GAH!!! It's Cold!!

It's 32 degrees right now. Last night it was 21 degrees at about 9 pm. That's friggin' cold. Just another reminder of why I moved back to Texas. Good thing it hasn't snowed yet. But the weatherman has called for snow some time next week. Hopefully it'll hold off until Tuesday, since we fly out on Monday. Today we're taking a trip up to Decatur to visit some friends. It'll be a little colder there but not much. At least it's not Chicago. Not just because of the crappy weather there, but because the traffic there sucks too.

Home for the Holidays

I finally took some time off from working 2 jobs. On Monday afternoon the wife, the little man and I packed our stuff and flew out of Houston to STL to visit my parents and family in IL for Thanksgiving. Mom was pleasantly surprised. My sis actually somewhat did keep it a secret. Mom figured the next time she would see her grandson would be when he turned 18, save her coming down to Houston. She was complaining the other day about how I said we'd come home on the holidays before moving back to Houston and we hadn't come home yet. I didn't mean every damn holiday.

I won't be able to be totally lazy during my time off. I get to help my brother-in-law run a Cat 5 cable to my niece's room. I'm sure my Mom will have some stuff for me to do too. Plus I have to fix my sister's computer so it's no longer as fucked up as a soup sammich. Hmmm...first thing? Get rid of the damn thing. Oh wait, that's probably not an option. So I guess I'm gonna have to fix it the old fashioned way. Going through the damn thing with a fine-toothed comb. I hate Compaq/HP. Too much proprietary software. All of it junk. My wife's computer is my old Compaq with my own custom software install on it. I lovingly refer to it as "the Comcrap". I bought a Dell off a co-worker, and the thing has performed impressively. My next project will be to put aside some cash in order to build my own system, but right now that has to take a back burner to everything else. One of these days...

Funny...Yet So True

Stole this from GOC.

A father walks into a bookstore with his young son. The boy is holding a quarter. Suddenly, the boy starts choking, going blue in the face The father realizes the boy has swallowed the quarter and starts panicking, shouting for help.
A well dressed, attractive and serious looking woman, in a blue business suit is sitting at a coffee bar reading a newspaper and sipping a cup of coffee. At the sound of the commotion, she looks up, puts her coffee cup down, neatly folds the newspaper and places it on the counter, gets up from her seat and makes her way, unhurried, across the book store.
Reaching the boy, the woman carefully drops his pants; takes hold of the boy's testicles and starts to squeeze and twist, gently at first and then ever so firmly. After a few seconds the boy convulses violently and coughs up the quarter, which the woman deftly catches in her free hand.
Releasing the boy's testicles, the woman hands the coin to the father and walks back to her seat in the coffee bar without saying a word.
As soon as he is sure that his son has suffered no ill effects, the father rushes over to the woman and starts thanking her saying, "I've never seen anybody do anything like that before, it was fantastic.
Are you a doctor?"
"No," the woman replied. "Divorce attorney".

Martel Electronics Sucks

Martel makes the Dash Hound vehicle video system. It's a dash-mounted camera, basically a Sony handi-cam, an electronics control box and a mount that has a suction cup that mounts to the windshield, and 2 straps to secure it in place. It's fuckin' junk.

Before I took this job, someone ordered these monstrosities because they were cheap, about $1400 per unit. Ever hear the old adage "you get what you pay for"? This is a prime example. Did I mention they're fuckin' junk? Not to mention shitty customer service. They won't even return my calls. Their motto ought to be "Once you buy it, you're on your fuckin' own, pal."

