Sometimes I wonder if I'm doing the right thing... while that sounds deep, I'm really only referring to work. I get in around 9:15 every morning but it seems like I'm the only person in my group to do this. My mentor doesn't get in until 10ish (but today she's not even here yet and its after 11). My manager comes in around 11 (but works late most days... i think...) so he isn't here yet. The only other person in my group is another new hire and he's in training today (yay for finishing that!). That really leaves me here by myself with not all that much to do in the grand scheme of things. I don't know if I should be coming in later as well. Why "kill myself" to wake up early, fight traffic and not have time to eat breakfast when nobody else wants to?
Work is going ok in general though. I have two small assignments: find out info for setting up our test-bed in the lab downstairs and port over a bug fix from an old version of the code to the most recent version. Sexy? not really. Can't complain too much though I suppose.
Hope you're all doing well... drop me a line sometime
Thursday, September 13, 2007
Sunday, August 19, 2007
Completely Absurd!
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/20298840/site/newsweek/page/0/
Is it just me or has this suddenly gone too far? Every single right an privilege that Americans have enjoyed for so many years is under attack, and some of them are already gone. I'm completely disheartened with our government at this point. I've never trusted politicians and now I can see that I was always right (yay), as much as it pains me to say it. I don't know if its just that I'm more aware of the political environment now that I'm older and reading more about the news, or if things are just worse now than they were.
There is something to be said about learning to appreciate a good news story. A succinct and well researched piece is truly something to behold. I can remember having no interest in the news only a few years ago. Well, maybe some interest... but not a lot. I feel like I want to speak out and try to shake the apathy from not only my eyes, but also those who are around me. The number of times I've seen people shake their head in disgust at reports of wrongdoings by our nation's leaders compared to the number of actual demonstrations of their opinions is shockingly low. I am definitely one of those who tries to not get involved. "Someone should do something about that!" I say to myself. Truth be told, I'm an adult now. As scary as that sounds, this new role I'm playing gives me every right to be that "someone" who takes action. Whether I have the courage to or not, is still to be decided.
wish me luck
Is it just me or has this suddenly gone too far? Every single right an privilege that Americans have enjoyed for so many years is under attack, and some of them are already gone. I'm completely disheartened with our government at this point. I've never trusted politicians and now I can see that I was always right (yay), as much as it pains me to say it. I don't know if its just that I'm more aware of the political environment now that I'm older and reading more about the news, or if things are just worse now than they were.
There is something to be said about learning to appreciate a good news story. A succinct and well researched piece is truly something to behold. I can remember having no interest in the news only a few years ago. Well, maybe some interest... but not a lot. I feel like I want to speak out and try to shake the apathy from not only my eyes, but also those who are around me. The number of times I've seen people shake their head in disgust at reports of wrongdoings by our nation's leaders compared to the number of actual demonstrations of their opinions is shockingly low. I am definitely one of those who tries to not get involved. "Someone should do something about that!" I say to myself. Truth be told, I'm an adult now. As scary as that sounds, this new role I'm playing gives me every right to be that "someone" who takes action. Whether I have the courage to or not, is still to be decided.
wish me luck
Wednesday, August 15, 2007
Current post
California.
Life is interesting. I suppose I was in a contemplative mood when I wrote that last entry a month and a half ago. It made me think, though, now that I finally got around to writing it up. In a way, I'm glad it took me this long to post it. My life has been very hectic in the past few weeks as I've been running around like a crazy person trying to get everything accomplished. In some ways, I realized that I've strayed a bit from what I wanted to do, and in other ways I'm doing exactly what I want to do.
The Cisco Choice program that I just finished is a three week whirlwind that literally throws the company at your feet and challenges you to find a single manager/team that you feel you will get along with the best and whose work you're interested in. It's scary in a way to think about how much time I spent with groups, taking away from their time to do work just so they could get me to choose their project to work on. Some managers spent an hour with me, and this one guy was a 2nd level manager, so not too shabby. I ended up joining a Security team doing Firewall stuff for their routers and such. The scary thing is, I've never really taken a security course or anything of that nature. This is particularly exciting since it gives me an opportunity to learn tons of new stuff. The other exciting thing is that I am the 2nd person on my team. WTF!!?!? yeah... new team. Lots of exposure to managers... new and interesting stuff... but also a team that if it doesn't produce... will be disbanded... meaning I just get reassigned to another project. Not the worst thing ever. I'm definitely looking forward to the work though, sounds pretty interesting, even if I'm just going to be doing bug fixes for a few months until I get up to speed.
