December Update
Isn't it wonderful to pick up a journal and pretend that nothing has changed? That there hasn't been over 2 months since I last updated? I refuse to apologize for the absence, but I make no promises that it won't happen again.
That being said, allow me to tell everyone how absolutely excited I am for tonight. My family is currently driving in from Charleston to see a Paul Simon concert tonight. Tomorrow morning, I'm riding back to the Holy City with them and taking a weekend to relax. I've scheduled Monday as a vacation day and I plan to use it as such. No telecommuting; no checking email & definitely no thinking about Mysoft.
Speaking of Mysoft, that's the name of what I currently work on. My last entry, "yes!", refers to a switch I made at work. That day, I officially accepted an offer from Office of Information Technology (OIT) as a Business Analyst I working Mysoft, our OIT Finance & Accounting tracking and billing systems. As thrilling as it sounds, there are definitely some issues I inherited. Namely, my team was already playing catch-up. Understand I don't blame my teammates, they were put in the same situation I am in, however there is a distinct lack of documentation available. Did I mention that the vendor refuses to talk to me until I go through their extremely expensive certification class which, by all accounts, teaches me nothing. But hey, if Emory is going to send me to Nashville to learn stuff and see my friends, I won't complain.
I'm not totally sure when I'll be able to make it up there, though. I realized that my social calender is absolutely booked from tonight for about a week, straight. Absolutely crazy but I don't think I could have it any other way. I hope I find time in there to practice, though. I started taking accordion & resumed my piano lessons. Finally going back and learning some of that repertoire that I should have a long time ago. Two pieces in g-minor, I must really like that key.
Fantastic Weekend
From this past Wednesday until today, my life has been pretty awesome. I've had friends hang out with me while I was working at home, I got to catch up with one of my oldest friends at a Braves game - we lost. I had another good friend come to town. We went to a bonfire party (in the middle of summer). I saw other friends, I went climbing. I spent a day hanging out with my neighbors drinking. It's the good life.
Saturday night, we had our annual TechOps staff party. My schedule is insanely busy throughout the year, causing all sorts of havoc when it comes to staff meetings. Trips to Charleston, working at the 14th St. Playhouse and concerts have all prevented me from making the mundane staff meetings, but I always make sure that I am free for this one. Hosted by the lovely Bill & Cat, two of the nicest people I know, it is the place to be. A family united through common craziness and devotion all eating and drinking together. Is there anything better? I got to see some old friends and made several new ones. Not to mention I got to see some of the DCTV shots.
Speaking of DCTV, I might be going out on a limb here. I am not such a huge fan of Bob & Carl. Some of their bits are funny but I find them annoying for the most part. The guy who makes them is quite nice and pretty geeky, which is why I feel bad getting annoyed at them. Looking at it from the production aspect, I know why DCTV loves them. They're short. They're made by someone else. They can use them to fill time. Past that ... they just get old.
Also, I hate waiting. I should have an answer to something I'm waiting on either this afternoon or tomorrow. Then a whole 'nother waiting game begins.
Quick line from Encyclopedia Dramatica
Music Before 1960
"After banging on things and shouting in time with said banging got boring, music slowly evolved to include instruments, structure and lyrical meaning. Back in the day musicians were hobos, getting paid to travel around and make shit up to entertain passerby."
Source: http://encyclopediadramatica.ch/Music
More Labels
Last night, Adam and I went to Milonga Luna, a tango event hosted by Angel and April. It had been a while since I had attended their events, so I didn't quite know what to expect. I was blown away! Generally, I only make it to the Milonga Bs. As., hosted by Horacio and the Milonga Emory (obviously put on by Tangueros Emory). Turnout tends to be decent, but it's mostly an older crowd. The Milonga Luna had people within ten years of my age. I think I will make more of an effort to make it to that one in the future and also check out Tango Evolution.
