As this blog talks to random parts of my life that I feel are pertinent to share, I am talking this moment in April to reflect upon change. Recently, I left my employment for a new job. In this job market (Q1 2010), I have noticed that it has been quite hot (for now). 5 of my colleagues left within a 4 week span, now some might speculate on the reason those people left, but I choose to take it for what it is. I do believe of everyone that did leave, the least amount of years spent with the company was 2 years with one person being with the company over 10. Now, I only say this to place perspective on the situation. I can only speak for myself and I truly enjoyed my time with my previous company. I can honestly say, in my short life, it was my best job ever. Yes it had its challenges, but in totality it was a place I will never forget. But as I left one job to join this great job, I felt it time to leave this place to experience something new. I have no plans on jumping from job to job, that is not fun at all, but I do feel I am at a time (recently married, no kids) in my life where I can afford to take moderate risk to see how I can enhance my skillsets to make me a complete contributor to an organization. I do know that with change comes a level of unknown that can be daunting, but life is short and we must do what we can to live each day to the fullest whether we are on top of the world or walking the streets below it.
Now I do write these blogs to all out there that are willing to listen to this man’s thoughts. But this blog post is dedicated to a friend of mine, from my previous employment, who always asked me: “Charles when is the next post coming out? Your public wants to know more!” And out of the respect I have for him, I will end this post in a similar manner of a television show we both love (Criminal Minds):
“The men who try to do something and fail are infinitely better than those who try to do nothing and succeed.” – Lloyd Jones
April 29, 2010
March 16, 2010
Lua de Mel
So for those who have been following the “saga”, after the wedding comes the Honeymoon (lua de mel is honeymoon in Portuguese). For those who are getting married, I would say having a honeymoon is an important step in your journey together. It is during this time you both get a chance to not only relax, from all the wedding planning, but really enjoy being Mr. & Mrs. away from everyone else. You meet people who will only know you as Mr. & Mrs. since they are meeting you for the 1st time, while friends and family knew you together or separately, which I think is pretty cool.
So onto the goodies…the trip started off quite interestingly. It was the day that we had a snow storm here in New York City (we left 2/25/10) but our flight left right before the full blast hit New York (there was enough snow to be worried, but we made it out). My computer was acting up in the airport, which made me a little cranky since I need my computer! And when we were on the flight, there was a drunken lady that had to be escorted off the plane, which delayed our flight from NYC to Atlanta (our connecting city to Buenos Aires --Video below will show). After all this, we were pretty much sailing right in South America.
When we landed the weather in BA (Buenos Aires) was beautiful, definitely a welcomed change from snowy New York City. We stayed at the Glu Hotel, which is a beautiful boutique hotel located in Palermo – Soho (upscale fashion area). The hotel has its quirks here and there, but overall I would recommend staying there if you are in BA. While in BA we participated in Graffiti Mundo (purchased our 1st and certainly not our last piece of artwork as Mr. & Mrs. Nixon), a polo lesson and enjoyed 1st class dinning (Social Pariso & Casa Cruz) at a rate of 4 to 1. BA is a place I will not return to, unless I am already in that region, even though the exchange rate is fabulous. One issue I had with Buenos Aires is that a lot of the addresses to things are not very clearly marked, so when using googlemaps for directions I had to get creative, so if anyone wants the location to any of these things just leave a comment.
click to see larger
Next stop, Sao Paulo Brazil. For those who know me, I travel to Brazil quite frequently. So far, this was probably not my best trip there (the weather did not cooperate at all) but I enjoyed every moment with my wife. When we travel to Sao Paulo the only hotel we stay at is the Unique, which is very “unique”. It is one of the top hotels in Sao Paulo and it shows! The hotel service was fabulous and they were helpful every step of the way. We were there for a week, so we had a chance to speak with a lot of the staff and even the manager (no problems with English, though my Portuguese has improved considerably). During our stay we went to great restaurants (Dalva e Dito & DOM), partied at Mokai (VIP set up by the hotel), watched AVATAR in IMAX (Bourbon Shopping; movie theatre was packed), lunch @ Google Brazil (a friend of mine just moved there for work) and our usual activities (dinner with a friend’s family, delicious room service dinner, etc.). The week before we arrived was extremely sunny, the week after we left was very sunny, but the week we were there was extremely cloudy with a lot of drizzling. ALSO, the traffic in Sao Paulo is some of the worst in the world. To give a little perspective on this, I will provide you with 2 examples. The first example comes when we were in a cab traveling from the airport to the hotel at 9:30 at night. The cab driver decided to ride the shoulder of the highway for 30 minutes because the traffic was so bad. Next example comes from us trying to get to a night club at 1:30 in the morning and traffic was so bad we got out of the cab and walked the 8 blocks remaining in the cab ride because traffic was almost at a standstill.
click to see larger
All in all the honeymoon was one my wife and I enjoyed and will certainly remember for the rest of our lives. We are most certainly looking forward to our 2nd honeymoon… ;P
So onto the goodies…the trip started off quite interestingly. It was the day that we had a snow storm here in New York City (we left 2/25/10) but our flight left right before the full blast hit New York (there was enough snow to be worried, but we made it out). My computer was acting up in the airport, which made me a little cranky since I need my computer! And when we were on the flight, there was a drunken lady that had to be escorted off the plane, which delayed our flight from NYC to Atlanta (our connecting city to Buenos Aires --Video below will show). After all this, we were pretty much sailing right in South America.
