Tag: A day in the life

Seriously?

In the O RLY department we have this job posting on Craigslist.

Among the responsibilities are developing systems that will meet the company’s needs and participate in business meetings to identify and understand the company’s goals and objectives in order to develop a system that will meet the company’s current and future business needs.

So, you’re saying, I can’t sit around all day and code on my mega-ultra-awesome Tetris implementation but I have to develop to satisfy the company’s needs? Whoa…my head is asploded.

Back to the Grind

So it looks like I took a goodly amount of time off, not only from work, but from blogging. I buried myself in holiday celebrational activities like eating and visiting with relatives and playing games and programming at 3pm in nothing but a bathrobe. The highlight of all this fun?

I put a ball and chain on layaway.

That’s right, I’ve become engaged to the lovely and oh-so-talented Elz. It’s looking like a long and entertaining engagement what with all the hurdles (legal and otherwise) that must be overcome but I wanted to make my intentions known to her and the rest of the world. She’s a wonderful lady and a delicate flower (not) who shares many of my interests and accommodates many of my idiosyncrasies with aplomb.

There’s really naught else to discuss. My other happy gift is a USB-enabled turntable. I’ve been ripping vinyl for some time and am considering putting some of the more esoteric stuff up on my home server for downloady goodness. Lots of jazz lately but I am hoping to stop doing piecework shortly and just start the A-Z rip of my 13 shelves of vinyl. This project will probably take years, but what’s a good project without long-term commitments?

Stormy and the Like

The ice wasn’t too horrible out here and the snow has been nice. Then again I didn’t clean off the driveway before heading off to work. Work that started at noon.

Feeling really mellow and listening to a lot of Brubeck today. It’s nice.

Last night was an interesting night on the desk. Was propositioned by some lady who looked like my mother’s peer to come to [bar’s name] on Friday so that I could meet her mid-thirties-ish, single friend. All well and good—who doesn’t like to be found attractive, right? I deftly parried the request by alluding to my present girlfriend, with whom I live. Perhaps it was too deft because the request turned into some kind of hard sell. She wasn’t going to take no for an answer all the while I’m trying to help her locate some obscure article. Thank FSM the reference librarian wandered back to the desk so I could pass her off. Seriously weird moment in the life of a geekular wall flower.

Told Elz about it and she asked if she needed to mark me every morning before I head off to work. I replied that I think that could be kind of fun.

heh.

Something Weird

You know what’s weird? Seeing a blog entry written by someone and having them reference you as “their boss.” Even if that is technically true—that person does work for me—it just gives me the willies. I never wanted to be anyone’s boss. I just want to write code and see what goofy crap can be conjured up out of a bunch of computers sharing files over a decentralized network.

Also weird? Wanting to go back to that time in Lincoln when I was noticeably hipper, younger, and ‘in the scene’ as it were. Can’t really hang out with the neo-bohemian set when you’re pushing the upper edge of your fourth decade on this planet. Conflict and contrast—the keys to artistic endeavor.

Reasonably lacking in fun

What passes for the mothership-in-law will be staying with us this evening.  Here are some ways in which this promises to not be fun:

  1. She self-diagnosed her sinus infection as a mini-stroke
  2. Incessant demands for all and sundry to “feel my forehead.  Isn’t it hot?”
  3. Requests to “just hold my hand” made almost as frequently
  4. Reportedly her attempt at a bath this afternoon lasted for approximately 120 seconds

This added to the fun of having to clean the house top to bottom, rearrange said house to accommodate a sit down meal for a baker’s dozen, and plan and shop for an elaborate meal in anticipation of hosting the first joint family holiday celebration.  Elz recently recovered from a bout with pneumonia and is now nursing someone with a raging sinus infection and getting increasingly run down from it all.  Thereby opening herself to further ailments and possible hospitalization.

I’ll save further editorializing for off-list conversations.  I will say that I’ve spent nearly an hour on the phone with Elz here at work calming her down.

Why do people insist that holidays are fun?

An Extra Hour

Probably my favorite day of the year…the day we get the extra hour moving from Daylight Saving to Standard time. Oh yeah!

So I spent the extra hour revamping the blog a bit. While I was high on the blue background with wacky box thingers and on involving the dogs for some reason, I like this theme a bit better. I think I’ll mute it a bit more—the background color on the posts kind of screw with the Zen I had in mind. Still, I think we’re in a place where we’re mostly open for business. There’s still the per-category stuff to go over and translating the whole look and feel of The Millionaire’s Holiday site into the WordPress universe.

A Dolphin Named Tired

When I was a much younger man, I went on a family vacation to Worlds of Fun. It was maybe the first or second time I’d been there and it was mostly as advertised. Then again, I was 15 going on 16 at the time—an age more or less squarely in their target demographic. The important thing, however, is that I was a skeeball aficionado. I parlayed a few dollars in tokens into a stuffed dolphin which, being a boy without a girl, I gave to my sister.

On the 4 hour car ride home I fell asleep resting my head on the dolphin which was perched on my shoulder. My sister fell asleep leaning again me (small car). And thus the dolphin was christened “Tired.”

After closing the desk down at midnight last night and returning to open this morning at 6:30 I am in need of some Tired therapy.