For months I’ve been combing the interwebs looking for the perfect setup. Everyone appears to have their own philosophy on what’s necessary, which services, carriers, phones are best, and what type of iPhone case best protects that sugar-glass screen. The following plan is what I believe to be best for me:

• a soon to be a relatively immobile expat from the states
• a freelancer for North America based companies
• a web developer, in or around the computer for the majority of my day

The Hardware

• A computer with Skype installed.
• An unlocked quad-band GSM phone (I bought a Samsung T629)
• A computer headset. This is optional, but nice for sound quality, and you’re probably going to have some kind of headphones anyway.

The Services

• Skype Online Number and Calling Plan — The most important thing here is the online number. This allows you to pick a standard phone number to tie to your Skype account. If people call this number, you get a call on Skype. If you call people on Skype, it appears to come from this number. Why the calling plan?

  

  Buying one year of the calling plan gives you a 50% discount on an online number. The online number alone is $60.00. The number plus the plan is $60.05. I’ll pay the extra nickel. Having unlimited US and Canada calls is also essential to interact with the next service…

• Google Voice — You could just stick with Skype, that would work fine and well. You get Voicemail, unlimited US and Canada calling, 90% of what we want. But Skype doesn’t receive SMS. And let’s say in a year or two your trip is all over and you return to the states. You go back to a “normal” cell phone plan and get a new number. Do you want to have to hand out your number all over again?

  With Google Voice we can send and receive SMS. We can keep one number and have it forward calls and messages to any number of US phone numbers (including your cool new Skype number.) Google Voice valiantly attempts to transcribe voicemails using speech recognition, and can send you an email and SMS with the results, at times with interesting results. Plus, when you return to the states you can just change or add forwarding numbers. If you’re bright and keep your contact information within Google Voice, you’ll never have to create a new-phone-number Facebook event again.

• Local SIM card — For calls within the country you’re staying, pick up a local GSM SIM card when you land. Pop it in the unlocked phone and you’re set. Pay as you go, prepaid, or some calling plan? That shit’s up to you. Right now, while I’m in the states, I personally have a pay-as-you-go TMobile card in mine. Just thinking of AT&T’s service makes me spit vitriol, so I’ll refrain from ranting.

Recap

Somebody calls my US phone number. It rings Skype, and if I’m in the states, my cell phone as well. When I’m in China (or anywhere abroad) and not at the computer, they get my voicemail. Go ahead, call me (Enter your phone number and Google Voice will connect us):

I want to make a call to the US or Canada. If I’m at the computer I enter the number into Google Voice or select from my contacts and tell it to dial my Skype number. If I’m away from the computer I use my cell phone to dial my Google Voice number, which recognizes it’s me, and tell GV to dial the desired number. (This makes your call appear to be coming from your Google Voice number.)

I want to make an international call. If it’s within the same country, I use my cell phone equipped with the local SIM card. If I’m at the computer and it’s outside the US or Canada, I make calls using the great Skype rates or Google Voices rates for international calls.

If I want to make a call out of the country and I’m not at the computer, I don’t. Unless it’s an emergency. We don’t need to be connected to everywhere in the world every second of the day. If I’m out, I’m probably doing something (-shock!-) and could care less about making or receiving phone calls.

Extra Tidbits

• The Google Voice Chrome extension is fan-fucking-tastic. Phone, SMS, Voicemail all from a button in the browser, and it turns phone numbers on web pages into links to call using Google Voice.
• If you’re going to make a lot of international calls you should consider Skype Unlimited World. It’s cheap and you get a nice portfolio of countries you can dial.
• I’m ignoring data plans here. Sorry, iPhoners. But depending on the country and phone you’re using, you may be able to use Skype on your phone and forego a voice plan altogether. Do some research on your location. If you’re going to China like me, you’ll find that China allows the Skype app on the computer but doesn’t support it on their mobile data networks.

