Freeeeeeeedom

(every man blogs... not every man really writes)

Oh, you know your muse is on when she comes up with a title and opening without so much as a hint of a thought.

My project is over.
OVER!
The long work hours, the early starts, the undetermined late finishes, the weekend work, the upgrades, the logging in from home, the general mental weight of how much had to be done - what can be summed up as 'June' - is done.
Officially, anyway. Unofficially, the system is still a bit slow and has some kinks. But it's still working, damn it, and that means that the dreaded sense of urgency - the now now NOW NEED IT DONE NOW - is finally dissapating. I have room to mentally breathe, which I wouldn't have understood until I actually got out of it. How can I tell that things are better? Well, for example, Caissa is running around like a virgin that just discovered the fun times being with the opposite sex can create. I've been writing TFOR like a fiend, and she's wanted to blog all weekend, though that would have been tough in internet-poor Chautauqua. But now that I'm back, work seems like it was before. Work hard, but you could take some time to rest, or take a breath, or get a drink... and after everyone's gone, it's not so hard to remember it in a blog entry.

Saw fireworks last night, which was nice, and am going to basketball tonight. Dodgeball Mondays, basketball Tuesdays, and volleyball Thursdays means I am at least staying in shape better than I would before. Julie's playing dodgeball and volleyball too, and I'm stunned at the way she's taking it - i.e., very well. She's open to learning and trying to have fun. Example 14,879,206 of how confusing the female gender is.

Seeing the family over the weekend, we now have our 10-team fantasy football family league lining up. I am absolutely pumped for it. Combine that with my friends' league and my work league, and I will be in fantasy heaven come September... as I expect to be in a heated race for the championship in fantasy baseball at the same time.

Trying to stay in touch with all my friends. I'm hoping to see Martin for a writing conference tomorrow night, hoping to get Stoph to come down to Pittsburgh on a weekend, and I haven't heard anything from Margaret but will send her something around July. She's probably collecting all kinds of bedtime stories... if you know what I mean.

A new month and some free(r) time. I am looking forward to it!

It's Up To You

(the things you throw away)

A sad blog post, this is.
My posts have been infrequent and far between, and I hate that. But I look back and I'm not sure what I would have done differently to create a more suitable blogging environment. These last days have seen a lot of crazy things happening. There was a massive layoff at my company, with 30+ people in the company leaving. With a workforce in Pittsburgh of less than 200, that is huge. And I made it through by the skin of my teeth... when one of my close coworkers (in the sense of my job description) did not. With a deadline of June 30th as a drop-dead date for the biggest IT project of the year, everyone is going nuts.
The major upheaval - a word that looks wrong no matter how you try and spell it - at my workplace is really taking its toll. I worked a 14 hour day yesterday, not getting back til well after midnight. I will elaborate on the shock of being confronted with my very ugly plan B later. More events have happened.
My aunt is still battling recovery from colon cancer chemotherapy and radiation, and today there appears to be internal complications. She's still in the hospital. The whole scenario, which I've mentioned only briefly to a few people, is pervaded (for me) by a huge dose of unreality. It's like I still haven't begun to grasp that this is happening, that it actually resists in this reality. I can't seem to assimilate it. Mostly I feel extremely detached from the whole thing - not sad, or angry, or even confused. Just sort of distant. And for one of my closest members of my extended family - someone who is so loving, so funny, so sweet, and the owner of probably the best laugh on the planet - I feel I should do better.
But the work in particular is what's driving all of this. Now stripped bare of excuses and given a tidal wave of work to rise above, the next two months will determine whether I keep my job and the view in the company (hopefully) as a naive but tenacious and hungry-to-learn young professional on the rise. The point is I am still here instead of other coworkers because they expect production. And I don't have the track record, experience, leadership, education, or backup plan NOT to deliver.

Hence my lack of writing... my worthless weekends... my infrequent calls to friends... and my lack of blogging.
This weekend seems to be equally filled. Julie and Jess are both coming in, both with birthday plans, Jess with graduation plans on top of that, and with family plans including Mother's Day...

I'm not complaining. I said from the beginning that I wouldn't let being busy keep this blog from going on.
I needed a little time to get my feet. A couple of areas in my life took a left hook to the temple. I'm not on the mat. I'm not getting a standing 8-count. I'm not even leaning against the ropes. But my opponent's a little blurry.

