Month: November 2004

A Dark Day

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Today was a dark day for me. My boss and friend Gus announced he was leaving my company for good at the end of the month. On many levels this was upsetting and of concern to me. Firstly my boss is leaving. I have to hope (pray) that the next guy that comes in is not a dumb-ass. I have had enough fun with crazy boss’s in the past (ie Kenny). Other work related reasons for concern for me are that Gus has been one of my biggest supporters at work. I am confident in my track record, but it is always good to have a fan in the person you report to.

On a personal level, it will be weird going to the office every day and not having him around. He was someone I worked for, but I consider him a friend. We talked and did tons of stuff outside of work. It will take allot of getting used to, with him not around.

In the interim Bob will be taking over the day to day role Gus played. I like Bob, and I think I get along well with him, so I am not worried. It just won’t be the same as with Gus. On the flip side, not having Gus around may actually decrease my stress level a bit. We won’t know that until December.

What I am wondering about is why do people at work think I have tons of information regarding gossip items like Gus leaving? Even if I did, where do people get these ideas? Just because I am in the Information Systems department does not mean I have all the information.

What will happen in our department? It is an open book right now. It is way to early to tell right now. That is what worries me. I am all for change. It is good and bad. I know people usually hate change. Sometimes I like it. Unfortunately when some things change, you just worry. You might do it for no real rational reason, but you do it anyway…

Thanksgiving Plan’s And Planning

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I do no planning for Thanksgiving. I am “that guy” that shows up, eats (not very much) watches the game and goes home. We always goto my parent’s best friends house for Thanksgiving. It usually is a big turn out. I don’t have to travel to it. It is only in Queens. I guess that is some travel. I don’t need to plan on anything. Everything is taken care of.

it is not the most glamorous night of the year. We are probably the average Thanksgiving Day “family”. The only thing out of the ordinary we do is, we don’t have a formal sit down meal. It is usually buffet. There are allot of us.

Other planning news is I hope to take off Wednesday. I need a day off, and this way if I take Wednesday off I get a whopping 5 days off in a row. that will be nice. I won’t know what to do with myself. Really, I have no idea what to do with that much time off and no travel.

Handouts

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Why is it that there are so many people giving away “free” stuff near the subway entrances in NYC? As of today I am offered a free Metro, & AM NY. Also I get people giving me information about saving some (fill in name of oppressed, abused or unjustly treated foreigners here) group in some foreign country. There is another group handing out stuff, but I don’t know what it is for. I haven’t stopped long enough to find out.

At first I thought this was a problem near Penn station when I got off the LIRR. Then it started happening in Union Square. Now for months I have getting pestered up by my apartment.

Whose idea was it to place annoying low paid people at the bottleneck point of an exit/entrance to subway stations? I know it is a high traffic area, but come on. I am barely making it to work on auto-pilot half awake as it is. Having people mess up the routine is not good.

This is a down side of living in a crowded city I guess. To me is just annoying.

Halo 2 Day

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I was sitting around on a Saturday afternoon like I normally do, and the funniest thing happened. I got calls from 2 people to have plans. Now I like having friday to unwind. I usually go out friday night, so Saturday is the day of rest for me. I have been going on Sunday’s, so I relax Saturday. Well jayson wanted to go shopping. I was all set to do that when John called and wanted me to play Halo. I decided to let Jay and Gretchen go shopping and I would frag (really get fragged) by John, Dave, and one of John’s friends.

We played Halo 2 for like 5 or 6 hours. it was fun. I get tunnel vision head aches when I play, but I still have fun. John has a 42″ plasma that we play on. I suck at first person shooters. I used to be good at Half Live but that was back in 2000. Even then Jay and John could still wipe the floor with me.

All around a geeky day, but I had fun. We ordered in and hung out. We were all going to head back to the city and goto a bar, but when we got to the door everyone realized that it was raining out. Fearing melting everyone bailed out of the trip, so I just went home. Everyone else went back in to play some more. I headed back to Manhattan since the subway run’s less frequently later at night, especially on the weekends.

