I really hate Bank of America, I really do. This all started when it was next to impossible to get access to my money in the local BOA branch, it took manager approval. You see accounts in Florida, are very different than ones in Washington. Each state is treating seperately (I didn't look into why, but there probably some stupid laws that our over bearing government have passed at some point). So the easiest thing to do was to open a new account here in Washington. But most of our money is still in the Florida account. All I wanted to do was go online and transfer my money from the Florida account to the Washington account. Something that in theory sounds very easy to accomplish. Well I ended up in a live chat with a bank representative, which I post here for your enjoyment. Hopefully you will also see the absurdity that this is just to get money from one BOA account to another, both of which are in my name. And, in my haste, my spelling was awful, so I hope that makes it a little bit funnier.
Our Olympic Adventure
We decided to head into Vancouver yesterday because we are so close just to check out the Olympic atmosphere. We had some grand plans to check out the city, and then go to one of the venues to see if we could scalp some reasonable tickets. I looked online when we decided to move to Seattle and tickets were crazy expensive, so we passed at that time. Things didn't quite go as planned.
Our first order of business was to check out the Olympic torch. We got sidetracked on the way there by some shopping. After spending way too much money getting outfitted in the official Team USA Olympic gear (except for Sarah, she couldn't find anything that she liked), we turned our attention back to goal number one. When we got to the site, it was absolutely packed. It didn't help that they have the whole area fenced off. You can only get about 75 - 100 yards from the torch by pressing up against a big fence. They had an elevated viewing area, but the line for that was probably an hour long. It would have been a lot smarter to have fenced right around the cauldron, then put security around it (which they had anyway). It is in the middle of a big plaza that was not being used, so all the people needed to cram into a little space to try and get a shot of it. It was really nice looking in person.
Settled into Seattle
It has been awhile since our last post. We have been pretty busy getting moved into our new place in Seattle. There are a few more boxes to unpack still, and need to buy some bookshelves, but other than that we are pretty well settled in now. Here is the house that we are renting in Redmond. I am just about 5 minutes from work, although we just announced that my group will be moving over to the main campus which will take another 10 to 15 minutes which is kind of a bummer. The job is going really well so far, Microsoft does not act like the huge company that it is.
Ella has gotten into her new Kindergarten class at Alcott Elementary, and Max just started pre school at a Timberlake Christian, which is a local church that we have tried out. Both of them are really enjoying it, Ella gets to ride the bus to school, I think that is her favorite part of the new school.
The family has Olympic fever again, we have enjoyed the first 2 days of coverage so far. We are planning on heading up to Vancouver next weekend to check things out. We don't have any event tickets, but we'll check it out when we get up there to see if we try to see something or not.
Ella has gotten into her new Kindergarten class at Alcott Elementary, and Max just started pre school at a Timberlake Christian, which is a local church that we have tried out. Both of them are really enjoying it, Ella gets to ride the bus to school, I think that is her favorite part of the new school.
The family has Olympic fever again, we have enjoyed the first 2 days of coverage so far. We are planning on heading up to Vancouver next weekend to check things out. We don't have any event tickets, but we'll check it out when we get up there to see if we try to see something or not.
Happy New Year!
Happy New Year everyone, here is hoping to a slightly calmer 2010 for the Wynns. I am currently in Sweden wrapping up my affairs here and will head to Seattle as soon as I get back to the States this week. Sarah has been busy getting everything ready to go in Michigan so we can get settled in as quickly as possible.
We had a fun New Years party over at the Vernagus's again this year. They really went all out for the kid's New Year at 9pm or so to get them all excited.
Here is to a great 2010 from the Wynns to all of you.
We had a fun New Years party over at the Vernagus's again this year. They really went all out for the kid's New Year at 9pm or so to get them all excited.
Here is to a great 2010 from the Wynns to all of you.