As to the title of the post, I have more news about labels. I /dreamt/ about them. It was a weird dream in that none of the people involved were the same, yet I was still trying to get labels made for housing. Also, instead of working in the registrar's office, I was in a hybrid mix of my workplace and theirs. This time, I ran into different problems than in real life: transportation and payment. In my dream, we were trying to figure how to pay for the labels because the department responsible was out of cash. I think we ended up trying to represent the labels as an "access" department expense and that settled that. Once the labels were made, I had a giant stack of them - and I mean at least thirty pounds worth - and they had to go completely across campus. I then woke up.
I was supposed to go to synagogue with a friend this morning as she wanted someone to go with, but she was out waaayyyyy too late to make it. I went ahead and scoped it out so I'd be familiar with the place for next time. It was a reform temple which is always a bit weird for me. I find the biggest things which put me off tend to be omissions in the text. For example, they say the first two lines and then jump to the last. Also, the cantor's voice was too operatic - the vibrato and range simply weren't accessible for me. Other things like when they stand and more importantly, when they don't stand get me. Also, an elderly woman there cornered me and insisted on talking with me until we found someone we knew in common. I don't think we found anyone.
I'm trying a new application to write these posts. This has been written entirely on my phone because I'm working at the 14th Street Playhouse. I'm working the matinee show of 'The Meeting, ' a hypothetical meeting between Malcolm X and MLK Jr. Of all the productions we see come through our tiny nest of joy (aka the Silly Farm), this is one of the better ones. They know their lines, their timing and it is thought provoking dialog. I worked sound for them the last time they staged it, today I'm a house manager. Once this ends, I'm going home, grabbing some clothes and then going home to Charleston.
Feel free to call and talk to me on the ride!
Labels
A friendly word of warning. If anyone asks for your help in getting labels printed, say no. In fact, take it a step further. Say "Hell no" and stab them in the face, repeatedly.
The process for having labels made at the University is pretty straightforward. You email a certain person in the Registrar's office with the information you need on the labels, you include your payment information ($50 flat fee) and then you pick your labels up the next day. Sounds straightforward, right?
As of 9:30 this morning, over 18,000 labels have been destroyed. The first time, the labels weren't sorted correctly. It doesn't sound like a big deal, but trust me - it's huge. Not to mention that it was only one set of labels and we need the labels in triplicate. The Registrar's office offered to correct that issue and reprint them all. They say two hours and it should be set.
6 hours later, they email us and let us know the labels are ready. I go over to pick them up because the person I'm picking them up for is older and I didn't want her to have to make the walk all the way across campus. I get there and the person in the Registrar's office is sorting and collating the labels. I help her and we're making great progress getting them sorted. Until I look down and see that one of the sets is labelled "Haygood Hall," a building not located on Emory's campus. It turns out that the information was grouped incorrectly.
Long story short, the person forgot how to do the labels correctly. About 15,000 labels had to be destroyed because they contained student information. After helping her do her job correctly, she stayed late yesterday to get them started. When I went back to the Housing office to explain the situation, my housing contact sent an email blasting the Registrar's office and copied it to the director of Housing Operations. Which means at 4:45 yesterday, I sent a 750 word explanation of the entire situation to my coworker and my boss just to keep everyone in the loop. My office works hand in hand with both departments so it wouldn't be good for people to be at each other's throats.
We have a roaming sticky-note at the office which reads "No Good Deed Goes Unpunished." My coworkers told me that until someone else deals with something crazy enough of this magnitude, the note is mine.
This weekend, though, should be jam packed full of ... blah. Tomorrow, I picked up a shift at the theater I work at. I much prefer to be a house tech, however I'm a House Manager tomorrow. The show is "The Meeting," and I know absolutely nothing about it. As soon as that ends, I'm driving to Charleston. I should arrive late Saturday night, assuming I'm not too tired to make it. Not quite sure what I'm going to do in Charleston, but I'm leaving early Monday morning to arrive back in Atlanta before it's too late. I think 3:30, 4:00 am should be about right?