There’s so much to say about international mobile, this could go on forever. If anybody has any specific questions, shoot em my way in the comments and I’ll try to help.

With almost 200,000 miles she still runs young, but her body shows rough around the edges. Certain doors don’t work right. I haven’t had a passenger mirror in years. Some would say, however backhanded, that she has character.

Earlier today I dropped the car off at my aunt’s place. My cousin will pick it up in a few days. I believe the transmission on his vehicle is in the middle of a death rattle, and it’s only fitting that this reliable old bag take up the cause of transporting a young gent around.

And there we have it. It’s all gone. Ehhh well, there are things, things which some members of my family would rather I leave with them than throw away. I’ll oblige. They’re with me here in Corning now as I begin this trip. I still have a few posts for the sidebar — a packing list and an overview of my international phone plan, at least — which I still intend to write. But as far as the calendar is concerned: The 100 days are over.

An unexpected benefit from this blog: Transferred anxiety. I told D a few days ago, by forcing myself to blog each day I worried more about finding the time to blog the throwaway than actually throwing something away. I stayed too busy to let anything sink in.

Without getting into unnecessary details, Friday night/Saturday morning brought about the culmination of a lot of that pent up anxiety spiked with a little physical pain. Thanks Eva, for helping me deal with it in the moment. And thanks to my awesome family and friends for your constant support. You all fucking rock.

I’ve spent all day taking everything out of the room, packing items promised to people up north or throwing them away unclaimed. I’m so tired. I’ll post pictures tomorrow, I promise.

Today is my last day of work.

RIM TEAM: I friggin love you guys, I imagine in the way World War I veterans loved their trenchmates. We fought staggering battles and endured many a night together, and I wouldn’t be the person I am today (for better or worse) without you.

APPLE TEAM I friggin love you guys. I’ll miss the box. (For the uninitiated, we have to sit in a secluded, key access area of the building. That’s how we roll.) I don’t think I could ask to be surrounded by more pure talent. From engineering to UI to project management, everyone is the epitome of professional. And hey, you got me off that damn PC. Ok, maybe I’m still running PC hardware, but Windows is out of the picture and I’m an official Mac OS fan. Congrats.

I’ll miss all of you.

• A bunch of hangers. I actually have about 30.
• A half used bottle of Dior Fahrenheit.
• A fuckload of #2 pencils.
• A stack of random CDs and DVDs.
• A half used bottle of hand sanitizer.
• A white binder. (Contains the original work binder contents from when I started at Web Associates, but I can’t give that to you.)
• A quarter bottle of liquid detergent.
• A few dryer sheets.
• Two used black belts.

If any crazy person wants any of this mostly have used shit, you have through Saturday to come get it.

• Size: Mens Large
• Condition: Used, Clean
• Number of shirts ever printed: 1

C at work designed it. R presented it to me as a gift at an all-hands meeting. If I ever want to print another one, I’ve got the Illustrator file buried in the back of a drawer somewhere in the cloud.

Anybody want this one?

And for the astute, dedicated readers out there (read: “Hi Mom!”), yes I reused the desk image. It’s resourceful, not lazy. That’s my story, at least.

By the way, in the process of building computers like this during middle/high school I learned a fun fact: If you forget to remove the little white patch of paper on the bottom of a heatsink, the processor will run for a good five, maybe six seconds. Neat, huh!

So, um, I know what you’re thinking: “Caleb, you can’t just go into work naked. You don’t have one of those jobs where that kind of thing is cool.”

I still have the clothes I’ll be taking on my trip. I’ll get into the details later, but it amounts to three and a half changes of clothes.

Not pictured is one giant white plate and ten or so small ones. All of it is up for grabs.

This is not me giving away my computer. Or the fire safe, or that sweet ass orange extension cord, or the crusty old power supply. It’s me giving away my computer desk. The desk is just moving to a different part of the room, since the roomies are taking over both the room and the desk when I move out.