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| Sunday, April 3rd, 2005 | | 4:16 am |
I'm going to watch Wrestlemania tomorrow at a friends house. Word. I haven't seen a Wrestlemania in quite a while. :D "Spring forward" can kiss my ass... | | Sunday, March 13th, 2005 | | 12:50 pm |
7AM to 4PM, M-F
I'm now a full employee, instead of just contract. A small raise, full benefits, stock options... pretty sweet deal. :) As of Friday, I'm now on a 7AM to 4PM shift at work; personally, I think this is better than the 8AM to 5PM shift. The primary reason being commute time: instead of 35-45 minutes, it only takes 20-35. The secondary reason being that I get off work and certain shops and banks are still open, which is helpfull. Finally, the tertiary reason is that work was dreadfully slow between 4PM and 5PM, and now I'm able to skip that and just go home. One other interesting note, is that I'm finally a salaried employee; this is my first time ever of having a true salary, not just hourly employment. I'm sure there will be times where this might bite me, however based on the ebb and flow of work at this company, it can translate into zero penalties for leaving early on slow days. *************** Current Short-Term Life Plan: A. Prior to moving out of my parents house: * Finish paying off credit cards (only 2 left of the original 5) * Finish paying off minimal student loan (about $3000) * Begin investing B. When Jessica finds a job after graduation in June: 1. If the job is in town: * Locate a suitable house to purchase * Use step-dad's connections for a good home loan * Move the hell out of my parents' house 2. If the job is *not* in town: * Save up some money by continuing to work in Portland for a few months * Attempt to find job in new town (Her current prospects: LA, SF, NYC) * Depending on income/expenses, will probably need to locate and rent an apartment, sharing with Jessica * Potentially sell Explorer for a vehicle with better gas mileage and lower monthly payments C. Figure out what the hell I'm doing with all of these college credits and no bachelors degree: * Determine alternatives * Transfer if necessary to some form of weekend "working professional" school * Still looking at a degree in Business *************** I think that's everything. Now, back to playing World of Warcraft on the Alleria server (42 Undead Warlock named Marik)... :D | | Saturday, February 12th, 2005 | | 12:39 am |
Greetings. My first full week at my new job is now over, and what a week it's been. I've pretty much got the product usage locked down, figured out some tricks, had help on the rest, and all in all I'm feeling pretty confident about providing support for it. Except when that random customer calls up and asks some of the most obscure questions they can think of... I mean, just because it's the Federal Reserve Bank, they think they need to know every little detail about the encryption! Sheesh! ;) I started out doing just a couple emailed support questions, and those were a cakewalk. I'm not rushing my responses, and I try my best to verify that I'm giving the best answer; so far I've had nothing but good feedback from both customer and coworker. Yesterday, I was supposed to get some training for phone support... it was kind of funny, though, because we couldn't get a dual-headset setup so I could just listen in on the call instead of doing a 3-way conference... so I just asked for the specific info that needs to be logged, and said that I was ready. ;) Yeah, it's easy though... having 5 years training in a warzone (the mall) prepared me for just about anything. Anyway, one critical detail that was on my mind is that this was supposed to be just a 6 month contract job. At the end of that time would be the company's option to terminate, extend, or make me a full employee. Well, there is nothing for me to fear, because on day number 4 I was told that by the end of March I should be a full employee! They're so pleased with my performance and progress that they're skipping the formalities. And that, my friends, makes me very happy. So, yes, I am now holding an 8am-5pm job downtown. It takes me about 45 minutes to get to my parking garage (I rent a spot in the same garage my dad does, that's kind of neat). Getting home takes an eternity. I like it though, I'm having fun. When I'm bored, I play with an XP box, a Linux box (currently loaded with my favorite pet distro SoL, Server optimized Linux), and a Solaris 9 SPARC workstation. There's always something for me to do; I mean, half the time when I'm sitting at home playing a game, I'm thinking of some application that I've been meaning to check out. This just gives me a chance to sit down and do that. Some really cool things about my job are: the coworkers rock, atmosphere is cool, I wear street clothes, the break