More Changes in Store for the Wynns
I sadly have to change the name of the blog to "The Wynns - An American Family That Almost Lived in Sweden". I recently made a hard decision to resign my job with Hansoft in Sweden after only being there for 3 months. I did this a few weeks ago at the beginning of December because I made a ver difficult decision prior to my family and stuff being shipped to Sweden. But I have been holding off on talking about it until everything was in place and all of the necessary people were notified.
When I accepted the position, I was fully aware that it required quite a bit of travel, between 30 and 50%. What I did not anticipate was how hard that would be on me being away from Sarah and the kids. It was something that Sarah and I talked about quite a bit, but in the end we didn't think it would be that big of a deal, so we went for it. But as time went by, it was becoming increasingly difficult on me. Sarah had handled it very well, she settled into her own routines, and the kids were too young to really express their feelings. But I was having a harder and harder time thinking about being the father that I want to be while being away from the kids and Sarah that much. So I decided to make a really hard decision and quit that job before it became too hard to do so and I would have regretted taking the job in the first place. It was not easy, and I know that it hurt a lot of people, most of all the team of very hard working people at Hansoft in Sweden. But I had to put my family first and I still feel that I made the right decision.
However that still left us in a bit of a quandry, we had sold the house in Florida and I couldn't do anything about that. Very unexpectedly another oppurtunity presented itself that I really never expected. I was offered a really good position within Microsoft in their gaming division that I have decided to take. So now, instead of moving to Sweden, we are moving in the other direction to Seattle. We turned around a complete move in 24 hours and our stuff is now on the way to Seattle. It is a bit of a shame because we had sold just about everything anticipating moving into a much smaller home in Sweden, so wherever we move to in Seattle is going to be a bit bare for awhile. I will be starting that job in January after spending some time in Michigan for the holidays and a final trip to Sweden to wrap things up over there right at the beginning of the New Year. I will be taking a job as Lead Producer on the Gears of War franchise for Microsoft. I have always been a big fan of that game, and am really looking forward to having a chance to be a part of it.
It has been a really crazy year for the Wynns, a lot of things happened that I would have never expected to happen. We feel like we ultimately have made the right decisions even if we got there in a way that not everyone would understand.
When I accepted the position, I was fully aware that it required quite a bit of travel, between 30 and 50%. What I did not anticipate was how hard that would be on me being away from Sarah and the kids. It was something that Sarah and I talked about quite a bit, but in the end we didn't think it would be that big of a deal, so we went for it. But as time went by, it was becoming increasingly difficult on me. Sarah had handled it very well, she settled into her own routines, and the kids were too young to really express their feelings. But I was having a harder and harder time thinking about being the father that I want to be while being away from the kids and Sarah that much. So I decided to make a really hard decision and quit that job before it became too hard to do so and I would have regretted taking the job in the first place. It was not easy, and I know that it hurt a lot of people, most of all the team of very hard working people at Hansoft in Sweden. But I had to put my family first and I still feel that I made the right decision.
However that still left us in a bit of a quandry, we had sold the house in Florida and I couldn't do anything about that. Very unexpectedly another oppurtunity presented itself that I really never expected. I was offered a really good position within Microsoft in their gaming division that I have decided to take. So now, instead of moving to Sweden, we are moving in the other direction to Seattle. We turned around a complete move in 24 hours and our stuff is now on the way to Seattle. It is a bit of a shame because we had sold just about everything anticipating moving into a much smaller home in Sweden, so wherever we move to in Seattle is going to be a bit bare for awhile. I will be starting that job in January after spending some time in Michigan for the holidays and a final trip to Sweden to wrap things up over there right at the beginning of the New Year. I will be taking a job as Lead Producer on the Gears of War franchise for Microsoft. I have always been a big fan of that game, and am really looking forward to having a chance to be a part of it.
It has been a really crazy year for the Wynns, a lot of things happened that I would have never expected to happen. We feel like we ultimately have made the right decisions even if we got there in a way that not everyone would understand.