I'm going to Maine...I think

I have a work trip scheduled to Maine next week--it's the annual face-to-face meeting of a committee I'm on, and this year we decided to go to Augusta. That's the home office of one of the committee members, plus a recent retiree that we all know lives nearby and invited us all to visit, plus we try to have the meeting in a different office each time so we can publicize who we are and what we do.

The recommendation was to fly into Portland, as cheaper than Augusta--still not inexpensive, but better. And like a good girl, I went on the Web site for the current travel vendor for my agency, picked my flights, and got it set up. Did this back in June, in fact, and I have the confirmation email. Good thing, too.

Today I discovered a friend of mine will be visiting her parents in Maine that same week, so if I can come in a little early, I can hook up with her and her husband and do a little sightseeing, or just hang around the lake at her parents' place, or whatever. It'd be nicer than flying in, attending the meeting in Yet Another Government Office, and leaving, which was the previous plan--especially as this will be my first time in Maine.

So I went back to the Web site to see if I could change my flight, and it says "You have no upcoming trips". And "You have no cancelled trips". "Past Trips" shows my trip to Denver in June, which is the only travel I've had since this vendor took over in April.

On further investigation, the Delta Airlines site does know about the reservation, but I can't change the flights there because the ticket doesn't get paid for until right before the trip. I finally dug out the vendor's number and called their Help Desk, and they can see the reservation in their system--it just doesn't show up for me. The Help Desk had me send them a screen shot, and they say they'll get back to me.

Computers and passwords

It was Change-The-Password Day today. This day occurs when QuickTime, our home-grown time-and-attendance software system (used to sign in and out, and put down what account to charge each day's work to) decides that your current password is too old. Of course, none of the various password expiration terms agree, but I find it much simpler (if less secure) to pick one good password and use it everywhere I can.

So today I went through the hassle of picking a new, good password that I can remember. QuickTime always has more quirks about what it will accept than I think--I remembered that it wants a digit early in the password, and upper and lower case characters. But I forgot that the digit must be in positions 2 or 3, and you also must include one special character. But watch out--some special characters that QuickTime accepts are banned other places. And vice versa.

I did find a new password after three tries. (They don't give you all the password criteria at once, of course--it spits out one error message at a time for each unacceptable password.) And now I've changed to the new one on Windows, the Lotus client, the Lotus Internet password, AFS, and Sun servers in Reston, Denver, and Atlanta. I'm pretty sure I've missed something, too--it'll crop up before long. Let's hope I still remember the old password when it does...