room has an XBox + cable tv + electric guitar, free soda and water, and when my boss gets stressed he plays Battlefield 1942 on his PC. The company is making money, people are (mostly) happy (but sometimes stressed)... this is what I was thinking of when I was trying to figure out my ideal employer! Now I just need to work at it and then see where else I can go in the company. Of course I would like to get back into IT, but realistically this particular support job isn't too far of a departure, especially in the interim while I break away from the school district. I mean, I'm supporting a specialized security application used by large corporations and gov't agencies, so I'm not dealing with "regular" people; and some of the problems require a bit of thought and elbow grease to work out, so that's cool. Well, I'm pretty tired, so it's time to end this entry. This going to bed "early" thing is killing me though... I went to bed at 10PM last night and woke up feeling pretty rested... how fucked up is that?? 10PM??? The Josh everyone knows goes to sleep at like 3AM, if not 7AM! Oh well... change can be a good thing. A very good thing. | | Friday, January 21st, 2005 | | 3:06 pm |
I GOT THE JOB!!!! Wheeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!!!! Goodbye christian school! (well, ok, I'm going to be doing 10 hrs per week consulting after hours, but that's nothing like what I've been doing, it will be servers/networking only!) | | Thursday, January 13th, 2005 | | 3:36 am |
Potential New Job
I had an interview for a new job today. It's located downtown, at a really cool company that works hard and makes a lot of money. They make intrusion detection and change management software. It would be for a tech support position, but the pay would definitely be more than what I make at the school. I'm really excited about it, so I hope I get it. I'm supposed to hear back on Friday. Resume given on Sunday, interview on Wednesday, hear back by Friday... pretty quick, huh? | | Monday, November 1st, 2004 | | 9:08 pm |
Midterm
I just finished a 1 hour, 50 question midterm in 8 minutes flat. I checked my answers, too. I may have missed a couple, but wow, I hate paying for easy tests. | | Thursday, October 28th, 2004 | | 8:02 pm |
And with that...
He's gone and buried. Now, back to work. I get to spend $30,000 of someone else's money to setup a new computer lab! | | Sunday, October 24th, 2004 | | 12:41 pm |
| | Friday, October 22nd, 2004 | | 7:34 am |
5PM "Josh? You need to come to the nursing home.... your grandpa isn't doing well." The visit was..... My brother left after about 5 minutes. I don't think he can handle it. This is the first death in his family he's experienced, and right after football practice. It was so surreal to just go up to him while he's practicing footaball with his friends, and say "Hey Jordan... Papa's in the nursing home, and... he's not responding... so we need to go see him." He just said "Ok". I worry about him.. my brother. I love him a lot, I know he looks up to me, I just hope that when he cracks in half from emotional stress, he'll talk to me. I didn't really have anyone to talk to and honestly I think it hurt me more than sharing it with anyone would. I wasn't always emo, I think I drove myself to it. Get yourself a girlfriend who'll cheat on you and tell you it's your fault, and there you go. Anyway. I love my Grandpa. Loved my grandpa. He.... you know. I'm fucking worthless. You know I saw him once in the past 3 months. One goddamn time. Maybe 3 times this year. What the fuck is that. Now he's fucking dead and I only saw him fucking 3 times this year?????? What the fuck is that. What excuse could I have????? I fucking love my grandpa, he's fucking rad. I love him. I fucking love my grandpa!!!! omg grandpa I love you!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! omg grandpa I love you.. I fuck findg love you grandpa grandpa I love you :( :( :( :( :( :( :( :( :( :( :( :( : ( :( :( :( :( :( :( :( | | Tuesday, October 19th, 2004 | | 11:11 am |
I need more sleep. I hate iBill. CCBill is ok. Almost have my office moved at work, such an annoyance when I'm actually trying to get stuff done. I have an intern. He's a cool guy. I'll hopefully have a tech under my supervision relatively soon, I desperately need the help. My one class is ok; it's kind of boring though. "Competing with Information Technology." Our midterm project is to design an MS Access database. *yawn* Your tips for the day: 1. Don't use Internet Explorer any more. It's horribly flawed and worthless. Use FireFox. Unless you really like your spyware and popups, I guess. 2. Use Ad-Aware SE Personal. Kill that spyware that's still there from that dark age when you foolishly used Internet Explorer. | | Tuesday, September 21st, 2004 | | 10:22 pm |
One step at a time.