Future Imperfect (/ Perfect?)
Today's the big day. Today, I have my first mid-year review with my boss. It's interesting, too, how closely it falls to my 6 month anniversary as a University employee. I've had a ton of fun in my current position, serving as a business analyst for Housing and supporting Adirondack. My days aren't stressful and I enjoy my coworkers. But let's go back to the beginning.
When I first started here, I wasn't sure what I wanted to do. A functional user? How does that differ from a technical user and where do I fit in? We established that a functional user is one who looks at how the application is used as opposed to the technical user who makes things fit based on what the functional says. A functional user takes what the user wants and tries to examine it to determine what the user actually needs out of a system. A technical user builds the system to meet the requirements put out by the functional. Before I understood the relationship between Functionals, Technicals and users, I was very confused. During my adjustment period, I spoke with both sides to try and figure out what I wanted to do and even admitted to a few of the technical users that I was interested in becoming more of a technical.
Yesterday, in a Technical meeting, one of my coworkers who I had mentioned this to expressed this for me. A new position might be opening with Student Records, one where they would be taking in someone with no PeopleSoft experience and training them. When the manager (who I know and work with) asked if they knew anyone interested, she spoke up and mentioned that I have a computer science background and I'm wasted in a functional role. Here's where it gets tricky:
I did mention that to her when I first started working. It's true, I would like to get back into a more technical position. That being said, I've been here only 6 months. We are currently down at least two positions in my group. I'm starting to get used to my role here and take on my responsibilities, and I don't know if the reward would be so great. I tried going to HR's employee toolkit to find sample salary guides - it's broken. Amusing story, though:
One of my friends works across the hall from me in HR. I go over to tell him that it's broken, but he's in the middle of something. I walk next door to another co-worker's office to let him know. As I'm telling them what's up, I hear from the next room over in chorus with the person I'm talking to "What, Again?!" Apparently, this is the 3rd time it's been down in as many days. Time to fix that SQL, huh?
Back to me. If I want to continue in my Business Analyst career path, this is a perfect starting place. I have room for advancement and a nice easy job to take me through. If I want to switch to a technical career path, I need to write the other manager.
All this on the day I have my first mid-year assessment with my boss, right?
So Tired
Last night was quite deceiving. I did everything correctly - I ate dinner at 20:00, I watched an hour of TV while was doing it. I spent about 30 minutes on my computer and read until about 10:45 pm. I was excited - I was going to get 8 hours of sleep and I even allowed myself 15 minutes to fall asleep.
Good thing that worked out so well. It took me about an hour to fall asleep. I woke up this morning and wished I were dead. On the plus side, I got a free lunch today!
Of course, that free lunch doesn't make up for much. I had some weird dreams. The first dream, one that I've actually had before, was about my teeth. My front left canine tooth (or one of those), was loose. Not just loose, but like a light-switch. There were two positions and it felt like it was going to fall out any moment in either of those. Eventually, I was able to get past it and move to the next stage of my dream.
Apparently, my subconscious decided that I wanted to get a tattoo. I had this design which I thought was really neat put on the side of my calf. It looked similar to the Torchwood logo - think hexagons / bubbles shaped like a T. I was taking a nice and relaxing bath and I looked at it - and saw there was a giant cross hidden in that. I was not happy. No, that was not a great way to wake up this morning. As much as I love breakfast, it didn't help me get past how annoyed I was at my dream self.
Now, I have to figure out what to do tonight. As we performed this past weekend at http://www.PlayOnCon.com, we don't have rehearsal for at least a week. Granted, Genevieve (SP?) told me that we should schedule a rehearsal for some of the wedding music, but ... I'm going to ignore that for a bit. There are several options I have. I can go climbing. I really enjoy climbing, I had started to get into that. I've taken about 2 weeks off because I've had so many rehearsals, but I usually do it at least one time a week.
