Camping/Vacation in NY

Wednesday I am jumping on a plane and headed back to NY for a week. I haven't been in NY in over 3 months, so it will be nice to see everyone! I am going camping for 4 days with some buddies so that will be an experience! I haven't camped since I was 12, my major concern right now is power (I can do without my laptop, but not my blackberry!)

We are camping at the NASCAR Race at Watkins Glen. Through Best Buy I got corporate hot-passes, which I can't describe how awesome that is. Basically I get to be on pit-road DURING the race. How sweet is that?

Plus of course I get to see my family while in NY! My dad, mom & step dad have all been out in MN to see me over the last few months, but I can't wait to see my Grandma's, Jen, Dan & Sarah.

A few weeks ago one of our show cars and race bus where at the corporate office...

Random

View from Best Buy Corp Office I am taking classes at University of Minnesota in the fall

Since 2 guys from SU are now playing for the Minnesota Timberwolves, I bought season tickets, this was from the second season ticket holder event, on draft night

Toby Keith has line of 'Toby Keiths - I Love This Bar & Grill's' in a number of big cities, there is one that just opened in Minneapolis, there signature thing is serving beer in mason jars.

Through Best Buy, finally got my passport! Next stop who knows... somewhere warm.

Neither of us look that great, thats because we just hiked nearly a mile down to the Mississippi, it was about 80 degrees out! Fun, but very tiring!

Whoa... no traffic. Sunday AM's! I will emjoy well I can, come Mon AM it will be a different story.

The church I have been going to had a 60 person choir this morning, it was really awesome. Check out my church, but especially check out the vid's below

Hosanna Luthern Church

Video 1 (watch at 26:00)

Green Acres (watch specifically at 20:45 and 30:15)

MN Weather

One of things I didn't realize about Minnesota (and one thing no one told about) was that MN is on the top of Tornado Valley! A few weeks after I first moved here, there was a tornado drill with sirens and all, I didn't think that much of it.

Oh boy... nearly every week now atleast once, tornado sirens are going off. I have adapted pretty well, I check the radar real quick, see where its headed and react then... not too bad. I will say though, the other night, the tornado sirnes went out at 2am, it was pitch black outside.... that might have scared me just a little bit!

MN Tornadoes

But other days (and most), the weather is AMAZING! Checkout those sunsets!

Lake Minnetonka

A few weeks ago I was invite on behalf of Best Buy to join our Accenture IT partners on a dinner cruise, it was on one of the biggest lakes in MN, Lake Minnetonka... check it out!

Al & Alma's

Downtown Minneapolis

Barenaked Ladies!

Goo Goo Dolls!

Socially Connected

I consider myself very 'socially connected', my blackberry and laptop are often overwhelmed with text messages and emails and apps like facebook and twitter.... and of the course the newest thing, foursquare(if you haven't heard of it).

But, what I really love is how 'socially' connected businesses can be... for example, Best Buy!





Best Buy ranked 9th in the top 'social' businesses http://www.flowtown.com/blog/which-companies-are-most-social?display=wide





Our CEO has his own personally updated facebook and twitter page http://twitter.com/bbyceo


and also a blog http://www.bbycommunications.com/briandunn/index.php

I witnessed this last week.... check this out, Best Buy recently had a company-wide 'town hall' this is a pic from that town hall, notice how we have Shanghai and Nanjing live by Satellite!

Minnesota "Nice"

Does this make it official? Got my new Minnesota Plates!

If I can't cheer on the Orange in person, I guess I can deal with the Timberwolves! If you aren't a huge SU fan like me, Jonny Flynn, plays for the Timberwolves and he used to play for the 'CUSE and is now pro! Fortunately for me, the Timberwolves sucked this year, so much that season tickets for next year are REAL cheap, cheap enough I couldn't resist, I am really looking forward to seeing a bunch of NBA teams come to town, 40+ home games in the Target Center downtown Minneapolis! BTW, the shot below is from when the LA Lakers were in town, Kobe was on the bench the whole game, though. I get to see this on the way to work everyday! Downtown Minneapolis! Don't let this picture fool you, this pic is from a Sunday afternoon, normally and 99% of the time the traffic is horrible on that highway!

That is the great Mississippi River! Apparently in northern Minnesota almost to Canada it starts as a tiny stream they you can go stand in, before it connects with some bigger rivers and lakes, pretty cool.