The people who started on the same day as me are great though. We all get along really well which makes me really happy. The first week before work started and the first few days of work were kinda lonely for me. I still have trouble talking to people for the first time but it turned out ok in the end. I was lucky enough to have a small group of people starting with me. 14 of us here in San Jose instead of the groups of 30-50 that were starting on other days. Much easier to get to know everyone, and we all hang out on weekends. So yeah, now that I have internet, I should be posting a bit more often. Drop me a line if you want to talk. Haven't really kept up with as many people as I wanted to... but that's only half my fault :-p
Life is interesting. I suppose I was in a contemplative mood when I wrote that last entry a month and a half ago. It made me think, though, now that I finally got around to writing it up. In a way, I'm glad it took me this long to post it. My life has been very hectic in the past few weeks as I've been running around like a crazy person trying to get everything accomplished. In some ways, I realized that I've strayed a bit from what I wanted to do, and in other ways I'm doing exactly what I want to do.
The Cisco Choice program that I just finished is a three week whirlwind that literally throws the company at your feet and challenges you to find a single manager/team that you feel you will get along with the best and whose work you're interested in. It's scary in a way to think about how much time I spent with groups, taking away from their time to do work just so they could get me to choose their project to work on. Some managers spent an hour with me, and this one guy was a 2nd level manager, so not too shabby. I ended up joining a Security team doing Firewall stuff for their routers and such. The scary thing is, I've never really taken a security course or anything of that nature. This is particularly exciting since it gives me an opportunity to learn tons of new stuff. The other exciting thing is that I am the 2nd person on my team. WTF!!?!? yeah... new team. Lots of exposure to managers... new and interesting stuff... but also a team that if it doesn't produce... will be disbanded... meaning I just get reassigned to another project. Not the worst thing ever. I'm definitely looking forward to the work though, sounds pretty interesting, even if I'm just going to be doing bug fixes for a few months until I get up to speed.
The people who started on the same day as me are great though. We all get along really well which makes me really happy. The first week before work started and the first few days of work were kinda lonely for me. I still have trouble talking to people for the first time but it turned out ok in the end. I was lucky enough to have a small group of people starting with me. 14 of us here in San Jose instead of the groups of 30-50 that were starting on other days. Much easier to get to know everyone, and we all hang out on weekends. So yeah, now that I have internet, I should be posting a bit more often. Drop me a line if you want to talk. Haven't really kept up with as many people as I wanted to... but that's only half my fault :-p
backpost...
So I wrote this on the flight out to California on the 2nd of July, just on a sheet of paper I had. I never got around to posting it, but better late than never right?
Leaving Ithaca
It is without a doubt that my time at Cornell has been some of if not the most amazing times of my life. Everyone always says that college is supposed to be the best time of your life and I don't think I fully understood that until now. I know that I have grown a lot mentally as well as emotionally. While much of this growth has really only come in the last year or so. The odd thing about this sob story is that I don't miss Ithaca as much as I thought I would. Driving away as I watched campus disappear in my rear-view mirror, I felt a twinge of sadness but the feeling passed almost as quickly as it came.
I do not know what life has in store for me, and the uncertainty is a little maddening. I know I have to have confidence inmyself. I need to have more confidence in other people when it comes to certain matters in my life. I have been burned by people in the past, but most of these things were so long ago I feel a bit dumb using them as reasons to myself. I think I will make a concerted effort to share my thoughts with the ones who are closest to me. Sucks to be ya'll :-p
Time to be serious.
Leaving Ithaca
It is without a doubt that my time at Cornell has been some of if not the most amazing times of my life. Everyone always says that college is supposed to be the best time of your life and I don't think I fully understood that until now. I know that I have grown a lot mentally as well as emotionally. While much of this growth has really only come in the last year or so. The odd thing about this sob story is that I don't miss Ithaca as much as I thought I would. Driving away as I watched campus disappear in my rear-view mirror, I felt a twinge of sadness but the feeling passed almost as quickly as it came.
I do not know what life has in store for me, and the uncertainty is a little maddening. I know I have to have confidence inmyself. I need to have more confidence in other people when it comes to certain matters in my life. I have been burned by people in the past, but most of these things were so long ago I feel a bit dumb using them as reasons to myself. I think I will make a concerted effort to share my thoughts with the ones who are closest to me. Sucks to be ya'll :-p
Time to be serious.
