hibernation or bust - part i

well... damn. i haven't posted this whole time for a number of reasons, the prime one being that i've been feeling awful. i've been told that it's normal to be exhausted around this time, that it's a circadian rhythm thing because of the speed at which the seasons are changing. but i was sick. and then i trained. and that could have combined with a consistent lack of sleep (in part caused by last-minute apartment sale details) and motivation. whatever may be making me feel this way, i feel like i can self-diagnose with chronic fatigue syndrome and i hope that that's just the hypochondriac in me talking shit with a loud voice.

granted, i *do* feel a bit better now after a day of actual rest.

---tuesday:

it was a cold night and i needed the duvet, but i had a headache and i was exhausted and i suffered a long, uncomfortable night for not sorting that shit out. then my lawyer got me up early with urgent tasks. i really, really wanted to call in sick, but i'd be taking a long weekend off and i didn't feel that that was the right thing to do.

...

oh, human bodies. i scratched the back of my head and couldn't determine the damage. it's okay now (days later) but for a while i was worried about infections :(

---work: the cavalry arrived! a couple of executives came over to oversee operations; darn became super-enthusiastic and almost-cooperative in an attempt to impress them but there's a general sense that his little act is transparent even to the visitors.

i had a job to do on tuesday that would have been incredibly menial and time-consuming had notepad++ and its regex engine not come to the rescue. it's unusual for me to actually find regex helpful, so i was really stoked :)

little victories: the office provided a healthy, delicious lunch instead of the pizza that darn and megaman have been forcing on us, and everyone seemed pleased with the change! while we ate, my brain dropped through to the floor when i discovered that i'm managing a software developer who used to feature on the local pro-wrestling circuit. he has lots of funny stories to tell and explained a couple of fundamental things about the scene; it was fascinating!

the rest of the afternoon was kind of pleasant, but i was tired and feeling a bit chilly. i went home early enough for jiu-jitsu but napped instead, did some shopping and headed out to kickboxing. that was alright except for an odd moment when i managed to hit myself in the eye. my head was not in a good place :/

---SO! once upon a time i used to play a lot of tekken (3), and a week or so ago i found a cheap copy of tekken 6 on ebay. i bid, i won, and on tuesday my copy arrived in perfect nick and with a sweet note attached.

in the days since, i have been playing a fair amount. i am impressed that 6's timing is consistent with 3's, and the scenario mode is, surprisingly, a lot of fun!

---i had the presence of mind to sort out my duvet, i watched a bit of the adventures of tintin while eating, then crashed...

---wednesday:

... or not. there's nothing quite like getting out of bed at 1.30am to argue with a mortgage bank hotline agent. so much for catching up on sleep :(

i got up early to catch pg and then returned to bed - it was sooooo difficult to get out from under the duvet on a chilly morning! i still felt terrible when i got into the office, the only positive was a (non-vegan) muffin to go with my coffee that kind of made me feel better.

---oh, darn... you asshole. the previous afternoon i'd called a meeting with the entire dev team for fifteen minutes to ensure that everyone knew how to work with our build automation. after we all assembled and just as we were beginning, darn strolled up to cancel the meeting and let everyone know that he thought it was a waste of time. ignoring the fact that he didn't have the authority to do that, why couldn't he have said that at any time before the meeting took place? he really got under my skin. he made me so angry that even now while i'm recounting the incident i'm becoming agitated.

the awesome vegan pizza ordered for me for lunch would have tasted even better if not for that.

other fun parts of the day included fighting with the web developers because they don't respect our naming conventions (and they use "new" and "old", which is a pet peeve of mine), losing over an hour to a problem that had nothing to do with the code i was looking at, and being told "don't waste your time on the coke" right before having the can explode all over my white hoodie.

as i left for the extra-long jewish-holiday weekend, i had a quick chat with the cto that put me in better spirits. playing some more tekken when i got home completely the spiritual rescue, and i was ready to do the jewish thing.

---it was an absolutely perfect evening, and i met up with aota and her daughter and we entered the sukkah. there were some awkward religious moments, but overall it was a pleasant evening. a couple of the guys had been in cape town recently, one has trained at tristar, and one is trying to go vegan for political / ethical reasons. i wasn't bored.

but i'll be damned if a little bit of alcohol didn't put me in the mood to relive my origin story while recounting it to aota.

on my way home i finished reading kill shakespeare: what a clever and entertaining story! i do declare that shakespeare himself might have been proud of this one :)

---thursday:

i played tekken until i was ready to pass out. i actually got up at 7.30 and was already feeling a little better. it helped that one of the visiting execs sent me an email apologizing for not meeting with me before the holidays, it sounds like our appointment on monday might not be about me being out of favour.

...

how about that? it suddenly occurred to me that i'm celebrating sukkot (tabernacles) in quebec...

