I first heard about Creative Visualization when I was considering taking a job as a manager. It was on my goal list to reach by the time I was 30. I thought I was a bit young for it, but the opportunity was there and I really wanted to take that next step.
As usual, I had to search around for books to help me. Along with all the books about actually being a manager, I ran across a comment about Creative Visualization. I bought a book, read it and sat down to put it in practice. That was in 1988. I’ve been using it ever since.
Whenever there’s anything happening that requires a decision (of course after doing all the proper things to determine the correct course) I will stop and picture myself doing the various options and even more importantly picture myself after I’ve done them. Expecially at work, I will picture myself in a meeting explaining why we did things that way. Will I be embarrassed if it fails? As I explain it do I feel like I did enough leg work ahead of time to reach the optimal solution?
It also has the benefit of reducing stress because basically I am putting myself in a “meditative” state. If you do it after you have filled your brain with all the facts, even if you don’t consciously remember them all, then it can be similar to dreaming in that your brain pops up with ideas seemingly out of nowhere.
True meditation is different from creative visualization in that you are supposed to clear your mind of all thoughts. I took a Zen class on Barnes and Noble University about three years ago. As a result of that class, I started meditating daily. At first my daughter was accompanying me, but after a while she moved on to other things. So now I meditate before I go to bed every night. It helps me sleep much better.
When my daughter and I were meditating together, we cleared a spot in the living room and sat on cushions facing a wall that is covered in a natural light oak. It helped to have our backs to the rest of the livingroom, with all it’s furniture, TV etc. And the light through the west facing window made interesting patterns on the wall. The dogs were quite interested on this new activity. At first they walked around us and sniffed us, the cushions, the wall, everything. Soon they were sitting with us facing the wall also. It was very comforting to have them there. I guess since I’m the alpha dog, they felt they had to do the same. During the meditation I kept getting an the urge to pant along with them. :)
The first five minutes were fine, but after that it was torture was the first few days. After a while you get used to it and do not even sense the passing of time. I had to set the timer on the microwave to make sure we didn’t stay too long (homework had to be done!). Now I don’t worry about it because my internal clock takes care of it, and the meditation is almost as good as sleep anyway.
Sunday, February 18, 2007
Losing weight on a budget
On December 29th I went back on my diet in an attempt to lose those holiday pounds (and a few others I managed to acquire over the last few hurricanes). My diet of choice is WeightWatchers. In the past I've tried Atkins, which works great in the short-term (as long as you follow all the rules of the diet, not just the food rules), but in the long run you aren't changing your eating habits in a postive manner, so the weight comes right back on.
With Weightwatchers you’ll basically be on a food budget. You get a certain numbers of “points” for the day plus there’s a bank of points that you can take from for the week. So, for example, I get 22 points a day, and there are 35 points that I could use during the week (additional to the 22 a day). If you use them all, you will maintain your weight but not lose any most probably.
The number of points you get a day is determined by your start weight. The points drop as you lose weight. The idea being that your stomach slowly shrinks and you are less hungry.
The food is not limited in any way other than staying on the diet. There are Community meetings, at-work meetings (if you want to organize one), and there’s the web-page which is what I am using now. I have been an at-work member twice in the past. It does work. After each of my kids I followed the diet and lost the baby weight. In the last few years I slowly gained a pound here and a pound there mostly during the six hurricanes that came through. It’s difficult to pick wisely when all you have are canned foods and peanut butter sandwiches.
You can eat healthy and not be hungry as long as you don’t mind salads and veggies. There are many “free” veggies; vegetables that count as 0 points. So you can have a salad with a low calorie dressing (watch out for trans fat!) say 2 points (unlimited lettuce, tomato, cucumber, mushroom, sprouts for example; but not unlimited dressing). Then have two or three veggies with a 4 ounce piece (4 points for chicken or pork, 2 points for fish) of meat and 1/2 cup of pasta (2 points) with non-meat tomato sauce(also free).
That’s a large dinner and only 8 points (or 6 if you have fish). They also have frozen weightwatchers meals that are 4 to 6 points. Those are good for lunch when there’s a time crunch.
