Decatur is the home of Cat Chow! Meow Mix!

12.19.2006

I'm employed again! Mostly. Sort of.

After all the interviews, I was finally offered a temp/contracting job for a pharmaceuticals manufacturer in Decatur. It's one of those "6 months with a chance to become permanent" deals, but I'm looking more at it as "income". Probably not the best way to approach it, but that's they way I am right now.

I used to drive to Decatur 4 times per week back when I was going to school at Calhoun Community College. This drive is a little farther into Decatur, but nothing that isn't manageable. Spending the past month and a half at home, I had gotten to where I missed the tranquil drive to and from work.

But now I have a .NET job to keep me busy. Today is my first day of actually looking at code, and a part of me wonders what I've gotten myself into. This company is using the newer versions of .NET and SqlServer, so everything is just a little bit different - mainly in trying to set everything up. I'm also working on code that's been under development for 2 years as opposed to starting fresh on my own, so I'm having to go through and decipher their code to what my brain is used to (not always an easy task).

But at least I have income again!

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B13

12.13.2006

In the mood to watch something a little different? Go rent District B13. It's an action movie. It's a French action movie. It's a French action movie co-produced by Luc Besson, so there's a good chance I'm going to like it, because when his name pops up in the credits somewhere I usually go "Huh, no wonder I liked that one".

The movie doesn't have anything that hasn't been seen before. After all the decades of action movies it's hard to come up with something completely new. What this movie does present is that it does things right. The action sequences are fresh and well timed. There's a story that's been borrowed from 20 other movies, but it's not important. It's the fun ride from the beginning of the movie eventual end 80 minutes later, and all of the buildings they jump through to get there.

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Cold Side Cold

12.08.2006

It was cold last night on the way home after my weekly TV Nite (CSI &ER) at Ginas. 19°. Back in June, it was 100°

Have I got nothing better to do than keep up with the temperature?

Well, actually I've got plenty of things better to do than keep up with the temperature. It looks like none of them can keep my attention as well as the temperature can.

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10:46 AM

12.06.2006

As of 10:46 this morning, I am officially unemployed. As those that have been following the blog know, this wasn't an unexpected occurence. Since finding out that the government contract I was working on was not being completely funded for this fiscal year, I've been hitting the want ads looking for that special place that needs a cocky web guy.

This has turned out to be my week for interviews, so after the pre-Thanksgiving draught my hopes that the lack of call backs were due to bad timing on the holidays and not my skill set are bearing a little fruit. I had an interview Monday for a job that for which I think I'm about 70% qualified - they're looking for someone with experience developing .NET web components, and while I know what a web component is I've never actually made one. Today I had an interview for a .NET web developer job that for which I'm about 110% qualified. They're looking for a person to take over web development, from tools and design to ecommerce. That one is so me. I'm really hoping to hear back from this one soon, although it will probably be after the first of the year before they start their second round of interviews. Tomorrow I have an interview in Decatur for a temp/contract job. I'm not sure what to expect, but at the very least it should be interesting.

As today marks the beginning of my unemployment, I promptly went online and applied for unemployment compensation. I've filed twice before, spending the whole day each time in the unemployment office filling out paperwork, watching "how to get a job" videos, and more than anything else: waiting. Thanks to the interweb, it took all of 5 minutes to fill out the needed form. I love the interweb. With any luck I'll collect 1 unemployment check and then I'll have a super cool web development gig.

Do people still have gigs? Can a website be a gig? I may have to Google a gig to find out.

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Virtual Dreamscapes Revisited

11.30.2006

I've spoken before about a city that's managed to stay fairly persistent in my dreams for quite a few years now. There are certain areas that pop up consistently - a long hill leading to a bridge to a peninsula that I want to think is Guntersville. An amalgam of buildings that are, in my dream, Birmingham-Southern College. These buildings are connected underground by an catacomb of air ducts and crawl spaces that somehow only I have ever discovered, plus I can fit! There is a residential section along a steep hill which causes car engines to whine and almost stall before reaching the top. There is the home of my first job, Humana Hospital, with the elevator supported by heavy gauge chain that starts to snap every time I get on the elevator.

It's been a while since I had a dream take place in my little persistent dream world - which thanks to Jer I've taken to calling New Vertiform City. It's been nice to not dream of that place. For many years I was stuck getting on the elevator at the hospital and having to jump off at the last minute before the bottom of the elevator snapped loose from the chains holding it. I would also be stuck in the catacombs of the buildings at BSC trying to get to a part of the library that was inaccessible through any other path. Who would design a library that way? It may have been stress that would induce a dream here, because the dreams were always stressful. Maybe that means the past few years have been less stressful?

Last night I had a dream, a vivid dream. In my dream, I was in front of the house of a couple of friends who had just gotten a new 2-seater convertible sports car - it's not a car I would recognize now that I'm awake, so just imagine a generic 2 seater convertible. The friends aren't anyone I would recognize, other than a husband and wife (that I don't really know). I saw the car and said "Wow, a convertible! I love convertibles! You've got to let me drive!" At this point the 3 of us comfortably got into the front 2 seats of the 2-seater convertible sports car. I backed out of the driveway, and it started raining.

Through the magic of dreamtime, the top was instantly back up on the car. Since it was a 2-seater, and there were 3 of us in the car, I found that my upper torso and head were sticking out of the drivers side window. But that was ok, I could still drive. And evidently we were all still comfortable. The rain had become an intermittent sprinkle, so I continued to drive down the street.

At the end of the street there was a stop sign, and the street intersected with another street. As I stopped I saw 2 women in summer dresses crossing the street, but both were holding their arms across their bodies as if they were naked and trying to cover everything up. While stopped at the stop sign I noticed that both women were drenched, probably from the rain that had made me put the top up on the car. I bet they're covering themselves because the rain has made their dresses cling to them like a wet t-shirt contest! Being me, I hung a left at the stop sign and started following the 2 women.

We had nary travelled a block before I was reminded that were weren't supposed to be going down this street, we were supposed to turn left. In my dream, this made perfect sense,so I turned left. I suddenly found myself faced with a steep hill in a residential section. I remembered this place! It was the residential section on the hill! Evidently I knew where we were going. My dream then skipped to us pulling in front of a house in a row at the top of the hill - I guess once I knew where we were I could skip the part on how to get there. We walked into a house that had a huge, garage type opening for a front door smack dab in the middle of the front of the house. as we went in, 2 skateboarders came out, doing tricks, flipping their skateboards up and riding along the wall. As we went back toward the back of the house, I saw the people huddled about (which is all I remember now) and thought "we don't need to be here". At this point I turned a corner and saw a room with a large fire door bolted shut, with a "do not enter" sign attached. I looked at the door and suddenly realized that this was on of the doors into the catacombs and passageways of BSC that led to the library. I knew where I was, plus how to get somewhere else! I never knew these 2 places were connected.

With this realization I woke up. I woke up and laughed. Somehow I've managed to connect the geography of my dreams. I really hope this is something that sane people do.

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