Life is Good

I recently passed 90 days doing my new job at Twitter. Anna, the girls and I have started to settle into our new home, and school and work have been great, if not tiring. Bunny has started running track, which she has been excelling at! She really enjoys the events, and the younger kids all do the same events as the older kids, so she really feels a part of something bigger than herself or her school. Lila started doing a dancing/cheer class, which will be short lived but she is thoroughly enjoying it! Anna has been working hard at reupholstering and refinishing furniture in our house, in some cases to great transformative effect! I’m so proud of all my family members!!!

Working for Twitter has so far been the best professional experience of my life. The company takes great strides to keep their employees well (and healthily) fed, the work is very stimulating, and there are tons of interesting events going on all the time. Sometimes they’re just social, but there are also a lot of mentally stimulating events going on, from visitors coming in to present talks, to discussions that occur by serendipity. This week was the first week I took over primary duties in my new role, and while it’s been exhausting, it is really rewarding to know I’m having a positive impact so early on. My new schedule will start soon, and just in time for the summer months so our whole family will be able to spend a lot of time exploring the trails and other places in California. So much to do, and soon we’ll all have lots of time to do them! I’m really looking forward to that.

New opportunities

Yesterday was the last day of my employment at the Nasdaq Operations Center. It is extremely surreal to no longer be responsible for systems that I have been monitoring for several years. All of a sudden I am no longer responsible for the systems that I helped create and curate. It’s hard not to think about it. However, I have a new opportunity at Twitter to leverage my experience in operations at Nasdaq and I am excited to get started there. I will miss the relationships I have fostered at Nasdaq but its time to move on.

Catheter: miracle of modern science

Catheter.mp3

Buddy Times

I just went away for a quick weekend with two of my best buddies.  We converged by plane in the great state of Maine, and basically just played video games and drank beers until we couldn’t stay awake anymore.  I was so excited to go that I didn’t sleep a wink the night before.  There is just something about spending some time with your friends that is so refreshing to the mind and spirit.  We had a great time, and I look forward to our plan of having quarterly get-togethers like that, each time at the next guy’s house, round robin style.

Free at last

I cancelled my myspace account today. I feel much better about life.

Shutting off

Lately I have been a real hermit.

I didn’t really notice except today Anna posted on myspace commenting on my recent closed-off-ness.

Now looking back on the last few days i realize I have been REALLY closed off. Saturday afternoon I spent all morning doing tasks around the house while Anna was inside with Bunny and then later running her own errands with Bunny. At roughly 4:30 her parents took Bunny away, and shortly thereafter I decended into the basement for a while and Anna made plans to go out as I was very glad to have an oppotunity to spend some time alone. So she went out to the mall for a few hours and I switched between teaching myself UNIX and playing GTA:SA. That night I spent a LOT of time alone, and to be honest, i really liked it. I used to have so much time to myself that I was eager to interact with people, like when I lived in Bloomfield and was unemployed for 9 months. It was nice to have the house to myself, no doubt, but by the end of the day I was eager to interact with other humans. Recently though, I probably only get about an hour or two of pure alone time a day, and somedays that just isn’t enough. I have to point out though that Anna only gets alone time when I’m upstairs with Bunny giving her a bath, and rarely any other time. So it’s not exactly egalitarian. Although I honestly do think that I need to have time to myself more than Anna does. Maybe I’m wrong, but that’s my guy reaction. But at the same time I have to recognize that Anna is spending roughly 99% of her time (asleep and awake) with Bunny, and the charge of caring for her. So if anyone deserves MORE time to themselves it’s definitely Anna.
So that’s where I’m at, feeling like a hermit lately and just wanting to clam up and shutdown. And I realize now that Anna has been asking me so much lately if I still love her and that she is taking my dimished communicating as a sign that I am getting bored with her or something. This is certainly not the case, but when I get in these funky modes I shutdown everything, indiscriminately. That being said, there is nothing that is bugging me or making me sad or anything like that, this just comes along every now and then and I just ride it out. I do wish I could have more time to sit down with UNIX and learn learn learn, but I’m sure we all have wishes that will go unfulfilled.

The Fridays

I realized that I haven’t updated my blog because there is only a small window of opportunity to do so. Typically, if I don’t do it right away first thing in the morning I wind up being too distracted to do it. Luckily this morning leaves me with only one of three coworkers in the office, so the distractions are minimal.
Our new record should arrive today, and that will feel great.

THis weekend Anna’s mom is taking Bunny for a night and roughly a 24 hour period. I am really looking forward to this. While it is great to spend time with Bunny, I really just want some time to myself, mostly just to study up on Unix and learn new things. I haven’t had any time lately do to so, and the other night I secured my iBook with a root password and then promptly forgot it. I do however have a solution which should work fine that I will try out tonight.

Anna is starting to feel worse and worse as the last third of her pregnancy begins…this is the time when all the aches and soreness really start in earnest…I wish there was something I could do to physically comfort her, but not even a CAT scan revealed the cause of her leg pain at night. I have been trying to keep Bunny occupied when I’m around, but that’s only for a few hours a night, and then Bunny insists on being with Anna.

There is not really anything else interesting to talk about, or anthing which comes to mind anyway…

This is where we live!

