anacronyms

I’m away every second weekend. That has been a fact of our life together since the beginning. Though we tire of it, and find it inconvenient in some ways, one of our fundamental principles is that the children come first, and if there is a choice between us and the children, the children win.

This has worked out. We accept this and the sacrifices that are sometimes required of us. However, it does make for some further difficulties, like last week. I was away for the weekend to see HouseApe 1.0, came home to eat dinner and repack and sleep, and the was up at 4:00 AM to make sure I was in Seattle for my class. I came home for a night partway through that week, which meant arriving about 7 and getting up at 5 again in order to be back in Seattle, but the big thing is that when Friday came and I was back home, there is tons of stuff undone here. When you cut your available weekends in half, the ones that remain become that much more valuable, and I wind up in a bind: there are major things that need doing – I have to replace the clutch and exhaust on the Miata, for example – but there are other things that need attending to, like time with spouses and children.

We had a pretty good day yesterday, even though my allergies are giving me hell at the moment. I had to do some running around yesterday morning to make arrangements for getting the windshield on Moosh, the 8 year old Subaru, replaced, because we were trading it in. I made such arrangments, and then later yesterday we traded the Subaru, a little sadly, for a new Mazda 3, which Christine has christened ‘Delilah’. I will post a photo at some point.

We took Delilah for a maiden cruise over the new Golden Ears bridge, which is so much faster than the old ferry that it almost defies description. We had a slow lunch at a busy 50’s style diner in Maple Ridge which features real ice cream floats, hamburgers made fresh, and perfect french fries. After that we came back over the river on the Albion ferry, which is shutting down in another month or so. We weren’t able to get out of the car, being at the front of one of the lanes with the engine on one side and a giant pickup truck on the other.

On the way back, we took a left from Fort Langley and walked on the dikes near the river at a peaceful spot between farms on one side and a creek and meadows on the other.

Then last night we took the kids to Earl’s (a local upper-end-of-mid chain targetted at hip young adults) for their report card reward dinner.

So yesterday was a good and restful day, especially considering the 1 hour nap I had – heavy allergies really sap my energy.

Today, some errands in the morning, and then some cleanup around this place. Then I should make a start on some work, because I’m under time pressure at work due to the course and the fact that this week is a 4 day week.

Oh, and I also found time to replace the tires on the Miata somewhere in there.

NSFW.

This one is amazingly textural.

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Bellevue is about 120 miles south of home. Last night, missing my family, I left after class and was home shortly before 7:00, where I kissed and cuddled and perhaps got lucky and slept in my own bed beside the woman who I adore, and then I got up and left at 5:15 and was back at the hotel in time for a quick wash and a creamy coffee thing…

and time to write this. Restored, I head off to class. I’m bringing my older Delaney book for Kalen to sign.

NSFW. Nipples and bare bum.

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The course I am taking is called SQL Server 2008 Architecture, Internals, and Tuning. The instructor is Kalen Delaney, primary author of one of the most informative and useful series of books available for SQL Server, the Inside SQL Server series.

There is too much material for it to be covered in exhaustive depth, but it serves as a set of keys into other material. The instructor points out things which are important, and offers insights that you won’t find elsewhere. After that, it is up to you to dig into the stuff on your own, armed with the keys that the instructor has given you.

In many of these courses, you have to eat the bread to get to the meat. In this course, however, it’s all meat. I’m going to be digesting for a while.

Yesterday was the first day of class. I’m taking a week long course here in beautiful Bellevue, Washington, on SQL Server Internals. Yesterday we spent 8 hours on data storage, which I just know all you find fascinating. I learned a lot of useful things, and I’m looking forward to learning more today.

Yesterday was the usual First Day. Everybody sussed out who is a dork, who is there becasue they want to be, who is there because their boss sent them, etc.

I hope I’m not a dork.

We will see as class progresses, I guess.

More later, maybe, or tomorrow, maybe. I was up very early yesterday to be sure to get here by start time, but I’m in a hotel now, and I’m more rested than I was. Still less than I’d like to be, because I am away from Christine and I never find that conducive to rest.

I don’t know the last time I had a dry spell as dusty as this one.

I’m not sure what is going on here. I haven’t been writing much – I haven’t had the mental energy for it.  I’ve had some good ideas, but haven’t been able to turn them into anything.

It’s the same at work. I tend to get interrupted a lot anyway, but in the last while I have had a hell of a time getting back to where I was after an interruption. And I find myself easily distracted. I’ll be working on something and I’ll think of something else and I’ll just have to run off and check on it.

I’d best be careful. I might find myself diagnosed with ADHD and slapped on Aderall.

I don’t know where the time went.

I was wandering the halls of a local high school, in which HouseApe 2.0 was rehearsing her dance recital. On the wall I found a 4′ x 6′ framed set of pictures of the senior class of 2009. I followed the trail down the hall…2008…2007…2000…1990…1980… and then stopped. The last framed 4′ x 6′ was not digital. The pictures were photographs fastened on. The names were hand-lettered, as was the heading. The Last of the 70’s, it said.

It is another milestone. I have now been out of high school so long that memories of that class have scrolled off the dusty list of memories hung on the wall – even the pictures are too old to keep hanging. When I was in school, I looked back at crisply lit black and white pictures of boys with oil in their hair, wearing narrow conservative ties, and girls with earrings and hair piled high. In some of them, I saw people that I knew – old people. Wrinkled people.

I’m one of the old people now.

Most companies complain about lack of communication. Even if there are memos flying around all the time, people still complain that nobody tells them anything.

But that is a two way street, or a two-edged sword. There are two parts to communication, the message projected,  and that received. The best writer and communicator in the world will get nowhere if his audience is not willing to listen.

Yesterday, I wrote a long email explaining proposed table changes that would affect a number of teams. They are important changes, urgent ones, and so at the beginning of the email I outlined the major business change that would ensue.

I got back a raft of emails. Every last one of them asked questions that were answered later in the body of the email, making it obvious that they had read 3 sentences in and then stopped, requiring me to send a bunch of answers (polite versions of read the rest of the fucking email) and another email that is a shorter version of the first but which includes the important questions I need answered right at the top.

Maybe I should send out an email on communication. Except nobody would read it.

Wow, no post since June 5.

I am upgrading to WordPress 2.8 – no major improvements, although they claim it is faster.  I like the admin interface changes that came with 2.5 (wasn’t it?) and this looks to be about the same, but the admin panel has definitely been slow. 2.8 claims to fix that.

I’ve just been really busy, people.