2003-12-24 - 4:17 p.m.

Welcome home, how ya been?

Well, I moved back home today. Yes, I know, I don't think I told you I had moved away from home. But I spent most of December away. Before I scare anybody, I'm talking about "home" at work. About six weeks ago, I was pulled away from my usual tasks and put on a very high visibility, high-powered, mission critical project. An odd set of circumstances arose such that I was the perfect, and almost the only, person, for the job. For the first three weeks it was fun and kinda crazy, because we were in a mad rush for the drop-dead date. It took a lot of overtime, which was good in several ways - first of all, I get paid for overtime, which is cool; second, my situation is such that I can work late with no notice with no trouble at all. The fact that I was willing and able to do that impressed people. Kinda sad, huh? But being able to happily make the company your life is extremely valued, and they hit me at a good time, so I was here.

About three weeks ago, the drop-dead date arrived, and we were ready, thanks in no small part to my brilliance (pardon me while I shine my badge). We hit the ground running, and promptly skidded right into a wall. NOT MY FAULT. Although there were some tense moments, and someone did say sternly to me that it would be determined who should have taken care of that situation before it arose. Finger pointing and blame assignment are two favorite intramural sports around here. But yeah yeah whatever. Being a temp/consultant/contractor/whatever is truly a freeing thing. When I'm already living on borrowed time, there's nothing they can threaten to take from me that I didn't figure was going soon anyway. I care about my work and my projects, and I give 100%. (By the way - none of that "110%" crap. I'm way too mathematical for that. Once you make it possible to give more than 100%, just stop using the percentages in your speech. You've made them meaningless.) But being a temp takes away the need to sink too deeply into the local politics. That may be good and bad. It's certainly good for my mental health, possibly bad for career development. However, I'm currently of the opinion that career development is a myth anyway.

So where was I? Oh yeah, smashed into a wall. Well, this is what led to my move away from home. Everyone got together in a room, and we "massaged the opportunity." The original solution was working, but needed constant babysitting. To correct that, we came up with an option A and an option B - and decided to do both. Option A was quicker but temporary, and Option B was slower and more permanent. You know that saying, Fast, Cheap and Right - pick any two? Well, A was fast and B was right. Neither was cheap. May I please mention at this point that I was the only one in the room who pointed out that A was neither right nor cheap? Thank you. We'll be coming back to that point later. However, at the time, I was very nearly literally laughed at. Oh ha ha, that kind of money is nothing to us. Poor na�ve little temp child, we spent more than that on those magic beans we bought from that Jack kid last month. Do not worry yourself with such things, but aren't you cute to attempt to contribute.

Whatever. So as part of this whirlwind of important decisions, it was decided I should move from one area to another. Before I or my supervisor (who thankfully, was in the room, so I didn�t have to be the one to explain why I was being kidnapped) could blink, someone had been dispatched to move my computer from my old cube to a new one.

So for the past three weeks, I've been not only a temp, but an �ber-temp; temporarily living in a new department. They couldn't have put me further away if they tried. I'm not exaggerating to tell you that these departments are so far apart, when you go out for lunch, there are whole different sets of restaurants people go to. Even though there is technically one big parking lot for the whole company, if someone were coming to visit me from outside (which of course no one ever does), I'd give them entirely different directions from the highway to get to one department vs the other. It's a difference of two whole stoplights.

About a week after my big move, two things happened: Option A was completed. A work of art if I do say so myself. Fully tested and ready to go. Everyone was thrilled. However, at the same time, Option B got to a point where the team estimated it could be completed in another few days. Don't ask me how, with development not completed and no testing done - but that was their estimate. So, a half hour before Option A was set to go live, the decision was made that guess what... since A wasn't the permanent solution, it wasn't worth that last expenditure it would take to implement it. Picture asking two teams to build you a car. One is building an economy car and the other is building a luxury car. You pay them both for their time, let them buy engine parts, get body work done, and do endless detailing. At the last minute you decide the luxury car is looking so cool, you don't want to spend the money to buy tires for the econony car, even though it's ready except for that.

So for want of tires, my nice economy car sits there and won't ever be driven. The luxury car.... guess what, it's going to take a *little* longer than they thought. But soon, really, soon. Meanwhile they're still getting along with that original motor scooter I rebuilt for them. And it really is getting them where they want to go.

But everything is cool (to avoid an expression I detest, "it's all good"). I impressed some people who are good people to impress, certainly kept me from being bored, and solving some of the developmental issues gave me a logical and algebraic workout that was really a lot of fun. I kind of impressed myself with some of the stuff I did. I also seem to have borrowed myself a bit more time - I'm told there are some line items on next quarter's budget that have to do with keeping me on for "a little while."

Plus it was kind of nice moving "home" today - they kinda acted glad I was back. Nice to be missed, to whatever extent.

And now I'm off work until 2004! Too bad I haven't had a paid vacation day since 2002!

my mood -

the mood of the whole world wide bleepin' web -