When we landed the weather in BA (Buenos Aires) was beautiful, definitely a welcomed change from snowy New York City. We stayed at the Glu Hotel, which is a beautiful boutique hotel located in Palermo – Soho (upscale fashion area). The hotel has its quirks here and there, but overall I would recommend staying there if you are in BA. While in BA we participated in Graffiti Mundo (purchased our 1st and certainly not our last piece of artwork as Mr. & Mrs. Nixon), a polo lesson and enjoyed 1st class dinning (Social Pariso & Casa Cruz) at a rate of 4 to 1. BA is a place I will not return to, unless I am already in that region, even though the exchange rate is fabulous. One issue I had with Buenos Aires is that a lot of the addresses to things are not very clearly marked, so when using googlemaps for directions I had to get creative, so if anyone wants the location to any of these things just leave a comment.
click to see larger
Next stop, Sao Paulo Brazil. For those who know me, I travel to Brazil quite frequently. So far, this was probably not my best trip there (the weather did not cooperate at all) but I enjoyed every moment with my wife. When we travel to Sao Paulo the only hotel we stay at is the Unique, which is very “unique”. It is one of the top hotels in Sao Paulo and it shows! The hotel service was fabulous and they were helpful every step of the way. We were there for a week, so we had a chance to speak with a lot of the staff and even the manager (no problems with English, though my Portuguese has improved considerably). During our stay we went to great restaurants (Dalva e Dito & DOM), partied at Mokai (VIP set up by the hotel), watched AVATAR in IMAX (Bourbon Shopping; movie theatre was packed), lunch @ Google Brazil (a friend of mine just moved there for work) and our usual activities (dinner with a friend’s family, delicious room service dinner, etc.). The week before we arrived was extremely sunny, the week after we left was very sunny, but the week we were there was extremely cloudy with a lot of drizzling. ALSO, the traffic in Sao Paulo is some of the worst in the world. To give a little perspective on this, I will provide you with 2 examples. The first example comes when we were in a cab traveling from the airport to the hotel at 9:30 at night. The cab driver decided to ride the shoulder of the highway for 30 minutes because the traffic was so bad. Next example comes from us trying to get to a night club at 1:30 in the morning and traffic was so bad we got out of the cab and walked the 8 blocks remaining in the cab ride because traffic was almost at a standstill.
click to see larger
All in all the honeymoon was one my wife and I enjoyed and will certainly remember for the rest of our lives. We are most certainly looking forward to our 2nd honeymoon… ;P
March 11, 2010
Change Thy Name
I just got married about 3 weeks ago now and one of the most dreaded parts of getting married is the combining of both people’s lives. Now I am not speaking of the emotional and mental part of the union, but where the real meat occurs…finances and government! And for those ladies that have to change their name, I hope you are organized.
If you are like me, I am a fan of the wife taking the husbands name. And in doing this, there are quite a few steps that are necessary in becoming one surname. One of the things I found for my wife (1st online reference to her – feels good) is this service called missnowmrs.com. Its $30 for the deluxe, but the basic should be enough to get most through what they need. In all honestly it can be done on your own, the website just helps you with the questions and pre-fill the forms for you to send out. My suggestion for all the women out there changing their name is to do it in the following order.
1. Department of Motor Vehicle (In NYC $15, $80.50 for renewal)
2. Social Security (Free – NYC)
3. Passport ($75)
Each of these can be done through a simple search of the item needing to be changed and the text “change name”. Now what my wife and I did was mail our license in before we went on our honeymoon, so that when we came back it would be waiting for us, as it did. We then needed to take that marriage license to the DMV as proof of the change, which then gave her a temporary drivers license with her new name on it. We then took the marriage license, social security card and passport (old name) with us to the social security office (they no longer accept drivers license as a form of ID). And finally we went to the post office and mailed out the forms, pictures, money order and original marriage license. What’s important to note in this process is that the passport office wants a certified copy of the marriage license, which would take time to obtain since we just received the license itself, so we just sent the license since the other government documents could be done 1st and we don’t have plans for international travel for some time.
I was with my wife through this entire process. I would say as long as you are organized and take 1 day off to get this done, it isn’t as horrible as one might think. All the other stuff, bank accounts, professional licenses (she is an attorney), cell phones, etc. can be just notified via phone…usually. We also took a scanned copy of the license in PDF format so that it could be emailed to whoever would need a copy.
