Sparktoblog!

Oh yeah

Today sucks more than I thought. My car was stolen last night – and right out of our secured garage too! I'm at least glad that my new job is easy walking distance to my condo. I'm trying to decide if I want to put a lot of effort into finding and fixing my car again, or if I just want to go get a new (better) car and be done with it.

Thoughts? Opinions?  I almost want to say I want a late 90's German car of some sort. German cars make me happy. They are expensive and manage to break down frequently, but boy are they pretty. The thought of getting a station wagon is also kinda nifty – it would give me a good place for Skype to hang out when he had to come with me.

 

The end of an era

So this has certainly been an interesting week. I've been unable to write about a few of my frustrations and goings ons recently due to various political reasons – luckily now I can. On Tuesday I went into my employer and handed in my notice. I have really not been happy at work for the last year and I'm quite glad that I'm able to move on.

Now don't get me wrong. My previous employer is a fantastic recruiting company, and they did a lot for me (I went from unemployed and practically on the streets to owning a condo in under three years) but the longer I did it the more unhappy I became with my work. A major part of what I was doing was business development, and I've never really considered myself a sales guy. While there I was also feeling my technical skills slowly sap away and that added to my fears of future employment.

I have accepted another position at a company that has an ethos much more in line with my personal philosophies and personal career goals. It's a consulting company here in Seattle that is fairly new, but seems to be going places fast. I'm eager to explore the future with this company and see what it can bring for me. I'll still be doing some recruiting, but the work is far more technical, and the company offers me many more opportunities to stay technical. The company is also offering an environment much more akin to my liking: casual dress, flex time, the ability to work from home occasionally.

This week marks the end of my previous life it would seem. I'm unemployed until next Wednesday and I intend to enjoy myself. I've spent the last couple of days cuddling with my new Media Center (finally god dammit - I really don't want to go into the whole saga it took to get a working one from HP) and spending quality time with Skype. Today I'm off to clean out my old desk, and then go to spend the afternoon with some old friends of mine.

Merry Christmas!

The last week in Walla Walla has truly been an enjoyable experience. Yes, my dad being sick has put a bit of a damper on it, but being home with most of my family and just taking an opportunity to relax has done wonders for me. I've spent most of the time laying around the house talking with my parents or going on walks in the country with my mom and Skype.

Christmas yesterday was fun. Given that my sister is off on the east coast with her new finance we did not bother with most of the festivities. We spent the morning watching movies and talking with each other about what Christmas means to each of us. We exchanged a few small gifts (never a big thing with our family) and called it good. It's sad to see how some families and people get so into the commercial side of Christmas and forget it's religious and family meanings.

After a simple dinner we settled down and watched some NOVA programming on string theory (of all things). It's fascinating stuff and I've been investigating it more and more. I first heard about it on PT's blog, and have been reading a number of Scientific American articles and such on it since.

I'm looking forward to going back to Seattle tomorrow. I have some things I need to get taken care of this week. I have some big exciting news, but I can't write about it publicly for another day or so – keep an eye out for an update on Monday or Tuesday.

Finaly home

The last week certainly has been interesting. I took Thursday and Friday of last week off and spent it recovering from my workday blues. I really spent the majority of my time just resting at home and bonding with Skype. Life did not really get interesting until Sunday when I had my massive Lord of the Rings marathon. It was a smashing success with more than 10 people showing up for a day of Peter Jackson madness!

Quitting smoking has been going fabulously well. The patch has been quite helpful and aside from the odd drag here and there I've been doing very well at avoiding smoking. I'm hoping this stays true and I'm able to stay quit this time. I have plenty of stress coming up in January so I'll be interested to see how things sort out.

Yesterday I hopped in the car, Skype, Skypes stuff, more of Skypes stuff, and my baggage in hand and drove down to Walla Walla. The trip was surprisingly uneventful (thank goodness) and I arrived home about 5 hours later. I was quite pleased with how well Skype dealt with the long ime in the car. I had been worried that he would get too restless.

I've spent most of the day being lazy around my parents house. It's so nice to come home and relax once in a while and just do nothing. Not having to worry about the hustle and bustle of city life can be good once in a while.