In my business, I've dealt with a few vehicle camera systems.
Kustom Signals' Eyewitness camera: Though rather clunky (got a full sized VCR in a vault in the trunk) and a pain in the ass to install, it's a workhorse and almost impossible to kill. Short of putting a bullet through the damn thing. They even have a vault that is bullet- and fire-proof. They now have a digital system with a rear-facing infrared camera on the headliner mount control panel that can keep an eye on the arrestee(s) in the back seat. Comes with choice of hard drive or DVD drive and have a pretty small front facing camera so it doesn't block your view. They have a lot of options. Plus they look cool. I've never had a problem with these systems, save operator error.
Decatur Electronics Gemini system: It's a good system, it's small and easy to put in and maintain. Just gotta keep the cops from losing the keys to the compartment that houses the recorder. The digital system has a touch screen display, which in my experience is a big no-no. Cops and firefighters are not known for their gentleness with their equipment.
Panasonic Arbitrator: Another good, small, rugged system. Interfaces with the Panasonic Toughbook mobile data terminal(MDT). The Toughbook is basically a laptop with a wireless internet connection. Only problem I've seen with it is the display on the screen. Can be occluded by other windows on the Toughbook being open, reducing the chance the officer will be able to see while he's filling out paperwork and running driver's license and plate info. Comes with option of a hard drive or a solid-state drive (like the memory card in your digital camera). I'm not a big fan of hard drives in vehicles, just because of the chingazos (bumps) they can sometimes take.
Motorola Enforcer: I'm sort of biased toward Motorola. They make some kick-ass products. From cell phones, to two-way radios, to video. Plus I'm a former Motorolan. Yet another kick-ass product from the Galvin family. Comes with a 60GB hard drive and interfaces with their version of the MDT. See above for my thoughts on hard drives in vehicles.
Martel Dash-Hound DH1: POS. Worst system I've ever seen in my life. Let's start with the way it is mounted. Two straps to hold the back in place and on the front...a suction cup that attaches to the windshield. A suction cup? Yup. Damn thing doesn't hold suction either. And with the heat here in Houston if it stays stuck to the windshield it flattens out, therefore losing all its suction capability. That makes it a flying object hazard if you get into an accident, or even hit a decent bump. Secondly, the camera sits directly in the sun. Not a good thing. You know how hot it gets down here? Roll the windows up and leave it in the sun, then turn on the A/C, oh wow...now you've got condensation inside the camera. What a concept. The cameras themselves are a whole other ball of wax. It has two jacks on the side for microphone functions and I'll be damned if they don't fall out. Now the concept of having a camera you can take out to film an accident or crime scene is good in theory, but how often will that really be used? And as for the little control box that's mounted underneath the bracket, well the antenna jacks seem to have a hard time staying soldered in the box. Plus the wiring inside is soldered together pretty shitty. My 7 year-old nephew could have done a better job. All-in-all, if you are considering buying this system, the next time you take a dump wipe your ass with $1400. Then get some more money and go buy a real video system.

Ick

OK, this is just gross. I can actually remember when Madonna was somewhat hot, but now she's just a harping old hag. I mean, I don't mind seeing some cameltoe once in a while but that critter looks like it's been wrecked. Oh, Gawd...I'm getting physically ill just looking at it. You know what looks good on a 47 year-old mother of two? How about dignity. Hang it up. You're washed up and old. I don't care what your religion is. And I don't need to hear you telling me what I need to do or what's cool. That goes for every other Hollywood type. Did I ask you for your opinion? No k thx stfu.

Aftermarket Batteries vs. Impres Batteries

I got an email yesterday from our Assistant Chief regarding a department in Illinois that wanted some advice about whether or not to go with aftermarket batteries, standard Motorola rechargeable NiCd batteries, or the new Impres batteries and chargers. I tried to offer as much advice as I could in the area, and I hope I sufficiently answered their questions.

My thoughts on the matter was to go with the Impres batteries and chargers. Simply for the fact that in the long run it would save their department time and money since the bank chargers automatically recondition the batteries after 90 charging cycles. Granted, the Impres batteries cost almost twice as much, and they'll have to replace their current chargers with the Impress chargers (which are pretty comparable in price). But they don't have to contract with a radio service for reconditioning their batteries, nor do they need to have a substantial amount of spare batteries on hand to accomodate the loss of the batteries during the reconditioning process.

The differences between our departments is this: the majority of our portables are HT1000's (about 225) with about 70 more being the new PR1500. They're using the HT1550-XLS.

I have about 30 of the PR1500's outfitted with the Impres batteries since they are assigned to bank chargers here at HQ. The rest are take-home units or assigned to officers in seperate offices, thus the need still for the NiCd batteries since they're using the single-unit chargers. I've had no problems with the Impres batteries so far, plus I like the fact that I don't have to constantly keep up with the reconditioning of at least those units.

Has anybody ever had any experience with the HT1550-XLS aftermarket batteries? I've heard some don't fit the radio properly, like the contacts don't even line up right. All I've had experience with is those for the HT1000. Interstate's RAD1830 is good, but doesn't fit our radio holders. Alexander's H7143 is a great battery, with a long life and a perfect fit.

Well, at least I got an "Attaboy" for puttin' my $.02 in, and maybe it was some good PR for the department (I hope).

My Little Blue Eyes

I love my boy. Sometimes he can be fussy as all hell, but overall he's a cute little man and I'm glad that he's here. He was born 8/25/05 at 0724. He finally came out after 2 days of labor induction since he was already a week overdue. He weighed 6 lbs 15 oz and 20 inches long. As of his 2 month check-up, the little chunky monkey is now 23 inches and a whopping 13-1/2 lbs. That was 2 weeks ago, and he hasn't slowed down on his eating either. But that's a good thing. Now if we could only get him to stop fighting so hard not to go to sleep...