Google Maps – 52 Youmans avenue, washington, nj

Learning / Growing / Expanding / Contracting

Recently as noted below I began learning UNIX in order to pursue a career in IT. Saturday Bunny and I went out to the Barnes & Noble in Ledgewood to get a book to help me along in this process. She must have pointed and went “unh unh unh” about 50 times in the 15 minutes we were there at books about animals, little stuffed dog toys, the large sign advertising said dogs, and finally settling on a display of Dora the Explorer© books. We picked out the one she liked the best and then I picked up a book on UNIX. I was looking for “Learn UNIX for Mac OS X”, unsurprisingly they were out of stock (being a mac user, I’m starting to get used to no one keeping materials in stock for 3% of the household computer market). However I did find a book called “Teach Yourself Unix System Administration in 24 Hours”. It consists of 24 hourlong lessons. This book is marvelous. It assumes you have at least a basic understanding of Unix and the goal is not to teach you the definitive commands for a particular version of UNIX, but how to figure out what you want to do. This is a really great concept. In the foreword the author describes it this way:
There are two types of SysAdmins: wizards and gurus. Wizards know every single command and how to run them. Gurus know how to find the information they are seeking in order to control the system as they like, and can pass these techniques along; it’s not just rote memorization. Which is much more helpful because the computer world is in a constant state of flux, and in Unix you could be facing the memorization of 15,000+ commands!
The really great thing is that it is not platform specific, it goes from Linux to Solaris to Mac OS X, showing the differences along the way. It has been really helpful in getting me on track to learning this stuff as quickly as possible.
Which leads me to my main point. It is really great to be involving my brain in activity again. It feels so good to be learning something new, and I am really eager to plough forward every night and dig around to find out new tricks. Learning something new, which is useful, and engages my mind has been an invaluable boon to my self-esteem. In general I feel as though my mood is brighter now that I have a tangible goal which I have control over. I have tried teaching myself new things before, but usually my interest fizzles out after a little while (I’m looking at you HTML, and my desire to build websites in the early 00′s). This feels totally different. The more I learn the more I want to continue learning about Unix and all the things I can control. I really enjoy that there is already an environment set up on our Apple laptop at home. So I already have a lab with which to test commands and see exactly what the output given is, and how I can change it.
Not to mention that once I’m proficient enough I can start looking for a new job.
So now I’m not just waiting it out to see how much longer I have to stay with my current job…I am proactively engaging in the acquisition of new knowledge which will directly or indirectly lead to a new career. The point is that now I’m in control, rather than just waiting to see what happens. And that feels great.

UNIX / Eunuchs

I decided the other day to start learning UNIX in order to eventually pursue a career as a system administrator. When I told Anna this she though I was saying the word “eunuchs”! No thank you!
I have always loved technology, often spending the better part of my childhood weekends at Mom’s house in front of the computer. To be able to work in an environment where I was responsible for all the computers in a building sounds great. I have read some articles and done some research, and sure a lot of it is boring and droll, but it sure as hell beats my current work situation. So I have dived head first into UNIX using some tutorials online, which has been keeping me up way past my bedtime for the past few nights. I feel as though in the long run it will be worth it though, as I can enjoy working in a career which I choose, rather than a job that was handed to me which I’m not really qualified to do.
On the heels of this new chapter I read an article today that suggested the number of IT professionals is decreasing while the demand has been increasing. What they actually said was that less students are enrolling in IT programs throughout the US (no further information is given, so we’re just stuck having to take their word (Slashdot that is)), which is not surprising because you don’t necessarily need to have official accredidation in order to pursue a job in this field. James for example is self-taught, and he currently owns his own consulting business at 25! Although I suspect James is a little more advanced than your average *nixer, or even your advanced *nixer.
Anyway, it give me great hope that I can actually change the course of my life and pursue something I want/like to do. I really enjoy the technical knowledge I’m gaining, as well as the ability to control a computer without using the GUI (Graphical User Interface). I feel like I’ve joined some kind of secret society…

In general my attitude has been good lately, largely due to my new project of independent study. Also, we’re on the cusp of getting our new record back from the plant, meaning we can start the promotion process, as well as the college radio push. That is going to be very satisfying. Who knows what could come out of that whole thing! The possibilities are exciting, although the odds are decidedly against us. You never know though, and you never can tell.

Anna and Bunny have started getting better from their colds, which is very nice, especially since Bunny has been supercranky the last few days, which is trying on me for the few hours I’m home after work. No doubt it is absolutely murder to Anna, who has to be with her all day long…yesterday Bunny didn’t even take a nap until late afternoon! OUCH!

This weekend we are having a bunch of guests over for dinner, which should be interesting…and then Sunday is the typical rehearsal/dinner. We had a rehearsal last night and things are finally coming back into a place where the songs are sounding good again. We were a bit rusty for the first few weeks since finishing the record and everyone’s hectic schedules (Jeff was in Europe, Scott went to FL, John was running around like a chicken without it’s head) didn’t help to get us back in shape. But last night gave me hope that we will be ready to rock next week at the Pussycat Lounge. I can’t believe the show has creeped up so quickly already. The weeks have just flown by!

Well, here’s to more good times to come…