If you want 2 points for chocolate everyday, then you can do that. I do!
I like the webpage because I get to log everything online and they have a great database to search for point values, as well as, a large forum for communicating with other folks that are on the plan. But I would suggest, for the first 12 weeks at least, join a group so you get all the materials and hear the lectures once through. After that the webpage is enough, in my opinion.
In the last seven weeks I've lost 11.5 pounds. Not quite the best weight loss in the world, but adequate. I found out this weekend that I failed to re-take the "point allotment" test, so that explains why my weight loss slowed down after I reached 150 pounds. Now I'm allowed 19 points instead of 22. Next Friday we'll see if there's an improvement.
With Weightwatchers you’ll basically be on a food budget. You get a certain numbers of “points” for the day plus there’s a bank of points that you can take from for the week. So, for example, I get 22 points a day, and there are 35 points that I could use during the week (additional to the 22 a day). If you use them all, you will maintain your weight but not lose any most probably.
The number of points you get a day is determined by your start weight. The points drop as you lose weight. The idea being that your stomach slowly shrinks and you are less hungry.
The food is not limited in any way other than staying on the diet. There are Community meetings, at-work meetings (if you want to organize one), and there’s the web-page which is what I am using now. I have been an at-work member twice in the past. It does work. After each of my kids I followed the diet and lost the baby weight. In the last few years I slowly gained a pound here and a pound there mostly during the six hurricanes that came through. It’s difficult to pick wisely when all you have are canned foods and peanut butter sandwiches.
You can eat healthy and not be hungry as long as you don’t mind salads and veggies. There are many “free” veggies; vegetables that count as 0 points. So you can have a salad with a low calorie dressing (watch out for trans fat!) say 2 points (unlimited lettuce, tomato, cucumber, mushroom, sprouts for example; but not unlimited dressing). Then have two or three veggies with a 4 ounce piece (4 points for chicken or pork, 2 points for fish) of meat and 1/2 cup of pasta (2 points) with non-meat tomato sauce(also free).
That’s a large dinner and only 8 points (or 6 if you have fish). They also have frozen weightwatchers meals that are 4 to 6 points. Those are good for lunch when there’s a time crunch.
If you want 2 points for chocolate everyday, then you can do that. I do!
I like the webpage because I get to log everything online and they have a great database to search for point values, as well as, a large forum for communicating with other folks that are on the plan. But I would suggest, for the first 12 weeks at least, join a group so you get all the materials and hear the lectures once through. After that the webpage is enough, in my opinion.
In the last seven weeks I've lost 11.5 pounds. Not quite the best weight loss in the world, but adequate. I found out this weekend that I failed to re-take the "point allotment" test, so that explains why my weight loss slowed down after I reached 150 pounds. Now I'm allowed 19 points instead of 22. Next Friday we'll see if there's an improvement.
Thursday, February 15, 2007
On-call
I'll say one positive thing about being on-call... it prepares you for taking care of infants! But seriously, changing diapers, feeding and comforting infants in your sleep is a snap after getting up to fix computer problems. And babies are more fun to cuddle than a keyboard!
I was handed a beeper at the ripe 'ole age of 20 when I could still stay up all night without feeling it. So I developed survival skills. For example, I learned to write all documentation so that I could follow it almost literally with my eyes closed. I also set-up tons of little scripts that monitor everything I could think of so that I would be notified by my servers when they were close to failing, instead of by a human. That improved my on-call experience a great deal. And I can fall asleep (and have done so) in the middle of an outage, and wake up again to continue when necessary.
I was on a one year contract job in Albuquerque NM back "in the day". The computers were UNIVAC 1108s and the applications were from BellLabs for premise and facilities data. Bell customer service used the systems to create service tickets and to resolve problems. Bell had done a study and concluded that they lost $100,000.00 in revenue for every hour they were down. Right now I would find that incredibly stressful. At 23 it didn't phase me. I did my best to resolve the problem as soon as possible and that was it.
