Birthdays

Looking at all the birthdays celebrated yesterday is bitter sweet and makes me kinda sad. Today would have been my father's 70th. However, there's nothing like the Pet Parade to cheer one up!

Great day

What an attitude adjustment I've had today. It's so nice to get out, go to a ballgame and then hang with the fellas afterwords for some beers, brats and bean bags. I great day all around. Happy birthday to Tom, Cindy, Phil and Gabe.

Anticipation

Tomorrow is Friday which also happens to be my first scheduled (and granted) vacation day is quite a while. Not sure how long it's been. I'm scheduled to go on our annual "Trifecta" which is a round of golf in the morning, a baseball game in the afternoon and then a pub crawl to end the evening. I'm stoked; ready to rock.

Update: We just cancelled golf because there is a 70% chance that there will be thunderous downpours in the AM. (Friday...Showers and thunderstorms likely. Some thunderstorms may produce heavy downpours and gusty winds. Highs around 80. Southwest winds 10 to 20 mph. Chance of rain 70 percent.) This is not good news. It's now a biathlon...

Bedtime already?

It's 9pm and I'm going to bed. What a lifestyle change I'm going through...

Perspective

Jon and Kate plus eight:
http://tlc.discovery.com/tv/jon-and-kate/jon-and-kate.html

I am NOT the helpdesk, part deux

I decided to assist. Guess what, my advice was spot-on and the issue was resolved. While I feel great that their issue is resolved, it's troubling as they now have faith that I can fix things... Double-edged sword here. I love family and all its units.

On a side note, Katie and I got outside today for the first time in quite a while. We actually took Amanda shopping with us - that is a major accomplishment. In the afternoon, we loaded her up in the "Sherpani" infant backpack (very cool - http://sherpani.us/product.aspx?bO3FscouH=1&GQd0EjaqX=6&pmdoXJC4W=31) which my sister was gracious enough to lend us and we went to Cold Stone for some ice cream. Oh how my mood has improved. I'm ready to start the work week at 0700 tomorrow.

I am NOT the helpdesk

Folks who work in IT speak many different languages, but when it comes to providing technical support for our family and friends we have a common voice - we are not the help desk. Call someone else.

Today is Memorial Day (happy Memorial Day to all those protecting us from ourselves) and I am in my basement *trying* to leave the house to run some errrands with my wife and child. I haven't left the house on the weekend for the past 2+ months and it's starting to wear me out. I feel trapped and it's not healthy. I could use some support from the rest of my teammates, but they don't step up. Don't offer to help; help. They go on with their weekend party livestyles and let the family man suck it up. After all I am their manager so it's fitting. Or is it? I'm too hard on them.

I have to really thank Roger who works harder than I do. He's been doing this line of support far longer than I have. He truly is Superman...

On top of all that, I get a call from a family member who just experienced a BSOD (blue screen of death) from their computer. Where do I go with this? I am not the help desk. I am an IT manager who is on call 24x7 for a platform that generates millions of dollars per year and touches the lives of millions. I work every day, even holidays and haven't had a vacation day...I cannot even remember when. No, I don't want to do more.

Migration a success

There are still open items, but suffic it to say that the migration of one of our company's core components was a success.

Much improved

Even though I've been working all weekend I have the comfort that it's at home and on my terms. No one walking up to my desk; no distractions.

On a side note, there's this core group of individiuals from many different teams at work that have been on conference calls hammering out some last-minute show-stoppers; some are directors, others managers and so on. We're starting to argue like a family.

You can clearly see the lines drawn as to who is the grandmother, father and spoiled brat. It's refreshingly funny to listen in while we lose time spent with our families or anything else that might be going on in our personal lives to solve these problems that will soon be distant memories.

Mood

Man am I moody today. If it's not one thing, it's something else blowing up at work. One step forward, three steps back. As I've stated before, I can't get any traction on the five simple tasks I need to knock out that are on my plate because someone starts a fire and we have to call in the fire department to look at it and so on and blah blah blah.