...

the first day of my extra-long weekend began with my putting pg in touch with my apartment's caretaker to try to pay the man. i cannot believe that i've been chasing after this guy for months to give him money. hopefully this story ended today, after much harassment he's promised that she'll get everything i need by the end of the day... which will essentially be on the day the contract is signed. talk about cutting things close :S

i replaced my headphones and had a quick subway lunch: falafel?!?! the employees are still having a hard time getting to grips with the different ways of pronouncing it. interestingly enough, it's apparently so successful that in one week they're far enough over their projections that they're running out of stock - vegans! changing the world one meal at a time :P

i did some serious shopping at walmart, the primary targets being a blender and frames for my comiccon art. i came away satisfied.

i played a little tekken and then hit the gym for a bit of sparring. fighting with reggae in the background was cool and weird at the same time. having said that, i was not having a good sparring day.

i returned home to do the laundry and unlock the tekken "arcade addict" achievement (ya think?!), and the dryer took such a long time i missed the wrestling class i wanted to go to.

...

question: how is a monster energy drink a "natural health product"? oh.

...

jiu-jitsu: one over-enthusiastic armbar can mess up a whole evening... the guy i was working with had a height advantage (he's much shorter than me) and just couldn't control himself. he really hurt me, and it's taken two days for my elbow to go from frustratingly sore to merely uncomfortable :/

i followed that up with another sparring session, only the guy i sparred with was far more competent and all i walked away with was a severely bruised ego. i mean, shit, random people came up to me afterwards to try to console me and that just made it worse :(

at least after training i had my first great smoothie experience: either i have a latent talent for blending, or it's really that easy to make something decent :D

if finished watching the adventures of tintin and decided that spielberg did an excellent job of it. it's just as much fun as the comics and captures the attitude of the artwork in spite of the obvious differences.

---friday:

another early wake-up to deal with the apartment sale. followed by a long discussion with aota caused by megaman making a fool of himself in an email. followed by a distinct inability to get out of bed. i needed a slow start to the day and orange is the new black's tenth episode ("bora bora bora") was a good option. it was so intense that i'm going to want to watch it again sometime...

the weather was nice and sunny, and i went shopping at the further supermarket. i shambled rather than walked. i returned - slowly - and made myself a lunch that could have been a dessert; it was healthy, yes, but it tasted so good!

after a little more tekken i headed off to starbucks to get some sketching done. i don't know why i can't be productive at home, i guess it's the distractions :$
anyway, i hammered out a decent page and returned to nap, play some more tekken and go to training.

now, i know that training while not feeling good isn't wise, but while i was exhausted i wouldn't feel any worse than that until later. so i can tell you that i am exceedingly glad that i went to box on friday night! our instructor wasn't around, but a couple of the guys were up for sparring. while i didn't exactly level up, i did manage to lose two levels of "cowardice" in the ring. confidence-wise, it totally made up for the previous night's little tragedy. hooray!

in fact, the first guy i sparred with confided in me that he could feel the difference each round :)

what started off as good post-training exhaustion soon became bad exhaustion, but i really wanted to play thunderstone with vfmp and co. i grabbed another subway falafel and a coke and headed on down.

[continued...]

winds of change?

i was tired and sleepy today. at the beginning there was some good apartment sale news, but there're a few nagging things that need to be sorted out and it's a chore. i can't say i appreciated the surprise phone call from israel while on the can, all i could identify was the country code :(

there was also a response from the letter i sent last night, and it seemed positive. we'll see how things go, i hear that balls have started rolling in the office and wondered if the general sense of calm had to do with me simply being relaxed after making my peace with my situation. the alternative is that darn has heard that something's up and is being cautious.

actual work-wise: a successful hunt for an obscure bug made me feel pretty good, and i got some satisfaction by finding an elegant solution to an ugly problem. otherwise my day was consumed by management and coaching.

perhaps it was spending too much time indoors, or maybe i was suffering a post-pre-workout protein shake bellyache. either way i left for boxing unsure if i was ready to return. i knew i had to take it easy, beginning with the jog to the gym. first comment from the instructor?
"dude, you look like a retard."

i wasn't too offended because i knew what he meant, but he couldn't tell me what to fix. his only advice is to get a rubber rope, but you know what? the cord i'm using is making me work harder physically but it's cause for me to take more pride in the sets i get right. i stopped more times because i was tired than because i was tripping myself or hitting myself in the head - as i told one of the girls later, maybe... maybe i should just make my peace with looking a little goofy.

i wasn't a tough training, partially because i worked with a southpaw who's new to the number system so it took forever to get in sync on each exercise. by the end of the lesson we'd switched partners and i was working with a veteran. he's recovering from a broken rib on his right side so i had to avoid liver shots, but he had no such restrictions and i was pretty sure he was going to hurt me. boy, was *i* surprised when i had to repeatedly tell him to up the power! when he said "dude, you're like a wall!" i was pleased as punch ^_^

[yes, i couldn't resist.]

the girl that everyone's scared of and that scrapper fantasized about doing impact training with? i made a remark about almost being ready for her and was told that next time i'll be obliged. oh, shit... :P

i watched trigun - getting deeper - and then had a loooong chat with my mom (oh, skype, you world-changer you) while i made dinner. then i settled down to eat in front of orange is the new black that's keeping up the pace. you know that idiom that "work expands to fill the available time"? did it really take me a whole episode to eat my salad? and on that note, the night is over already.
*sigh*

...

godsdammit! darkside skittles are addictive. "the other side of the rainbow" for sure.