I'm not sure how much I'm going to be updating my blog in the next couple of days. I'm trying to distance myself from technology and its inherit complications for a little while to make my life a littler easier, and try to relax.

Day 1 - sick, tired, and doing well!

Project "I'm quitting smoking" is going better than can be expected. I'm not much of a fan of these patches but at least they are managing to curb my cravings. The only problem with them is they seem to be making me sick. I constantly feel like I just smoked a few cigarettes and it's making my stomach upset. Hopefully as I taper down my dose to nothing this will all go away and I'll be a healthy non-smoker soon.

Aside from that I'm pleased to announce that I'll be starting my vacation a little early this year and tomorrow will be my last day of work for nearly three weeks. I've been so burnt out at work and I talked to my boss about it. I'm really looking forward to taking some serious time off and relaxing a bit - letting my body and mind reset. Hopefully I'll ready to tackle the business world when I get back in early January.

Tonight and tomorrow night are going to be very chill for me. I have nothing planned save playing with Skype and watching movies on the couch. This weekend I have a big LOTR marathon with a bunch of friends at my place so that should be pretty fun!

What a show, what a day

Last night was certainly fun. I went out to the Fenix to watch the Bardo show that Brien was a part of. I got some great shots and overall am very pleased with the way things ended up. The shot shown here was one of the better ones, but I have a few more I'm still working on touching up. After the suspension part of the event was a bit of a fashion show - not my cup of tea, but still interesting to watch.

This morning I woke up to my personal day zero - I'm making yet another attempt to quit smoking. This time I'm going to use a method I tried much earlier and failed, but I'm willing to give it another day. I'm hoping that I can get all of this crud out of my lungs for good - I'm always much more healthy when I'm not smoking, and given the luck my family has with lung problems it's for the best.

Speaking of lung problems my dad managed to land himself in the ICU today at the hospital he works at. He has blood clots in his lungs again, and is having serious problems breathing. I'm quite worried about him, and am getting increasingly concerned with the frequency that my parents are having medical emergencies at their ages.

I'm hoping this week whisks by. It's already off to a shaky start, and I'm tired to begin with. I got a lot of DVD's in the mail today so hopefully I'll be able to amuse myself with them in the evenings, and just keep myself busy with work during the days.

Overstimulated

Skype seems a little overwhelmed from the past 24 hours. Things started off yesterday morning when Dom and I steam cleaned my carpet. We rented a Rug Doctor from the QFC up on Pine, and went at it ourselves. I have to say I'm pretty impressed with the results – there are still a few remnants, but for the most part it got all the stains that have built up over the last 5 months of having Skype living here with me.

This was hard for Skype – he dealt with it well, but being locked in the kitchen while I rumble around with a big, heavy, and loud steam cleaner was somewhat stressful for him. After we got done we took Skype to the dog park so he could run around and get some of his energy out while the carpets finished drying. He spent a good hour and a half running around with the other dogs and having a blast.

After we got home Ian and some of his friends came over for dinner and a movie. Skype was already worn out, but he got to play with two new people and had fun with that. We ate our Thai food and watched most of Alien 3 before they left. At this point Skype was pretty much exhausted from all the new sights and sounds of the day.

Finally I topped off the day by heading over to my friend Randy's home to chill with a bunch of friends. I brought the now tired Skype with me so he could meet them all. He had a good hour walking around the house sniffing everything and playing with new (and old) friends. By the time we got home he was ready for a good 9 hours of sleep – something that I was only too glad to oblige him.

Today has been pretty chill so far – I've watched Spider-Man 2 and a bunch of the bonus material while waiting around for the afternoon. I'm not much of a fan of comic movies but I have to admit it was pretty good. A lot of detail went into it and I can really appreciate the everpresent feel and tone of the film. Soon my friend Scot is coming over so that we can watch weird movies and discuss my future technological development. This evening also has in store one of the Bardo suspension shows at the Fenix. I'm going to go shoot the event – should be pretty interesting.

