|
Carefully, Correctly Wrong
|
|
|
| The Stress / Relaxation Cycle |
[Oct. 18th, 2009|10:02 pm] |
Hmm, have spent the day being nice and relaxed, catching up on e-mail backlog and RSS, reading a book, playing computer games and so on. I decided to skip the Mark Burgess gig to give myself some more relaxation time.
Now it's gone 10pm and I need to apply for a job, carefully respond to some job-related e-mail, move some boxes to the basement and do a dozen other things. I've not spent time with ![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif) greyeyedeve as intended, and I'm feeling pretty stressed out and crappy. Sounds like I could do with a day of chilling out to recuperate...
I'm getting fed up of this endless cycle now. |
|
|
| Swine Flu |
[Sep. 24th, 2009|04:20 pm] |
| [ | Tags | | | health, work | ] |
| [ | mood |
| |  curious | ] |
| [ | music |
| | Robyn - "Dream On" | ] |
Somebody I was in reasonably close contact with over the weekend has been diagnosed with Swine Flu. I've got a bit of a sore throat, headache, runny nose and dodgy stomach, though at least 50% of those are symptoms of stress which I definitely have. I'm going to pick up a thermometer on the way home - if my temperature goes above 38C / 100F, I'm not allowed into work.
I'm not entirely worried about this development - it's fairly unlikely I've got it, and it won't be the end of the world if I do (though it'd be extra crap for greyeyedeve). Frankly I like the idea of another two weeks away from the office ;)
Update: Bah, my temperature's normal for now at least. |
|
|
| Job Fail |
[Sep. 16th, 2009|04:13 pm] |
| [ | Tags | | | lib dems, work | ] |
| [ | music |
| | My Life With The Thrill Kill Kult - "The Smash-Up" | ] |
I didn't get an interview for job I applied for a fortnight ago, as a PA for the Liberal Democrats. I will e-mail them and request feedback.
And now, My Life With The Thrill Kill Kult, at ear-splitting volume. |
|
|
| Left Hand, Right Hand, Arse, Elbow |
[Jul. 6th, 2009|11:16 am] |
| [ | Tags | | | work | ] |
| [ | mood |
| |  pissed off | ] |
| [ | music |
| | Nine Inch Nails - "Self Destruction (final)" | ] |
I find it hilarious that my New corporate Overlords have been so disturbed by the results of a recent employee satisfaction survey that they've instituted a special committee to improve staff morale, while at the same time cancelling the free Monday morning bacon butties, soft drinks and coffee... |
|
|
| Job Update |
[Apr. 16th, 2009|10:47 pm] |
Thanks for all your comments on my recent work dilemma. I'm sorry I didn't reply to many of them on LJ (though a few sparked conversation on IM or IRL), but I did read and consider them - I was just a little busy thinking about the issue to be able to put things into words. I'm particularly grateful for the support I've received from my fellow identity activists. I've had a few phone calls from very busy people who've taken time out from opposing the database state to discuss my concerns and offer me support.
From the perspective of my personal wellbeing and that of greyeyedeve, it doesn't make sense for me to quit a well-paid job because another part of my organisation many miles away is working on something I don't like. If I were required to work on it myself, I'd refuse, and the company's big enough that they could employ me elsewhere - meaning they'd get into trouble if they tried to fire me over it.
One thing that's been pressed upon me over the weekend is that from the perspective of identity activism, my personal wellbeing is important. I dedicate many hours each and every week to this important cause (and you should really join, donate or get involved locally). I don't have a lot of free time - I'm mostly still working where I am because I've not had time to pursue other career opportunities. If I had to find a job urgently, it would take away valuable campaigning time at a critical moment. I would end up in a job with no protection, in a recession, and hence be under more pressure to curtail my extracurricular activities in favour of overtime to impress my new bosses.