One morning at the 7:45am turn-over meeting (that frustrates me!), the third shift operators announced that there had been a disk crash during the night, the recovery procedure had been followed and all was well. I was very impressed with the guy because he'd followed the documentation all by himself for the first time. So after the meeting I went over and shook his hand and expressed by great exuberance that he's done it without calling me. He informed me that I was nuts (well I already knew that part); that I'd been on the phone with him the entire time, helping him through the procedure!
I had noticed that I woke up with a hole in my sock that wasn't there when I went to sleep, but I didn't put two and two together at that time. Apparently (and my ex backed him up on this), they called. I stood in the kitchen and helped them for over an hour. During which time my puppy chewed a hole in my sock while I was wearing it. Then I went back to sleep and pushed the whole experience into the category of a dream.
To me oncall problems are like video games that I get paid for playing. If I didn't enjoy fixing those problems so much, I'd be really frustrated too!
I was handed a beeper at the ripe 'ole age of 20 when I could still stay up all night without feeling it. So I developed survival skills. For example, I learned to write all documentation so that I could follow it almost literally with my eyes closed. I also set-up tons of little scripts that monitor everything I could think of so that I would be notified by my servers when they were close to failing, instead of by a human. That improved my on-call experience a great deal. And I can fall asleep (and have done so) in the middle of an outage, and wake up again to continue when necessary.
I was on a one year contract job in Albuquerque NM back "in the day". The computers were UNIVAC 1108s and the applications were from BellLabs for premise and facilities data. Bell customer service used the systems to create service tickets and to resolve problems. Bell had done a study and concluded that they lost $100,000.00 in revenue for every hour they were down. Right now I would find that incredibly stressful. At 23 it didn't phase me. I did my best to resolve the problem as soon as possible and that was it.
One morning at the 7:45am turn-over meeting (that frustrates me!), the third shift operators announced that there had been a disk crash during the night, the recovery procedure had been followed and all was well. I was very impressed with the guy because he'd followed the documentation all by himself for the first time. So after the meeting I went over and shook his hand and expressed by great exuberance that he's done it without calling me. He informed me that I was nuts (well I already knew that part); that I'd been on the phone with him the entire time, helping him through the procedure!
I had noticed that I woke up with a hole in my sock that wasn't there when I went to sleep, but I didn't put two and two together at that time. Apparently (and my ex backed him up on this), they called. I stood in the kitchen and helped them for over an hour. During which time my puppy chewed a hole in my sock while I was wearing it. Then I went back to sleep and pushed the whole experience into the category of a dream.
To me oncall problems are like video games that I get paid for playing. If I didn't enjoy fixing those problems so much, I'd be really frustrated too!
"Pride and Prejudice" by Jane Austen
I enjoyed “Pride and Prejudice” by Jane Austen a great deal more than “Sense and Sensibility”.
Elizabeth’s sense of humor made her a much more interesting heroine in my opinion. She and her father seemed to enjoy a love for the absurd, although her mother’s behavior did embarrass her. Other than that there are many parallels among the characters in the story: Elizabeth and Elinor, Lydia and Marianne, Jane and Mrs. Dashwood, Wickham and Willoughby.
It still bothers me that all the women think about is finding a husband, that an “accomplished” woman “sang and played all day”, but I have to assume that was the world Jane herself was exposed to at the time.
You know that with a family that size and all those dinner parties, there had to be some people working very hard in that household, but they are barely ever mentioned and then only in brief passing and only in their concern for the family.
Fifty years after these novels were published, we see books such as “Little Women” by Louisa May Alcott depicting an American family. In this book the characters are much less one sided. Although some of the girls were still thinking primarily of finding husbands, they had to pitch in and help make the world around them.
Another fifty years later, “Anne of Green Gables” by L. M. Montgomery describes a young Canadian woman from a very different set of cicumstances who puts the romantic side of life into perspective.
Both Jo and Anne are charcters that I would encourage young girls to meet early in life. The Austen women in the books I’ve read so far, although they may be a study of women from a certain subsection of society in England at the time the novels are written, are not ones I’d place before my daughters.
Elizabeth’s sense of humor made her a much more interesting heroine in my opinion. She and her father seemed to enjoy a love for the absurd, although her mother’s behavior did embarrass her. Other than that there are many parallels among the characters in the story: Elizabeth and Elinor, Lydia and Marianne, Jane and Mrs. Dashwood, Wickham and Willoughby.
