Just an example of how unorganized this place is:
I have been waiting on the phone for two hours now for the ZJX (Jacksonville) guys to get on the line so we can test these last two circuits. They said they had a cable to finish and would join the bridge in five minutes. That was at 8:30, it is now 10:30. My SAC tech finally gets a hold of them and they say that they finished the cable a long time ago, but they also got word that we couldn’t test any circuits today. Well thanks for telling us this little nugget of information.
Why can’t we test today? Because the FAA has put a lockdown on all circuits in the ZJX and ZMA (Jacksonville and Miami) airspaces due to the freaking Super Bowl! Because of a stupid football game, I can’t get my work done. I’m pretty sure the place, time and date of this game was set up and known a long time before this morning. I mean, it’s not like a rave party or a cock fight and you don’t know where it will be until a few hours ahead of time is it? No, this FAA moratorium was set up ahead of time but no one thought to schedule around it. I could have gone home last night. I could have gone to another site and gotten something done. What’s worse is that now that we know about it, I’m still stuck here while they hash things out and try to squeeze these two circuits in. I have dealt with the ZJX manager (he’s strict but very nice guy) and I know that we will not be able to test. But still, I have to sit here.
Sure enough, as I typed those words, I got the word to stand-down on all Florida circuits. Go home. Damn it, I wanted to get those last two done and then Myrtle Beach would be done for now… Oh well. I’m on the road home and happy to be gone.
I’ve been taking I-95 to 386 into Myrtle Beach. One of the other techs said he tried US17 but it was too slow. The hotel clerk told me that 17 was a nice drive and about the same travel time of going up to 386. I decided to give it a try. I’m glad I did, it was a nice drive. The rain was coming down and it was cold out, the new scenery was nicer than the same old stuff. There was a part of 17 that really impressed me. It was the chunk just south of Charleston. It turned to a two lane road and normally that means following the slowest driver for thirty miles but not this time. It had signs telling you that there was a passing lane two miles ahead. When the lane opened up, there was a sign telling you that the lane ended again in three miles. There were plenty of my favorite highway signs, “Keep right except to pass”. I don’t know who built that highway but I hope they do some work here in Florida.
They also had speed limit signs that had a smaller sign attached that said “New”. Some of them had orange flags on them too. Cool, so they lowered the speed limit and made sure everyone saw it but the question that I had is, “How long is ‘new’ considered new?” The orange flags on these things were tattered and weather-beaten. Have these “New” signs been up for more than a year? I always hated it when the radio station Teresa listens to called themselves, “The NEW 95.1″ for something like six years! The word New should have limitations.
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