New again

Today is going to be a monumental day of note: My carpets are getting cleaned with a big nasty steam/vac machine. Skype has been doing very well about accidents of late and I think it's finally time to give the carpets a good cleaning. I would have called chemdry but I don't see a reason to spend quite that much money when I'm planning on ripping out the carpets and putting in hardwoods sometime in the next year anyway.

I'm really glad the week is over. With the Chairman in town, and the holiday Christmas party I was running on fumes for the last three days of the week. Luckily Friday was a pretty chill day in the office. once the Chairman left at around 10:00 the whole office let out a collective sigh of relief and got to take some of the pressure off. A lot of work still got done (even managed to close a deal myself) but everyone was just a little bit more even keel, and was able to take the odd moment to browse the web or chat with one another.

Last night a feast occurred - I got home and Dom was still hanging out using the internet. He finished that up and we decided to go grab some stuff from QFC and make some dinner for a movie. He whipped up the most amazing pasta with a creamy veggie sauce, and we hunkered down with dinner and waking life. It's been a while since I saw that movie so it was nice to re-familiarize myself with it.

It has been really frustrating to not have my Media Center to watch content on. I dislike having something break so soon after I get it. HP has been keeping up their end of the bargain on replacing it, but the process is taking forever. So far it's been 9 days since it broke and they only yesterday received the original one back for inspection. It will be at least a week before I get mine back it's looking like - possibly longer. At least I can still use my xbox as a DVD player. It's not the worlds best DVD player, but with the component video kit it actually does a decent job. Not having 1080i up-scaling or a digital connection really limits it on my TV.

Late for work

Grrrrrrrr... Last night some homeless guy tried to break into the garage
for my condo building. In the process he managed to completely break the
garage door. Now there is a line of people waiting to get out of the
garage in their cars to go to work while we wait for the repair guy to
get here and fix it.

Thank god it's Friday - after my week I'm really ready for a weekend.
Aside from dinner with my friend tonight, and cleaning tomorrow I don't
really have anything planned. I'm thinking it's going to be all about
the quality time with Skype, my TV, and my couch in that order.

Update: I also managed to sleep funny on my pillow last night. I woke up and the right side of my neck was hurting quite badly. I decided to ignore it beacuse this happens from time to time and it usualy goes away quite quickly. Not today buddy - It's almost 11 and I'm still in pain.

Fatigue

I sit here at my desk, feeling like cotton gauze has been wrapped around my senses - dulling me to the outside world. I'm tired - very tired, and it shows no sign of letting up. I suppose my monumental fatigue could be blamed on staying up late with Skype a couple of nights in a row. I suppose I could also blame it on a 14 hour work day on Tuesday for our client/contractor Christmas party (more on that in a moment). I even suppose that I could blame it on the fact that our Chairman is in town and I've been having to blow sunshine up his ass to avoid the finger of doom being applied to the entire Seattle office.

That or I could just accept the fact that I'm tired, burnt out, and need a break - just one week left until I start my two week holiday!

As promised: back to the holiday party. Every year now (or at least for the last two years) my company has thrown a big holiday party for all our clients and contractors. They are a stuffy affair where everyone comes all dressed up and hobnobs on our dime for a good 5 hours. I wouldn't mind so much except for the fact that since I work here I have to go entertain the masses. Some of the people (mostly my contractors and a few good clients) are not so bad, but as always there were a few asshats there that I had to suck up to.

The evening dragged by, and finally at around 10:00 my last client left. I gathered my things, collected my friend Brien who came (THANK YOU BRIEN!) and drove home to snuggle up with my little darling. All in all the 14 hour work day would not have been that bad aside from having to be at work bright and early Wednesday morning. You would think after a nearly double shift like that our bosses would have given some leniency, but again, our Chairman is in town, so asses will be ridden, and unhappiness will ensue.

Yesterday was not quite as bad other than being exhausted. I made it through the day at work then crawled home to cuddle with Skype. We played for a little while then I curled up with him to watch Amelie. Unconsciousness came over me sooner than anticipated and I ended up passing out on the couch fully dressed. I guess I'm lucky I woke up shortly after my alarm would have normally gone off.

