launching...

i walked home fast from work last night, partly because there were lurkers at the beginning of the road and i didn't want them to see that i was... distrustful... i had a quick shower and went straight to bed.

i'm very lucky - as is pg - that after she got up at 6.30am and was getting ready to go to class, i began to stir and somehow registered that i hadn't informed her of the strike. we hadn't been sent any details, so she decided to take a chance and went back to bed. two hours later i got up for my class (with the same teacher), and i arrived on campus to discover that the lessons were indeed cancelled and that pg had gotten it right.

---so i went to work. they set me up in an office with two other guys (who seem nice enough, but then again i've only seen this company as having a good dynamic), and after a weird struggle with security settings i managed to get started. aside from two short breaks for phone calls and coffee, i worked straight through from 11-5 and *enjoyed* myself. not least of which was caused by my getting the basic underlying requirement functional.

i'm kinda proud of myself. and grateful to microsoft for their visual studio line. it has evolved into a set of exquisitely solid products and aside from a few nuances (almost nothing that a good forum hunt can't handle) they really do allow one to focus on the programmatical problems instead of the environmental.

---the bus back to tel aviv smelled bad. at certain hours of the day, the back of the bus is packed with less hygiene-orientated people and it's hard to concentrate on reading shakespeare (we're on taming of the shrew, and it turns out i don't remember any of it) in that sort of environment...

i met up at the lincoln with daddy-o, and we spent a good hour and a half catching up, arguing politics and getting into the games; i think the last time i saw him we were taking the judges examination together in order to be promoted to captains, and now we're both civilians (he's been out two weeks) we can discuss this stuff freely :)

late for a meeting with nystire - and slightly tipsy, and with my mind still racing from the debating - i rushed to azrieli to meet him and his wife for coffee and rather interesting conversation. then i rushed home to strap on blades for a really fun couple of hours around tel aviv.

now i'm about to hit the hay: i'm still really excited about the day in general. the only thing that mars it somewhat is hearing about the south african secrecy bill. well done, assholes.

---i wonder why stephen hawking thinks we can't manage? and who was that weirdo who used to say the same thing? oh, yes... timothy leary... you don't wanna listen to someone like that... </massive irony>