Je Vie!!!

Let me quickly dust off this blog and give an update. I am now officially moved over to Zurich. I have a temporary apartment that is a tad too small for me. I have some pictures of it that I will upload later this week. My job is moving right along, I’m putting in a bunch of hours right now trying to get up to speed asap. I am searching for an apartment somewhere closer to the main train station. Currently it takes me about 50 mins to get to work, Tram -> Train -> Bus is the normal routine. I put my name in the hat for a great place last week, I’m waiting to hear back this week. Unfortunatly, the demand for apartments is really high, I think I am competiting against 100 other people or so.

I don’t have a car even though my work rented a Smart car for me, I have no where to park it at my apartment so I had to decline this marvelous piece of machinary. As of this morning I opened an account at a bank so that I can finally get paid, I’ve missed 2 pay periods thus far, and with prices here in Zurich I need that money soon. To give you an idea of “normal prices” here I went to McDonalds and ordered a Big Mac menu meal, it cost me 11 Swiss Francs, which is roughly $10.5. I think the same meal in Chicago is roughly $5 or maybe $6.

That’s all I have for now since I’m at work. Oh, I almost forgot, I now have a facebook profile so if you have one also try and find me!

LOL WTF

I stumbled into this a few days ago, and I can’t stop watching it……

 

Initial Plans in Zurich

I officially start my job in Zurich on the 21st in less than a week. Looks like for at least 1 week I’ll be living out of a hotel and my company has rented me a car for the week.  But just because things are never boring with me….. the car they rented is this….

 

I don’t have my official work permit yet so according to Swiss law I am not allowed to do any type of work until I get the permit. So….. we’ll see what I end up doing during the week.

My ride

I’ve been meaning to post these pics for a few weeks now. Here is what I’ve been driving for about 6 weeks now. Prior to this was a Mercedes E-Class 220. This is doesn’t have the Turbo engine, but so far I’ve been managing.

New Design

I got tired of the layout I had and decided to use this one. I’m not sure if it’s easy to read or not. Let me know  your thoughts.

I’ve been spending some time with the French girl I met recently. We’re starting to break the language barrier a bit more now. It’s too bad I’m leaving for Zurich in a few weeks. She’s turning out to be alot of fun.

Not much else going on, although I think thats going to change when I get closer to moving.

Pretty much official now

I’ve started telling people my news about my job situation as of yesterday. I haven’t signed the actual agreement/contract yet (should happen this week), its pretty much a 95% lock.

I accepted a job offer in Zurich Switzerland. I’m pretty excited and nervous about this job. I don’t have any solid details as to where exactly I’ll be living or when I officially start. All that is going to be worked out this week hopefully. I do know that the team out there wants me to start in a few weeks, which means I won’t have time to fly home before I start the job.

I am definitely going to be looking to take a week in June or July to fly home and visit everyone. In all honesty I’m a little homesick, but I think a week’s visit should really help. Even though I gave my verbal acceptance it hasn’t quite sunk in yet that I’ll be moving to another country in a few weeks. Like usual with me, this sort of stuff doesn’t make me super nervous until like a day before.

Oh la la

Better late than never I guess….. Last week I asked this girl for her phone number. Well, I more or less demanded it looking back now, but whatever. After a few phone calls and text messages we decided to meet up for some drinks on Thursday.

Let there be light!

After some phone calls inside my company and to the French electric company (EDF) I have power again. What a mess that was. Apparently, EDF decided to send last month’s invoice to my address but with my company’s name and not mine on it, when they usually send the invoice to my company. Obviously, the post office became confused and didn’t deliver the invoice, and the invoice never got paid.

Oh yeah…..

I forgot I had a blog for a while. Quite a few things have happened since my last post. I’ll probably just do a quick summary of it all in a few days. But for right now, I just want the electricity turned back on in my apartment. I got home last night from work to find that I had no power. I called a friend who called the electric company for me. She found out that they cut the power because of an unpaid invoice. Ugh. I had to sleep in a hotel last night. Updates to come later.

What’s Next?

I’m sitting here in bed wide awake and I know I’m not going to be able to sleep tonight and knowing that really sucks. Anyone who has talked to me recently knows I’m about to start the job hunting process. I’ll be looking within my company only because I signed a contract to stay on for a few more years. Well…. today it officially started and I can’t get my mind to stop running.