Aside from Sushi tomorrow with a co-worker and some movies with a friend on Sunday I don't have much planned for the weekend. I'm going to try to get rested up so that I can make it though next week. All I have to do is show up for five days and get my work ready to be mothballed for two weeks while I unwind, unstressed, and get ready for a fantastic year in 2005.

In awe

In the wake of a drunken Christmas party last Thursday I was certainly ready for a nice relaxing weekend. The Christmas party brought the entire office to Tulio's in downtown Seattle for an evening of drinking, eating, and excessively loud noises. This year it was not quite as stuffy so I had a decent time, although I would have much preferred a far less fancy affair. I ended up ducking out early, at 10:30 or so for Skype was at home with Steve and I needed to get myself rehydrated before I went to bed. Friday morning loomed at me, meetings in store for everyone!

Friday kind of flew by. I had several meetings, and was quite hung over to boot. I just let the day wash over me and envelop me in it's painful grip, letting my alertness seep away slowly. Once I got home from work I settled down into the couch with some of the new DVD's that I had acquired over the last week.

Two of these movies struck me with awe as I sat watching them. The Qatsi trilogy (a new experience for me) comprised of Koyaanisqatsi, Powaqqatsi, and Naqoyqatsi was by far one of the most amazing cinematic presentations I've ever seen. They are documentaries of sort, described by one of their producers (George Lucas) as cinematic poetry. They are made from footage, time lapse photography, and other media blended together with an amazing soundtrack composed by Phillip Glass. They are very well done, flow well, tell a story, and leave you with a lot to think about in how you fit into the world around you. I would highly recommend anyone with an interest in that kind of presentation check them out!

Also on the agenda for movies this weekend was the Alien Quadrology. The Alien series by Ridley Scott have always been one of my favorite Sci-Fi horror flicks. I remember watching Aliens with my dad when I was a kid (way back at their old place on Tillamook street) and it scaring the living daylights out of me. For months I couldn't sleep in the dark for fear of the aliens coming to get me. Re-watching the entire series with a more critical eye and noticing the little bits that the director threw in for the special edition was quite pleasant. I'm also quite pleased with the bonus material - it's kind of cool to see how they made such landmark movies back then without the assistance of computers.

Aside from movies not much happened this weekend. On Saturday Brien and I did an Ikea run (and Fry's) so that I could get a new DVD rack and some UPC equipment. Saturday evening Brien and I put together the rack and tore my place a new one moving furniture around. I'm quite happy with the new layout and think that it makes for not only a more open living room, but also much more of a home theater. Now my only concern is how to quiet my desktop blinky down a bit. He's sitting very close to my TV and the fans are getting annoying when I'm trying to watch a movie.

This week should go by quickly. The chairman/owner of the company I work for is in town, and we have our client/contractor Christmas party tomorrow. All in all I just want to keep busy, let the week fly by, and then just endure one more week next week before I take a two week holiday. Fun stuff all around!

RIP HP Digital Entertainment Center

Well, it was a good ride while it lasted. Last night my HP z545 Media Center died. May it rest in pieces. I'm not sure what happened to it, but when I came home from work it was dead. It won't boot, won't play, it won't even post. I spent a good hour on the phone with HP support only to be told that the error that was occurring could not occur on this model. They want me to ship it to them and have promised to have it back to me within 2-3 weeks. Overall I must say I'm pretty disappointed - when I spend nearly $2k on a piece of equipment and it fails less than a month later I would expect some form of remuneration - instead I get a kick in the pants and half a month without any form of digital entertainment in my house.

To add insult to injury yesterday my Media Center Extender arrived in the mail and I was quite excited to go hook it up and have the media center experience in my bedroom as well. Now I get a nice shiny piece of equipment to sit around in my bedroom and loom at me for the next 2 weeks, laughing at my inability to use it.

Aside from that today has been a fairly mundane day. I'm getting ready for the first of two work Christmas parties this evening. Tonight it's the smaller of the two events, so if I'm lucky I should be home by 9:00 or so. I really hate these stuffy events and wish that I could just stay home with Skype rather than go. *sigh* the things we do for our careers.