So now I'm using Rush song titles for my posts: interesting...
Work has become very, um, challenging.
The first challenge has been the resignation of my boss, the director of software development and the person most directly responsible for me taking the job. After two years of struggling to get the software department aligned with a product development process that can best be described as chaotic, after telling senior management time and again that the demands placed on the software organization exceeded our capacity by almost 200%, even with the most optimistic estimates, I guess he got tired of pushing the rock up the hill.
With his departure almost three weeks ago now, I've been drafted to assist my boss's boss, the VP of product development, as we first try to figure out where we are with all the products - all 67 of them.
Seriously. 67 products.
You have to page down three times to get to the bottom of our CruiseControl page, and that's just for the products being actively maintained. It's insane.
We then have to figure out how to take steps to continue product development while also going back and fixing all the shortcuts and bandaids and just plain screwups we made getting the products out the door as quickly as possible. This week, that involved 4 solid days of meetings - 9:00 AM to 6:00 PM - with test-driven requirements, planning poker, etc. Grueling, especially since I had to lead all the meetings and I was the one standing at the board writing down all the use cases and leading everyone through this. Ugh.
I've also been going to way too many meetings with senior management, including some with the CEO. I now believe all the stories I've heard about people leaving meetings with the CEO's spittle on their face (from him screaming at them). The CEO hasn't screamed at me (yet), but he definitely has anger management issues. I want to get back to where I don't interact with him or any of the other senior staff as quickly as possible, but that may be a while: we have yet to interview anyone for VP of software engineering.
On the positive side, we finally got some C++test licenses, and it's a very interesting tool (not cheap, though). More on C++test later...
So, at this point, I'm hating on this job. I've got a couple of things lined up, including a company in Vero Beach which looks like a great fit if they pay enough and if they'll go for a couple of days a week of telecommuting. And yes, I do get work done when I'm sitting out by the pool with the laptop, thank you very much!
I'm also looking longingly at some jobs out in Reno (gambling systems) and in Grass Valley, CA (video, much better), but that's mainly to keep me sane. We just moved into a big house in Rockledge with an awesome pool, so Barbara and the kids will probably miss me if those turn out to be viable options, but still... Grass Valley is only a couple of hours from San Francisco, and Reno is an extra hour. Intriguing, and I've had this itch to go west for about 5 years now, and it keeps getting stronger.
Anyway, this is getting long, and I need to get home. I'd like to close with a shout out to my friend who cannot be named, and I hope this post gets him the review he's been waiting for. With that raise he's sure to get, he can probably afford to upgrade his monthly cable to HD and maybe have a little left over to buy some fancy treats for the dog.
I kid, I kid...
25 September 2008
Breaking the Silence
References to Queensrÿche songs aside, it's been a while since my last post.
I was in the middle of composing a post, in fact, when I got the news about Angie, and we're all still dealing with the loss of someone who was - in every real sense of the term - a member of our family.
Three months later, it's still hard to accept that she's gone, but I'm very grateful for the time we did manage to spend together, and I'm especially glad she was able to see Nate grow up into a truly wonderful - although sometimes frustrating! - young man. I'm glad that she was also able to know Jen and Julianne and all the other members of this interesting extended family of ours, and we all miss her dearly.
One good thing, if one can say that, to come of all this is that we reconnected with Angie's mom Judy and were also finally able to meet her good friends Kyle and Kelly and meet other friends and family at the service. It was difficult afterwards being in this great little house she was living in at the time of her death, seeing all these traces of her, even catching scents which triggered memories, but although her life ended far too soon, she definitely was loved and will be for as long as we all remember her.
Life moves on, though, with no regard to whether you want it to, so don't take it for granted.
Angie, we love you and we miss you.
I was in the middle of composing a post, in fact, when I got the news about Angie, and we're all still dealing with the loss of someone who was - in every real sense of the term - a member of our family.
Three months later, it's still hard to accept that she's gone, but I'm very grateful for the time we did manage to spend together, and I'm especially glad she was able to see Nate grow up into a truly wonderful - although sometimes frustrating! - young man. I'm glad that she was also able to know Jen and Julianne and all the other members of this interesting extended family of ours, and we all miss her dearly.
One good thing, if one can say that, to come of all this is that we reconnected with Angie's mom Judy and were also finally able to meet her good friends Kyle and Kelly and meet other friends and family at the service. It was difficult afterwards being in this great little house she was living in at the time of her death, seeing all these traces of her, even catching scents which triggered memories, but although her life ended far too soon, she definitely was loved and will be for as long as we all remember her.
Life moves on, though, with no regard to whether you want it to, so don't take it for granted.
Angie, we love you and we miss you.
05 June 2008
Snowflake
So the current rumor is that Mac OS X 10.6 - "Snow Leopard" - will be announced at WWDC in Monday's "Stevenote" and ship at the beginning of 2009.