It still bothers me that all the women think about is finding a husband, that an “accomplished” woman “sang and played all day”, but I have to assume that was the world Jane herself was exposed to at the time.
You know that with a family that size and all those dinner parties, there had to be some people working very hard in that household, but they are barely ever mentioned and then only in brief passing and only in their concern for the family.
Fifty years after these novels were published, we see books such as “Little Women” by Louisa May Alcott depicting an American family. In this book the characters are much less one sided. Although some of the girls were still thinking primarily of finding husbands, they had to pitch in and help make the world around them.
Another fifty years later, “Anne of Green Gables” by L. M. Montgomery describes a young Canadian woman from a very different set of cicumstances who puts the romantic side of life into perspective.
Both Jo and Anne are charcters that I would encourage young girls to meet early in life. The Austen women in the books I’ve read so far, although they may be a study of women from a certain subsection of society in England at the time the novels are written, are not ones I’d place before my daughters.
Waiting for Harry Potter 7
A couple of years ago during a night in June, I sat in Barnes and Noble waiting for midnight. No it wasn't New Year's Eve, it was the release of Harry Potter 6. A friend of mine accompanied me out of curiosity, expecting to be entertained by the people in costume, and he was not disappointed.
As an aside, coincidentally I had been on vacation those two weeks prior to the release of the book. I'd spent a great deal of that time on Barnes and Noble University's Harry Potter bookclub discussing the prior five books with people all over the world. The discussion was lively and in some instances confrontational! Who would have thought adults would get so heated over a discussion of Harry Potter. The response to that book club had been so monumental that the one bookclub session had to be extended to five! Two were added immediately and the other two were added when the book was released. Later on the bookclub was extended for three more months before it was retired completely. (It is back on now of course! BN online bookclubs .)
Back at B&N, at one point as we sat sipping our lattes in the cafe and we noticed an odd man approaching us. He wore pajama bottoms, a white ribby wife-beater and he had a cape around his shoulders with a bandana tied around his head. The guy looked scruffy and a bit scary. As we looked for the best escape route, the creature said our names. In astonishment we found that he was a co-worker in costume. He'd brought his family for the big event and decided to go all out a la World Quidditch Cup in Goblet of Fire. He'd done an excellent job!
Holding my ticket I waited patiently for the book. The fact that I'd already paid for overnight delivery on two copies from Amazon didn't matter in the least! The fact that my two daughters were at that very moment waiting in another bookstore up by their grandmother's house in Punta Gorda where they were visiting, for their copies made no difference.
Later that morning I fell asleep having read about half the book, and I finished the rest by noon the next day. Then after getting some more sleep, I went back on the Barnes and Nobles online University HP bookclub and chatting away with other folks all over the US that had read the book.
It was a great experience! If this year's is half as good, I'll be happy.
As an aside, coincidentally I had been on vacation those two weeks prior to the release of the book. I'd spent a great deal of that time on Barnes and Noble University's Harry Potter bookclub discussing the prior five books with people all over the world. The discussion was lively and in some instances confrontational! Who would have thought adults would get so heated over a discussion of Harry Potter. The response to that book club had been so monumental that the one bookclub session had to be extended to five! Two were added immediately and the other two were added when the book was released. Later on the bookclub was extended for three more months before it was retired completely. (It is back on now of course! BN online bookclubs .)
Back at B&N, at one point as we sat sipping our lattes in the cafe and we noticed an odd man approaching us. He wore pajama bottoms, a white ribby wife-beater and he had a cape around his shoulders with a bandana tied around his head. The guy looked scruffy and a bit scary. As we looked for the best escape route, the creature said our names. In astonishment we found that he was a co-worker in costume. He'd brought his family for the big event and decided to go all out a la World Quidditch Cup in Goblet of Fire. He'd done an excellent job!
Holding my ticket I waited patiently for the book. The fact that I'd already paid for overnight delivery on two copies from Amazon didn't matter in the least! The fact that my two daughters were at that very moment waiting in another bookstore up by their grandmother's house in Punta Gorda where they were visiting, for their copies made no difference.