The upshot of this is, predictably, that I'm not going to quit my job in protest. It would do more harm than good for the cause, and would obviously have negative effects on my life in other areas. But at least I've thought about the decision carefully, with a lot of support and advice from a lot of lovely people.
Incidentally, hacking the systems from inside isn't going to be an option - even if I were prepared to risk dismissal for gross misconduct and never working in IT again, my employer is sufficiently canny about security that I wouldn't stand a chance of getting near it. |
|
|
| Sitting in a chair, crying "What am I gonna do with my life?" |
[Apr. 7th, 2009|12:33 pm] |
I've been given an extension over the bank holiday weekend to return my new employment contract; my personnel manager seemed to understand why I might have personal ethical concerns with working for the company, and I appreciate him being receptive to that.
On the other hand, I'm pretty unimpressed with the behaviour both of my co-workers and my potential fellow-employees-to-be; the latter in particular have been entirely disinterested in the issue, coming up with crap like it's not an ethical decision, it's a business decision to try to justify the company's involvement in the scheme. If I can't manage to convince the people around me that the National Identity Scheme is a bad thing, what good am I doing? |
|
|
| Job Prospects |
[Apr. 6th, 2009|11:54 pm] |
Just found out that my glorious new employers have signed a contract with the Home Office to provide part of the National Identity Register, the authoritarian über-database at the heart of the Identity Cards scheme, which will give the Government unprecedented ability to observe and control the people of this country.
Obviously as a supporter of NO2ID (and you should really join, donate or get involved locally), I'm not happy about this. My corporate overlords keep pretending to be an ethically-minded organisation, though they've enabled fascism before...
On a personal level, the Identity Cards Act 2006 gives the Home Office sweeping powers to ensure the smooth rollout of the scheme. It doesn't seem beyond the possibility of the legislation that they would have the power to search the homes of employees of the contractors without a warrant. This is obviously something I don't want to happen to me.
I'm sitting here with my new employment contract waiting to be signed, which has to happen by Wednesday, and the temptation right now is strong just to throw the damn thing in the shredder. However, in a recession, with precarious finances, I'm not sure I can afford to be blas about the fact that I have a job that it's quite hard to sack me from.
I don't know what to do. I can't stand the thought of my labour going to enrich bastards who'll prey off people's civil liberties for a quick buck, but I don't want to end up unable to pay the bills by quitting. I keep thinking that I should have been more aggressive at jobhunting months ago, then I wouldn't be in this damn situation. Hell, even if I'd filled in the paperwork last weekend as planned, I wouldn't have to sign the fucking contract finally knowing what amoral scum I'm committing myself to...
Update: Just to make it clear, I'm not going to be working on the NIR itself - my department work on entirely different technology. Still, it'd be hypocritical of me to campaign against the Database State while taking money from one of hte main companies involved. |
|
|
| General Update |
[Apr. 3rd, 2009|04:28 pm] |
Whoa, long time no LJ. It's indicative of just how bloody busy I've been recently. I don't feel like I've been getting much accomplished though.
Still, when I think back over the last few weeks, it seems that things are progressing - I've now got the last bookshelf assembled and fixed to the wall, laden with books (freeing up another shelf for the DVDs which were piled dangerously on top of a CD rack). I've acquired a rather comfy office chair for use with the desktop, which is great to keep greyeyedeve in a comfortable position when geeking, and also an exercise bike so she can keep in good shape. I'm looking at replacing wibblefish's TV, which is starting to flicker, with a large TFT and a new computer which can double as a PVR - this will take up less space in the living room too.
I've been doing a lot of Lib Dem leaflet delivery, often assisted by tartful_dodger. It's nice, and I'm getting to know a new ward, but also quite daunting - we've got an aggressive delivery schedule for the next 12 months and I'm struggling to cope as it is. I need more help but I'm not sure how to get it. The Moston by-election isn't helping me here, I must admit, and I've been too busy holding my own fort to go help out there. Identity activism is pretty stagnant right now. More people are volunteering to do stuff, but not enough and I'm having difficulty keeping track. LGBT Lib Dem stuff seems to have hit a bit of a rut - my accounts are overdue but I'm mostly concentrating on improving our Pride presences and campaigning.