If you do your homework, prepare and get the paperwork in order you too can truly become ONE!
If you are like me, I am a fan of the wife taking the husbands name. And in doing this, there are quite a few steps that are necessary in becoming one surname. One of the things I found for my wife (1st online reference to her – feels good) is this service called missnowmrs.com. Its $30 for the deluxe, but the basic should be enough to get most through what they need. In all honestly it can be done on your own, the website just helps you with the questions and pre-fill the forms for you to send out. My suggestion for all the women out there changing their name is to do it in the following order.
1. Department of Motor Vehicle (In NYC $15, $80.50 for renewal)
2. Social Security (Free – NYC)
3. Passport ($75)
Each of these can be done through a simple search of the item needing to be changed and the text “change name”. Now what my wife and I did was mail our license in before we went on our honeymoon, so that when we came back it would be waiting for us, as it did. We then needed to take that marriage license to the DMV as proof of the change, which then gave her a temporary drivers license with her new name on it. We then took the marriage license, social security card and passport (old name) with us to the social security office (they no longer accept drivers license as a form of ID). And finally we went to the post office and mailed out the forms, pictures, money order and original marriage license. What’s important to note in this process is that the passport office wants a certified copy of the marriage license, which would take time to obtain since we just received the license itself, so we just sent the license since the other government documents could be done 1st and we don’t have plans for international travel for some time.
I was with my wife through this entire process. I would say as long as you are organized and take 1 day off to get this done, it isn’t as horrible as one might think. All the other stuff, bank accounts, professional licenses (she is an attorney), cell phones, etc. can be just notified via phone…usually. We also took a scanned copy of the license in PDF format so that it could be emailed to whoever would need a copy.
If you do your homework, prepare and get the paperwork in order you too can truly become ONE!
February 23, 2010
I wonder…22010
What it means to find dreams…”
The growth of one’s life can be measured in multiple ways, but for the purposes of this discussion I would like to highlight one metric: DREAMS!
When I was a kid, I had all sorts of dreams. Some of them I forgot, some of them transformed while others I grew out of. One of them was to fall in love with a person who I could share my life with…Nytimes.
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So as we begin our lives together, I am not disillusioned that there will be good and trying times ahead, but with as fast as our vows went so can life. And I in this short existence we have labeled life, I have 1 question for you…
You wonder if you’ll ever find your dreams?
~ Kayne West, I Wonder”
I have and she has a name: Christy Nixon!!!
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NOTE: The inside joke that occurred during the ceremony was about the presentation of the vows. I decided to write my vows in a note (in High School we use to pass notes to eachother, folded up in a special way). The night before the wedding, I spoke with Christy and until this moment we had not discussed any details about our vows. But tonight she told me how she originally wanted to write her vows on a note as we did in high school, but decided to do it differently on the day of. What is interesting, she called me only 15 minutes after I shared the details of my plan with a good friend of mine. Who I used at the wedding as my witness to this idea not being STOLEN!
January 1, 2010
DROID
Yes people you are reading the headline correctly, I have switched over to the new Motorola Droid on Verizon! I have left my blackberry in the dust. Now, I do not believe this phone is better than the upcoming Nexus One but for a loyal Verizon customer...I am happy. I originally wanted to go with the Eris, but based on a friends account of the poor battery life, I felt that the upgrade to 2.0.1 was worth the dive. For me the droid make more sense since it is linked to google (I am a google services guy) and everything pretty much just WORKED!
Anyway, to help some of you out there with the droid are the following 2 links:
Yahoo Mail on Motorola Droid for FREE
Other Dorid Instructions
I told you 2010 was going to be HOTTTT!
Quick Tips
Reset = shift+alt+del
Voice Search = HOLD the spyglass face button until option launches
Last 6 Apps = HOLD Home button
Copy Text From Email = Open keyboard, hold shift and slide finger across text you want copied
Wallpaper Size = 960 (W) x 854 (H)
settings->application settings->quick launch
search + e: email
search + y: youtube
search + b: browser
search + c: contacts
search + g: gmail
search + l: calendar
search + p: music
search + s: messaging
Anyway, to help some of you out there with the droid are the following 2 links:
Yahoo Mail on Motorola Droid for FREE
Other Dorid Instructions
I told you 2010 was going to be HOTTTT!
Quick Tips
Reset = shift+alt+del
Voice Search = HOLD the spyglass face button until option launches
Last 6 Apps = HOLD Home button
Copy Text From Email = Open keyboard, hold shift and slide finger across text you want copied
Wallpaper Size = 960 (W) x 854 (H)
settings->application settings->quick launch
search + e: email
search + y: youtube
search + b: browser
search + c: contacts
search + g: gmail
search + l: calendar
search + p: music
search + s: messaging
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