Later that morning I fell asleep having read about half the book, and I finished the rest by noon the next day. Then after getting some more sleep, I went back on the Barnes and Nobles online University HP bookclub and chatting away with other folks all over the US that had read the book.
It was a great experience! If this year's is half as good, I'll be happy.
Wednesday, February 14, 2007
Finally moving along...
I’m working my way through “No Plot? No Problem?” by Chris Baty. The general message in this book seems to be that you don’t need to do any planning in order to write the 50,000 word rough draft of your novel. That it’s actually better not to. I know this approach doesn’t work for me, although I admit it could work very well for a more spontaneous, right-brain person.
The rest of the book is full of tips to get your through your one month typing spree.
Afterwards, I’ve found another book that looks like exactly what I need. "First Draft In 30 Days: A Novel Writer’s System for Building a Complete and Cohesive Manuscript" by Karen Wiesner. It contains a very exact plan to get from idea to detailed outline. She says the outline will be so detailed that it could be considered a first draft. This will be my next book for this goal.
Here’s a general timeline of her approach:
Days 1-6: Preliminary outlines and sketches
Days 7-13: Research
Days 14-15: Story evolution (ideas for beginning, middle, end)
Days 16-24: Formatted outline
Days 25-28: Evaluating the strength of theoutline
Days 29-30: Revising outline – and on Day 30, you’re to put this outline “on a shelf for at least two weeks to several months.”
In the meantime, I’m also reading through the lessons on http://hollylisle.com/. The one on mapping your “world” is very interesting. I think it will help me considerably to spend time doing that when I hit a wall on the outlining.
Interestingly I’ve noticed my daughter always takes time to download or draw pictures of the characters in her story, and she’s written more stories than I have.
Last but not least on Storyright.com , I’ve fleshed out the first chapter of one of my ideas. And I’ve briefly described chapters two and three. I’ve also begun to define the main characters in a fairly detailed manner. There’s still a lot of work to do, but I’m moving forward.
This is the furthest I’ve ever gotten!
The rest of the book is full of tips to get your through your one month typing spree.
Afterwards, I’ve found another book that looks like exactly what I need. "First Draft In 30 Days: A Novel Writer’s System for Building a Complete and Cohesive Manuscript" by Karen Wiesner. It contains a very exact plan to get from idea to detailed outline. She says the outline will be so detailed that it could be considered a first draft. This will be my next book for this goal.
Here’s a general timeline of her approach:
Days 1-6: Preliminary outlines and sketches
Days 7-13: Research
Days 14-15: Story evolution (ideas for beginning, middle, end)
Days 16-24: Formatted outline
Days 25-28: Evaluating the strength of theoutline
Days 29-30: Revising outline – and on Day 30, you’re to put this outline “on a shelf for at least two weeks to several months.”
In the meantime, I’m also reading through the lessons on http://hollylisle.com/. The one on mapping your “world” is very interesting. I think it will help me considerably to spend time doing that when I hit a wall on the outlining.
Interestingly I’ve noticed my daughter always takes time to download or draw pictures of the characters in her story, and she’s written more stories than I have.
Last but not least on Storyright.com , I’ve fleshed out the first chapter of one of my ideas. And I’ve briefly described chapters two and three. I’ve also begun to define the main characters in a fairly detailed manner. There’s still a lot of work to do, but I’m moving forward.
This is the furthest I’ve ever gotten!
Sunday, February 11, 2007
Solipsism
This wonderful word was brought to my attention by a poster on www.43things.com ( Gary ). He posts a lot of interesting things on science and language, among other things.
For some unexplained reason, this word struck my fancy and I, as usual, went off on a writing spree.
According to Solipsism on Wikipedia, "Solipsism is the philosophical idea that "I am the only mind that exists" ... that knowledge of anything outside the mind is unjustified. The external world and other minds cannot be known and may not exist."
From observing my children and others, I found that toddlers seem to believe the world around them sprang into existence when they became conscious, but as they grow older and reach the wonderful age of about three, their minds open to the fact that there is more out there.
That’s usually when fear enters a child’s life.
