Then we heard that we aren’t deploying it on Monday like we’d heard. Apparently one team thinks their system specs are insufficient to run the client program.

So, there you have it.

I stopped using an alarm clock several months ago.

I don’t mean that I used my cell phone as an alarm instead, or that I found some other way to artificially wake myself up, I just simply stopped altogether. It wasn’t intentional; one day in January I forgot to set it and found myself waking up on time anyway. I doubt it will have the same effect on everyone, but for me it’s really made me a lot peppier in the mornings. In fact, by far my most productive time of the day is when I first get to work. This is a total reversal from the way I was just a year or so ago.

As an example, I woke up and rolled out of bed today at 6:45am because I knew my landlord was going to start installing new A/C units throughout the building around 7am. This is earlier than I normally get up, but I pulled it off anyway without using an alarm. When we started Daylight Savings Time, I had no problem adjusting at all.

My theory on this is that if I subconsciously know that I have to rely on my body clock to wake me up, then as the time approaches my body starts preparing me for it. The fact that I haven’t had any wonderful dreams interrupted by a screeching clock has contributed significantly to an improved state of mind.

You should try it. It seems a lot of people won’t because they don’t trust themselves. But, seriously, I am not a morning person and I’m a notoriously heavy sleeper…but just this one thing has made such a monumental difference in my life that you owe it to yourself to give it a shot.

This entry was posted bright and early at 7:20 am.

I know nobody else understands my excitement. When I first heard about this project in April, I had the impression it was going to be the one dreamkiller…the project I just couldn’t figure out. But hey, I survived!

Well, it’s pretty good. Unfortunately, I can’t really tell what’s going on a lot of the time due to shaky cam, dark scenes, and my own general inattentiveness. It also reinterprets history a little bit in order to make it more dramatic. But it could reasonably be argued that all history we’re exposed to is itself just a version interpreted a certain way for a specific effect, so I’ll let that go.

The one thing that irks me is that there’s a lot of time in each episode where the director just gives some quiet time for you to reflect on the thoughts of a specific character while looking at their face. Unfortunately, the only two people that are really convincing during these moments are Donnie Wahlberg and Damian Lewis…it’s just dead time for every other character.

One thing I really like is that the whole series is politically pretty neutral except for a few jabs about the ineffectiveness of British forces. It seems that some movies try to paint the picture like the U.S. had this amazingly high price to pay - they totally gloss over the fact that Russia lost some 10 million troops. So yeah, it doesn’t have “America, Fuck Yeah” (AFY) syndrome…but I wonder how things would change if the series had been made now instead of 2000-2001.

I have been working steadily on a new chat interface at work. Surprisingly, it has been easier than I imagined although I’m pretty sure I’m doing it all in a backwards way.

Anyway. He applied to Belton. He lists all his relevant education as a bunch of seminars and conferences. No, seriously. I am not making this up. On paper, he may be either the most highly educated person ever or the least, depending on the importance you place on such things. We interviewed him and…you know…he talked a real good game. He didn’t actually know squat about anything related to web stuff, but he at least seemed motivated and intelligent. Because of the exceptionally low salary we were offering and the sheer unhirability of every other candidate we had interviewed, he seemed like a decent choice. Or, more correctly, the least undesirable.

Then there was the second interview which Bizarro Bow Tie Tim attended. He was, apparently, a completely different person and even went so far as to say his version of webmastering was to delegate work to others. Needless to say, he was not hired.

He has an interview at Aplus tomorrow. I found out about this when people were doing what I assume most do when reviewing his resume: laughing. He accompanies his resume with a little picture of himself wearing a bowtie, as if that really seals the deal. Once I heard people discussing the bowtie, I knew immediately who it was. Luckily for him, the position they are considering him for is a little more in line with the skills he claims to have (SEO/SEM) so it’ll be interesting to see what happens. Sadly for him, he’s up against a team of seasoned marketing peeps so while he may have been able to pull the wool over the relatively inexperienced eyes of Belton’s tech department, he’ll need to bring his A-game for this one.

It’s a beautiful Victorian built in the late 1800’s which was completely remodeled 5 years ago. It sits on a double corner lot in NE Kansas City in a beautiful neighborhood of historic homes. It’s truly amazing!

Yes, that’s me in the lower right hand corner. I can reveal no more details at this time except to say that this particular picture of me won’t actually be used .

I cannot describe the last 2 or so months except to say my browser history at work, at home, and my laptop are filled with nothing but realty links. I have ate, slept, and breathed real estate. I’ve toured lots of houses and have finally been able to narrow them down to an elite handful. Do we choose on space, investment potential, neighborhood, price, or amenities? This stuff has dominated our conversations for weeks.

I guess it’s a testament to us that there hasn’t been a single argument. We realized early on, to our mutual surprise, that we saw eye-to-eye on what we envisioned for ourselves. I love the clean looks of contemporary furnishings and appreciate the contrast between contemporary furniture and historical surroundings. I do not want a ranch home in a cookie-cutter neighborhood. It’s kind of cool that she felt the same way.

At first when I started all this, I didn’t know what I was doing. Like everything else in my life, I just jumped into the lake first and decided I’d figure out how to swim once I got in the water. So far though, it seems we’ve done a lot of things right. It’s all worked out brilliantly, even down to the fact that Jamila is showing up right at the time when I’m getting burned out.