After three weeks, I get my own cubicle. It comes with a fancy-black IBM Pentium 4 1.6 GHz computer (with a seven-year-old Sony Trinitron 15″ monitor). So, there’s that.
And the word from the boss is he’s doing what he can to get me hired somewhere within the company. It’s all good.
On the books for tonight is seeing Bryan, M-D and Lewis. Hilarity is sure to ensue.
Last night was fun. Yes, I ended up going to the St. Patrick’s Day party and event (a benefit for the Fallen Heroes Fund) at the New York Stock Exchange. It wasn’t a bad way to spend my birthday, considering I don’t see friends anymore. Plus it allowed me to delude myself and pretend that all those CEOs and Very Important Persons were there to see me.
In any case, I spent most of the day preparing things for the performing musical groups. We had an Irish rock band (The Gus Hayes Band), an Irish folk band (Aoifa Clancy Band — I’m working on procuring a CD of theirs), Irish Tenor Ronan Tynan, an a capella group, and the daughter of one of the company’s vice presidents (a singer–the daughter, not the V.P.).
Well, that’s my story. All in all I’m pretty happy, and I’m looking forward to this, my twenty-seventh year on the planet.
Also, happy birthday to my little brother, who turned 21 today.
Also, in an unrelated note, I can now play DVDs and DivX movies on my linux laptop. I am very happy, very happy am I.
It was nice to get out and drive a bit–that is how I spent yesterday. I visited my storage area in south Jersey to find a book I had borrowed a while ago. Unfortunately the boxes I needed to get to were behind large pieces of furniture as well as other boxes, so instead of making a mess of the storage area and taking a hour or two, I decided to just go to the mall and buy a new copy. It was only a few bucks.
While I was at the mall, I called a friend and made plans for the evening. I also spoke to my mother which is always nice. Nothing much has changed out there in California.
Anyway, I decided it was time to give myself a little present for my birthday since I’ve been a good boy (and since I have a job and I am making some money). I picked up the soundtracks to O Brother, Where Art Thou?, The Lord Of The Rings, and David Byrne’s Look Into The Eyeball. I wandered around the mall some more, and eventually decided to get myself a fancy-new haircut.
After my adventures at the mall, I went to Borders to waste some more time before my eventual dinner and movie.
I saw the movie I Am Sam. It was a bit slow at parts, and a little long, but overall it was a decent movie. Sean Penn did a good job, and Michelle Pfeiffer reminded me of someone I know, but I’m not sure who.
Well, I hope that was informative.
Well, work has been pretty interesting and busy lately–except for when it’s boring and slow, but that doesn’t happen too often. We’re preparing for a big St. Patrick’s Day party on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange. 350 people will be there next Monday, mostly CEOs in the finance industry and their major clients. Fun stuff… don’t think I’ll be there, though. They haven’t decided who from the office will be attending, and we’re pushing our limint of guests. All the work I’ve been doing here in the past few weeks has paid off quite literally. I got my check which included all of last week’s overtime. Sweet. I’m on my way to reducing my debt and saving money for an apartment for myself.
In other news and somewhat related, my old work place is commissioning me to do some reworking of their website. While we’re talking about the place I used to work, it turns out they continued paying for my health insurance even after I left. That was nice of them, although they didn’t mention in to me until a few days ago, so I missed any chance I would have had to get a check-up.
Well, only a few days before my birthday. The St. Patrick’s Day party happens to fall on my birthday, and it kind of sucks that I might not be going. It would have at least given me something to do to celebrate the next anniversary of my birth.
It’s not fun to miss the train home by one minute and having to wait a half hour for the next one. Speaking of transportation, I need to find a place to drive to. I’d like to use my car.
Differences in Perceptions Fuel Mistrust. My favorite quote in that USA Today article is as follows, and I quote:
”They [Muslims] get a lot of propaganda that doesn’t allow them to see other cultures in a clear light,” says Frank Recco, 46, a teacher in Parma, Ohio.
I sure hope this guy knows more about foreign cultures than what he sees on American television. American TV is a propoganda machine.
I’m not trying to say I’m completely against American television. I like Cheers and The Cosby Show.
Oh no… I just realized I’m a product of the ’80s! Somebody help me…
So work has gone from being midly boring and slow to incredibly busy. There is a financial report due to the board tomorrow, and it’s interesting to see how this company works under stress and compare it to my past experiences at you-know-where. Here are some of the big differences.
People do not seem to crack under stress. When it’s cruch time, people spend time doing the work that needs to be done, instead of spending time on the phone complaining to their friends about how they have so much to do. People genuinely seem to want to help each other here. Personally, people seem to be very happy with the work I’m doing, and on top of all of this, I get paid when I work overtime! I left the office at a quarter to midnight last night , and will probably be staying late again tomorrow night with the rest of the team to finish up this report. And when you do stay late, and you work for the vice president of the company, they get a “car” to take you home instead of making you try to catch a late train.
On the other hand, large corporations seem to create work for themselves, but when you have a small non-profit organization with not many employees, there is a lot of excess that is stripped off. I wonder if a large corporation running stripped-down like a small company is something that would work.
That’s the last thing I expected to hear. After John Williams’ Olympic Theme during the closing ceremony, they played Pink Floyd’s Run Like Hell throughout the stadium. What’s up with that?
I wouldn’t exactly call my weekend incredibly productive, but I did get some things done. I did my federal taxes and it looks like I am due a pretty nice chunk of cash. Now that I am working and actually have income, I’m feeling a little bit better about my financial state.
Beyond the money scope, I’m getting my life in order. It’s all a matter of making choices; maybe it will be right, maybe wrong, but the important part is to make the choice. I’m almost twenty-six, and I’m thinking about where I want to be when I’m thirty and designing a plan that will take me there.
As for where I want to be, I’ve made some changes in my thoughts within the last few months. I’d like not to be in New Jersey, and right now the Washington, D.C. metro area or Baltimore metro area are my ideal locations. I will be working in a job that will allow me to work creatively with computers, to have a side-job of working with a marching band or some other musical group, and to be making enough money to secure my future and the education of future children.
Of course, I can change my mind at any time, and that’s all a part of being human. But for now, that’s the goal.
I’ll probably catch a lot of criticism and open myself up for nasty emails being sent around, but I’d like to be married by the time I’m thirty or at least heading in that direction.
Now that I’m pretty clear on my goals, I am working on a plan to get me there. In immediate terms, I plan to keep working in New Jersey for a bit more while making contacts and networking with people in the D.C. and Baltimore areas as much as I can.
Of course, I don’t have to stick with these goals just becaise I am publishing them here. Any number of things can occur in my life that would allow me to decide to change my mind. But the thing is that I’m not going to just sit around waiting for things to happen or for decisions to be made for me. I kind of like the thought of controlling my own future.
The last two nights I’ve remembered my dreams. This is odd, since I haven’t really remembered my dreams in a long time. It might due to the change in my sleep pattern… but what’s weird is that I was dreaming about this girl I knew in middle school and high school. We weren’t friends, per se, in fact we tended to intentionally not associate with each other. Well, I would have associated with her, but I never thought that she wanted to. We were always a little bit conpetitive for some reason, especially when we were in middle school.
In any case she showed up in my dream yesterday, and said something quite profound. Then she showed up again this morning, and I mentioned to her that she appeared in my dream the previous night.
I guess the true test is to see if she reappears tonight.