I’m off to work tomorrow morning, starting with a short morning flight to Baltimore. It will be quite different for me to, number one – be working again, and number two – start it with travel. I expect to learn a bunch of stuff this week and hope not to get overwhelmed. Even so, its something I’ve looked forward to for weeks. Finally I’ll be back to work!

Some asshat has stolen my credit card number and gone on a spree. Whee. I’m thinking back to when I may have used it last. I haven’t made many purchases since I’ve been between jobs, so the trail should be easy to follow. Just an occasional restaurant meal or drinks. I figure lunch at Crazy Fire was the last time.

Now that I think of it, something funny happened at my last Crazy Fire visit. As I was paying for my meal, something suggested to me that the cashier might try to do something with my card. I didn’t see anything overt occur and he only held it for a minute, but I don’t usually have that kind of feeling when I pay for things. A minute is all it would take, of course.

The fraud message we got from one company used Kelly’s name, so its likely her card info was stolen, perhaps at a restaurant or other physical transaction. Anyhow, Crazy Fire is likely safe, but every Starbucks in Raleigh is now a suspect. (Just kidding, sweetie!)

A friend once interviewed for a network security position at a big-name credit card company. He said such companies write off billions of dollars to fraud every year. That was a few years ago, of course. I have to say the fraud prevention algorithms now in use are pretty good. We got our call less than 24 hours after the first fraudulent purchases were made.

I hope we can still find out where our card was used. You know, living vicariously.

I begin a three month test-drive of my new job starting Monday, when I’ll travel to Annapolis to start a contract with a certain open-source network management company as a Consulting Systems Engineer. Should everything go as planned I’ll come onboard full-time this fall.

I’m glad my six-week unplanned vacation is coming to an end. I’m excited about the work, the product, and the company. I feel I have something to prove after being unceremoniously laid off and I fully intend to prove it.

Let’s get started!