work

When needs to start today

Blog Written with a loving hand by kitt some time around 21:08 on 29 June 2006

"Don't lose this client."

Nearly the last thing Mike said to me as he left for his two week no-contact-with-the-outside-world vacation a week ago. "Don't lose this client."

To him, this client is important. To me, that means this client gets first priority. When they say jump, I jump.

So, here I am, four thirty on a Thursday, and I'm completely exhausted. Doyle left this afternoon, and is gone until Saturday night. I have Mike's clients, my clients, and Doyle's projects. I've been working 12 hour days (making that 10 billable hours a day), and I'm still losing traction. My first thoughts last Thursday when I realized the enormity of the projects Mike left for me was, "Uh oh. I'm in trouble."

My first reaction was to complain. As the words came from my mouth, however, I realized how retarded this complaining was. It wasn't helping me finish the work. It wasn't boosting my productivy. It wasn't changing the fact that I had a huge mountain of work to do and the only way to get over the mountain was to simply start working.

So, I did. And haven't stopped. I left work not with the exciting feeling of accomplishment, but with dread: something left unfinished, something not quote done, something I'm still behind on.

As I was walking down the stairs from the office, I kept thinking things are just the same was they were when I was working for other people, nothing has changed. I'm not working on my own projects. I'm not building something that will build equity when I'm not working. I'm not building up a safety net. I'm not doing work that ultimate satisfies me and my sense of right.

It's the end of June, I barely remember my birthday, and it was only 6 days ago. If I work this hard on my own projects, how unbelievably successful would they be?

My next thought is, "One more week, survive only one more week, then I can start on my own work." But I keep having this thought. It's the same every day. But, I keep thinking that: when I have enough money, I'll do X. When I have more time, I'll do Y. "When" has to start today. It can't start when Mike gets back. It can't start in a week. It has to start now, or it never will, and I'll be 74 looking back wondering "WTF?"

The part of Kitt will be played by Liza today

Blog Written with a loving hand by kitt some time around 17:12 on 4 February 2006

Since I wasn't feeling good yesterday, I didn't head into work. We have the sick policy that if you are starting to feel ill, stay home and work, rather than getting everyone in the office sick, too. So, I stayed home yesterday. Good thing, too, given how sick I was last night. Today isn't much better, not being able to do much more than sit around the house, drinking sugar water, and asking Kris, "Do I feel hot?"

Liza had been sick on Thursday, but was feverish on Wednesday afternoon, so she couldn't go into school on Friday. Instead, she spent the day with her mom at work, then with her dad at work. Apparently she managed to get as much work done on Friday afternoon as I did:

"I just lost five inches."

Blog Written with a loving hand by kitt some time around 12:45 on 23 January 2006

"I feel so inadequate."

Turns out, TSA dropped his computer when they were inspecting his luggage. Like the TSA does anything worthwhile.

Mike and his new el-cheapo (read: least expensive) Mac.

Gallery drupal conversion schedule

Blog Yeah, kitt finished writing this at 14:36 on 18 March 2005 
Deliver by 3/12:
* Forums (including moderators)
* Wiki   (including editor permissions)
* News
* Users

We discuss when/if for this work (beyond):
* Gallery FAQ
* Gallery Remote
* Polls
* Gallery Testimonials
* Sample Galleries
* G2 Theme ?

Paypal Observations

Blog Posted by kitt at 13:14 on 17 March 2005
I'm in the process of adding PayPal Instant Payment Notification functionality to a site. Following are my observations about the whole process, starting with the biggest one:

Paypal makes it nearly IMPOSSIBLE to use their sites.

I'm kicked out of my session every 5 minutes. 5 minutes! I take that long to read a page sometimes, and I'm a quick reader.

I have to type in my password to access anything on their developer network. That means, for each new tab I click at the top of the page, I have to type in my password.

Bloody hell, people, make it easy for us to develop on your platform! Sure, make it hard to steal money from other people, but make it easy to get to your documentation, your toolkits, your examples. You want us to use it, not think, "This is the worst possible system I've ever encountered ... there has to be a better product out there ... let me look."

UPA Board Meeting notes

Blog Posted by kitt at 15:32 on 15 January 2005
My presentation seemed to go over well. 
 CMS installed:
   permissions setup (previous setup was terribly insecure)
   expandable (World Games application)
 
 Online rostering demo

 Out of online rostering development comes membership 
 accounts, and with that:
   forums
   members only pages / access
   events pages
   move away from yahoo groups for official UPA groups
   
 Also provide
   RSS for tournaments, game scores
   Email checking for bounce backs

 Also need to do automatic check of content:
  broken links
  quality of dated information: pickups, teams, etc.

 Integration of older content/statistics

 Other projects: expand info tracked (i.e. coaching), registration, etc.

Volunteers: dev't server available, needs installing 
before we can set up and get volunteers helping us.

Todd's observation:

The UPA was created to get all the ultimate players together to play in a series. Now, the success of the college series and club series has created a gap between the elite players and the average players. We're almost a victim of our own success. Maybe leagues are filling the gap between the top level of play and nothing.

One of those Moments

Blog Instead of being asleep at 09:59 on 13 January 2005, kitt created this:

Ever have one of those moments when you discover something that makes your life so much easier that you just want to cry in joy?

Yeah, I just had one of those moments, and I am so so so so so so so so so so happy. I think I'm tearing up.

Fair Use Notice

Blog kitt decided around 11:41 on 19 November 2004 to publish this:

I wonder how valid text like this is, when quoting from another site:

FAIR USE NOTICE:
This site contains copyrighted material the use of which has not always been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. We are making such material available in our efforts to advance understanding of issues of environmental and humanitarian significance. We believe this constitutes a 'fair use' of any such copyrighted material as provided for in section 107 of the US Copyright Law. In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, the material on this site is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes. For more information go to: http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/107.shtml. If you wish to use copyrighted material from this site for purposes of your own that go beyond 'fair use', you must obtain permission from the copyright owner.

Should my posting count at fair use, since I'm commenting on it from the site I originally saw it?

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