Bah, don't like the title. Perhaps I'll try again.

Bought something, which became a purchase four somethings, one for me, one for each of three kids.

Yeah, I'll try again on that title.

So, after 9 years out of programming, I've completed four (and a half) months of my new (aging) Perl programming job. What you may not know is I was brought on as a contractor, working for a local outsource company, who is loaning me to an outsourcing firm from India, who is loaning me to big-company (which may have been mentioned in a recent Slashback article) locally.

So, I took my son to Ikea while he was up for a visit. There are no such stores where I came from. So his Gramma asks me, "Isn't Ikea a some-assembly-required furniture store???"

This is about as incredulous as she'll get, and I felt like I had to explain myself. So, what I sent back reads more like ad-copy than an Email. Enjoy it, and feel free to ridicule me for it.

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I've been lurking on the boards, I've been following Sam (TheButcher's) programming stuff very closely, though it's probably not obvious. I haven't posted nearly as much as I've wanted to.

So, I'm going to write a few journals. Probably mostly useless.

All messaging options off.

I'm heading to

... where lived a young boy named Rocky Raccoon.
his woman ran off with another guy...

I'll be back when I'm back. If you journal past now, I probably won't ever see it, but I might get a chance to check my Email while I'm gone.

Have a great Independant Holiday everyone. For those not in the U.S., well enjoy your regular old work-days.

" It was a dark night, in a city that knows how to keep it's secrets... "

The movie was necessary for me to see. Every weekday, my car is parked in the parking ramp attached to "the Fitz", I've only lived in Minnesota since 1999, and I'm keen to learn as much as possible about it's peculiarities. The radio show that this movie was written about (though fictionalized) is definately born from Minnesota.

So, the kid graduated, and even got a real High School Diploma. He starts the local community collage in the fall.

Two more to go, then ... I'm DONE. Done FOREVER. No more kids.

No, my wife doesn't see it that way. A little, but not like I do.

----

Any new graduates in your families?

I decided to write about VMWare, and my short experience with it. Partly so that others who might be thinking about playing with vitualization might get a feel for what it takes.

I have this four year old - P4 @ 2GHz w/ 512MB (PC800 - impossible to find affordably) RAM. It runs Windows XP Pro... The processor is not-hyperthreading, and WAY before DualCore.

Skyways

It is possible, in either of the Twin Cities, to walk from building to building to building, to building without ever going outside or dealing with weather. Today, I left my office on the twenty-something-th floor of a St. Paul tower, took the elevator to the bottom. Walked through the lobby, up an escelator and into the skyway system - never leaving the climate controls of any building, crossed over several streets between the second-or-third floor of the next buildings pa

It's not necessarily evil, and probably not a conspiracy. But it could be, and there's no way to tell.

Speculation

The fictional Oil company, AZoco, has just posted record profits, and you are paying more for gas. Simple logic is suggestive that AZoco is making money because of your suffering. If you did the same thing, you'd be price gouging.

When I say YOU, especially in a MEME-like setting, it means the average, not necessarily, "you", the writer of the Meme. Either way, it's all part of why I suck.

Techno-Geek Rant. Sorry...

It was a whole bunch of stuff about AT&T working with synthesized voice, and they are clearly talking themselves up. No surprise. But what bothered me is they were showing all of these popular-entertainment computer voices (from War Games, etc.) No big deal, but then they start playing digitized voice (recorded voice played by computers... as if it's the same), K.I.T.T. (William Daniels) and finally a modern GPS/Talking mapper.

GMail Oddity

There are occasionally SPAM messages in GMail that I can't delete without opening them first. My immediate thought is conspiracy, but I'm hoping it's just a bug, or some sort of weakness that is being exploited until the GMail folks find it and fix it.
-- Any of you seen this, or am I alone with this issue?

My Previous Journals

This is the second of two journal entries about my transition from one job to another. The first one is here.

Well, I've completed my first week of the new job. I'm now, again, a Software Engineer, and no longer a Director of Information Technology.

This is the first of two journal entries about my transition from one job to another. The second one is here.

Last Friday, I left my employer of 6.7 years. I was the Director of Information Technology within the North American group.