R.I.P. Latino Heat

I read this morning that Eddie "Latino Heat" Guerrero was found dead in his Minneapolis hotel room yesterday morning. He was 38 years old. He left behind a wife and 3 daughters. Anybody who knows me knows I love to watch rasslin'. Eddie was cool as hell. There will never be anyone who can replace him, and he will be sorely missed. The story is here.

Happy Veteran's Day

Happy Veteran's Day to all our service members, past and present. We see what you're doing over there and we appreciate you immensely. Keep the faith, keep up the good work, and we'll see you back stateside real soon.

Go Navy!!

former FC2 Mike, USN

I Actually Like My Job...

Not too many people can say that nowadays. The place where I work, and the people for whom I work are great. I do have times when I get frustrated with some of the stupid stuff that goes on, like people destroying the portable radios or vehicles and management not holding people accountable for their actions, or people not adhering to plainly spelled out directives concerning the radios. Likewise, sometimes I get pretty overwhelmed by the amount of responsibility that has been heaped upon me. In my previous jobs I was a worker bee..."go here, do this." It didn't take a whole lot of thought or planning, I just had to make sure I accounted for my time and did the job right within a certain amount of time. Here is a whole different story. Here I have to get quotes from different vendors, write parts requisitions, plan installations of vehicular and fixed equipment, strip equipment out of the old vehicles, install equipment in the new vehicles, maintain a fleet of 20 current vehicles which they want to expand that to 30, maintain approximately 230 portable units on which I do PM's (preventative maintenance) twice daily, recondition batteries constantly, I take care of the programming of all the portable and mobile radios and the fixed base stations, repair the broken portables, send mobile radios out for depot level repair when needed, maintain the fixed equipment (3 repeaters, 3 base stations and 8 satellite receivers), maintain the dispatch consoles, maintain a backup dispatch office, attend numerous meetings for everything from daily update meetings to radio system improvements to new buildings that will house more fixed radio equipment, oversee any contractor work regarding fixed equipment in any building, issuing radio equipment to the officers and maintaining an accurate database, attend vendor demonstrations of new products (which can be quite cool sometimes), keep up-to-date on and inform upper management of the new technologies coming out and write up my own budget every year. Not to mention I'm in the middle of reorganizing the room where we store all the portables and reorganizing my own shop as well, which now looks like a disaster area. Did I mention I'm on-call 24/7 since I'm the only one who does my job? Oh yeah, and I'm part of a "ride-out" team when natural disasters like hurricanes strike.

The pay isn't bad...it's a damn sight better than the last company I worked for. I'm still not making as much as I did working for the City of Houston, but the raises here are more consistent and the benefits here are better than either of the last two places. I'll delve into that more in a later post. I'm under alot less stress than I was at my other job, believe it or not. Thankfully my management sees that I'm constantly busting my ass to get things done, so they don't pressure me too much. My predecessor was there for 28 years before she retired, and many of the people there have been there for anywhere from 5 to 15 years. We only have one problem child, and that one should be retiring in the next couple of years, so we don't pay too much attention to their bullshit. Everybody else has little gripes and complaints, it's just par for the course.

They recently did some schedule changes. It actually worked out better for everyone in the long run. Now at least we don't have to work a bunch of people on the holidays (the change before this one, which no one liked). We used to be off for every state- and federal-sanctioned holiday, but someone decided we had to be there even on the holidays so they changed the schedule to where we had to work 3 holidays out of the whole year. Terrible, right? The way I see it, such is life when you work in public safety. Others didn't see it that way. You can't please everybody all the time, though.

All-in-all I can say I'm pretty satisfied with where I work. I'm glad I took the job here, and I'm glad to be back in Houston again.

Happy Birthday, Mom

Today's my Mom's birthday. Shall I tell them how old you are? :P

This pic was taken the day my son was born. We had to come back home for a bit and clean up since we'd spent 3 days in the hospital waiting for the cute little bugger to come out.

Why Blog?

I'm starting this blog for several reasons. To network with people in my chosen profession to get some ideas on how to improve my workplace. To let my family and friends know what's going on. To have an outlet for my rants when I feel the need to rant. To make people laugh, and to make people think about what's going on in the world around them. I'll discuss anything with anybody, whether on the net or face-to-face. I'm pretty candid with my opinions, sometimes to the point of brutality. That being said, feel free to read and leave comments. However, if you troll I will smack you. If you spam, I'll delete your comments and ban you. I don't put up with bullshit from anybody that a) doesn't sign my paycheck or b) I'm not married to.

Enjoy!!