Thursday, June 21, 2007
Oh god, not another post...
Oh hush, I know few people are reading this and I'm doing what I've wanted... finding cool stuff online and posting them.
I came across a link to a New York Times article written in 2004 regarding poor writing skills used in formal business emails. I definitely agree with a few of the statements in there that relate to people not using correct grammar or punctuation when sending messages to clients or even potential employers. I know my grammar isn't perfect, but I try to remove as many short cuts from my writing as possible. Call me old fashioned or whatnot, but I think a certain amount of professionalism should be maintained. It boggles my mind sometimes to see how many people seem to not even care how their writing is viewed by others.
I have heard stories from my friends about their parents and coworkers who would throw out applications for poor grammar. Now, the points they were making is valid: if you want to be taken seriously, then behave as such. The "mistakes", however, were specifically going by common usage which many people would not even know are incorrect. One example that stuck out in my mind was throwing out an application that told the reader "please contact me if you have any further questions" or something of that sort. Apparently this is improper usage of contact and looking up the definition this is true. You can be "in contact with" someone but you cannot "contact them". I'm not about to turn into a grammar nazi or anything like that but it strikes me how common phrases are technically incorrect and give someone with a different upbringing a much different opinion of the writer.
I came across a link to a New York Times article written in 2004 regarding poor writing skills used in formal business emails. I definitely agree with a few of the statements in there that relate to people not using correct grammar or punctuation when sending messages to clients or even potential employers. I know my grammar isn't perfect, but I try to remove as many short cuts from my writing as possible. Call me old fashioned or whatnot, but I think a certain amount of professionalism should be maintained. It boggles my mind sometimes to see how many people seem to not even care how their writing is viewed by others.
I have heard stories from my friends about their parents and coworkers who would throw out applications for poor grammar. Now, the points they were making is valid: if you want to be taken seriously, then behave as such. The "mistakes", however, were specifically going by common usage which many people would not even know are incorrect. One example that stuck out in my mind was throwing out an application that told the reader "please contact me if you have any further questions" or something of that sort. Apparently this is improper usage of contact and looking up the definition this is true. You can be "in contact with" someone but you cannot "contact them". I'm not about to turn into a grammar nazi or anything like that but it strikes me how common phrases are technically incorrect and give someone with a different upbringing a much different opinion of the writer.
Can you say... reading list?
If there's one thing I've always loved... its sci-fi books. So great then, that I come across two great websites in the past two days. First is a list of the top sci-fi books as ranked by readers. The question now is where to find all these books. I could spend a lot of money and buy all of them, and once I'm actually getting a paycheck I most certainly will. Until then, however I can use the internet as a bit of a personal library for a few of the books. They are in crappy formats for reading but at least this way I can figure out which books I actually want to buy.
Wednesday, June 20, 2007
Ho hum...
Exciting times. Done with college. Time to move on. Get ready to work. Impress people. Advance. Make money. But is that really what I want? Why do I feel like I'm in a state of limbo in the month I'm sticking around Ithaca? I suppose that question answers itself. I've never been the most outwardly ambitious person in my family, or even among my friends. What I do have, however is the desire to prove myself to... well anyone really.
The problem with this is that I am prone to giving up at crucial moments or getting distracted by random things. I was completely ready to do tons of work for the AUV team this summer when I got back up here. Then I put off doing work for a day. Then two days. Now two weeks. I don't know why I'm even bothering being up here. I'm pretty much constantly lying about doing work. I don't like lying, especially when I'm the one doing it, but I've decided that I'm good at lying which angers me since the only way I could be good at lying is if I've been practicing it or I'm just a "bad" person.
It might be safe for me to assume that I'm a good person... and makes this a much simpler rant (I realize I'm not even talking about what I started talking about in the first place... or maybe they're related... bah I don't care). That means that I've had practice lying. Practice implies that I've probably lied to people I care about... maybe even lied to you? A white lie I'm sure, I really only lie for real to other people... never to you. Or is that a lie in itself? Is that what they call a paradox? I'm not even sure what some words mean and I use them, but I think that's fairly common.