Work has been utterly hectic. The integration process with our new corporate overlords is long and complicated, we're having to shift piles of kit around and we're learning new skills faster than we can disseminate them around the team, meaning that one or two of us are becoming single points of failure. This makes us look bad when somebody asks us to fix something and the only person who knows how to is busy with another task that only they know how to do. I've got mountains of paperwork to fill in for my new employment contract, and I'm pretty disappointed that I didn't get a pay rise with my new position.
Socially I've been out and about a little - since my last proper update I've been to the theatre with mr_turnip, minnesattva and taimatsu. Eve's new wheelchair has made spending time out and about with much more possible, and we've been out for lunch together as well as going to see Watchmen. After a few days on the buses, I fixed my broken spoke following tobestool's advice, and taking steps to avoid torsion. Took me a while to get sorted due to other commitments, but I'm back on the road and much happier for it.
I'm feeling pretty run down at the moment - there's a lot of stress in my vicinity, even if little of it affects me directly. I've been off work for the last couple of days with a headcold which has been going around, feeling like I'm letting my team down. Hopefully this weekend should be relaxing and productive without being stressful, and I can get back to work next week. |
|
|
| Exhausting Week |
[Feb. 20th, 2009|12:33 pm] |
| [ | Tags | | | lib dems, work | ] |
| [ | mood |
| |  exhausted | ] |
| [ | music |
| | Black Sabbath - "Iron Man" | ] |
Gosh, this week has been one of the most draining I've had for some time. I've been on the early shift at work with an 8:30am start, well ahead of my usual 10am. The upshot of this is that I'm supposed to head home at 4pm - but the two people on the late shift have been off sick, so I've been helping the rest of the team cover. Between that sickness and holiday, we've been short-staffed in one of our busiest weeks yet.
I've also not been getting much sleep - taimatsu, tartful_dodger and greyeyedeve are all people I've been spending evening-time with, and I'd much rather be up and talking to them than sleeping. I've also had a bunch of meetings and activism keeping my evenings busy.
Still, I'm ditching at 4 today no matter what, and going home to sleep and snuggle with Eve. Tonight will involve DVDs and takeaway curry; tomorrow Eve and I will sort out our joint account for paying bills, and go to the cinema. On Sunday I'm Lib Demming and probably meeting up with Olly in the evening. |
|
|
| Moving Forwards |
[Feb. 8th, 2009|01:27 pm] |
I'm not having much time to blog of late; I'm sure this comes as a relief to many of you. Work is very busy but pleasantly so - it's much better to have a job where there's too much to do than too little. This week I managed to get some bigger projects wrapped up, and I've been concentrating on proposing beneficial infrastructural work to make my day-to-day job a bit easier.
I wasn't offered the Salford Uni job. I didn't do enough research on the department beforehand - probably because I've been mad busy, and I didn't stress my Windows skills enough. I do need to brush up on Windows more, since I've been lucky enough to avoid it since before XP came out, and I'm sure it's changed since then (though my brief experience of XP on my ThinkPad suggested that it's as noddy as ever). Now I need to start jobhunting again, which is another pressure on my time. |
|
|
| Work Update |
[Jan. 24th, 2009|09:08 pm] |
| [ | Tags | | | work | ] |
| [ | mood |
| |  hopeful | ] |
My second week as a sysadmin continues to be busy - I've been conducting a fixed asset audit which involves crawling around on the floor looking at the backs of people's computers for serial numbers and trying not to knock out any important cables while doing so.