I have met some people that seem to keep that "innocence"; that live without thought of others and without fear. Yet they are outraged when anything happens that isn’t of their doing because in their "world-view" nothing can happen unless they make it happen. They appear incapable of looking ahead at all the possible outcomes because they limit "the world" to what exists inside their minds and in their experience.
Is it better or worse to be a solipsist?
A solipsist
exists
in a world of their making.
No worries have they
to plans gone astray.
But let the outside intrude
as it inevitably would
and the solipsist
insists
on the blame, abnegating.
(c) Maria Aleman 2007
I think that Jung’s collective unconscious is a variation on this. In this case, all the minds that agree on a particular “world-view” are creating it. In a way, they/we are, if you consider the “spread of culture” through the exchange of art, writings, music, philosophy, etc.
There is also the “create your day” idea of “What the Bleep do we know?” and the "The Secret”.
So are we all walking around within a bubble of personal reality? So that when two bubbles intersect, they either meld or they don’t? Does our acceptance or rejection of another person have something to do with this on a quantum physics level?
By observing a particle, do we really change it’s behavior?
I find this subject very interesting because I have often wondered what makes people act the way they do. I’m sure we’ve all heard someone say “How could they do that? They must be living in their own world!”
I wonder if maybe they are living in their own world and, if so, how does one get there? And is it unethical to just pop-on on them?
Solipsism takes “I think, therefore I am” to the next level, “I think, therefore you are!”
For some unexplained reason, this word struck my fancy and I, as usual, went off on a writing spree.
According to Solipsism on Wikipedia, "Solipsism is the philosophical idea that "I am the only mind that exists" ... that knowledge of anything outside the mind is unjustified. The external world and other minds cannot be known and may not exist."
From observing my children and others, I found that toddlers seem to believe the world around them sprang into existence when they became conscious, but as they grow older and reach the wonderful age of about three, their minds open to the fact that there is more out there.
That’s usually when fear enters a child’s life.
I have met some people that seem to keep that "innocence"; that live without thought of others and without fear. Yet they are outraged when anything happens that isn’t of their doing because in their "world-view" nothing can happen unless they make it happen. They appear incapable of looking ahead at all the possible outcomes because they limit "the world" to what exists inside their minds and in their experience.
Is it better or worse to be a solipsist?
A solipsist
exists
in a world of their making.
No worries have they
to plans gone astray.
But let the outside intrude
as it inevitably would
and the solipsist
insists
on the blame, abnegating.
(c) Maria Aleman 2007
I think that Jung’s collective unconscious is a variation on this. In this case, all the minds that agree on a particular “world-view” are creating it. In a way, they/we are, if you consider the “spread of culture” through the exchange of art, writings, music, philosophy, etc.
There is also the “create your day” idea of “What the Bleep do we know?” and the "The Secret”.
So are we all walking around within a bubble of personal reality? So that when two bubbles intersect, they either meld or they don’t? Does our acceptance or rejection of another person have something to do with this on a quantum physics level?
By observing a particle, do we really change it’s behavior?
I find this subject very interesting because I have often wondered what makes people act the way they do. I’m sure we’ve all heard someone say “How could they do that? They must be living in their own world!”
I wonder if maybe they are living in their own world and, if so, how does one get there? And is it unethical to just pop-on on them?
Solipsism takes “I think, therefore I am” to the next level, “I think, therefore you are!”
Saturday, February 3, 2007
Daylight Saving Time
How many people outside the computer world have heard of the U.S. Energy Policy Act of 2005?
I have this mental picture of a bunch of very bored people deciding to have some fun by changing something that is already totally unnecessary; costing companies and municipalities all over the US a lot of money (tax payer's money in the case of government agencies.)
Basically anything with a clock, and automagic timezone change for Daylight Savings Time, will need patching. Which means that customers (or users, as they were known when I started in this field years ago!) will have various disruptions of service while we, the support folks, work evenings and weekends to upgrade firmware, Operating systems and Java (Why does every package have an embedded Java? Some of my servers have 20+ instances of Java installed! ok, that's another subject.).
Some "middle-ware" software also has a built-in time mechanism so each separate piece of software on every server has to be researched, patches downloaded, tested and then outages scheduled with customers before we take our personal time to do the actual work.
