Last Day of the First Month
The New Year is already flying by; the first month is done and gone. Maybe I should start planning for 2006 now. At the rate time is zooming by it will be here tomorrow.
January 31, 2005
January 30, 2005
Staying Out
Getting up this morning was painful after staying out until 2am-ish last night.
I volunteered to take portraits for some friends of mine that are trying to adopt a baby. Despite how tired I as, it was worth the effort. They are great people that would make great parents. If a child was not going to be raised by its own parents, these are the people I would pick.
January 29, 2005
January 28, 2005
Java Invasion
According to a search that I did on Starbucks.com, there are 23 Starbucks coffee shops within 5 miles of my house. Personally, I think that is crazy, insane, and just whoa. Does the planet really need that many, and does my neighborhood really need that many?
January 27, 2005
Down with Quark
Quark needs to do one of two things. One, disappear and never return; or two, completely engineer their software to catch-up with InDesign. The fate of Quark may be proof that Darwin was correct.
January 26, 2005
Getting Help
If you are going to get help in your job hunt, it does not hurt to have the best agency in your field on your side. It does not hurt at all.
January 25, 2005
A New Mark
The next evolution in my personal mark has been completed. I have not been keeping a close count, but I believe this is version 5.
January 24, 2005
Cheers
I cleared off my to-do list in record time today. Which was a really good thing, it braced me for a troubling call from my Mother late in the day. Life can be so wonderful at certain moments, and then turn grey so very quickly.
Bad news travels faster than good. It always has, it always will.
Ever Growing
My task list has graduated to being a full two pages. It is a little frightening to look at, but it is all doable.
January 23, 2005
Social Butterfly
Seems like I have been going out a lot. Yesterday afternoon and evening, I hung out with my cousin and her boyfriend. We played Bocce, which my cousin won and was very happy about. We then went out to Cafe Tu Tu Tango at the Block. It was simply a fantastic and fun Saturday.
January 22, 2005
Good, Good People
Last night, Ong and I had dinner with my friend and old workmate, Karen, and her family. Her and her husband, Jim, are just great people in every sense of the word. They are fun, kind, and down to earth - just good people that you can relate to and enjoy being around.
Thank you for being our friends.
January 21, 2005
Friday, Already?
After only two days of work, I can't believe that is Friday already.
It was a great two days at work. I feel that I really helped those guys get caught up. They are no longer weeks behind; in fact, I was working on some jobs 3-4 days ahead of schedule.
This work has put the thought back into my head of how much I would really love to own my own print shop. I love the industry and I understand the work; I think that is enough to get me started. All I need now is the capital to get it started.
January 20, 2005
Glitch
I put in a 10 hour day today at one of the last places that I would have guessed that I would end up at. I filled in for my friend, Karen, at the first place I worked at when I moved to Orange County.
I am in awe. So much has changed about me and my skills since I left, and so little has changed about the place that I used to work. The people, equipment, and clients are all pretty much the same. I had a few mental glitches where it felt like I had never left; and that was not a bad thing.
Also on a good note, it felt really good to be doing that kind of work again. For several reasons... but the biggest being that I am good at it. It is a very natural thing for me; it has caused me to realize that while I have gained a tremendous amount of experience and skill by venturing outside of graphic design, it just never felt this good. There is a overwhelming amount of comfort and satisfaction that comes from being an expert at what you do.
There has been a spark. Maybe the flames with roar again.
January 19, 2005
Clean, Clean, Clean
I am focusing on getting the housework out of the way this morning - a little laundry and a few dishes.
January 18, 2005
Little Birdy
Thanks to a fantastic person that I met in Australia, I am now the proud owner of the new Little Birdy album. I fell in love with a song that was playing on Triple-J while I was in Australia... and I hunted the city for the CD with no luck. Since then, I have been burning a whole in my Triple-J's Hottest 100 CD listen to a single Little Birdy track.
Huge thanks to my friend, Dee, for shooting this album off to me. It is as good as I hoped it would be.
January 17, 2005
Moving
I helped a friend start moving. He recently bought a very nice home up in Ontario and will be moving in the next four months. Currently, he lives about 10 mile inland from me, soon he will be living about 40 miles north and inland. The distance really shouldn't impact anything; I sit on freeways going a lot short distances for a lot more time.
January 16, 2005
Bocce
The rain is gone and the grass has dried out... so I played Bocce with my friends today. It has been months since I have played... and was ready to start playing again. We only got in one game, but it was great.
