End of the Line

"End of the line." What a statement that is. There is no debating what it means. It just is what it is. You cannot argue that it will go on. The train stops here, and there is no where else for it to go.

F.Y.I. This is Stream of consciousness not news format. If you don't like that, don't read it.

Friday night, as I was finishing a rout at Climb Nashville, I got a voice mail on my phone saying that CompUSA had reached the end of its line. The deal for the owner to sell to a "restructuring" firm had finally gone through and they immediately announced that they were shutting us down completely. Some key stores will be sold as is, but I am not sure, but I assume staffing will not transfer with the store. Others will simply be liquidated. Nothing like a few key people high up benefiting from the sale and everyone else being out of work.

At first, the back of my mind was entertaining the thought that this could be a prank my boss was playing, but he would not joke about something like this (we all knew it was coming sooner or later - my money was on 5-10 years; Gordon, you win with a bet of less than a year).

Later that evening as I arrived home after finishing a couple more routs, I checked the Google News search and found quite a few sites already reporting the late news. Shortly after that, the store manager called me in person to make sure I knew as much as she did at the time.

I didn't sleep at all that night.

I went into work Saturday morning and we still had no news (I was actually a bit earlier than usual, arriving at 7:45 AM for an 8:30 test session). As the day went on, more info was passed along including a termination date of Jan 30 - I don't have official paperwork, so who knows how much time I have left. I did the usual surf the web between checking testers in and out of the morning and early afternoon examination sessions. This gave me lots of time to send e-mails to people that have sent me job requests and leads in the past. I have several opportunities I'm researching and need to follow up on Monday morning.

Having not eaten in about 24 hours by 4 PM Saturday afternoon, I had a small snack and went to bed. I woke up at 3:30 AM this morning (Sunday) and have been sending more e-mails and have continued talking with the Nashville Linux Users Group about the situation. Everyone has their own ideas of what happened, but the short of it is that CompUSA couldn't adapt to the new business model computer parts sales has taken in the internet age. This being the case, we either had to close up a lot and restructure (they closed 128 stores in February of this year), or close completely (which is happening because the restructure wasn't handled correctly).

The Tech Shop is business as usual through the end of the year, at which point I assume we will be stopping operations completely after finishing up any open service requests. I don't have any info about whether or not this is the case, and I feel bad for anyone that has an extended warranty through CompUSA, as they no longer have a service provider unless CompUSA can really sell the TechPro service as they are planning to.

Now does everyone understand why I would not mention CompUSA as my employer in previous posts?

Random Thought

I watched most of PU-239 (IMDB link) the other night. I gotta say, it was a bit of a strange movie, due to there being two completely different stories it kept jumping back and forth between and only brought together at the very end. I could ruin the story for you, but one person who reads this might actually look the movie up and watch it, so I'm not going to. Basically, it involves Plutonium, Russians, and Mobsters, so it caught my eye as I was channel surfing Sunday, stuck in bed again. Synopsis here . I would say rent or borrow it if you are interested in a look at dedication, unfairness and corruption in life, and circular justice.

Better

I'm feeling better. Worked Saturday, but that was too much, and I was laid up again Sunday. Worked Monday and Tuesday of this week. It was good to get out. I'm working from home today, feeling a lot better, but still have half a week of doses left, so I'm hoping to be all better by the time those antibiotics run out.

So, calling someone I've done freelance for, and also trying to wrap up the last website I've been working on. Then a quick on site setup for someone who needs wireless installed. I'm taking my laptop. Doing some wireless scanning while I'm there. Good thing it's not illegal to look, so long as I don't crack and steal service. I actually want to make sure the network I'm setting up is on a channel that isn't being used by the neighbors.

I rebuilt my main desktop inside the CM 690 computer case that was on sale over the weekend. I'm hoping it'll fix some of my cooling problems I've been having with the old case, now I just need to get a computer desk. I'm talking to someone about what looks to be a sturdy desk that I could add on some extra "attachments" to mount my monitors vertically (better for working with text and websites). I would love to have swivel mounts so I can set the monitor vertically or horizontally, but I can only ask for so much. If I got a full setup, I'd be looking at $300 or more, so I'm trying to take a d.i.y. rout. something with $10 1" steel pipe that the monitors will mount to with a $30-$40 mount. We'll see.

The Wonderful Time - to be Sick

So, I'm waiting for one of the people I do freelance for to pay me so I can go to a walk-in clinic and have a throat culture done to see if I have strep. Then I get to wait for CompUSA to pay me so I can pay my car insurance. I just love doing freelance, but you have to get used to the payments being a little delayed (by as much as a month and a half, in one case).

Update:

Its just a sinus infection... that has had me in bed all day. I'm going to go to sleep now and hope that I can get up in time for the breakfast at church tomorrow. The fever has finally set in, and now I feel like I'm freezing, even though I'm roasting in my very warm room (thanks computer for putting out a little extra heat for me).

Doing the Life Thing

So, applying for new jobs this week. Fun stuff.

It MUST be my week, "Down Parascope" was on yesterday. Oh, but that would have been last week. Oh well.

Swing dancing last night was great. Christmas ball is in two weeks! Break out your fancy garb; it's gonna be a swingin' good time! The time is 7:30 PM at Otter Creek Community Church Dec. 1 in Brentwood.

Good News from Florida

My good friends Nate and Jos had their second daughter Tuesday evening. They have pics on their blogs. Congratulations guys! I'm not sure when my next trip to FL will be, but I'm looking forward to meeting Amberly Anne.

Comspastic

So, just a thought, but if Comcast stopped advertising and put all that money into increasing speeds and maintaining better connections (that don't drop out in the middle of raids in World of Warcraft), think the word would get out by word of mouth from person to person that they were better than the competition?