I Consider This Day Seized

(tomorrow we'll seize the day and throttle it)

For all those who know this quote, you know what I feel like. For those who don't: today has been an absolutely fantastic day!
For starters, it is stunningly beautiful here. Warm, sunny, it's like a nice April afternoon without all the wind. Only it's the dead middle of February. Anyone who doubts the effects of global warming is an idiot. It's stunning to think of how long it takes to get snow now, how little total snow we get, and how quickly it gets warm. It's really stunning. But this morning the air was crisp and clear, and it buoyed my spirits immensely.
Then, on the way to work, the T broke down. I mean, we were at the Potomac stop and it just didn't want to go again. T's break down pretty rarely. I've only seen it twice now in many years riding the rails, and once I was on a T when the whole line got struck by lightning and it reset all the signals and switches, so they had to manually reset everything on all 10 miles of track. But this T wasn't going. Perhaps it wanted to enjoy the nice day too.
No problem! I took my laptop out and began writing my story. This is after last night, where I wrote some great pieces of various scenes throughout the book. My muse is picking up the production big time. I think that's because I am now getting to hear from two of the three people that were so critical to me originally writing a fantasy story, Martin and Margaret. Both want to see the rough draft I'm feverishly trying to work on, and I think the excitement have having such talented readers is pushing my muse to new heights. If Marla got in on the act, who knows what could happen. But I sat on my stopped T, the sun shining in the window, cheerfully called in to work to tell them I wasn't going anywhere for a bit, and started typing the morning away. Yeah!
Eventually we got out and had to catch a T that was going the wrong way, which then went inbound on the outbound track towards the city. So I eventually got into work at about 10 AM. All good so far.
At lunch I went outside, and it was even more beautiful than the morning. "Somewhere Over The Rainbow" got into my head out of nowhere and I couldn't stop singing/whistling it. I danced across the street, I walked on top of the planter in Fifth Avenue, I bounced up to the Wendy's. I got my order and went back to find out that my burger was incorrectly made, a difficult thing to do when the order is "Plain burger, ketchup only." And this happened three times. No problem! I kept going back outside to get the order fixed, and I enjoyed every minute of it. I said hi to people I knew on the street and took my time getting back to work. Ahhh.
But the ultimate highlight of the day were the envelopes on my desk today. Upon opening them, I was given some wonderful information. I received a raise! It's a modest raise, but the mere fact that I was deemed to be putting in the time and working hard really meant a lot to me. But even cooler, I received A BONUS. (Every time I say that or think that, all I can think about is the commercial where the guy comes into his boss's office and says, 'This other company is offering me a bonus. Can you even say that? BO-NUS. ....BO-NUS." He also picks up the boss's telephone and says, "Hello, Bonus?" Then switches it to the other ear and says, "Speaking..." Great stuff.) But I received a 100% bonus, meaning I achieved all the goals the company set for me personally and I was following the company direction and guiding principles. Translation: A four-digit check in my name. I'm stunned! I'm going to put most of it in my savings, but maybe I'll do something or get something fun for $50 or so. My first raise and my first bonus on the same day. I can barely believe it.
And my boss just left my cube after trying to convince me to take off early today!
Days like this don't come around too often. I'm going to enjoy it!!

Happy Valentine's Day

(if you're single)

I re-read my previous post today and boy, did it have some feeling behind it. Some people are uncomfortable with putting their emotions down on paper. Not me. Go back and look at the very first entry of this blog. I write this for myself first, to help myself sort out my own feelings and have a record of my own thoughts. If people want to come along for the ride, that's all well and good, but I won't hold back what I think or feel for anyone. So if you don't like posts like the previous one, well, get out now.
You've been warned. :)
In all actuality, my friend Dave sent me an e-mail today about that post that was simply wonderful. It really helped me pull out of the bitter mood I was in and gave me an outside perspective on what I had been doing these last years. The e-mail was long and kind, and that kind of reassurance is invaluable.
I have come to realize over the years - later than I should have, but realized all the same - that there are few things more valuable than friends who will stick up for you without question.

