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Telecommuting is the best thing to happen to the Internet since e-mail, online dating and porn.
It behooves me that our government can waste so much time and money debating the irrelevant (or the relevant but it is obvious they will never make the right changes...I'm looking at you, healthcare bill and bailout bills) when they could be drafting legislation to promote telecommuting (maybe tax breaks for allowing a certain percentage of employees to work from home?).
To wit, telecommuting reduces our oil dependence by reducing rush hour traffic; allows for more free time for personal use; and saves money for everybody except for the people who rent out office space.
I know one of the arguments against telecommuting is that many people are too easily distracted at home to be productive. And for some people, this could be true. I'm not saying that telecommuting is for everybody.
But for the vast majority of people who spend eight hours or more in an office or cubicle everyday, transitioning to telecommuting would be smooth and result in no loss of productivity. Quite the contrary, I have experienced a morale boost from working at home and have been more productive.
I blame the Old Guard for stifling telecommuting. For example, my first high school journalism teacher taught us how to layout a page on pica-grid paper, complete with old fashioned cutting (with scissors) and pasting (with glue). You know, just in case that whole Internet thing didn't work out, we could still design a page for the Gutenberg press.
The Old Guard have failed to appreciate that the Internet makes gathering information and communicating easier and faster. As a result, eight hours is too much time to be in the office every day. Even the most industrious, busy-bodies out there can still find time to read EF'M or other blogs at the office.
I think it is only a matter of time before there are more Americans telecommuting from home than working in an office. Here's hoping for the rest of you, because I'm already living the dream.
I got my first taste of what life will be like in Mexico as I spent my first day in my new office, the living room.
Sure, there were a few difference between working at home in Crystal City and working at home in Hermosillo. For example, while it did reach a sunny 61 F here, it was a sunny 74 F in our future home. And their low only dipped to 50 compared to the nearly freezing 37 here. Oh, and everyone I interacted with spoke English, but otherwise, yesterday was a microcosm of my future life.
The day got off to a rude start as I had wanted to sleep in until 7 a.m., but Natalie was less than quiet getting ready in the morning. For almost five years, I've been getting up before her to go to work, quiet as can be, and on this my first morning of getting to be the later riser, no dice. To her credit, she improved a thousand times over this morning.
After seeing her out the door, I started my new morning routine - making my own pot of coffee. While I'll be saving a lot of gas money and time not having to drive to and from work, I will be incurring new coffee costs as there was always as much free Starbucks coffee at work that I could drink. At home, I use Guatemalan coffee beans I bought through a vendor I met at the Crystal City's farmer's market last summer. Now, I like coffee, but I don't love coffee, but if I don't get two cups in the morning, I start going through withdraw by lunch time, which is marked by a throbbing headache.
Then I took Tiffy on her morning walk, and came home to get our breakfasts. I don't think my being home altered Tiffy's schedule too much, as I imagine this is how she spent her days while home alone. She didn't pester me at all.
Fed and caffeinated, I spent much of the morning getting organized. This included lots of e-mails. Some of it was work related, some personal and some foreign service oriented. The main task was to get an extension from Free Spanish on Internet (FSI) for another three months of Rosetta Stone access. I've been in touch with our Career Destruction Office (CDO; after much discussion, this has been accepted as an alternative to the Official Unofficial Acronym Chart's designation as Curmudgeon who Decides Overseas post), FSI and some other group, and I hope this gets resolved today.
After a couple hours of this sort of work, I went a jog until I nearly puked. I made it five miles, but before you say "good job," let's not forget I need to get to 9.3 miles by the end of the month for the Cincinnati minimarathon. That pretty much wiped me out for the rest of the day, but I ate lunch, checked on my e-mail accounts to make sure I wasn't following behind on my communications, and ended up watching TV for an hour or so.
Of course, this is when Natalie came home from work, finding me sprawled on the couch in pajamas. This is how I get judged.
All in all, I felt like it was a good start. I need to create a routine to make sure I get everything done, and yesterday went a long way to doing that. This is an exciting time right now, and I don't want to squander the opportunity to start good habits to maximize my situation.
This morning, I had to go back an re-read what I posted over the weekend, especially after reading some of the feedback.