One of the 'perks' of Best Buy is that when some artist signs a deal with us for promotions or whatever, they often give a free show at the Corporate Office, the only one I have catched so far are these guys the BoDeans, ever heard of them? Yeah... me either! haha They are most well known for the Party of 5 theme song 'Everyone wants to be... closer to free'. Crazy part is that played 8 songs or so and didn't even do that song! I am anxouisly waiting for some other cool people to head to the office, in the past the Black Eyed Peas, Sting, Bon Jovi have all been there... hopefully they will back soon!

Bachelor Pad > Girl-Friend Friendy

I was overly happy with my old apartment back in NY, but the layout, age, and feel of it…just screamed 'Bachelor Pad'… which was nice, when I was 18! I lived in that same apartment ever since graduating high-school!

Well, since my new place is technically a 'condo' and most of the people that live here consider these their home not 'apartments' or whatever, I figured I should too! Plus, the fact that I left 99% of my furniture back in good ol' NY!

The icing on the cake is this place has a real nice Balcony, real-wood fireplace, dishwasher, and my own washer/dryer. Pretty nifty!

Believe or not... see that coffee table? The top of it was a real light color wood, guess who stained it that dark red oak color? This guy!

The New Job :)

So as you can tell the first two pics I totally got from google, but that is the Best Buy Corporate Campus! I work in the 2nd building from the right. The massive gray area in the back is the parking garage where 4000+ other people seem to always gets the best spots and make me walk a mile everyday. lol.



Below is my area aka my 'cube. My new direct team did a great job of decorating it for me as you can partially see below! Of course I got the Syracuse pendant up... go 'cuse!

Hello from Minneapolis :o)

I have been in Minneapolis for 4 days now!

Its has been quite tiring, but I truly think I'm in love! The 19 hour trek from NY really wasn't too bad, I am glad I didn't have to do it solo, I brought my dad along and we drove 17 hours straight from NY with only about 45 minutes not in my suv headed west! That gave us a short 2 hour drive the next day and a lot of time to unpack on day 2.

My dad is here til Tuesday so yesterday I took him downtown Minneapolis, its a real nice trip, we drove to the Mall of America (10 minutes from my place) and then took the light-rail for a 30 minute ride downtown.

The first 2 days were cold and rainy :( however today reminded me of Miami during my vacation a few weeks prior, it was 58 degrees and sunny! I of course broke out the shorts and flip-flops.

Tomorrow is my first day at the new gig, I am excited, not really nervous, I have been to the corporate office a bunch of times, more than everything I am just ready for everything to start and for me to get into a normal routine.

I'm psyched... I will keep you all updated! Once I get more situated I will post more pics of my place. I promise!

7624 157th Street West, Apple Valley, MN

I found a place to live! I will be renting out a really nice condo 15 minutes away from the Best Buy Corporate Campus, and 30 minutes outside of downtown Minneapolis.

I'm psyched!

I will be in Minneapolis in 11 days, crazy!

Sarah & Chase

This is from Christmas not this past year, the year before, but still how cute! I think I might these little guys the most. :o(

I got the JOB!

So I am 1 plane hop away to Ithaca from Newark… I can’t wait to be done with airports for awhile, I don’t know how people can do this daily! So, I officially got offered the job today! I will be taking my career to the next level, moving from an Assistant Manager position for Best Buy to work at the Corporate Office in Minneapolis, MN! My official title will be ‘Store Systems Capability Analyst’, you all know what that is right??? haha So basically, in a nutshell, I will be charge of facilitating the training, development & monitoring the success of new support tools and programs for 1,000+ Best Buy retail stores. I can’t even begin to say how excited I am! Plus the pay raise is well, AMAZING! I am really going to miss my family & friends in NY, but as my mom has already checked into, flights from Ithaca to Minneapolis are mad cheap!


I am such a dork when it comes to this stuff, but I smile every time I see one of these in an airport! :o)

Hello Cozumel Mexico!

So, as I begin this journey, I figured I would start a blog… something for me, but also something for my family to look at (for you mom & grandma!). Right now as we speak, I am floating just south of the Gulf of Mexico headed to Cozumel, MX. I deserve a vacation right? Haha… I don’t care if I do or not! I took one! The thing is, I know I probably should be home packing and spending time with family, I wasn’t necessary planning this move to Minneapolis when I booked this cruise! That will just mean I will have to spend EXTRA time packing and time with family when I get back, who needs sleep anyways?