San Francisco Days

A couple of weeks ago our friend Lynette from Chicago was out to run the Napa to Sonoma half marathon. Her cheering squad, Cherie, came out for support, and to lead us all on a wine tasting tour of the dry creek valley. We had a great time and Cherie introduced us to some new wineries. While we were tasting, our good friend Caroline came out of the mountains to meet up with us for a tasting at Rosenblum.
From left to right Scott, Carolina, Lynette, Cherie.

Now that it is official, here is the new job information. I have accepted a promotion with Abbott. Yes this is the same position my director offered my in Gramany. My new title is Manager of Document and Label Control. I will have 10 direct reports, and be responsible for maintainging the system which maintains all of the policies and quality documents for the site and global responsibility for the divisional documents (looks like more trips to Germany and Ireland in my future). As an extra bonus I will also be in charge of all labeling for all of our products produced in our division. This not only entails maintaining proper documentation of the lables, but ensuring they meet all FDA and European standards and regulations. To sweeten the deal they through in another fun item; currently, this new positionn was managed by 2 managers. The manager for document control left Abbott 3 months ago, and the manager for label control is transfering back to Chicago this Tuesday (7-26). So for the last 2 weeks I have been trying to absorb form the label control manager everything I can because I really don’t know anything about the regulations for labels, barcodes, medical Instructions for Use, dealing withing people in Marketing (YUCK!!!). All of the above is the reason I have not posted. I have also hade to do my current position while training. I have not gotten home befor 9:30 and day in the last 2 weeks.

The up side to the new position is that it came with a 15% increase in pay, a yearly bonus of up to 13%, and stock options, a real office with a door. So all of my whining above is be compensated, but I still can whine!

We took the plunge today! We registered as domestic partners in Kalifornia. It was the ceremony I’d always dreamed about… slept late, stumbled over to Weight Watchers for our monthly weigh-in, went to the bank, stopped by the UPS Store to have the declaration of domestic partnership notarized and dropped it in the mail. Now how’s that for romance!

If you’re curious what it means to be a registered domestic partner here in beautiful sunny Kalifornia, have a read through this pleasantly non-legalese summary.

You may have noticed… Rog and I are a little, some might say over-, protective of our cars. Although we freely admit there are a lot more important things in life, we still love a nice clean machine to tool around in.

This week brought a little trauma into our lives. I got a small dent/gouge in the back bumper of my new car while it was parked in a garage at Pier 39 in San Francisco last Sunday. Nothing some touch-up paint won’t dull down a little, but it’s gonna bug me. I think I’m gonna have to sell it now (kidding!). Inconsiderate people and those with a total lack of driving skills can be found in abundance in the Bay Area.

Roger had a much tougher week. Returning from the wedding last weekend, his oil light came on while taking the exit ramp a couple blocks from the house. Since he had very recently had the Toyota dealer service his car, this was a bit of a surprise. Pulled the oil dipstick - nothing, nada, dry as a bone. Added two quarts of oil obtained from the neighborhood Chevron, pulled the dipstick - nothing, nada, dry as a bone. Those mechanically-minded folks at this point should be making that “ewwwww… hmmmmm” sound.

He took it to the dealer the next morning. They had to add another TWO AND A HALF QUARTS! Let’s do the math here… 5 - (2 + 2.5) = 0.5. That’s right, the dealer drained the oil, put the drain plug back in and FORGOT to replace the oil. Through small miracles and some apparently excellent Toyota engineering, at this point there doesn’t appear to be any permanent damage. Rog still had the dealer document the problem in case something goes wrong later. Incredible.

Last year, after I noticed one could induce about 6″ of lateral movement by just leaning against the rear of his car, he took the car to this same Toyota dealership. Turns out when they did a major engine service a few weeks before they FORGOT to re-install the honking huge bolt that secures the sway control bars to the frame.

Anyway, enough of this minutia. Going out to buy a housewarming present for a trip to our friend Carolyn’s vineyard this weekend (see our post from 3/5/05 for the rental car versus driveway debacle). Heading up there tomorrow morning with Kristen making some stops at various wineries along the way to gather up our various wine club shipments. We’ll stay the night and head back on Monday. Then, Roger’s off to Washington for a brief audit trip.

Have a safe, happy, healthy and relaxing July 4th holiday.