soul-searching - part ii

[... continued]

i smuggled in some beers for bnw and her husband and went to a presentation on the historical relationship between montreal and the wwe, but it was all in french so i returned and joined in with the drinking. after a very pleasant time with them i went to the george takei q&a (hah! it rhymes); the man is simply great. listening to him describe the depths of gene roddenberry's vision and sync that with elon musk's was a real treat!

that was it for the con for me, i met horseman outside and we walked around, then up the mountain, while he coached me on freestyling and a little french. the first is a lot more of a challenge, apparently, but after lengthy discussion (some of it freestyle) i understand why he wants me to get comfortable with it. we seem to agree that "cyberpunk-hop" should be a thing.

i started fasting around 5pm in preparation for blood tests, but i was almost home when i discovered that my tests require 24 hours without alcohol. that led me to the realization that the tests aren't actually going to be helpful and that i need to reschedule.
*sigh*

i had a long chat with my mother about the work situation and the email i was going to send, and she was precisely as supportive as i needed her to be. i'm confident i've done the right thing and it's now time for me to get a good night's sleep before facing whatever the new week brings.

soul-searching - part i

great scott!!! it's been an amazing weekend, and i've just brought it to a close by sending a fracking long email to the executives describing our situation and listing all of my complaints against megaman and darn. i have just officially and properly put my job on the line and the issues will either be resolved or i will be fired. and i'm totally okay with that. i guess i really did get into the spirit of "yom kippur" in the sense of soul-searching.

---thursday:

thursday began with perfect rain coupled with exhaustion; i didn't and couldn't get out of bed for far too many snoozes. the exhaustion didn't go away and was chased with a headache. i'm pretty sure i wasn't well.

that morning i received an email to say that my copy of tekken 6 had shipped, that afternoon horseman informed me that the online version is now free... i was upset until someone explained that that's only free on ps plus which i don't have.

in the evening i went on a date with a girl i met online. i waited for a few minutes outside the mont royal metro and enjoyed the general craziness. then a specific craziness joined me: a homeless guy sat down next to me and made awkward signals to passers-by that he wanted a cigarette, eventually some young punk came up to give him one but not without a political lecture. it was all in french so i only caught bits and pieces, but the whole ordeal was pretty surreal.

the date wasn't bad as far as dates go, though it was pretty clear from the beginning that we didn't share sexual chemistry. we sat for a long coffee and everything was amiable until we got on to the magic topic of the nature of reality. we spent the following hour arguing - sometimes positively and sometimes not - and eventually moved on. apparently we both enjoyed them evening overall, though, so i might've made a new friend.

i was completely wasted by the time i got home. so much so that i was in a zombie-state while making my mega-salad and thought it was tipping (i might have been hallucinating) so i tried to catch it: i upset the bowl and half the contents were on the floor. what a fantastic and refreshing moment that was :/

at least netflix returned the new season of community (in order this time), and trigun has become most entertaining.

---friday:

i walked into the office to hear about intrigue: megaman has been doing some extremely dodgy shit and appears to have been caught out. the consequences are not clear, but it's certainly an interesting time for him to be taking a vacation (not to mention doing so when we're in a crunch he's dictating).

i went for a massage even though my neck and back were feeling pretty good: apparently i was so tense for so long i got used to them being locked because the minute she started working on me they got all sensitive and whiny. it was nice to shut off my brain for a half an hour.

i bowed out on the pre-fast dinner aota had invited me to when i learned that it was at the rabbi's: i really, really didn't need to be made to feel all awkward about neither fasting nor going to synagogue. having said that, i still wanted to leave work at 4pm so as not to make the other jews look bad ;)

isn't it amazing that when you're in a hurry and you hit the supermarket for just one thing (literally) ALL the slow people come out? not only the self-service lane, but the express lane too with coupons and shit. *damn* it was frustrating...

... i got home, threw in laundry and completed the new season of community. turns out with the previous ordering i'd already seen the final episode. at least now i understand my confusion the first time :P
what a great season! they definitely restored it to its former glory.

i don't know why but twelve years (to the day!) later, i had a sudden flashback to the induction base and experienced elation that i may never have to see that place again.

it was warm and cozy on the metro and i almost fell asleep with the empty energy drink can in my hand.

---montreal comiccon! yeah, i totally geeked out this whole weekend and had a lot of fun. my con experience opened with a smooth entry and an excellent improv performance, i don't know what they call themselves but they used cards against humanity and hilarity ensued.

the qa with tahmoh penikett and james callis... even they were surprised when edward james olmos and michael hogan suddenly appeared on stage! they were all awesome and the audience had great questions and it was very touching ^_^

i sat in on a presentation about back to the future and was totally inspired. the personal story behind the to the future project is incredible and once i'd heard it i knew that i had to take a turn in the driver's seat. but not before fueling mr. compassion. those two people are very special indeed. i would get my turn the next morning and i gotta say... i'm pretty darn impressed and pleased and i enjoyed it just like a teenage me wouldn't have ;)

the night ended on a horrific note: cannibal diner. it was a decent b-movie gore-fest and the acting was not inappropriately bad, but the ending was a viewer's nightmare combo of shaky-cam first-person lost-in-the-dark footage that just... wouldn't... end.

anyway, totally worth getting the three-day pass! i was completely satisfied as i made my way home and sat down to clear my mental palate with another episode of orange is the new black. what a tough night.