By the way this includes YOUR personal computer! If you use Windows, the Windows Update has, or will have at some point before March 11th at 2:00am, the necessary patches. If you have non-windows software installed, check each vendor for their particular approach to dealing with this man-made non-emergency emergency. I don't know what Apple is doing for this, sorry.
Apparently, from what I read, the issue is not the 1 hour difference in time, but the change of timezone from, for example, EST to DST. Client/Server software doesn't like situations where incorrect timezones are used. I recall one specific problem years ago, the mainframe had been mistakenly left at GMT but the time matched EST. My servers were set to EST with the correct time. We were implementing a package and having one of those "bang your head against the wall" moments when nothing made sense. Turned out that because the mainframe was "logically" in the UK, the software said its time was off by 5 hours from the client time! The maximum allowable time difference was 5 minutes, so therefore no connection!
So we are looking at... no backups! no job scheduler! no client/server connections.
If you take all the money that is being wasted on this effort, we could probably go a long way towards shoring up all the levies around the US that are ready to go!
As a point of interest, in some versions of UNIX there will be an overflow situation in the date/time in 2038. Get more information on that here: Unix time and Year 2038 problem
I have this mental picture of a bunch of very bored people deciding to have some fun by changing something that is already totally unnecessary; costing companies and municipalities all over the US a lot of money (tax payer's money in the case of government agencies.)
Basically anything with a clock, and automagic timezone change for Daylight Savings Time, will need patching. Which means that customers (or users, as they were known when I started in this field years ago!) will have various disruptions of service while we, the support folks, work evenings and weekends to upgrade firmware, Operating systems and Java (Why does every package have an embedded Java? Some of my servers have 20+ instances of Java installed! ok, that's another subject.).
Some "middle-ware" software also has a built-in time mechanism so each separate piece of software on every server has to be researched, patches downloaded, tested and then outages scheduled with customers before we take our personal time to do the actual work.
By the way this includes YOUR personal computer! If you use Windows, the Windows Update has, or will have at some point before March 11th at 2:00am, the necessary patches. If you have non-windows software installed, check each vendor for their particular approach to dealing with this man-made non-emergency emergency. I don't know what Apple is doing for this, sorry.
Apparently, from what I read, the issue is not the 1 hour difference in time, but the change of timezone from, for example, EST to DST. Client/Server software doesn't like situations where incorrect timezones are used. I recall one specific problem years ago, the mainframe had been mistakenly left at GMT but the time matched EST. My servers were set to EST with the correct time. We were implementing a package and having one of those "bang your head against the wall" moments when nothing made sense. Turned out that because the mainframe was "logically" in the UK, the software said its time was off by 5 hours from the client time! The maximum allowable time difference was 5 minutes, so therefore no connection!
So we are looking at... no backups! no job scheduler! no client/server connections.
If you take all the money that is being wasted on this effort, we could probably go a long way towards shoring up all the levies around the US that are ready to go!
As a point of interest, in some versions of UNIX there will be an overflow situation in the date/time in 2038. Get more information on that here: Unix time and Year 2038 problem
Update my resume
www.43things.com is a wonderful web-site for those of us that love lists. Recently I put "update my resume" on my list of things I want to do. I’m not sure exactly why I put this on my list, but I think it shows that the level of BS at work may have finally hit some subconscious threshold.
I took this job in 1990 when my oldest started preschool. Not that I was a work-at-home mom, but my job was eleven miles away from the preschool. Until then she had been at a daycare a few blocks away from my job. Eleven miles may not seem like a lot, but in Miami, especially with pre-H. Andrew traffic patterns, it could be an hour to an hour and a half to travel those eleven miles. All it would take is a car accident on the expressway and I wouldn’t be able to pick her up at the end of the day.
So I took a job close by. I don’t regret it. The stress was less, the hours more flexible and the pay about the same. I’ve very rarely been bored, and there’s always new things to learn if I do find myself bored at work (those days are gone forever!).