I feel like I need to have an assignment that I care about. It takes a lot to motivate me, but I'm fairly good at concentrating when I am motivated. I'm terrified about work. I'm terrified about moving. I'm terrified about clinging to something that won't work out or dropping something that could be amazing. I'm terrified about making all of these decisions in the next month that the slacker in me would love to give up on.
Perhaps this is why I sit here in my apartment and stare at my computer screen and play games, read blogs, listen to music... pretty much do whatever I can to not think about the future. I've never been one to plan out my life, I like going with the flow but at the same time I see a destination as to where I want to be later on and have some confidence that I'll get there eventually. The uncertainty is exciting and terrifying at the same time. I don't like making decisions, I like the time after a decision has been made. I will sit there and analyze the hell out of every damn angle I can think of before deciding on something. I'll get so worked up over a big decision... but the release of tension afterwards is practically a high.
I realize that I identify with the main character in Office Space a bit too much. I don't know if working at a tech company in California is the right career for me. Sure I was an engineer. But the number of times I wanted to quit engineering is quite high. I'm no longer sure if I'm doing what I'm doing because I want to, or because my parents said "hey, do engineering... you like that sort of stuff". Or maybe I'm just looking for an excuse to quit.
The problem with this is that I am prone to giving up at crucial moments or getting distracted by random things. I was completely ready to do tons of work for the AUV team this summer when I got back up here. Then I put off doing work for a day. Then two days. Now two weeks. I don't know why I'm even bothering being up here. I'm pretty much constantly lying about doing work. I don't like lying, especially when I'm the one doing it, but I've decided that I'm good at lying which angers me since the only way I could be good at lying is if I've been practicing it or I'm just a "bad" person.
It might be safe for me to assume that I'm a good person... and makes this a much simpler rant (I realize I'm not even talking about what I started talking about in the first place... or maybe they're related... bah I don't care). That means that I've had practice lying. Practice implies that I've probably lied to people I care about... maybe even lied to you? A white lie I'm sure, I really only lie for real to other people... never to you. Or is that a lie in itself? Is that what they call a paradox? I'm not even sure what some words mean and I use them, but I think that's fairly common.
I feel like I need to have an assignment that I care about. It takes a lot to motivate me, but I'm fairly good at concentrating when I am motivated. I'm terrified about work. I'm terrified about moving. I'm terrified about clinging to something that won't work out or dropping something that could be amazing. I'm terrified about making all of these decisions in the next month that the slacker in me would love to give up on.
Perhaps this is why I sit here in my apartment and stare at my computer screen and play games, read blogs, listen to music... pretty much do whatever I can to not think about the future. I've never been one to plan out my life, I like going with the flow but at the same time I see a destination as to where I want to be later on and have some confidence that I'll get there eventually. The uncertainty is exciting and terrifying at the same time. I don't like making decisions, I like the time after a decision has been made. I will sit there and analyze the hell out of every damn angle I can think of before deciding on something. I'll get so worked up over a big decision... but the release of tension afterwards is practically a high.
I realize that I identify with the main character in Office Space a bit too much. I don't know if working at a tech company in California is the right career for me. Sure I was an engineer. But the number of times I wanted to quit engineering is quite high. I'm no longer sure if I'm doing what I'm doing because I want to, or because my parents said "hey, do engineering... you like that sort of stuff". Or maybe I'm just looking for an excuse to quit.
Tuesday, May 29, 2007
Far from home... Close to home...
I've decided that I want to consolidate my online services and it just was easier to move from my livejournal account to blogger considering the number of Google services I already use (email, pictures, groups, documents... wow, Google owns everything of mine :-p).
In light of my move to California, I've named this blog "Far from home... Close to home..." to reflect the great distance that separates me from many of those I care about while also covering topics that are near and dear to my heart. I've always wanted to use my blog to cover more than just my life and post articles and video clips that I enjoy. I don't think I'll have much important to talk about but you're all more than welcome to criticize my opinions. I want to be able to say that my ideas are backed by discussion and reasoning rather than just my gut (apologies to a certain Mr. Colbert).
In light of my move to California, I've named this blog "Far from home... Close to home..." to reflect the great distance that separates me from many of those I care about while also covering topics that are near and dear to my heart. I've always wanted to use my blog to cover more than just my life and post articles and video clips that I enjoy. I don't think I'll have much important to talk about but you're all more than welcome to criticize my opinions. I want to be able to say that my ideas are backed by discussion and reasoning rather than just my gut (apologies to a certain Mr. Colbert).
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