January 15, 2005
Time Tracking
I have been keeping a log of everything that I do while I have been off. It has been very help to let me see exactly what I do with my time; and how effective I am with the time that I dedicated to a particular task. I highly advise tracking your time if you cannot figure out where it is going or why you can't get a particular task accomplished. It is evidence of whether you really tried or not.
January 14, 2005
The Missing
Clearly, I lost more files in my jump than noticed. When transferring form the old machine to the new one, there are at least 3 good portfolio pieces missing. I am sure the number missing is much higher, but I don't want to think about that - simply depressing. I am left to hunt through backups with nothing more than hope that I have those files elsewhere.
January 13, 2005
Spinning
Since I am at home most of the day, I am listening to a lot of music. Last time that I counted, I had somewhere around 700 CDs. Needless to say, I have not had to repeat a single disc yet.
January 12, 2005
Inching
It takes an amazing amount of thought to capture your entire employment experience into just a few lines. I have just kept inching forward; and I think my resume is just about finished. I have sent it out to the masses for review. Hopefully, the response will be good.
Dreams & Purpose
You have to have a dream so you can get up in the morning.
- Billy Wilder
Great minds have purposes, others have wishes.
- Washington Irving
January 11, 2005
Dry
With a small break in the weather, Ong and I decided to go to Disneyland today. It was perfect; there was hardly a soul in the park. Even the longest line did not take us more than 5 minutes to get through.
January 10, 2005
High Water
The amount of rain that has fallen here in So Cal is nothing short of amazing. The sidewalk in front of my apartment is like a river. I am so happy to be living upstairs and nowhere near a hill. I may invest in a small raft... just in case the waters keep rising.
January 09, 2005
Forty Gigs of Files on the Wall
To historic events in my life have lead to a very large task: First, I migrated to a new desktop machine in mid-2004. Second, I have been working 60 hours a week for two years. These two combined have a massed 40 gigs of miscellaneous files. I dedicated a good part of today going through this mammoth collection; and have made only a small dent. Cleaning up this mess could easily become my new career - if only it paid a little more.
While sorting and clearing the mess of files, I am hunting for items to go in my portfolio. I have designed an insane amount of things over the past five years; it is difficult to choose the select few to be in my portfolio.
My resume is also shaping up nicely. Both should be ready for web-release by the end of the week.
January 08, 2005
Baby-steps
I have been taking baby-steps at C# throughout the day; and I have completed three baby-applications.
At this point, I find it more overwhelming to learn the Visual Studio interface than to learn C#. The latest book that I bought has really helped get me through learning how to use or rather getting around in the Visual Studio environment; as well, it has taught me more about creating a UI than the other books - which is the fun part anyway.
January 07, 2005
Unemployed
Merc is officially unemployed. The hunt for what to do next has begun.
January 06, 2005
Testing 1 2 3
Setting up to test takes half the day; and the actual testing will take days and days. Oh, the joys of testing; it is so much better to be on the development side.
January 05, 2005
The Second Day
I am not yet convinced that Firefox is so hot. The padding and margins in CSS are simply messed up. If I create a space that is 600 pixels wide with a 10 pixel margin or padding, it is not a request for a 620 pixel wide space... apparently "proper rendering" in Firefox says it is.
Currently, my vote still goes to IE.
True Pain
It is truly painful to try and find a bug in someone else's ancient code. I have been at it all day; and I have discovered more bugs, but no solutions to any of the bugs.
Current status: hopelessly broken code.
January 04, 2005
Firefox
I have finally downloaded and installed... and even used... Firefox. I am not sold on the theory that Firefox is the greatest browser on the web. I still love my IE, but I am open to change. I think it is going to take awhile for this relationship to warm-up.
I do find it interesting that spell check suggests firebug as a replacement for Firefox; and it suggest IA for IE. Maybe it is a sign? Or maybe not.
January 03, 2005
The Free World
On my list of things that I wish that I would have discovered earlier is SharpDevelop and Mono. Here is everything that one needs to start programming in C# and for free. OpenSource is a beautiful thing.
Goal: 2005
For 2005, I will be mastering a programming language. So, I have just ordered three books about C#; and will be dedicating time everyday to learning and practicing.
January 02, 2005
Merc For Hire
Next week, I will be officially unemployed and looking for work. Over the next few weeks, I will be working on my resume and portfolio. Look for updates here.