I've also been attempting to resolve an issue with management in my team - at the end of my second week it's not something that has yet affected me directly, but it's been causing stress in the team for months and it's time that something constructive was done about it. I don't think my manager was happy with the new boy approaching him and his own manager on behalf of the team, but it seems there's newfound optimism and happiness among my co-workers which will be important with the huge amount of upcoming work.
Even if there are repercussions, they may not affect me for long; I've got a job interview on Friday at Salford University for a GNU/Linux technician and lab demonstrator, specialising in thin client technology; I'm playing around with both the free and proprietary versions of NX to brush up, since it's been ages since I deployed them at work.
Trouble is, while this is a good job, and better than the one I currently have (apart from hassle with a longer commute to Salford), it does present me with a problem - I'm aware of an even better one coming up at Manchester University. It's doing sysadmin for a medical research place, not dissimilar from my old post at Cancer Research. The pay's better than Salford, the commute is more convenient (direct 197 bus, or a shorter cycle than I have at the moment), and it'll keep me around the Uni campus which will be handy for a lot of activism stuff.
Unfortunately I'll probably have to give a yay / nay to the Salford job before I even get an interview for the Manchester one. Not sure what my options are here - accepting the Salford job and not taking it could have repercussions. I'll have to double-check with my Dad. |
|
|
| (no subject) |
[Jan. 13th, 2009|10:26 am] |
| [ | Tags | | | health, work | ] |
| [ | mood |
| | busy | ] |
| [ | music |
| | Sneaker Pimps - "Half Life" | ] |
I managed to be in bed around midnight last night and slept very soundly. Unfortunately today has been a bit stressful - my cardiac arrythmia has been playing up and I've been feeling a bit under the weather. That was before the city centre power failure knocked all our systems offline, leading to panicked sysadmins running around gracefully unpowering our network before the UPS generators died - and taking advantage of the downtime to recable some of the switch infrastructure.
The day has been improved immensely by skiving off during the outage and meeting arkhamsprincess for lunch at Taurus. Chocolate and orange bread and butter pudding is an unusual concoction, but they managed to pull it off admirably. Also, chocolate fudge cake which actually tastes of fudge rather than just chocolate for the win. We then went and perused laptops at Morgan Computers, but annoyingly their website doesn't have their full range, and they didn't have any deadtree catalogues. I suggested Pixie do a comparison with Laptops Direct anyway.
Now I'm back at the office and getting down and grubbing around with some of the random breakages which have been caused by the outage. I'm documenting them to make sure we can fix them properly in future. I am also shedding bits of Pixie-glitter over my desk :) |
|
|
| People's Republic of Sysadministan |
[Jan. 12th, 2009|09:06 pm] |
| [ | Tags | | | work | ] |
| [ | mood |
| | relieved | ] |
Something positive has happened at work! I have been put into the sysadmin team on a six-month secondment as an extra pair of hands during the technical merger with our new owners.
As people may well know, I've worked as a sysadmin a lot in the past, with omega_amigo and others. On the one hand, this is a retrograde step in my career to go back to an old job title, but on the other I've never seen such a diverse setup as we have here, and there'd plenty to learn even if my skills weren't rusty. Given that shell scripting for decade-old Solaris systems is the only new stuff I've learned in three years of being promised qualifications and then fobbed off, I'm in dire need of updating my skill set.
Last night I found myself awake at 4am, desperately trying to finish off the last piece of work for my old team. It's never going to get used, there's no real specification for what it's supposed to do other than help people, and I've been hacking away at it for about six months. I tidied it up, put it into Subversion, added some documentation and washed my hands of it.
Today, apart from the desk move and setting myself up on the sysadmin systems (including taking my home directory off the central file server and onto the private sysadmin network), I ended up patching in some desktop switches and phones for some visiting staff. Then towards the end of the day I was helping a user diagnose a problem that involved some VLAN routing. I've never done much with VLANs before, and was working alongside some of my team, but managed to get to the root of the problem with a little perserverance, and avoided making any particularly stupid mistakes.