---saturday:

in the morning: shit that was a lot of queue. i don't know why they told me to go through it even though i already had my pass and band, i only discovered the re-entry point later...

i started the day with horror, watching a series of shorts some of which were absolutely inspired and some of which were utter rubbish. a chance in hell fell in the first category, baby-sitting fell in the second.

discovery of the day: kill shakespeare. bloody, brilliant and fun, and available on comixology :)

the biggest deal of the day: simon bisley was signing autographs. simon bisley is responsible for the horned god artwork which combined with the script to become one of my biggest inspirations - he's one of the few artists that really excites me. i arrived at his booth and realized i didn't have anything for him to sign. so i headed over to bnw's booth and commissioned a version of one of simon's slaine's with my face. less than an hour later i returned to pick up the watercolor and go over to wait for him to return from a break. simon was super-cool and friendly and was really impressed by the work! he happily signed it and told me to pass on his approval ^_^

...

while a waited a man with the head of a bird walked past and indicated that he wanted a hug. i obliged, and felt just as weird and amused as everyone who witnessed it.

...

it's one thing to walk around inside a portable tardis, quite another to dress up as a tardis. especially if you're a sexy female, it inspires awful pickup lines like "omg! i totally want to travel into the future inside you!" :$ [no, of *course* i didn't actually say that out loud...]

i was going home first but the metro cut out at bonaventure, so i took it as a sign and stepped out to pick up a gift wine for the "breaking of the fast" dinner. rain threatened me and my painting and i felt stupid for not taking the plastic bag offered...

i watched another episode of orange is the new black and napped in front of ted talks. i'm very glad i woke up in time for jane mcgonigal. you should watch that one. really. right now.

i dressed up and headed out to a pleasant evening with a few awkward moments but ending with a deep anime / cyberpunk conversation with a young 'un who's looking for guidance. :D

---sunday:

yang woke me up at 5am as instructed to see if i was ready for a trance mission, but i was utterly bombed and there was no way i was getting out of bed. good thing, too, because later i'd have mortgage details to sort out.

one of the heroes of the north writers gave a presentation on the process of writing comics and it was fun to watch; it was nice to see that bnw and i are handling things in a similar way :)

[continued...]

the cat in the rat race

i'm in such good spirits after almost thirteen hours in the office! decent rum is one way to take off the edge. after yesterday's drama i started the day in a much better mood in spite of still feeling out of sorts. it might have had something to do with the perfect summer's day that was taking place outside:

oh, man - am i really on my way to work today? the sun's out after the rain and walking outside feels like when you pull the blanket over yourself a little more on a cool sunday morning...
- standing outside the metro, hesitating

in the office, machinations seemed to be gearing up in all directions. i kept myself safely in the eye of the storm and actually got a whole lotta shit done.

i witnessed an attempt to tear our qa manager apart and didn't feel that i could say anything without properly antagonizing the monsters - more than i have been already at any rate - and when he responded calmly and reserved and rationally they reversed themselves and behaved as if he'd been making the prior claims. i wish i'd been recording the ordeal, it was really pathetic and i felt bad for not being in a position to stop them.

...

tuesday's "talk" has been playing over and over in my mind. that dodgy bastard, accusing me of not working enough hours when i was in the office, sick, the whole weekend and where the hell was he? how come he doesn't do the hours he demands of everyone else?

---one positive part of the day was going out for lunch with newk'd and clearing the air after last week's mess. another was working closely and comfortably with darn's developers. the weaker one was feeling awful when i walked in because he was struggling with debugging his code... when the fault wasn't with his code. he's brutally overworked and i don't think he understood me when i told him to take a walk. i think he was shocked when i complemented his efforts - i don't think darn has anything nice to say even to his own crew. the stronger dude joined me and moonlighter for a technical talk in the afternoon and between that and the support i've been giving him of late i get the feeling that he's come to appreciate my attitude and the way i solve problems.

it's almost like trying to befriend a beaten dog. these are human fucking beings, and all their work experience is megamen and darns :(

---even moonlighter and i got along famously today. it was a stupidly long day that began with meetings and ended with solid grind, and although i walked away satisfied i was also exhausted and had a bit of a headache. so much for getting personal shit done :(

---while eating last night's leftovers (which i forgot to take to work for lunch) i finished watching reincarnated. aside from a bit of awkwardness it inspired to check out the album... snoop lion - reincarnated sounds much better in the documentary than off the album. bummer.

dramatuesday

holy shit. i can't believe today actually happened. it's now a dark and stormy night and i'm bombed, but i have to share.

the early day began with my finally getting back to the dermatologist's office to make an appointment. i overheard the guy in front of me wishing the secretary a happy new year, inferred that she's jewish and wished her as well. suspiciously, there's an opening early next week and not in a month's time. jewish mafia, i tell you. jewish mafia.