The last seventeen years have been educational, interesting and as I said never boring, definitely my kind of job. Unfortunately in the last two years or so, management has become somewhat erratic in their decision-making. My position is not hourly and it’s not exempt, it’s “job-basis”. Garbage pickup folks are also job-basis. It means you are given a job, and you take however long you need to do it, and then you are done. In the case of the garbage pickup, the routes are fairly well established, but in my case, the work is continually piled up whether or not it is more than a normal workload.
I’ve been a systems programmer since 1980, so I know there are times that projects require 60 or even 80 hours of work in a week, and there’s the support tasks on top of that, as well as, on-call duties. But usually those are scheduled. Now we find ourselves in a position where we have lost three people in the last two years (one was promoted, one position was never filled and subsequently taken back, and the third was fired). The workload has increased by about 300% from the time we had three people in the group. There are now two of us. Even working 16 hours a day, we couldn’t catch up because management, in all it’s wisdom, refuses to let us take outages on the servers to perform said work.
So basically as the senior person in the “group”, I document everything so I can have that piece of paper ready to hold up in the meeting (after something fails because we couldn’t do Preventive Maintenance), and attempt to use it to cover my umm… donkey. That part of my job is a waste of time, effort and tax-payers money.
Anyway, I’ve thought of moving on, but my kids are still in school. The correct thing is to survive until my youngest goes to college in about four years, and then move on. I can get a job in any municipality that participates in the Florida retirement plan and keep my longevity (at least towards retirement). Homes are much cheaper, and bigger and newer further north.
But I see myself putting “update my resume” on my list of things to do now. Along with a separate goal "get my certifications" this shows a definite shift in attitude towards finding a new job.
For now I will get my certifications, keep them current and keep my resume updated. Maybe familiarizing myself with with government shops have UNIX would be useful, too.
I took this job in 1990 when my oldest started preschool. Not that I was a work-at-home mom, but my job was eleven miles away from the preschool. Until then she had been at a daycare a few blocks away from my job. Eleven miles may not seem like a lot, but in Miami, especially with pre-H. Andrew traffic patterns, it could be an hour to an hour and a half to travel those eleven miles. All it would take is a car accident on the expressway and I wouldn’t be able to pick her up at the end of the day.
So I took a job close by. I don’t regret it. The stress was less, the hours more flexible and the pay about the same. I’ve very rarely been bored, and there’s always new things to learn if I do find myself bored at work (those days are gone forever!).
The last seventeen years have been educational, interesting and as I said never boring, definitely my kind of job. Unfortunately in the last two years or so, management has become somewhat erratic in their decision-making. My position is not hourly and it’s not exempt, it’s “job-basis”. Garbage pickup folks are also job-basis. It means you are given a job, and you take however long you need to do it, and then you are done. In the case of the garbage pickup, the routes are fairly well established, but in my case, the work is continually piled up whether or not it is more than a normal workload.
I’ve been a systems programmer since 1980, so I know there are times that projects require 60 or even 80 hours of work in a week, and there’s the support tasks on top of that, as well as, on-call duties. But usually those are scheduled. Now we find ourselves in a position where we have lost three people in the last two years (one was promoted, one position was never filled and subsequently taken back, and the third was fired). The workload has increased by about 300% from the time we had three people in the group. There are now two of us. Even working 16 hours a day, we couldn’t catch up because management, in all it’s wisdom, refuses to let us take outages on the servers to perform said work.
So basically as the senior person in the “group”, I document everything so I can have that piece of paper ready to hold up in the meeting (after something fails because we couldn’t do Preventive Maintenance), and attempt to use it to cover my umm… donkey. That part of my job is a waste of time, effort and tax-payers money.
Anyway, I’ve thought of moving on, but my kids are still in school. The correct thing is to survive until my youngest goes to college in about four years, and then move on. I can get a job in any municipality that participates in the Florida retirement plan and keep my longevity (at least towards retirement). Homes are much cheaper, and bigger and newer further north.
But I see myself putting “update my resume” on my list of things to do now. Along with a separate goal "get my certifications" this shows a definite shift in attitude towards finding a new job.
For now I will get my certifications, keep them current and keep my resume updated. Maybe familiarizing myself with with government shops have UNIX would be useful, too.
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