I know there's an easier way. If you end up staying with your same company, I'm sure there's an office somewhere that helps you get those things straightened out. I looked a bit at the US visa's office, and yes there is a visa option for transfers, the thing is though, I highly doubt my company would do that for me. Getting work visas is a bitch, and I'm rather low on the ladder, they're not going to put in the effort for an extra person in their call centre. Also, I don't think the people on my end will be all that happy to see me go. I mean, they'll be happy for me, but I've always felt like a valued empoyee here (or at least I have with my current boss, and the boss before her, the one before that wasn't as nice), and I know that my leaving will leave a spot that might not be that easy to fill (they kind of made the position for me, so I'm not sure if they'll try and find a full time replacement). I probably won't apply for a transfer (I wouldn't even know how to go about it in my company, we're kind of huge), I was more planning on just going there and applying for a job and using my experience to get me the job, if that didn't work, I'd just try for another job.
Oh, wow. I figured the office would be in downtown somewhere, but you would actually be really close to me. Oh cool. I'm not all that surprise it's off to the side, it's not the head office, that's in Pittsburg. This is just a call centre (well, I'm assuming they do more, but mostly it'll be a call centre), and the it's more about space rather than location.
The thing about Houston is that it's huge. All Texas cities are the sprawling kind. We don't do compact. Hah, you're talking to a Canadian. We have more land than we can shake a stick at, we don't really do compact either. The GTA (Greater Toronto Area) encompasses pretty much all of Southern Ontario. Ottawa is 1800 square miles and only has a population of just over 800,000. We're also Canada's 4th largest city. The rest of Canada? Well, Nunavut, our largest territory (about the size of Western Europe) has a population of just over 31,000. Imagine the sprawlingness there. :P
I'm not sure how similar Canadian and American roadsystems are (I assume fairly similar, but you never know), but the exit number is based on what mile markers it falls between. Well, in Canada it's the kilometer marking, but close enough.
Basically, everything is within about 50 miles of each other. Depending on traffic, that can take anywhere from a half hour to an hour to drive. From where you live? Also, how are the buses in Houston? Is it viable to take public transit? Or would it require getting a car?
Cool. I haven't really looked at the hotels around there, but keep in mind that I work at LaQuinta and I can get an employee discount. I assume you'd be cool to room together? That was in my theoretical budget. I'm way too cheap to get a place on my own. :P Plus, staying up talking or whatever and getting no sleep is all part of the con experience, right?
But usually we stay around the twenties. Day time temps in winter average in the 40s. Does that help any? Ahh, it was helpful once I got a converstion program to put all those numbers into celcius. I can get most American units of measure, inches, feet, no problem. I would suck at trying to tell you how long a mile is, but I wouldn't be able to do much better with a kilometer, so it's more of a long distance thing than the unit itself. But temperature, I just have so much trouble wrapping my head around Fahrenheit. Like, saying that it's 20 degrees outside? That's a beautiful late summer/fall afternoon. 100 degrees? That's boiling, literally. The only time I ever use Fahrenheit is when I'm taking my body temperature, since it's more accurate that celcius.
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I looked a bit at the US visa's office, and yes there is a visa option for transfers, the thing is though, I highly doubt my company would do that for me. Getting work visas is a bitch, and I'm rather low on the ladder, they're not going to put in the effort for an extra person in their call centre. Also, I don't think the people on my end will be all that happy to see me go. I mean, they'll be happy for me, but I've always felt like a valued empoyee here (or at least I have with my current boss, and the boss before her, the one before that wasn't as nice), and I know that my leaving will leave a spot that might not be that easy to fill (they kind of made the position for me, so I'm not sure if they'll try and find a full time replacement). I probably won't apply for a transfer (I wouldn't even know how to go about it in my company, we're kind of huge), I was more planning on just going there and applying for a job and using my experience to get me the job, if that didn't work, I'd just try for another job.
Oh, wow. I figured the office would be in downtown somewhere, but you would actually be really close to me.
Oh cool. I'm not all that surprise it's off to the side, it's not the head office, that's in Pittsburg. This is just a call centre (well, I'm assuming they do more, but mostly it'll be a call centre), and the it's more about space rather than location.
The thing about Houston is that it's huge. All Texas cities are the sprawling kind. We don't do compact.
Hah, you're talking to a Canadian. We have more land than we can shake a stick at, we don't really do compact either. The GTA (Greater Toronto Area) encompasses pretty much all of Southern Ontario. Ottawa is 1800 square miles and only has a population of just over 800,000. We're also Canada's 4th largest city. The rest of Canada? Well, Nunavut, our largest territory (about the size of Western Europe) has a population of just over 31,000. Imagine the sprawlingness there. :P
I'm not sure how similar Canadian and American roadsystems are (I assume fairly similar, but you never know), but the exit number is based on what mile markers it falls between.
Well, in Canada it's the kilometer marking, but close enough.
Basically, everything is within about 50 miles of each other. Depending on traffic, that can take anywhere from a half hour to an hour to drive.
From where you live? Also, how are the buses in Houston? Is it viable to take public transit? Or would it require getting a car?
Cool. I haven't really looked at the hotels around there, but keep in mind that I work at LaQuinta and I can get an employee discount. I assume you'd be cool to room together?
That was in my theoretical budget. I'm way too cheap to get a place on my own. :P Plus, staying up talking or whatever and getting no sleep is all part of the con experience, right?
But usually we stay around the twenties. Day time temps in winter average in the 40s. Does that help any?
Ahh, it was helpful once I got a converstion program to put all those numbers into celcius. I can get most American units of measure, inches, feet, no problem. I would suck at trying to tell you how long a mile is, but I wouldn't be able to do much better with a kilometer, so it's more of a long distance thing than the unit itself. But temperature, I just have so much trouble wrapping my head around Fahrenheit. Like, saying that it's 20 degrees outside? That's a beautiful late summer/fall afternoon. 100 degrees? That's boiling, literally. The only time I ever use Fahrenheit is when I'm taking my body temperature, since it's more accurate that celcius.