Sometimes you really need to step back, for what seems to be the millionth time, and critically look at what is causing you stress. This past weekend, and today, has been one of those times. I think I'm back to my old self, where instead of letting the minor "problems" at work of some of my coworkers affect me, I think they're kind of humorous. Back to the cynical smirking when Jane Doe's printer is on the fritz, back to rolling my eyes when a critical piece of infrastructure goes haywire, back to being in control. The past few weeks were really a rollercoaster off the tracks, and I had to break out the tool belt, pull out a hammer and power drill, and really just repair things in my head. You see, when you're in the business of dealing with problems, if you're not careful they'll overwhelm you and try to control you. At that point, it's really hard to remain calm and methodical, for the engineer to just take a look and understand the issue and then correct it. And then you've just gotta take a vacation so you don't go crazy. Sometimes you just need to laugh at one thing at a time. | | Thursday, September 16th, 2004 | | 11:23 am |
On a lighter note...
Here is a picture of myself and my girlfriend, Jessica, from this past weekend... linked to larger size.  | | Wednesday, September 15th, 2004 | | 11:54 pm |
Update on the office situation, and more!
Ok, so now it's tentative that I'll actually get a slightly better office than what I currently have, except that it's completely remote from everywhere. So remote that we call it "the tower". It's a nice office with pretty high ceilings, and a window (a smaller window than my current one, but a window nonetheless), and plenty of space for a workbench and storage. I think it's perfect. The only problem? Someone has to get kicked out of it, so it's just going down the line. The only good news is that the person in there works mostly from home, and her location within the school is mostly irrelevant. So that's pretty cool, so I must have had a much better day today, right? Wrong. My boss called me this morning to setup a meeting about "stuff", so I go to this meeting after fixing a bunch of problems... I'm told that one of the site administrators called to harrass my boss about my "poor performance", "lack of completeness", "lack of common courtesy", and "inability to show up on time." WTF. This is the day after I spent seven fucking hours fixing ALL of that site's problems. ALL OF THEM, every fucking problem they had on their list, I fixed them all. And the next morning she calls my boss to yell at him that I'm doing a terrible job. The good news, is that my boss defended me, and will continue to defend me, and he pretty much just said "ok" to her a lot before saying "goodbye" and hanging up. But, the bigger problem is that this site administrator likes to bitch all the way up the top, including the Board. And sometimes they listen to her psychotic rantings. Ok, let me give you some background: 1. That site always has the stupidest problems that I never consider high priority, except for one or two times where I drove over there immediately and had their critical issues resolved immediately. 2. I'm "supposed" (using this loosely, because it's definitely not in my job description, just something they've come to expect/say) to go there once a week to "show my face" so they know I'm around to help. ... ... So I'm supposed to babysit them? 3. I'm routinely "late", by that I mean that I don't show up at their site during business hours. You know why? So I can get things done without having to interrupt people. But they want me to be there so they know I'm fixing things?? Like they can't fucking tell when it works the next day and I've left a fucking note with my name on it? Do they think some fucking boogeyman fixes the computers at night? 