Saw The Razr Today

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Wednesday Jayson and I went to the Cingular store to check out the new Motorola Razr. It was really cool. Super slim, and all metal. The screen was almost as big as my Treo’s. The downside, it was $500 with a contract. I have been pondering moving to Cingular, but that price was way too much for me right now. Without a contract it was $600. If the price came down to $300 maybe I would check it out. I wasn’t going to buy a plane old phone that is more than what I paid for my PDA/Phone. that is just crazy.

Gus was upset that I didn’t wait to goto the store with him. He seemed jealous that I went with Jayson. I told him if he was a good boy I would goto the store with him too!!!

Ebay is Adictive

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I finally got around to putting up on ebay a bunch of items that I need to get rid of. I put up a cell phone from Verizon that I have not used in over a year, a linksys router that I cannot use, even though I still want to keep it, and my old HP iPaq 1945. I don’t use that anymore, even though I want to. I am just too lazy to use it, so I carry my Treo. I will miss the 1945’s nice color screen.

Hopefully I will get decent amounts for all that stuff. The proceeds of these auctions will go to pay for my new desktop computer I just bought. I like to ebay stuff so I can buy or pay for other electronic stuff I buy. it is the circle of life so to speak.

Update: I shipped out the iPaq and my old router today. I am still waiting for the cell phone to sell…

Cisco Executive Briefing

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It sounds fancier than it was. Gus, Dave, Kai, and I went up to Cisco Systems Executive Briefing Center outside of Boston. We were getting the overview of their IPCC product from all the product managers and engineers working on the system. First off I will say I think the trip was worth it. I think there were some issues still unresolved by some of our team, that I think Cisco was able to handle.

We got up to Boston by noonish. Our account manager and his boss picked Gus and I up from the train and we drove the 40 minutes to the site. it is a nice new campus. We ate lunch, which was surprisingly good. Normally this sort of stuff is not what I consider good food. They had nice chicken dish with stuffing and potatoes. I was stuffed for hours after that. We meet a VP of sales or something who came down to make sure we were getting treated right. I am not sure what Gus said to whoever at Cisco but around August they started treating us really nice. Far better than I would expect from a company our size. Granted we do some advanced stuff for a company our size, but it is weird when the #3 guy or so at Cisco stops by your office for a meeting. I will say that Cisco is very responsive to questions or problems. Some of my / Gus’ comments have reached high levels. it showed with the presentation.

We got a really good overview of their IPCC product. I think Dave was pleased with what he saw. I was. I also got to see some nice warez from them. We checked out the color VOIP phone. Gus and I also test drove the video conference functionality of Call Manager 4.1. I even got to see the long rumored VOIP WiFi cordless phone. It was so cool. I want one for my house, but a practical deployment of it would be for the supervisors in the call center when we have 2 floors to cover. Check out the MOB for some of the really cool tech we saw. No pictures of the video conference system we used. Just trust me that it was way cool.

We had a long fact filled day. Then we rushed off to catch a late train. We made it to the station with 15 minutes to spare. I decided to upgrade to First Class. I figured I wanted good service one time, and I would pay for it out of my own pocket. I am on the train now. The seats are bigger. There are less people in the First Class car. I also got dinner and free drinks. The food is MUCH better than Biz class. I had a steak with potato’s, with chrem brule. I cannot spell it. I was not a fan of the desert anyway. I am sitting at a conference table for 4 by myself. It is roomy. I was hoping to take a nap, but I haven’t written a detailed blog entry for a while so I decided to take the time now. So was the upgrade worth the money? Probably not, but it is nice to get waited on and just relax sometimes. Amtrak for the money has the best upgrades. And that is saying allot since the Biz class on the Acela Express is nice as it is. Right now this is my favorite form of travel.

Another Week, Another Trip To Boston

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I am back on the Acela Express up to Boston today. Gus and I are on the 8:03 again. Dan couldn’t make it, so he bailed on us. David, and Kai are both driving and meeting us once we get up to the site. Today we are visiting the Cisco Customer Briefing Center. I have never been. I hear it is nice. 2 of our Cisco engineer’s are also on the train. I stopped and said hi to one of them.