I went home at a vaguely sensible time, with a palpable sense of happiness at having achieved something. I don't remember the last time that happened, but it's probably over a year ago. This doesn't affect my long-term plans but may well make the next few months a lot more bearable. |
|
|
| Back to Work |
[Jan. 4th, 2009|08:45 pm] |
| [ | Tags | | | work | ] |
| [ | mood |
| | depressed | ] |
Back to work tomorrow, my first day back since Christmas Eve. I'm a bit pissed off that I've taken holiday for the time between Christmas and New Year, but I hear that many of my co-workers who didn't have just failed to turn up. Either way, I'm going to go back to more boredom, feeling undervalued, working on pointless projects with no direction or ending, waiting to be assigned to another team I don't want doing another job I don't like.
My attempts to apply for other jobs have all failed so far; I've got an outstanding application for a position at Salford Uni, but I'm not holding my breath. I've got to get out of where I am, as soon as possible. But until that happens I've got to drag myself out every day and make it to the office.
I said that I didn't want to just swap to another private sector IT job, and that I wanted to take my time to find something which would be more fulfilling and rewarding, as well as more accepting of my desire to do politics, but I'm just not sure how long I can keep up the daily grind. |
|
|
| Blue Rinse Fail |
[Dec. 14th, 2008|11:41 pm] |
So given that my employer has recently been taken over by a certain large American corporation, I have been planning to dye my hair blue for a while. I didn't manage to do it before the recent day-long indoctrination meeting, and figured with my upcoming schedule that tonight would be the only chance before work's Christmas party.
Things were pretty promising at first, but the dye just hasn't taken; it's ended up a sort of blue-tinted grey, and I've got no chance of doing anything else with it this week.
Meh. |
|
|
| Hippy Music |
[Dec. 3rd, 2008|04:17 pm] |
You know you're an enthusiast of free software and open formats when you realise that your work computer hasn't been able to play MP3 files since it was reinstalled the other week, and you didn't notice because all your music is in Vorbis...
Had a day off sick with this cold yesterday. I deliberately didn't get up and do activisty things, just actually spent a day relaxing, lying in bed, failing to get dressed, pottering on the laptop. I also missed BiPhoria! for which I'm sorry, but frankly it was just what I needed. Still lacking job motivation, but doing better than I have been.
Tonight I'm off to a bi meeting after work, followed by a Lib Dem one. I need a shave when I get home - I'm having my photo taken tomorrow for my new Corporate ID Card. Speaking of which, I've got a rant about the Queen's Speech's Stasi implications coming up.
In happier news, I have an A6 week-to-view diary for 2009, which I can start filling up with events! |
|
|
| Week Ahead |
[Dec. 1st, 2008|10:42 pm] |
Hmm, this week is busy, but on careful inspection it turns out that most of the stuff I'm doing is social rather than activisty. Didn't quite manage an early night last night due to some fun with greyeyedeve and a rubbery new birthday present, but had a good day at work - perhaps applying for a job yesterday has cheered me up enough. I actually completed one of the sections of my current task ahead of schedule.
Tonight I've been down the pub with a crowd of geeks, civil libertarians and co-workers, and had a jolly nice time over several pints. The FAB Café is doing an awesome spicy fish finger and cheese toasty, and we firstly outstripped their capacity to toast sandwiches and then their fish finger supply. I came home where the lovely Eve fed me soup and cake, and I'll be off to bed soon.
Tomorrow is Biphoria!, which should be fun. I'm hoping to see a few friendly faces there. On Wednesday I've got a bi-activist meeting with a few Manchester faces, which should be quite productive. Thursday is my Lib Dem local party AGM; I'm standing for Membership Development Officer because I want to try actually getting stuff done. I will probably make myself very unpopular in the process, but fuck 'em. Friday is #manlug currybeer which should be fun!