And first, I need to thank everyone who shared their stories and advice about how they have handled their cell phone situations.
But after reading again what I posted, I fear that in my effort to not point to accusatory of a finger at one group, I perhaps painted the entire foreign service community with too large of a brush.
I think another contributing factor is the fact that perhaps I've had it too easy so far. I've been riding a streak of good luck that has included nailing down some employment, getting to start freelancing early (today, yippee!), being a part of a fun and active A-100 group, and have had the opportunity to meet many of the people who will be moving to Hermosillo about the same time we will. And to top all of this off, I have found that this blogging experience has been rewarding as well as I've learned a lot from reading others and from getting feedback on my posts as well.
So I was about due for some adversity, I suppose. After all, it is not like I'm being asked to stand idly by state-side while Natalie is shipped to Iraq for a year.
But where I probably was too hard on in some areas, I also might have erred in not highlighting how critical a cell phone that meets my parameters is to my situation.
Blepharokeratoconjunctivitis. My options are to have a cell phone that can record that word and its equally daunting friends or go to medical school. The ability to do my job is dependent on my having a cell phone. (Though doing interviews via Skype is intriguing; you deserve some type of award for creativity, Donna.)
And I consider having my own government-free job at post to being critical for maintaining my independence and semblance of self importance.
I do want to thank everyone again for their concern and thoughts, and apologize if I offended anyone by being too whiny. I'm a whistle blower by nature, which is great for journalism, but unfortunate for forming social bonds.
What seems like what should have been a rather simple task has proven to be a trying, soul-searching, several weeks-long event.
A couple of weeks ago, I used this blog to ask for advice about owning a cell phone abroad and didn't get any feedback. If you don't remember, haven't been reading that long and/or didn't feel like reading that post, I need a phone I can use in Mexico to call doctors in the United States and around the world, and the phone needs to have a recording mechanism. My current phone, over there on the right, has no such bells and whistles.
About the same time, I also tried reaching out to the people already working at post in Hermosillo to find out what the spouses do about a cell phone. Unfortunately, I came by the same advice, which was none.
Next, I turned to LiveLines, which yielded a couple of responses, but it came up short on the, "Well, this is what I did when I moved to Mexico," statement I was hoping to receive. As I was awaiting responses from LiveLines, I did some online research, which had the added benefit of locating this Web site, which has more information about Hermosillo than I have found any where else, and it at least got me pointed in the right direction regarding cell phones.
I was getting frustrated because I expected more help from the supposed tight-knit, supportive group that the Foreign Service family is supposed to be. I couldn't imagine that I was the first Entrepenural Freelancing Machine (EFM) to move to Mexico. My fruitless search for advice on this topic has been my worst experience with the Foreign Service to date because it was the first time I've felt isolated and, to an extent, lonely during this process.
(I realize I'm committing a faux pas by saying less-than-flattering remarks about current and future colleagues, and for what it's worth, Natalie isn't thrilled about this posting. But this is my blog about my thoughts, opinions and experiences, warts and all. That said, I'm exercising some restraint so as to not negatively effect her standing with her colleagues in case this gets read.)
So with what little information I had, Natalie and I went to the Pentagon City Mall to buy a new cell phone today. I knew enough from my research to know that Verizon did not have any good Mexican options, but as they are our current provider, I was ready to give them the first chance.
To no surprise, after we explained our condition, the salesman agreed that Verizon would not be able to help us.
So we went to the AT&T kiosk, and described our situation again, and the salesman described some rather undesirablely expensive options. Then he added his two cents that we would probably be best off buying an AT&T or T-Mobile phone, but hold off on buying a service plan until we reached Mexico and then signing a local contract with TelCel. (For full disclosure, AT&T and TelCel have some sort of financial relationship that I'm too lazy to understand, and definitely too lazy to understand and explain it. Also, only AT&T and T-Mobile phones can be used with a TelCel plan, as I understand it.)
I was impressed by both salesmen's honesty on the topic, and ultimately, Natalie and I decided not to get a cell phone for the time being.
But this still doesn't solve my current problem of trying to record interviews before we go to Mexico while I'm freelancing from home. Unfortunately, I can't buy an AT&T phone and use my Verizon plan on it; and doesn't this seem like a monopoly?