I have been trying to (with mixed results) use my T610’s bluetooth connection to download email on my Powerbook. Not very reliable today. At least I have my blackberry with me. I got no movie watching done on the train. I just did work, and followed up on email. I have no life…

Targeted Advertisement, Not!

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I have been a user of an American Express card or another since I was a freshman in college (thanks dad). If asked I will tell you why I think paying the annual fee is worth it. Lets face it I think the fee is way too much, but they kick ass when you need help so I suck up and pay the membership fee each year.

Now I have to ask myself (and Amex) why then did I get a “personalized” offer to get a fancy Amex green rewards card? I haven’t had a green card since freshman year in college. Why would a company that I spend tons (for me it is tons, for them it is not so much) of money with, offer me a product that is significantly less than the product that I currently have from them? is it me or is that just retarded advertising?

My Thoughts, I Cannot Sleep

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I am getting to a point where I don’t know what to do about certain stuff anymore. I keep asking for help. Even though I am told the requests are not falling on deaf ears, it feels that way. Things miss target dates, people are not happy. Non important issues slip, and I am told not to worry, then people complain and it becomes the biggest thing in the universe, or that is the way it feels at the time.

Problems pile up. The solution, or so I am told is to let them pile up, and then we can make a case for help. To me when help finally comes, it will be way too late. We are supposed to be proactive, but I can barely get emergencies out of the way now a days. I am in a word, frustrated. I had to stop and think about writing this entry. I stop and think about allot of entries, but I know people I work for, work with, and work for me all read this. I decided I don’t care. I am writing what I feel. If I am wrong, that is fine. But for now I feel frustrated, and unable to make any dent in the problem.

A problem happened yesterday that plain old should not have happened. I have had plans for ages to replace a system that we know sucks. It is kind of an important system. The reason it hasn’t been worked on is, the current system sucks but it does sort of work. To evaluate a replacement will take total concentration for days. I don’t have that kind of time, so it gets put off to the side. If I decide to focus all my time on that, nothing else would get worked on. Their is no good answer.

Everyone I work with is frustrated with similar issues. We just have way to much to do. I cannot quantify what we do, so we cannot show that we are under staffed. I have been trying to get a program in place so we can track how much time it takes to do our jobs. it keeps getting put on hold, since it is “not a priority” to others. Not sure how I can get things done for others when we can not be efficient internally?

I want a solution. I am willing to work to a solution. I don’t want to act like a pain in the ass all the time. I don’t like feeling this way. I just have no idea how to fix the problem, unless something gives.

I have been hoping for a day off to just rest. Unfortunately I have been traveling for the past week. I don’t have the time to take a day since I have only been in the office twice in a week. That leaves Jayson all alone to do the work of 3 people. he is also strung out because of it. I can see it. I keep telling myself a day off will make me relax a bit. I am not sure if that is true, but I like to keep telling myself that. This week I wont have a chance to take off either. 2 days I am away, and I have to catch up from last week.

This post is not a bitch session. I am trying to express my thoughts. That was what this site was for. I don’t want to walk on egg shells since people are reading this. Nothing written here was intended to be an attach on anyone, or complaining. Just writing what I am thinking, since it is midnight and sleep wont come. Tomorrow will be a horrible day. Can’t discuss it now, but it will be a bad day. I can tell already. That is never good.

I want one good day. A day where things go right. People do what they are asked, and I am able to accomplish what I set out to do before I leave for work. Is that allot to ask for? Wow, I sound depressed. It is weird. I guess I am depressed. I love what I am doing, but not the way I am doing it right now. I just want work to be fun again. The weird thing is that my personal live isn’t awesome (no girlfriend), but it is not bad either. I am having fun outside of work. But I am just down about all the issues written above. I am looking for the light at the end of the tunnel. I haven’t seen it yet, but I hope it is somewhere nearby…