Ick.

Has anyone else ever done this?

"Hmm.. I'm hungry. I wonder if there is anything good in the fridge."

"Let's see.. Salad.. ..no. Soup.. ..nah. Hey - what's that?"

"Whoah cool! I didn't know they made frosted strawberries!?"

"...Oh... ...these aren't frosted."


I need to clean out my fridge more often.

-iRob

"There is little choice in a barrel of rotten apples."
-William Shakespeare

iPatch

Hey,

We celebrated 'Talk Like a Pirate' day at work last week. In honor of this, there were cheap, black cardboard eyepatches left on every desk by the fun-loving management team.

I didn't think to wear a costume (shame) although many did. However, I took a friends idea and ran with it.

I turned my patch inside out so that it was plain white cardboard. Then I wrote the word 'iPatch' on it in big black block letters. Then I amused myself for 8 hours by watching the reactions of people who read it.

Good times.

-iRob

“The average man will bristle if you say his father was dishonest, but he will brag a little if he discovers that his great-grandfather was a pirate.”
Bern Williams

All Hail The Great D*Con

Behold my illustrious post. BEHOLD IT!!

O.K. so I'm working up the energy to make some sort of post on DragonCon, but it's a bit problematic.. I have the memory retension of wet sand, and it's all congealed into one big giant sludge of imagery and memory.

I'll start with the beginning, and work forwards from there, as that would seem to be the most satisfying, chronology-wise.

The Thursday before leaving was given over entirely to preperations. I took the entire day off of work, to pack, clean, and generally prepare. I'm not really that sure anymore what took so long or required so much energy, but I'm sure it made sense at the time. I have a vague impression of emergency costume repairs and paint fumes, but nothing solid. Oh well.

Long story short, we decided that in order to get to the airport on time, we needed to leave the house at 4:30 am. I wasn't previously aware of the existance of this time, but I assure you that it is there. It hides neatly between bed-time and civilized morning.

So in order to get up at that time, we decided that we needed to be in bed at 10. 8 pm would actually be mathematically correct to get us 8 hours of sleep, but we aren't nine-year olds, (we're grown-ups) and that didn't seem feasable.

So at 12:30 when we finished our packing, panicing, and preparing, (the three horsemen of air travel,) we got precicely 3.5 hours of sleep, and then got up to face the day. I've never woken up screaming before, so that was a first. Very, very painful.

So up we got, and my Father, was waiting downstairs with a couple of large coffees to ferry us to the airport and point us in the right direction. (Thanks Dad!)

The flights themselves were uneventful, which is the best kind of flight. There were five flights and five cities in total: Edmonton, Salt Lake, Memphis, Atlanta, and one other.. (can't even remember anymore.) That's total, not one way. Two flights there, three back.

So we get to Atlanta at 7:00 on the evening of Friday Sept 1st. 3.5 hours of sleep, 7 hours in the air, 11 hours travel time total, and two time zones. Clearly, the only sensible solution is to party into the wee hours, which we did.

Will post more later. Same bat time, same bat channel.

-iRob

"Traveling tends to magnify all human emotions."
-Peter Hoeg

Warning - CPU use approaching 100%

Hey kids.

I've been very much incommunicado lately - My bad. I'm spending a lot of time away from my computer these days, (intentional) and what little time I do use it is looking for jobs. Applied for 10 this week. Blah.

My work is actually more fun and tolerable than ever before, that's becoming less and less the issue. The issue now is the fact that I am paid approximately 42% less than I should be for the duties I perform. (My original Job description was something akin to 'file clerk'. I'm somewhat closer to a 'Junior Human Resources Generalist'.)

That is not my assessment, by the way, but impartial experts. It has also been acnowledged by not only my manager, but my manager's manager's manager. (Seriously.) They know that I'm payed way too low, but they are not sure how to correct it. (Insert mumbo jumbo about 'headcount' and 'pay codes' here.) I'll give them a hint: "More money." They are 'looking into it'. I'm not waiting.

I'm not super comfortable posting the details here, but those of you close to me are free to ask privately.

So not having what we call 'Good Times' lately, but things are looking up for the future. There apparently is a Labor Crisis in general, and HR in particular. (Thanks to M for sending me that news article, it goes a long way towards helping me keep my momentum, and sanity.)

So I have options, and no longer feel trapped where I am. It'll all be O.K. And I'm sorry to those of you I haven't emailed lately, I'll do better.

Cheers,
iRob

“I expect to pass through this world but once; any good thing therefore that I can do, or any kindness that I can show to any fellow creature, let me do it now; let me not defer or neglect it, for I shall not pass this way again.”
-Stephan Grellet

EDIT - Yes, yes, D*C info is coming, hold your horse.

User is now operating in Safe Mode.

Yawn. Good morning!

Well, let's see.. I got back 4 days ago, and now it's the weekend. At this rate, by Monday I should be hitting on all cylinders again. (Currently I am running without any unnecessary drivers or programs, to prevent crashes.)

Dragon*Con was an absolute blast - Much more so than I had been anticipating. Everything went off without a hitch (more or less) and much fun was had by all. I took about a bazillion pics to remember everything by, which was what I intended given a) How lousy my memory is, and B) How much I spent on my fancy new camera and accessories.

Speaking of pictures I can't be bothered right now, but the definitive collection is here. Click to your hearts' content.

We arrived without much in the way of firm plans, which I think was wise considering how much there was to do. I did have to spend a lot of time asking the question "Sooo... what are you up to now?" - becoming completely transparent was the fact that I neglected to do my homework, but that's o.k. If I had actually sat down with the program I would have gone insane with all of the things I couldn't do. Choosing any one thing means 9 more I will never see, but would know about. That's hell for a completist.

There is so much to say about the trip that it's hard to get started. So I won't.

Cheers,
-iRob

"A good traveler has no fixed plans, and is not intent on arriving."
-Lao Tzu