Wow.
January is seventy-five percent gone, and I still have a job. I supposed that’s a good thing. If I had a job that I enjoyed, it’d be a better thing; beggars can’t be choosers. So what’s been going on in my little life since I last got bored enough to post an entry to this thing? Not a great deal. With a title like, “Stuff Nobody Reads,” that’s pretty much a given for this blog; but I probably should try to think of something. I mean, I’m assuming that this thing will be a vital tool for the hordes of biographers who are certain to be researching my life in 10 years or so – after I’m rich and famous.
Beats the hell out of having to read the backs of envelopes to find, say, The Gettysburg Address, or trying to interpret really poorly-drawn paintings of stickmen killing stickbison on some cave wall in France in order to establish that “Bob Neanderthal was here.” Biographers and historians of the future probably will have no idea how easy they’ve got it.
But I digress.
Last Friday we had a conference call during which we were informed that we’re basically working for no reason. Can’t say much about it (with my luck, the entire legal staff of every telecommunications company in the world reads this daily in order to see if I divulge any proprietary information), but it boils down to this: we can continue our market trial for the next year or so, but our product will never actually go on the market. Begs a couple of questions, right? Like, “Why?” and “Come again?” And the ever-popular, “What the hell am I doing here?” Eh bien. Having spent the last 16 years of my life navigating fairly stormy corporate waters, I guess I can sit back and wait for the maelstrom to start up again later this year. What else would a gadabout like me do for fun?
I had a concert with the Georgia Brass Band last night at a church in Lawrenceville. It was the 4th or 5th time we’ve played there. Always a good crowd (in terms of quantity and appreciation), so it was fun. There was a minor downside to it: I had a solo. Actually, it was a duet between me and a baritone, but it was still far too exposed for me. Made my way through the first half of it somewhat shakily and only cracked one note on the back half. I got a bit of a pick-me-up after the concert when our lead cornet player admitted to me that he gets extremely nervous when playing solos (not that you can tell when he plays). I realized that I don’t really get jittery playing in front of crowds anymore. My nervousness when playing exposed passages with the GBB is due to the fact that I realize that everyone else in the group is better than I am. It’s one thing to play for 1000 people who wouldn’t know if you played a wrong note or had thin tone. It’s quite another to play in front of 27 instrumentalists who know exactly how badly you suck.
But they were all nice about it and I enjoyed the concert. Our encore was from the William Tell Overture and the folks in the church really got into it.
Don’t know if I’ve mentioned it before or not, but my roommate is most definitely being deployed to Iraq at the end of March. She is understandably somewhat nervous about the situation. She’s also looking forward to the extra bucks she’ll get. Her orders, received a couple of weeks ago, imply that she’ll be in country for 18 months; but thanks to a recent rules change, there’s really not a limit on how long she’ll have to stay. As she put it, “Great. I’m being sent to work with a bunch of disgruntled soldiers.” Still, she’s taking everything in stride and doing a great job of getting organized (packing her storage building up to be put in Army storage, arranging for the care and upkeep of her houses in PA and TX, spending time with her kids….updating her will). Her boyfriend, currently in Pennsylvania, isn’t faring so well. After two tours in Kuwait himself (at least one of which left him with Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder), he is quite upset with the whole situation – which isn’t really helping her nerves.
I’ve been spending a lot of time recently recreating my flagship website. This time, I’m putting it on a Linux server (have never done anything other than Windows) and basing it in PHP (have never done anything other than ASP). It seems to be going rather well, and I’ve got about 30 folks testing it out for me. Hopefully I’ll be able to launch it for real in about a month. Until that time, I’ve got a really steep learning curve to deal with. PHP absolutely baffles me. So does MySQL (the database that runs the site – I’ve never used anything other than Microsoft Access). Fortunately, there’s a host of online support forums and prepackaged code out there, so I should be able to get some sort of product working before I really need to start customizing it for my own purposes. And the experience will certainly help me should I decide to start looking for new employment in the IT field.
My XM radio continues to be a wonderful little thing for my nerves. I find myself spending most of my in-car time switching between the 70’s station and the Broadway station. Don’t know if that means I’m a disco freak or gay; it does make the traffic jams seem a trifle less aggravating.
It has been quite chilly in Duluth for the last several days. Chilly for the deep south, at least. The nights have been in the high twenties and we’re getting afternoon highs in the high thirties to low forties. Last night we had a fantastic amount of wind. Naturally, I had to open my bedroom window when that started up (I love wind), but was forced to close it after about 5 minutes, when the thermostatically-controlled space heater in my room started having convulsions. I toyed with the idea of just shutting it off, wrapping myself in a blanket and sleeping with the window open; but nixed that idea because 1)I’m sure my furnace would’ve had to kick on if I left it open (furnace is currently set to 57 degrees), and 2)I figured my roommate would freeze (she’s in a separate room, people. Enough already!). Anyway, it was nice to listen to it through the window.
That’s about all I can think of at this point. Taxes are coming due so that’ll be fun. And my bonus this year (the last one I’ll get, probably) is going to be the highest ever awarded in the history of BellSouth. Maybe I’ll write something after I get it. Like, “Hey. I need a new job.”
TWD