends have been spent in Campinas relaxing and I think the last weekend before I head back to the states I am going to head to Monte Verde and spend the weekend there. It's about 3 hours from Campinas in the mountains and it's supposed to be beautiful and cold. Great food, great wine, great place to hike and take some pictures so I am looking forward to it.
I did finally get my camera (thanks again Kurt) and I have about 100 pictures that I need to edit and upload. I will be spending some time at the beach over vacation and I plan on working on editing and uploading some pictures of the places I've been, Wold Cup pictures, pictures of my apartment, and Monte Verde. I know everyone is looking for pictures but my computer here doesn't have editing software nor do I have an SD card reader on my laptop. I have one at home and will be uploading them once I return to the states.
I hope everyone at home is doing well, I miss you all and will see you in a couple of weeks!
Tchau
Adam
Weekend was good and as I mentioned I watched the game with some friends on Saturday and then Sunday I came down with some 24 hr bug. I spent most of the day in bed resting and did some work off and on and made it to the store real fast to pick up some food, water, gatorade etc. My boss from the US was in town this week and Monday we were in SP for meetings and a dinner with a customer and man that was a long day. We went to one of the original Fogo de Chao's for dinner in SP and the dinner went until just after midnight then I had an hour or so drive home to my apartment, finally went to bed at 2 am and was up at 6 am work for since we have different hours for the World Cup. Tuesday we worked from 7 am until 1 pm and then went left work to watch the game. We have to make up the hours during the next couple of weeks and the next World Cup game is at 11 am and the hours that day are 5 am until 10 am. Office closes at 10 am for the game and then we come back the next day.
Tuesday was pretty crazy for the game, but it was awesome to see how the whole country shuts down during the games. There is NO ONE on the streets because everyone is inside watching the games at either a bar or their homes.
So the past month has been good but very busy. I have been mainly working out of my main office which is about 20 km from my apartment, but I was at the foundry for two weeks in a row and I think I will be heading there again next week for a couple of days to make sure I have everything wrapped up before I head back to the states. I was finally able to do some traveling to some of the beaches here and I went with a friend to Ubatuba, Sao Sebastiao, Ihlabelha (island off the coast), Maresias, and Juhquey. I know I misspelled some of the places, but if you look at the map of SP state if you find Ihlabehla you can easily find the other beaches. We hit so many because they are in a row and we started at Ubatuba on Friday night and then spent the rest of the weekend driving down the coast. The main reason was to go Kiteboarding but when we called on Saturday morning there was no wind, and when we showed up on Saturday afternoon there was too much wind. It turned out to be an extremely long weekend of driving for me and I spent close to 17 hours driving over the course of three days. For those that really know me, know that I LOVE driving so it was a lot of fun for me (hopefully you detected the sarcasm here).
The past couple of weekends have been spent in Campinas relaxing and I think the last weekend before I head back to the states I am going to head to Monte Verde and spend the weekend there. It's about 3 hours from Campinas in the mountains and it's supposed to be beautiful and cold. Great food, great wine, great place to hike and take some pictures so I am looking forward to it.
I did finally get my camera (thanks again Kurt) and I have about 100 pictures that I need to edit and upload. I will be spending some time at the beach over vacation and I plan on working on editing and uploading some pictures of the places I've been, Wold Cup pictures, pictures of my apartment, and Monte Verde. I know everyone is looking for pictures but my computer here doesn't have editing software nor do I have an SD card reader on my laptop. I have one at home and will be uploading them once I return to the states.
I hope everyone at home is doing well, I miss you all and will see you in a couple of weeks!
Tchau
Adam
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