So on the way home we stopped at Best Buy to figure out what to do as a stop-gap measure. So I explained yet again my cell phone needs to a saleswoman and showed her my phone causing an audible gasp, a few giggles and perhaps a short look of horror.
After composing herself, she said she doesn't think there is anything that can be done as far as upgrades are concerned and led me to the audio recorders section. "You must really love that phone," she said during the walk. To which I explained that I'm indifferent, but it has served its purposes as a phone until now, which is why I'm ready to part with it.
In the endgame, I still have my same cell phone and will have to resort to putting docs on speaker phone during our interviews, which is not preferred but will have to suffice for a few months.
And I've had the unfortunate experience of feeling let down by the foreign service community, but I'm willing to give everyone the benefit of the doubt this once that perhaps this topic is so complicated and full of bad news that no one wanted to be the bearer of bad news, that there is no simple, inexpensive, desirable way to be a freelancer in Mexico for an international trade journal.
I just hope I don't have too many more experiences with the foreign service community like this one because it did evoke feelings of helplessness.
Excited for the Liga Mexicana del Pacífico is more like it!
Last week, I decided I wanted to see how the Hermosillo baseball team was doing. The Naranjeros (which I've seen translated as the orange growers and orange pickers. Can I get an official ruling on this?) are like the Yankees of the Mexican Pacific League winning 15 titles since the league was formed in 1957.
Not knowing Spanish made it difficult to navigate their home page, but it led me to learn more about the league they've been dominating. And after a while, I also discovered they won the league championship in the end of January.
The Liga Mexicana del Pacífico (LMP) is the premier winter league of Mexican baseball, and some current and former MLB players take part in the league. For example, the Naranjeros' starting third basemen is former MLB two-time All-Star Vinny Castilla and coming out of the bullpen is current Mets' reliever, and Hermosillo native, Elmer Dessens.
The LMP winner then represents Mexico in the four-country Caribbean Baseball World Series, which includes the Dominican Republic, Puerto Rico and Venezuela, which hosted this year's event. The tournament is a double-round robin, and the Naranjeros finished third, beating Venezuela twice but losing to the other two countries each time.
Aside from the thrill of getting to cheer for a team that is playing to represent Mexico in the Caribbean Series, apparently LMP games are like minor league games complete with cheap tickets, interesting mascots and a general county fair-like atmosphere.
Let's look at the competition. Three other mascots in the league are the Sugarcane Pickers (Los Mochis), Tomato Pickers (Culiacán) and Cotton Pickers (Guasave). I particularly love the Cotton Picker logo, 
but for obvious reasons, this mascot would never fly in the United States. And before you laugh at these teams' expense, remember in the MLB, we have the Red and White Sox, and the Reds, who formerly were the Red Legs. (And yes, that is cotton ball holding a flaming baseball...what's not to love about that?)
I also love the Tomato Pickers' Web site, but it might not be appropriate for viewing in the office because it plays music. But you can't visit this Web site and not get excited about LMP games. If you watch the scrolling pictures at the top, those are cheerleaders you see. Kind of gives a new meaning to fantasy baseball. (Nerd note: If there is an LMP fantasy baseball league, someone please contact me and reserve a spot for me. I'm all over it.) Also have to enjoy the last song snippet they play is about five seconds of Black Eyed Peas.
To win the LMP, the Naranjeros had to knock out the regular season champs, Deer (Mazatlán). The remaining three teams comprise two indigenous peoples, the Mayos (Navojoa) and Yaquis (Obregon), and the Eagles (Mexicali). Though it is a bit confusing because the Sugarcane Pickers also use an eagle as their mascot, too.
I also love that their jerseys sport sponsors like NASCAR uniforms do. Even better, one of the Naranjeros' sponsors is Tecate beer. I had planned on adopting Dos Equis as my Mexican cerveza of choice, but unless I gag on Tecate, this beer has bought my loyalty. Sorry Dos Equis guy, but I still love your commercials. (He speaks fluent French, in Russian.)
No doubt, I will try to make it to every home game, which is probably like 30-40 games. Are season tickets an option? I'm legitimately excited about the baseball south of the border!