I'm still at work here, at 8:15 PM and will be for a bit longer. I had a very good breakthrough in my code late this afternoon. Database programming is very different from procedural programming. It requires looking at the code in an entirely different way. It's kind of like spending an entire day upside down. At the beginning, everything's backwards and you can't go anywhere without bumping into anything. But after a while, your brain compensates and you realize it's all the same thing, just flipped over. And then your brain adjusts, and you can start doing everything you normally would, and suddenly you cease to think of everything as being flipped over. It's just a different way of looking at it.
That was the breakthrough I had at about 3:30 PM. I fixed three serious bugs in my program and am cooking along to the final portion of the code. It has to be done by the 17th, but I want to try and get it done quicker. After missing so much work in January, I am here to kick ass and take names. This job is my livelihood and I won't give it up lightly.

One note that I think is particularly appropriate on this supposed day of love: All you singles out there! Particularly those who dread this day as some kind of announcement that you are lacking in some way! You have the rest of your life to be furious, confused, and bewildered courtesy of the opposite gender, in which you will personally utter, "How do women and men even live on the same planet?" Enjoy your singleness, your freedom to look over the opposite gender like looking at apples in a grocery store, your open nights and your available status. Remember, St. Valentine was having a deep relationship with a woman in the 400's, in which he was rumored to sign in his notes, "From your Valentine." He was then executed for having an affair with the opposite sex. The moral of the story? Romance with the opposite sex sometimes kills.
Perhaps we should all go gay.
My valentines go out to all the singles out there. Take heart.

This Shark'll Swallow You Whole

(smile you son of a -)

The above is from the Jaws movie of angryalien.com. They redo movies in 30 seconds... told by bunnies. Jess showed me the site first. It must be seen to be believed... particularly since they just added "It's a Wonderful Life". My favorite movie they do there is the Exorcist (which is probably my favorite scary movie of all time). When the bunnies are going, "The power of Christ compels you! The power of Christ compels you!" I lose it. The funniest might be The Shining, because of the bunnies going, "Red Rum! Red Rum!" Then I absolutely lose it at "Here's Johnny!"
You can't buy this kind of entertainment!

Another day of health for me. I worked until 9 PM last night, catching up on my backlog of work that I had to do. When I got home, I was tired, but I talked to Margaret, Jess, DW, and TO online, which relaxed me while my door was repaired. The workers went with a classic method of handling major internal damage to a room, namely, the "paint it until you can't see it" method. There was a LOT of paint flying around. I stayed as far away as possible, at my computer, trying not to suffocate on the paint fumes and semi-succeeding.

One of my coworkers was fired today, from the mailroom. My company has always had a history of being willing to hire people, willing to give big salaries and big bonuses, and being not afraid to fire people who don't live up to that. The thing was that this guy (Matt was his name) was universally liked. He was a real nice guy who I ate lunch with sometimes and who was going to be a member of my dodgeball team starting in two weeks. Rumor has it he was late to work, which I suppose creates more problems from a mailroom standpoint then someone in IT. But still, it was sudden, unexpected, and I'm sad to see him go.
It's hard to remember, sometimes, when I'm working in this amazing job with its amazing benefits and its amazing people that if I ever screw this up.... plan B is for me to live in a cardboard box. And that's less than half a joke.

I had a very strong dream about nuclear war last night. It was all about trying to get the family prepared before the bombs fell. It was one of those dreams I was happy to wake up from.

Hopefully it's a reality we'll never wake up to.

Muse-gasms

(late night muse fun)

Last night was intense! Woo!

First off, during the work day the IT Development Team was called in for a meeting with our boss, Jim. Jim is a great boss, but we were still worried because no one seemed to know what this meeting was about. Jim explained it was about our bonuses. He went on to explain about how one of the big projects wasn't done, and that is more the fault of some than others, but we take things as a team and everyone would take the same hit on their bonus across the board, etc, etc. Everyone looked unhappy but nodding, knowing that this was the case. Everyone but me - I was grinning like an idiot. I had no idea I could get a bonus! It's hard to be unhappy about lowering an amount I didn' t even think I had coming. The Penguins commercial from the mid 90's, where the guy walks into his boss's office and proclaims he is leaving for another job because they're offering him a bonus and goes on to one of the great strange sequences ever, has been running through my head all day.