i sat down for coffee and serious thought collection, then headed to work. things at work seemed to be going well... until megaman walked into my cubicle and we had a talk that sounded a lot like a formal warning. it was a series of veiled threats that if i don't pull 60-80 hour weeks like everyone else then my credibility will be blown and i will have no added value to the company.

i'm kicking myself; i really, really, really shouldn't have told him that working under those conditions is illegal. that was stupid of me. the truth is that he was really intense and i was super-defensive, and only later my brain went "hang on, you've just worked an entire weekend of overtime and where the fuck was he?!"

the reality is that i'll happily do overtime if it's in the company's best interests. i won't do overtime if it's purely in megaman's or darn's interests. the more we talked the more despicable a character megaman became; a couple of things he said to me had some merit, but most of it just reinforced the image of him as sinister and conniving. he blatantly told me that if the cto's new tools would be so good as to render the past few weeks' efforts useless then we won't use them.

what the hell is wrong with these people?!

i sorted some things out and went to aota's who'd also had a dramatic day. we drank plenty of rum and she made the most delicious cous-cous i've ever tasted (and carried back home in tupperware). we talked things out (or as out as they can be) and i came home to work some more and get into bed.

...

workwise: it's time to shape up, big time. "you're only in competition with yourself," he said to me, and he was lying through his teeth. the two of them have been undermining me from dang's first day and i need to pull the team back into the real world.

dog-eat-dog

yesterday:

i tried to take my broken headphones back to source to take advantage of my warranty; the first door was locked and barred but the second was open. i checked the times listed and stepped inside. the girl behind the counter was really welcoming, but when i told her what my problem was she stopped me.
"i'm so sorry, but you're in the wrong store."

what?! apparently people make that mistake all the time, i'd actually walked into eb games.

"penny arcade?" she asked, looking at my hoodie. "nice!"

i appreciated that a cute girl had said that. then i thought about it a bit. i love penny arcade and have been a fan since forever, but i'm a little disappointed by the rehashing of the dickwolves in spite of the response. i expressed my feelings during the transgender post, like everyone else i was upset by the mass stupid but i kinda ignored the fallout. i understand why they made the shirts but that really was going too far and i didn't really think about it until now.

i'm still a huge fan, but a little less gushing now.

---i was tired when i arrived at the office. so was everyone else. we spent a long day indoors which was only a thing because i went outside looking for lunch and it was an intensely beautiful day! perfect weather for anything except work! the supermarket was out of my usual frozen meals and the lebanese place was out of falafel (really?!), so i got to enjoy a bit of the afternoon as i strolled around looking for vegan food that wasn't what i'd had the day before. i couldn't find any, so i returned to the indian place.

in the office, i'd taken to playing my music loud as we were the only ones there. lots of rock, a little hip hop. before he went, most-likely-to-become-a-sex-offender played some of his playlist and he had some pretty good shit. then, as a goodbye, he played nirvana - rape me.

seriously.

...

by the evening i was done. "minimal" and "feature complete" were what i'd been instructed to aim for, but if you've spent a few minutes planning and base your software on an extensible design then all sorts of helpful features tend to creep in organically and effortlessly.
i called darn over to check it out, and he told me "i'll see it tomorrow."

what? when we're on a crazy deadline and need to be integrated and operational the very next day? i wasn't having any of it. i instructed him to come over and set him in front of my computer. he saw everything he and megaman had asked for. he tried to break it. he failed. he stood up.

"keep going."

nice one. just before committing my work and getting out of there i made a few changes and one of them introduced a bug that i'd only find today after a massive hunt; now that i know what the cause was, it *still* doesn't make any sense :S

---i dropped my gear off at home and headed down to aota's for coffee and venting (hah! "venti"). that turned out to be a really good idea because i discovered a few interesting things about the office dynamic that i'd been in the dark about. after we'd talked a heck of a lot, she took me to visit her rabbi (it was really late already) to pick up two mezuzot.

the rabbi's such a sweet guy, i really wish aota hadn't asked him to justify a deceptively racist statement i'd called her out for making earlier. he almost didn't fall for it, but he didn't want to make waves so he tried to step around it - this resulted in him unwittingly arriving at an even worse conclusion. amazing what power words have...

i put them up when i returned home, it's been a while. mystical. i spent some time recounting my work hours and remembering that in my case overtime is never unpaid because i'm authorized to take it back whenever it suits me. i can't say the same for everyone else, though... not cool...

---today:

i woke up feeling much better. spiritually. partially because of the conversation with aota, mostly because i managed to get through to my mortgage bank and the lawyer's given me a good feeling regarding the apartment sale. maybe the mezuzot had something to do with it? :P

i enjoyed a better attitude the whole morning and managed to keep a friendly face in spite of megaman and darn and their evil machinations. remember the "keep going" from last night? i was informed this morning that on friday they'd pushed back the deadline a couple of weeks. friday! so why did we all come in over the weekend?

when i asked when i should let everyone know, i was told not to say anything because it would be demoralizing if the devs found out they'd come in for nothing. so we should keep the pressure on.

those evil fuckers.

there will be Very Big Words soon.