Given that I've started on Snowflake - interesting name alignment, considering I thought of it the day before I heard about 10.6 - it would seem I've got six months to wrap up this foray into The Life.
I have less than 1,068 days and a 3-year-old G4 PowerBook, so it seems I have my work cut out for me...
04 June 2008
Strengths and weaknesses
Good article in the NY Times on a new creationist tactic. The opening line is great (emphasis mine):
Heh.
Creationists are really after a unified belief system - "God and/or the Bible explains everything" - kinda like science has (somewhat tongue-in-cheek) the goal of a Theory of Everything.
The difference, of course, is that science is always willing to throw out the current explanation and replace it with a better one provided the new theory stands up to experimental verification. There might be some resistance at first - scientists are people, after all, with egos and prejudices fully intact - but facts will prevail when the dust settles.
If you want to believe God put everything in place 6,500 years ago and pressed the Start button, that's all well and good, but what can you do to prove (i.e, test) it?
You can't, and the unified belief system sure as hell doesn't explain something like bacteria evolving to become drug-resistant, does it?
Opponents of teaching evolution, in a natural selection of sorts, have gradually shed those strategies that have not survived the courts.
Heh.
Creationists are really after a unified belief system - "God and/or the Bible explains everything" - kinda like science has (somewhat tongue-in-cheek) the goal of a Theory of Everything.
The difference, of course, is that science is always willing to throw out the current explanation and replace it with a better one provided the new theory stands up to experimental verification. There might be some resistance at first - scientists are people, after all, with egos and prejudices fully intact - but facts will prevail when the dust settles.
If you want to believe God put everything in place 6,500 years ago and pressed the Start button, that's all well and good, but what can you do to prove (i.e, test) it?
You can't, and the unified belief system sure as hell doesn't explain something like bacteria evolving to become drug-resistant, does it?
Repairing the Damage, Before Roe
Good essay in the NY Times today on that least controversial of topics: abortion. The last two paragraphs make their point:
I'll add that given my gender, I believe I'm entitled to my opinions on the subject but without much ethical ground to impose them.
'Nuff said.
It is important to remember that Roe v. Wade did not mean that abortions could be performed. They have always been done, dating from ancient Greek days.
What Roe said was that ending a pregnancy could be carried out by medical personnel, in a medically accepted setting, thus conferring on women, finally, the full rights of first-class citizens — and freeing their doctors to treat them as such.
I'll add that given my gender, I believe I'm entitled to my opinions on the subject but without much ethical ground to impose them.
'Nuff said.
27 May 2008
A couple of observations
Whatever your politics, I offer a couple of observations for consideration:
John McCain's limited, highly controlled access to his medical records is probably a good indicator of how open his administration would be. Ditto for releasing tax returns months after Clinton and Obama, the latter being first (and least affluent of the three).
Barack Obama's organized and disciplined campaign is probably a good indicator of how organized and disciplined his administration would be. In the same vein, Hillary Clinton's campaign reflects poorly on her administrative skills.
John McCain's limited, highly controlled access to his medical records is probably a good indicator of how open his administration would be. Ditto for releasing tax returns months after Clinton and Obama, the latter being first (and least affluent of the three).
Barack Obama's organized and disciplined campaign is probably a good indicator of how organized and disciplined his administration would be. In the same vein, Hillary Clinton's campaign reflects poorly on her administrative skills.
13 May 2008
Ha!
Childish superstition: Einstein's letter makes view of religion relatively clear
No more being subjected to that "Science without religion is lame, religion without science is blind." quote. 'Nuff said.
No more being subjected to that "Science without religion is lame, religion without science is blind." quote. 'Nuff said.
12 May 2008
Been takin' a break...
Now that the crises have mostly died down and we're no longer trying to get everything duct-taped together enough to make it through wide-area testing (seriously), I've been on a "less computer time" kick, hence the gap since my last post.
I've even cut my RSS feeds down to 28. I had been as high as 200+, and yes, I had a problem keeping up with all that. That's the problem with drinking from the firehose.
Anyway, the technical feeds I'm still subscribed to include the usual suspects -
I've even cut my RSS feeds down to 28. I had been as high as 200+, and yes, I had a problem keeping up with all that. That's the problem with drinking from the firehose.
Anyway, the technical feeds I'm still subscribed to include the usual suspects -
- Joel on Software [Joel Spolsky]
- The Old New Thing [Raymond Chen]
- Mark's Blog [Mark Russinovich of SysInternals fame]
- Eric.Weblog() [Eric Sink]
- Coding Horror [Jeff Atwood]
- stackoverflow [Atwood and Spolsky, only podcasts at the moment]
- dive into mark [Mark Pilgrim]
- Paul Graham: Essays
- Stevey's Blog Rants [Steve Yegge at Google]
- The Daily WTF [not sure I'll keep this]
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