I'm searching through my mind as I hide in a conference room eating lunch to avoid any more BS and I don't even know what my touch points are. That bothers me. There's always some one *thing* at the root cause of my woe and cannot put my finger on it. Maybe a relaxing weekend with my family will help. Oh, that's right, you'll be working again tonight and on Saturday. Hmmm.

Aren't you mister negativity!

I just read my previous post. It sounds so negative. I must have been venting.

Outsider

I don't know if it's because I am married or too old or just unpopular... For the first time, two or more co-workers kept me completely out of the loop tonight on a happy hour or birthday party or...well, I don't care what it was because I was never invited. For some reason, I feel cheated, the low man on the totem pole, unliked and disappointed. None of those are the feelings that I needed to add onto my already stressful day.

Could I have attended? Maybe, maybe not. The invite is the compliment that one never minds refusing. It says, "you're included, you belong and we enjoy spending time with you". Why does this bother me? These people don't really care about me and it's just a job. My real focus should be on my wife and child; the people that aren't so transparent in my life. Now, don't expect any sympathy from me if you come in hungover tomorrow...

Some days, I find it difficult to keep it all together. As we get closer and closer to conclusion on some very large and lengthy projects we are starting to slip. We're starting to slip collectively and I don't know how to right the ship. I don't even know who the captain is. Is it me? If so, we need a new one quick because this captain is losing his grip on the mainsail.

These are the nice mornings

Although several of us were up late into the night working, I feel refreshed when I walk out of my house to walk to the train. It rained last night and the air is ripe with the smells of flowers and aromatic mulch laid down recently at the townhomes next door.

It signals to me that summer is just around the corner. It will brighten everyone's disposition and outlook, both professionally and personally.

Fine line

Hmmm, I like to think that I don't get too stressed out or take things to seriously at work. After all, health, friends and family are far more important. Recently, I find myself hypersensitve to anything that can go wrong within our environment and more difficult to get along with. I'm always on edge.

We are in the middle of a data center migration and anyone that is involved in IT in even the most peripheral role knows that this is a very tricky thing to do. It's particularly tricky when the "product" we are trying to move is completely custom code and takes months if not years to really know all the bits and pieces and how they interact.

Luckily, we have and ace on our staff. Gabe puts in long hours and complains very little. He's the man behind the curtain and I hope he's able to see the light at the end of the tunnel. Times are rough for all of us. We've got a handful of manual processes to do each day because certain projects were launched before they could be supported or automated. So, the automation becomes a human. But at what cost?

All these distractions are just that; distracting. We spend more time hand-holding instead of focusing on making our product better and more supportable. I guess that will come with time. Once this tunnel ends and we do see the sun shine again, we can start pressing for improvements. Until then, we monkey though it and take the knocks.

Hazzardous

Today, I watched the recent remake of my beloved "Dukes of Hazzard". It wasn't very good or true to the original premise of the wildly popular TV series from the early 80's. Sad.

They portrayed Bo and Luke to be NASCAR-loving morons who only happen to solve situations that they got themselves into by happenstance.

Jessica Simpson, while not the best choise for Daisey, certainly got herself into teriffic shape for the role and was rewarded with at least 7 T&A scenes. That was mildly entertaining. I'm glad I didn't pay money to see it in the theater...

I could not get over the casting of "Mr. Friendly" from LOST as Roscoe. "We're gonna have to take the boy".

Burt Reynolds as Boss Hogg also seemed odd. I was waiting for "The Bandit" T-Top TransAm to make an appearance. There certainly was plenty of CB radio use, however.

You know you had a good week when...

Today marks the third concecutive day that the train doors on my Metra line have opened right in front of me. It's a suburban sport; you can stand anywhere you want along the 8+ car-long platform, but once the train finishes pulling into the platform, there is a surge towards the doors to get "the best seat". If you are expeerienced and have a good train engineer, he'll stop in the same spot each time thereby allowing you to predict where to stand. I've had a good week.