The first night of volleyball was last night. An absolute blast, despite the fact that I was exhausted (from the sickness) and my voice gave out on me because I used it way too much. But Team Try was victorious, 2 games to 1, and in our 8-team league only 4 teams make the playoffs, so every game is critical. A good start.

But the big thing, and the title of this post, was what happened late last night. I had been in bed for roughly an hour, and it was 12:30 AM. I was still trying to fall asleep. And all of a sudden, my muse - who I affectionately call Caissa - went nuts.
I mean she went bonkers, in what I would characterize as one of the top-5 "need to write" moods I've ever been in. I was sick, I had work early the next morning, I was exhausted, no matter! I broke out the laptop - which handedly worked well right on my bed - and wrote til 2 AM. I was pounding out ideas and sections. The breakthroughs my muse was coming up with were incredible. I busted through two plotholes that had antagonized me for weeks and wildly solidified critical backstory and character considerations. It was amazing! My muse went, to coin a phrase, totally off. Perhaps she had a lot of built-up tension after not being able to do anything for a week and a half while I was sick.
For those of you who don't write, you might not know what I mean when I say I "had" to write. Let me tell you, when your muse takes a hold of you, your life is no longer your own. It's really not your decision anymore. When she wants to write, she wants to write. End of story.
How ironic that my muse is female. ;)

Do any female writers out there have muses that are male?

My room still smells a little funky from this weekend - a story I have yet to tell. It will be good. But first I must open a window.

If Caissa lets me...

Don't Draw The Queen of Diamonds

(the queen of hearts is always your best bet)

I'm excited because I get to hang out with Martin and Margaret tonight, something I haven't gotten to do in a long time. In addition, I'm prepared with surprises. This is an added plus. May Caissa have a good night, and may the night be clear.

Marla continues to put out segments of her story, which is wonderful, but she is one of the handful that is updating semi-regularly. Claire, Rosie, and Martin are all in droughts, which happens to the best of us I imagine. Besides, actually seeing people is better any day.

Work went very well today, because I got done coding a request that I thought would take another two weeks. That is a very pleasant surprise. I want to get a lot of work done this week, but with all the activity it will be difficult. I'll see if I can continue having productive days like this before I say to hell with it and hang out with everyone coming in.

That's it from here. Start the friend barrage!

Disappointment Is Temporary

(chocolate is forever)

Had the meeting with Martin, and no Holy Blue Copy. The story was a project that Martin was working on for class. Damn it! Oh well. Sometime in the future, I will find it again. It's out there... somewhere. But we did get a ton done. For the first time I feel like there are no more plotholes left in the script. None. The power and vision of the story is really palpable, too. I think this is going to redefine what an amateur film can be... this crew has spent two years already on the project, and as a wise man once said, "NEVER date a woman named 'Trog'."

I'm working real late tonight. I have a fair amount to do work-wise, and I also have some work to do school-wise. Might as well kill two birds with one stone. Besides, I really like working here late at night. It's totally silent, no one is there to disturb me. I play music and really get a ton of work done. I recently got Sing the Sorrow by AFI and absolutely love it. I only buy CD's that I can place in my CD player, hit 'play', and enjoy every song I hear. This is one of those CD's. It also fits in well with the rest of my small collection of music, as those who know me know that I have insanely eclectic music tastes. Example: AFI is sitting next to Evanescence and The Lord of the Rings soundtrack, one page ahead of traditional Irish music and one page behind Pink Floyd. And it only gets stranger (heavy metal, game soundtracks,rage, anime, 70's, blues, we're all over the map). But the music is desparately haunting, and lends itself well to being alone.

I'll still need to talk to Julie tonight. My mind continues to be a jumbled mess on the topic. Women will do that. Damn women.

I'm looking forward to this weekend because 1) its my last day of classes and 2) it will be a fun football weekend, both fantasy and regular. Fantasy football - what a great way of staying in touch with friends. Speaking of which, I'm hoping the guys can meet up sometime around Dec-Jan, since it looks like Nate won't be available for the next century, at minimum. TO is already probably stopping down in early January, so we'll see if we can't plan something related. But also, the free time will allow me to get back to writing. I'm actually looking very forward to it. I imagine laying on my apartment carpet, under my Christmas Tree ('under' being an operative word, it's more like 'next to because it's less than 2 feet tall') and typing away. Beautiful.

I'll probably write a post right at that moment...