---other than that, it was an oddly reasonable day. i left early and got home to find it right-side-up after the cleaning lady had done her thing - very cool! i had a chat with my mum and then rushed off to muay thai.

i thought i was better, and that the headache that was just beginning was standard sinus and nothing more. i swallowed a tylenol and downed an energy drink before training, and arrived feeling alright after an intense jog. it felt good to step onto the mat and the warmup began well... except that that didn't last. halfway through the warmup i was struggling. really struggling. when my muscles refused to respond and i was dizzy i stepped off to the side to recover my breath and focus. it didn't take long for me to realize that for me the class was over - i apologized to the instructor and went to drink some water and try to recenter. i hoped i'd be ready for boxing, but after about ten minutes i found that just standing (and talking) was tough and i returned home pretty bummed.

at least it was a good excuse to watch ted videos and fix the '99 pants i ripped. they're not dead! they're getting better!
i did some shopping, made a great salad and watched a large chunk of reincarnated. the documentary makes me take back laughing at snoop lion for his reinvention.

great, i had stuff to do but i needed to post. dammit.

a "no" recovery

i tried to get some work done yesterday in spite of the holiday and began by synchronizing my code with the svn... which somebody had checked in to with broken code. when i got to the office today (yes, saturday, i know, thanks), one of darn's crew was there and he told me that's it's been like that for two days and nobody knows how to fix it.

in case that doesn't give you a hint as to the quality of developers i'm working with, let me say that the more hours i work with our code directly the more i realize that these assholes have either misunderstood or overcomplicated all of the solutions i've provided them with and i now understand why everything's taken so long.

"if you want something done right": well, i don't have enough man-hours in me. quite frankly, i don't think i have what it takes to get good code out of these guys. some manager *i* turned out to be :(

---yesterday:

i tried to nap because i felt terrible and had the shivers and ended up just lying wrapped up and praying that i wasn't sick. i can't be sick. not now. unfortunately willing myself to health isn't really my thing. i dragged myself out of bed and took the metro to de la concorde, which is "across the border" in laval and is an absolutely stunning metro station. i sat waiting for bnw on a bench in the sun, which warmed me almost enough to offset the cold breeze. i don't know why i left the house without my sunglasses. i really needed them.

so: bnw. she's almost done with the convention circuit (next weekend is montreal's comiccon, we'll both be busy with that), but she's decided that she's in ^_^
i'll be paying a symbolic fee per page and we'll share the rights* and the profits. super-exciting!

* to the artwork, not the project. the project is mine.

she's colombian and she made really, really good filter coffee that tasted just how i'd expected it to taste - magic! after spending some time playing with the outlines for the first few pages we talked a lot, mostly about the social differences between quebec and the countries we come from but also about israel and the middle eastern conflict. always a sensitive issue :(

i was planning on returning home for dinner but we talked so much her husband came home; bnw wasn't wrong, the two of us have a lot in common. and all three of us have similar tastes in music and gaming, in addition to aerospace (he works for one of the big ones i'd like to work for). hah!

we would have carried on talking but he was hungry and they weren't eating anything i would have, so they forced their copy of bioshock 2 on me (even though i'm pretty certain i won't get a chance to play it) and walked me out.

it was cold, but in spite of my still feeling awful and headachey i was in good spirits.

---flesh & blood is pretty cool. i wish i'd finished eating dinner before watching it, though. i usually have a strong stomache for gore but a couple of moments shocked me enough to make it hard to swallow. if the words "testicle piercing" have any effect on you, consider yourself warned.

---i went to bed relatively early, and got up relatively early. i had breakfast and tylenol before returning to bed for a while. still feeling rough.

eventually i got up and dragged myself off to the office. it didn't really make a difference where i was (now that i have a keyboard at home) but it was easier to focus and i guess if i hadn't been able to talk to anyone i would've wasted more than just an hour or so on finding the last unbroken version.

i spent all day on my task, properly consolidating my opinions on megaman, darn, my team and my company. let's just say i'm not deeply satisfied with any of them, but as my satisfaction is not what they're paying me for i'm going to keep on trucking.
i got through a sizable chunk of what i needed to get done and then called it a day.

at least i'm feeling a little better.

i came home to do laundry and watch a bit of trigun and community, but the plan changed a bit because netflix seems to have removed season 4 of the latter while i was halfway through! not cool, netflix, not cool.

i watched most of in time instead even though it stars justin timberlake. he's not an unwatchable part of the film, for once, but the script is quite bad. better-than-mediocre idea with uninspired writing: i'm surprised i sat through so much of it.

i seem to be getting used to the online dating world and it looks like i might be going on an actual date soon. the worst part of this scene is not knowing how your date looks in real life...

---shakespeare with a shakespearean accent? that sounds righteous!

it dawns on me

ah, i see. i hit the gym, and the gym showed me that everything i'm complaining about is related, and it's to sinusitis. it's been a while since i last suffered this bad boy.

i still managed a decent gym session, but was horrified when the jump rope gave me a splitting headache and i called it quits when working on slips and my neck started to stiffen up.

in spite of an irritated nose / sinus / throat and headache, i'm glad i went and i'm also glad to be informed that a visit to the pharmacy is in order.

