Justin's Blog

 Archive for the ‘Sazzad’s Travels’ Category

I made a remarkably quick trip down to New York today to pick up Sazzad from JFK (while Kara and Allison were busy ripping the office apart under the pretense of organizing!)

So, if you’d like answers to all those questions you had about ISPs, now’s the time, but be quick, his schedule is being snapped up quickly!

:: Justin ::

Sazzad and I are here in Rapid City, SD, and we definitely weren’t disappointed by any lack of beautiful landscape. We passed the Badlands on our way here and whereas Oregon had tons of sheep, South Dakota, has tons of cows.
This morning we went to visit at Northern Hills Training Center. They had a beautiful center and we got a great tour of the facility. I was particularly impressed by their woodshop. Very cool. After discussing various parts of Therap, we then had the opportunity to visit 3 of their group homes and meet some of the folks living there. I have to say that this is one of my favorite parts, meeting the people that are served by these various agencies.

Tomorrow we’re off on a 3 hour drive to Chamberlain… I’m becoming very accustomed to “Helga”, (as Justin calls her), our GPS system, and will miss her when we part.

Signing off

Kara

This morning, we started off by visiting some very nice potential users in Mitchell, South Dakota. After a good session, we got some great suggestions for tourist spots in the town. So, our next stop: The world’s only corn palace. It was neat how they change the corn-decorated exterior each year, but I think I was truly expecting for the whole building, inside and out, to be made of corn. All I could think of, was whether the building would fall to a pile of popcorn should a fire ever start. After hitting a gift shop, we then tried to enter the doll museum, but unfortunately it seemed that the rest of the tourist spots we tried to go to were closed for the season.

It was then time for our 4 hour drive to Rapid City. We got to see a lot of beautiful country and even saw glimpses of the Badlands, but I have to say that I was really kept awake during the drive by the countless number of “Wall Drug” signs.

Tomorrow we’re off to Spearfish,

Kara

So finally, after a cancelled flight, no clean clothes, and some time in Colorado, we have arrived in Sioux Falls, South Dakota. I was surprised that we were actually able to land last night, because the tarmac was covered with snow, and they actually had to come out and shovel us a path from the plane to the airport. Amazing! Luckily, we were able to retrieve all of our luggage and got an SUV to get us from the unshoveled roads of the airport to our hotel.

Today, we traveled over burgundy colored roads, through the snow covered plains, to meet with folks in Sioux Falls and Yankton. Sazzad and I met with DakotAbilities and Ability Building Services, where we were able to give introductions to Therap and they were able to share some valuable ISP information with us, as well as some insightful feedback.

More travelling tomorrow,

Until then..

Kara

Got up at 4a this morning and made it on a bumpy ride as far as Denver, where we are now stuck, due to a winter storm happening in South Dakota. The Denver airport, in general, seemed to be a mess–all escalators not working, and flight displays screens not working when we got there. What was also fun is they continued to send our luggage to SD, even though we can’t leave until late tomorrow night, and provided us w/ an ‘overnight kit’ (tootbrush, toothpaste, comb, etc) to get us through until tomorrow. Too bad there wasn’t an emergency outfit in that kit Much better to be on the ground and safe.
Hopefully, this doesn’t affect the rest of our week’s appointments too much….

-Kara

So, today was the first day where we actually saw a bit of sunny, blue sky in Oregon. It would figure that the sun comes out and it stops raining for a few moments, on our last day here. Oh well, I still was much happier in this 40 degree weather than the 20 degree weather we left in CT.
We started our day with a stop at a nearby 50′s diner for some good, yet lumpy milkshakes. We then headed, by car, about 3 feet down to Sunny Oaks. I even entered the address into the GPS, not realizing that I could have walked there faster than it took to get my map uploaded. C’est la vie! While there, we got a lot of insight and feedback from Char and Brian re: GER’s and BER’s. We also got to share some of the sweet new 7.0 features such as the ISP template, and my personal favorite, T-notes.

In the evening we drove to our hotel in Portland in preparation for our 4:30a wake-up call tomorrow. Thanks to Sazzad’s research, we didn’t turn in before making a stop at Oregon’s largest mall for some window shopping and food. It was pretty cool because there was an ice-skating rink right in the middle of it. I told Sazzad we definitely have to attempt ice-skating next time–maybe when there aren’t so many young kids that are better than us
Off to South Dakota,
Kara

It was a bit gloomy today in Oregon, but due to the occasional shower, Sazzad and I got to see a beautiful rainbow during our travels. It was funny, because if our GPS buddy hadn’t led us astray, we would have never turned around and caught sight of it.
After a nice photo-op, we continued on our therap journey and met with great people, who we had first met at the recent DSP conference. It’s been really great getting to reconnect with many of these people. Sazzad and I started off by meeting with Sheena and the team at Community Support Services, and ended the day by meeting w/ Sarah, Flory, Aaron and Mike from Partnerships in Community Living. After much talk of Therap and taking note of some great feedback, the PCL team, Sazzad and I ended the evening with a great dinner at a nearby Mexican restaurant. Therap, tacos, and good company, what more could you want from a day?!

Signing off—-Kara

Yeah, my first blog ever! Ok, so we finally made it to Oregon after a long day of bumped flights yesterday! Sazzad and I got to the hotel at 8p, Oregon time, w/ the help of our handy dandy GPS system (only got lost once). Thank you, Justin, for suggesting it!
Despite the neon green exterior of our hotel, the inside is really nice and we both were well rested for our visit to Shangri-La Corporation today. We met with a handful of very nice people throughout the morning and into the afternoon. The morning started off w/ a good McD’s breakfast, and with the help of our resident billing/supported employment expert, Jim Kelly, via web conference. Sazzad and I also got a chance to talk about some new 7.0 features, and got some great insight and feedback from Ginger and Tracy.
Ginger also shared with us some information about a program they have for people who are in prison and who have developmental disabilities. Their staff actually go to the prisons and teach them life skills to help them with a fresh start when they get out. I found this very interesting, as I hadn’t heard of a program like this before. Very cool.
Tomorrow we go to visit with the gang at OSLP, but for now we are on a search for good Oregon seafood!

Signing out-Kara

Kara and Sazzad are now in Oregon and will be spending the week there visiting Therap customers (or potential customers).  If you’d like to have them drop by just let us know.

They will also be in South Dakota and North Dakota next week.

Finally, they will be here!!!! Hopefully both Sazzad and Kara will be posting their stories and pictures here over the days to come

:: Justin ::