4. I don't always respond to her email within 24 hours. Boo fucking hoo. I get 100+ emails a day from work. Most of the time I'm too busy fixing the problems to take the time out and fucking let them know they can stop crying about their fucking printer. So yeah, I'm pretty fucking pissed about that. First I'm kicked out of my office for some sleazeball jerkoff who's supposed to bring the place money, but who, and I quote from the head boss, "WON'T BE IN HIS (my) OFFICE MUCH" !! Then, I work hard one evening to make this one site happy, and the administrator calls the next fucking morning to complain about me, when I just did everything on HER list??? Now, my boss is trying to work with me on ways to "make me look better" to the other employees. You know what. I don't fucking care how I look to them. If I turn the server off in the middle of the day tomorrow, they'll all cry their fucking eyes out like little bitches. I could "fix" it and they'd call me a "hero" or "computer genius" or some fucking retarded bullshit. But no, because I don't take time out of my schedule to fucking babysit them and smile and say "Oh, I'm here to help!" because I'm too busy trying to be fucking EFFICIENT at my fucking job, they've got their raggedy ass fucking panties in a bunch and start going ballistic! I fucking fixed your goddamn fucking shit, bitch, so shut the fuck up and go harass someone else! I swear to god if she asks for tech support on anything tomorrow I'm telling her directly there is AT LEAST a TWO WEEK waiting period due to "higher priority issues"! Swallow that one down, you fucking bitch! Anyway, this all stems because that site is the farthest away from the main offices, and they feel "neglected", like some bastard child. Boo hoo. Excuse me while I go throttle something. | | Tuesday, September 14th, 2004 | | 10:40 pm |
Wow. So work hired a development director, and an assistant for that position. They will need to be in their office on Friday. Guess who's office that is? Mine. After 3 fucking years in that office, they're kicking me out of it with 4 days notice to a windowless and ventilation-less room in the middle of the building. I feel so needed. I'm going to look for a new job. If they take my Swingline stapler I swear to god I'll burn the fucking building down. | | Friday, September 3rd, 2004 | | 11:52 pm |
Chatting while at work late on Friday...
[23:47] [johnk] they have a beer caled hit the trail ale [23:47] [Marik-At-Work] hit the trail? [23:48] [johnk] yeah it shows a guy with a hiking backpack going up a trail and everybody thinks its normal beer there [23:48] [johnk] i was like woah [23:48] [johnk] hit the trail [23:48] [Marik-At-Work] they should make gtfo beer [23:49] [Marik-At-Work] it could have the same picture [23:49] [Marik-At-Work] or maybe like... a guy in a business suit running out the office door [23:49] [sym] or someone holding a baseball bat in a threatening manner [23:49] [Marik-At-Work] hahahha [23:49] [Marik-At-Work] yeah they could have themes [23:49] [Marik-At-Work] the bitter stout would be that one [23:49] [johnk] lol [23:49] [Marik-At-Work] a pale ale would be "gtfo... to the beach!" [23:50] [Marik-At-Work] amber would be "gtfo... of work!" | | Thursday, August 19th, 2004 | | 2:01 pm |
| | Tuesday, August 17th, 2004 | | 2:15 am |
| | Sunday, August 15th, 2004 | | 2:31 pm |
I'm back from Sunriver. Quite a few physical activities with the family, now I feel like I've been run over by a freight train; although the pain/soreness is fading. :D I registered for 1 class this fall... there's so much to do, it's kind of annoying. Not troublesome, not stressfull, just annoying. I have over 200 credits now at Portland State University; 180 is the minimum to graduate. :P | | Thursday, August 12th, 2004 | | 8:29 am |
True Story of J & J
The Scene:Having just spent a mostly low-key evening at two different bars, among friends, our hero drives his lady home. Upon pulling up to her house, he interrupts her mid-sentence... The Dialogue:Him: "I can't hold it in. I've been wanting to say it the whole night. I love you, J." Her: ! "I've felt it too!! I love you, J!" The Aftermath:An embrace, hearts in their eyes, grins that won't go away. ------ I'm going to Sunriver, OR, to chill on vacation with the fam, they've been down there since Sunday. I'll be coming back up on Saturday. Life is, as always, crazy. But crazy good. :D | | Tuesday, August 3rd, 2004 | | 4:14 am |
I'm back....
And boy am I tired! Also: the website I spent hours and hours and days and days and months and months working on is in the current issue (Aug 2004) of Rolling Stone ("Hot Web Porn Site of 2004"). I am a little proud. Pg 96 if you see an issue lying around. :D |
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