Another option is for me to go out dancing. There is a weekly Swing Dance Practica, Cat's Corner which would be really cheap to go to. I've never actually made it out before as I've always had rehearsal, but it would require me to go out and be active in the Atlanta Swing Community, something I have little interest in.
Finally, I could go and do some Tango. I really like Tango, and I haven't done it in a while either. Another reason that is extremely tempting is because one my friends said she might be going and bringing several people with her. As much as I like hanging out with people, I really enjoy getting to know new people.
Either way, I think I'm going to have to run an errand or two beforehand. Need to return some flippers to Target (I ended up not wearing them at the Atlantis party @ POC), and I really need to deposit a rent check at the bank.
If you have any suggestions, hit me up!
Play on Con
Play on Con was fantastic. It doesn't matter which way you look at it, there is nothing like a strong, community driven convention where you have the chance to see all your con family and friends again.
I will be honest, I was a little worried going in. The group I play with, the Vauxhall Garden Variety Players, was scheduled to perform several hours of music for the charity casino Friday night. We started off with a dance class. I taught Foxtrot and was so proud to see my baby dancers going at it while we played. Assuming they weren't off drinking or gambling. We rocked it. We played some of our songs so awesome I thought I was going to burst on stage. After we finished up there, we went a' partying.
I don't have the slightest clue of what I did Saturday day. The entire thing was a blur. I know I taught Voltaire a new dirty joke about old ladies. I'm pretty sure I played Star Trek Jeopardy (I took 2nd overall). I do know that we opened for Voltaire and again, rocked. We had people dancing in the audience, which was a fantastic feeling. After we got our equipment put away, it was time to hit the party scene. Kaz stuck around to hear Voltaire's set which was, by most accounts, hilarious. He has a great sense of humor and a fantastic stage presence. Instead, Vortex, Maria & I went to the speakeasy party.
Thank you CoastCon!
Now, I don't know which pictures have made it out yet, but any picture with me in an orange suit is from Saturday night. It was if they had thrown this party for us. 20/30's style music and attire? When we walked in, the party organizers looked at us and said "You are in exactly the right place. Can we take a picture of you for our website?"
The night proceed to include 80's themed video game parties, Another few room parties and the pool. The police were called at some point during the night due to someone getting slapped and deciding he wanted to call the cops and press charges. Asshole. For us, the night ended with another massive pool battle & a trip to waffle house at 5:00 in the morning.
Sunday I walked around in a daze. On the plus side, I finally learned how to play Settlers of Catan! I later had a delicious dinner of sushi and noodles and said goodbye to all my friends.
Check out http://images.theartofnerd.com/index.php/POC?page=1 for some pictures.
See you at Dragon*Con!
Decisions, Decisions, Decisions
I have one pressing decision for the day - what should I do after lunch today? I'm reminded of the joke - why don't government look out of the window in the morning? So they have something to do in the afternoon, of course.
Likewise, at my current job, which I absolutely love, my afternoons can be a bit slow. I took care of all my work during the morning, and unless something new and interesting pops up, I think that's all I'm going to have. I've already enjoyed a nice lunch at Le Giverny with Nick, which leaves me free to relax in my chair.
My choices:
a) Watch (more) Stargate
b) Start some Online Shoppng
c) Read The Princess Bride
Currently, I'm on Season 5, Episode 11 of SG1. I've been watching a lot of this, but I'm afraid that I'm going to get burned out if I don't start mixing it up.
Once Ben moves out in a week or so, I'm going to have a new room which I don't plan on leaving for a while. I love where I live, I love my neighbors and I love just about everything about my place. I don't plan on moving for a while. That means it's time for me to get a real bed-frame and some furniture for the room. I know I need some more bookshelves (who doesn't?!) and some sort of working desk. There is no way I'm going to stay with the stupid hutch I'm still stuck with. I think I also want get some new sheets. I love the colors I have, they are just several years old.
As long as I'm shopping, I wouldn't mind a pair of Vibram's Five Finger shoes.
Of course, it would be nice to sit back and read.