---i walked in to find the muay thai master sleeping in the corner of the ring. if i'd had my phone with me i would have had to take a video of that surreal moment when the bell ringing the start of a new round was followed by his loud snores. i would have gotten my ass handed to me if i'd been caught, but it would have been worth it.

restless

i just got up from a night of unbelievably bad restless leg syndrome aches and pains (neither tonic water nor gatorade helped) which kept me awake and miserable after a day of serious headaches that i believe can be assigned to a hayfever / sinusitis crossover that's in the works. i'm pretty sure that that's what made my vision go all wonky for a while yesterday, either that or far too much time focusing on digital screens is making my eyes strain to look further than two metres. not good.

i think i'm going to hit the gym now, i suspect my body might be upset with me for missing so many days...

---dinner last night was delicious, and most of it was pleasant and interesting, but some of it was overshadowed by yang being his father. i've re-arrived at the conclusion that he's really not smart, he is possessed of zero self-awareness and he continues to speak thoughtlessly even after it should be clear that what he's saying is entirely inappropriate and uninteresting. or offensive: there was an admission he made about killing a hawk that made me want to attack him (verbally), but it wasn't the right time to be getting myself thrown out of the house for pointing out what a terrible human being he can be.

there was a moment when one of the others made a comment about our experiencing his stream-of-consciousness and what followed was about two minutes of absolute silence that was so awkward that it bore a sense of purity to it; we could all tell that we were all feeling uncomfortable, nobody had anything to say because we were all thinking about how we were feeling.

...

oh! and some of godmother's friends were helpfully discussing who they could fix me up with. it was decided that my age, ability to hold a good job and my apartment are in my favour but that not owning a car might be an issue, and there was this amusing "huh?" moment when i explained that i'm not interested in anyone who be concerned with any of those measurements...

de-stress

or re-stress. through a series of intriguing random links i stumbled earlier upon kelly mcgonigal's how to make stress your friend, one of the single most directly useful and important pieces of data that i personally need. you might well need it too. watch it!

---yesterday:

i woke up from a lucid dream of fighting scrapper gladator-style in an arena with an evil and violent relentlessness and horrific self-awareness. i don't recall the context but it set a dark tone for the day. the darkness continued lightly with my "new" headphones breaking (the right ear's cable's damaged), and deepened when i found myself responding impatiently to a problem newk'd was having. granted i was stressing out about the work i was doing and was irritated by his imprecision in describing the issue, but darn's assessment and report the day before brought to the fore a level of intolerance that i was quite ashamed of after i settled down.

that led to even greater distraction when i tried to get back into my work and could only think of "the newk'd problem". i tried discussing things with him over messaging while getting some work done, which ultimately proved to be a bad idea. now that i've heard darn i'm a lot more sensitive to his petulance. trying to get past this and find a fix, i came up with a solution that i'm pretty sure offended him even though it's in his best interests; i need him to start investing himself in studying theory - data structures, algorithms, design patterns and alternative paradigms and methodologies. and then i need to coach him personally.

either way, i feel poisoned by megaman and darn. if we're going to add significance to the jewish new year then this has been an ugly way to begin it.

---the end of the workday felt like an epic fail. while explaining to darn the situation i was leaving for the two-day holiday in, i thought about how i would hear the words i was saying if i was him, and as the words left my mouth i thought "credibility blown". it didn't help that he misunderstood my description of a bug that could be treated as a feature and was left with the impression that i'd been wasting my time implementing the "feature" instead of focusing on the core design...

---on my way home i picked up wine for dinner gifts and added a bottle of rum, downing a solid splash on arrival the same way i used to do during my interrogations. it was through a light haze that i got dressed, feeling awkward about putting on nice clothes for the first time in almost half a year, and walked out to a mind-bogglingly stunning sunset, all bright yellows and pink clouds streaked across the lightest blue of skies.

dinner was great, if a little awkward. there were a couple of interesting conversations amidst all the regular smalltalk, a significant note being struck by someone telling me that it's somehow possible for me to begin the canadian citizenship process directly bypassing the quebec one. something involving interviewing across the border (the us border) that wouldn't require me to speak french.

i strongly suspect that that's not a relevant avenue anymore, and in any event i really need to learn french so i don't know if i'd care to add layers of complication to the process.

by the end of the evening everyone was sleepy, so the goodbyes were said spontaneously and quickly. i was, as usual, very uncomfortable with waves versus handshakes versus kisses, on the way out i thought i'd gotten it right for once but then suddenly realized that i'd kissed another guest i'd never met but skipped the hostess. aw, crap :(

---today:

the windows are open and i'm sweating in spite of it only being fifteen degrees. during the night it dropped down to six, and while i pulled out my duvet cover i didn't actually use it. oh, canada: what have you done to me?!

i think i like it ^_^
as i walked around running errands today, i was struck emotionally by how the weather exposed a sense of spring that i can only connect to cape town on its best days.

...

i woke up to a chat with pg culminating in her holding up all my israeli clothing to the webcam for me to choose which to throw and which to keep. the video quality was terrible and some of the items were hard to recognize, but either way i sent most of it to be donated: we were both proud of my ability to let go. heck, of all my band / experience shirts and hoodies i think i kept only one. my claws shirt, because it's an awesome shirt and it's the fraternity that i will always identify with the most.

when she turned the light on at the end of the chat the video quality improved drastically...