I've still got a lot to do, and more jobs to apply for, and so on. However, I'm feeling pretty upbeat about things right now and I'm hoping that I can keep that momentum going forward. Continuing to apply for new jobs will probably help with that. |
|
|
| Job Prospects |
[Nov. 30th, 2008|01:50 pm] |
I need to find a new job, ASAP. My motivation for being stuck in a dead-end job making money for shareholders is at an all-time low. I'm in a horrible spiral where I am failing to get any work done, meaning I have to stay late to try and keep my head above water, which means I'm not getting enough sleep etc. and that's lowering my productivity still further. It's not gone unnoticed, though nobody's said anything to me at work about it. I'm pretty ashamed of myself, and would probably agree with anybody who said I should be fired for letting the company down.
All the stuff I do outside of work to give me the experience I need to get out of IT is fine, but takes up time I could be using to apply for jobs. I've just found that the positions at the Equality and Human Rights Commission I had bookmarked have been withdrawn before the closing date and before I could apply for them, so that's another couple of options lost. I didn't even get invited to interview for the  Stockport Political Assistant position, and the job I saw at Salford Uni was withdrawn as well.
I'm starting to consider the possibility of quitting my job. I don't enjoy it, I'm not providing any benefit to the company, and it's stopping me from furthering my career. The only benefit it gives me is money, and I've got a fair amount of savings which could keep me going for up to 6 months if spent frugally. It'd give me more time to hunt for jobs, achieve more with my activism, and generally take a break from being stuck doing a job I increasingly hate. Given my company's recent takeover, there's absolutely no chance of renegociating my contract there for 6-12 months. On the other hand, it is a very risky proposition, and there's a lot that could go wrong. |
|
|
| Temporary Tattoos |
[Nov. 28th, 2008|05:27 pm] |
| [ | Tags | | | work | ] |
| [ | music |
| | White Zombie - "Blur the Technicolor" | ] |
Does anybody have any recommendations for somewhere to obtain temporary tattoos? Most of the places online sem to work in runs of 1,000 and I need 50-odd.
In about a fortnight, my company's new owners take over and the employees attend an induction day. I'd like to get as many people as possible wearing the logo of our new corporate masters as tattoos on the back of their necks ;) |
|
|
| Shit |
[Nov. 19th, 2008|10:36 am] |
Urgh, the last few days have been pretty horrible. Faced with a blocked toilet, my natural DIY instinct kicked in and I figured that I'd rather fix it myself than call a plumber. Two plungers, an augur and half a litre of chemical goo, many trips to shops around south Manchester and Stockport later, and I was still no better off. I ended up calling out a plumber at 9pm last night, just before greyeyedeve got home, and paying 65 quid for someone to stick a bit of rubber on a long bendy stick down the bog for five minutes. This really should have been something I could have sorted myself, and I'm annoyed that I failed at it. I'm also annoyed that between the emergency late-night rate and the DIY kit I purchased, I spent far more than I would have done had I just phoned the damn plumber at 10am. So last night I ended up scrubbing the bathroom with Dettol to clean up the mess, and finally jumping in the shower and getting clean before I could give Eve a hug :/
On the plus side, going to B&Q to abuse their plumbing department meant that I've got the fixings I need to attach the bookcase to the walls, which is ace. In addition, I can return my unused-but-opened stuff for a refund, which is great news. I also managed to get an almost sane amount of sleep last night, something which has been sadly lacking of late. Weird dreams abounded of friends doing unusual but awesome things - tartful_dodger being an embedded systems programmer, wehmuth holding court in a gazebo, and foibey being a solo catamaran sailor.
In other news, my company has been bought out by Big Blue. This doesn't affect my decision to look for new work, but it's interesting anyway - I was expecting us to go bust within the next 12 months. I'm told that it's business as usual for the foreseeable future anyway. |
|
|
| navigation |
| [ |
viewing |
| |
most recent entries |
] |
| [ |
go |
| |
earlier |
] |
| |
|
|
blah
drunk