All I wanted to do was enjoy a couple days with my boys. We go camping a lot, but typically the campouts are arranged by age. My five boys, aged 12-16 span three age groups.
But, the Goblin Valley trip was different. It was a combined trip. All the boys and leaders went. We loaded the van, met the other boys and leaders at the church at 4:00pm and set out, my big van one of a caravan of 6 cars and trucks headed for Southern Utah.
And then my phone rang.
PRIVATE NUMBER flashed on my caller ID. I took a deep breath and swiped to the right.
Hey Rodney, this is Antonio in Salt Lake. Sorry to bother you. We have an issue on the call floor.
How many agents are impacted?
All of them.
Have you talked to Louisville?
Yeah, all there agents are impacted too.
Okay. I need both of you to open tickets and escalate to Incident Management. I also need you to open a ticket with the client. I’ll call them and get a status. Have the incident manager call my cell phone and add me to the conference bridge.
Okay. See you on the bridge.
Oh, and tell them that I’m headed into some canyons and I might lose you.
Will do.
The younger boys in the car stared at me with a “Can we talk now?” look. My 16 year old son just looked at them, “You need to be quiet until he’s done.” The car fell silent except for my multiple phone calls. As the miles passed, I switched back and forth between talking on the bridge with my team and making calls to the client.
My phone lets me make two calls at the same time. I use that feature a lot, especially when I’m on vacation and work interferes. In between calls I turned to my son,
I have a weird job. I don’t know of anyone else who has to take multiple phone calls while on a camping trip.
It’s okay.
Is it? I don’t know. Mabye it is. Maybe my boys will remember me being on the campout with them. Maybe they will instead only remember that “Dad was always on the phone.”
Goblin Valley
Gobline Valley is located in southern Utah. It’s a fun state park. The Goblins are unique rock formations called Hutus. They are anywhere from a few feet to over 2o feet tall rock formations. They look like Goblins. . .sort of. There are hundreds in the park. We won’t really get to see them. See, we get here in the dark and then we play capture the flag under the midnight moon. In the morning, we make an 8 mile hike up Ding and down Dang. There isn’t really time to go tour the Hoodoos.
This week I’ll be writing about my visit to the Valley of the Goblins. Everytime I go on one of these trips, I learn a lot. This one especially.
Rodney M Bliss is an author, columnist and IT Consultant. His blog updates every weekday at 7:00 AM Mountain Time. He lives in Pleasant Grove, UT with his lovely wife, thirteen children and grandchildren.
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