Easy tasks

Wow! I must be very old by IT Professionals' standards.

See, yesterday and today I've been doing tasks that a few years ago simply would cause anybody to plan very carefully the best course of action. It has become second nature to just start doing those for me. No planning, no worries, no scares.
I guess that's what experience really is: an accumulation of practice in order to make permanent.

And then, the new technologies are the ones that scare me. Therefore, since most of my experience and specialization are becoming obsolete; I must continue doing these now menial and boring tasks. I simply don't dare touch the new stuff.

Business does not change, fortunately. So, creating quotations, proposals and reports is something I still enjoy. Good thing these do not change much. Just the wording, the new names of devices and software versions and the strange labels attached to older firms' products that have been acquired by bigger fish.

So, it's businerdss as usual.

Good.

Email programs and devices

I just found out I use a variety of methods to send and receive email messages for/on my main email account:
If checking via web browser, my hosting company allows me to choose between Horde, Roundcube and Squirrel.
On my Windows server, I use Eudora
On my Vista/W7 Laptop, I use Thunderbird and/or Lotus Notes
On my Ubuntu laptops, I use Evolution
On my PDA, I use Blackberry email
I think on the family desktop I've also used Outlook, but that has been for testing purposes only
So, at least 9 different ways to use the same service. And that's only one account (on last count, among business related, associations' and free ones, I have at least 15).

No wonder people gets confused by my variety of fonts, features, signatures, looks, and all.

Wait! I need to send me an EM reminder about standardizing my signature. Chat soon.

Mellow tasks

I dunno about you but it's incredibly hot in my city these days. I am able to work remotely today and I do not know whether that's a good thing: my place does not have any air conditioned and my only source of breeze is open windows. I’m pretty sure the office and perhaps even the servers’ room is cooler than here.

Which makes me work slower than usual, despite the fact that I am mainly writing email messages, checking logs and applying updates. No physical movement practically, and even so I’m sweating.

Seems like everybody else feels the same; I have received only 2 phone calls in the day and have made two others myself.

After a cold lunch I decided to take my laptop somewhere else; found a nice park with plenty of families gathered around the kids’ water park, the shadows of a tree and the wind have made my workday more enjoyable. I even found a couple of open shared WiFi signals. Whoever is “Judds” thanks a lot for making my day nicer.

At my place I have a secured wireless network but also provide a secondary open signal. I've been fortunate enough to be able to find a way to connect through somebody else's router and therefore I offer mine in return. It is just nicer to share.

Shouldn't it be like this? It costs us nothing to simply open a channel for other to make their life easier, the same way the Open source community works towards a better world, we all can offer whatever we can to others. It just makes sense in my view.

I’m still mellow, but at least a smile is present.

What a month!

Well, now I know how it happens that all of a sudden varied situations accumulate and make one’s life… mmh, interesting; to say the least.

Just a month ago I knew that week would be hard and fast: I ran a half marathon on Sunday, woke up incredibly early on Monday to install/merge a server into an existing network, along with making everything in the network work flawlessly that same day. All that on top of the regular weekly duties, and having to prepare a presentation for a 40 attendees’ audience the next week.

All would have been alright save a few hours shaved from my daily sleep, however, sky fell when my partner had to leave in a sudden trip that would make me work twice as much for 5 days.

I learnt that one can do so much when under pressure, but also know that we need to rest in order to recharge and be at 100% level. It is until this week that I feel I’m finally catching up to everything –including sleep-, so then I need to come back to running, reading, and writing.

So, please understand it has not been a lack of desire that has putting me away for so long: it’s been simply, life.

Thanks for your patience!

River view

About to leave a branch office, the car is parked in a parking lot that oversees a huge river. For whatever reason it always catches my attention and I find myself looking up the river.

There's nothing that links me to it in any way. However, every time I'm here I feel strongly connected to the river. The view is not great, there's nothing artistic or picturesque about it. Yet here I am again and again trying to decipher the message it's trying to convey...

The other day I took a picture to send it to somebody I care about, and then when checking the picture after I did, I felt like a stupid because there is absolutely no way anybody would find anything interesting on it; save some engineers looking at a couple old bridges.

The point here is that I disconnect from work and other worries each time I'm here. In fact, I feel so relaxed and at peace that I had the time and inclination to write and post this entire piece on my PDA.

Not bad for a grammar and orthography freak. ;)

Find your relax spot!

The train...

Here I am stuck in traffic realizing I need to really start doing something about not having to drive a car everywhere.

While all I can do is listen to music, watch the vehicles around me and realize by focusing far in the distance the "problem" is a long train crossing, all my mind can really do is try to count its cars. Kind of easy, they are all different colours and shapes, one after another, a parade of steely objects all linked together and part of a whole.

What would those cars be unhooked?

Just like our thoughts and actions, they do really belong together. One after another they form and shape whole ideas and developments. They become actions that create value once we implement them; some even need more than ourselves to come to fruition, others grow by hooking up to somebody else's train cars and becoming part of their trains.

Keep it growing. Your train will look nicer with more cars of different shapes and colours. Make it so that your cars become somebody else's train too. And more importantly, allow other's trains to join yours and become a longer one.

Move your train; allow others to count your cars.

Read my mind

<blank>

 

Thanks!