*sigh*

it looks like we have another potential buyer for our apartment! i hope this all goes smoothly and quickly, may the best (first) man (couple) win.

i walked to the computer / surveillance store next door to discover that a simple, good motion-detection / video camera solution costs $150 (should i waste my time pitching it to the building manager?) and that their keyboards are *way* cheaper than what i'd find at walmart. on the way to walmart to price-check i discovered that there's another subway and it's much nicer and cleaner than the one i usually go to that's only marginally closer.

...

i tried to get something done at the post office and was surprised to hear the woman ahead of me explaining to the guy how to do his job. good thing for her she knew all the ins and outs of international postage, he was utterly clueless and wouldn't even admit that he was lost. he could easily have cost her the package she was sending! when i stepped up afterwards and asked for something simple, he asked me to come back in fifteen minutes when his manager would be around.

huh.

he was of middle-eastern origin with a heavy accent, i suspect there was an honour thing going on there.

...

i had a quick cup of coffee at the starbucks, did some serious supermarket shopping and then arbed around before napping an hour or so. i woke up with more of a headache than when i'd started...

---i think i'm addicted to penny arcade: gamers vs evil. seriously.

...

i'm listening to the new nin album i pre-ordered. i'm not blown away :(

---happy jewish new year, everyone.

lucky 13

ah! the perfect snooze once again. it makes it very difficult to get out of bed.

my day began with an exciting email: it looks like we have a real buyer for our apartment ^_^

i sorted out an onboarding issue on the weekend so that it wouldn't mess up my morning, but walked in to find a new it guy... surprise! he didn't make a bad first impression, but aside from the onboarding distraction he walks around with a cloud of halitosis :/

---"why wasn't i invited to the meeting?" i asked myself as i walked past a pow-wow that really needed my input. it was one of a number of things on my mind when i sat down with megaman to discuss the office discomfort. what he told me was very surprising, and while i didn't agree with all of it i certainly can see things from his and darn's point of view.

first, it's good to know that darn's issue with me isn't personal, and even though megaman understands what i've been dealing with on a managerial level he cannot justify my lack of direct, tangible contribution to the project. if i have to prove myself, and it's by neglecting my other responsibilities, then that's what i'll do. the cards are all on the table and while i'm upset that the two of them didn't think to explain the situation previously i'm happy to report that their behaviour following our discussion was professional and even comforting.

even darn came by at the end of the day - after 10pm - and we had a respectful and frank conversation which put everything in line. there are some big issues that concern me, in particular with newk'd, and i don't know how to proceed and i think i might've handled him badly in the afternoon. the insight into the office politics that are slowly developing wasn't enjoyable either - we're relying on moonlighter and competing with him simultaneously :(

at the end of the day i have to get *my* shit together vis-a-vis the current project and i'll be damned if i let that slip.

i didn't leave until i'd made serious progress, and i walked out enthusiastic and confident after almost exactly thirteen hours in the office, most of which were spent sitting down in front of my monitor. i'd forgotten what that feels like, and my legs had apparently forgotten too 'cause they were pretty stiff and sore.

thirteen is pg's favourite number, and after a couple of years with her i've pretty much adopted it.

---no more vegan at l'artère?? i ordered what i thought was couscous, and a chicken pie arrived. i knew it was chicken because i looked at the board and realized that i'd read the salad section instead of the meal section when ordering the meal of the day. i figured it was my bad and decided to eat it, but was upset when i took a bite and tasted cheese.

i went up to the counter to ask if it was cheese, which wasn't listed on the board, and the waitress said no. i returned, wondering suspiciously as i slowly raised another piece to my lips... what is it, if not cheese?

the chef jumped out from behind a pillar to inform me that he'd overheard my conversation with the waitress and that she'd misunderstood. he said that in french, actually, so i had to ask him to repeat it, but he then offered to replace the pie and he did so with gusto. gusto being the couscous i hadn't ordered. so i had a salad with my salad, enjoyed the coffee, and listened to the chef explain that the vegan menu isn't gone, it's just being overhauled. overall he made a good case for returning soon to find out how that goes.

---good on you, boulder! sounds like a good fight for a green economy, and there's time for us all to pitch in a little.

colin stokes discusses education in culture and is nothing short of inspirational. give the man a few minutes of your time.

labour day-intensive

damn it takes a long time to clear out a macbook. at least an hour of going through all the apps to clear sensitive data and sign out etc. i could've just done a "factory reset" but then the next luser would have had to reinstall all the software that was already there...

... a part of me is now wondering if maybe i shouldn't just own my own computer. aww, heck, i'll worry about that another day.

after doing laundry (finally! back to normal) i went to godmother's for coffee as an excuse to pick up fruit that my uncle had bought for me (he has to buy things on special even when he doesn't want them). we talked about apartment ownership and she reassured me that the guys i'd spoken to were talking shit: it's always a good idea to invest in property, and montreal taxes are no different from any other country's.

so, that was positive. i came back (playing a lot more penny arcade: gamers vs evil - the more i play the more i enjoy it) and followed that up with junk food on the couch watching community. they've really brought it back to its former glory!

so i've done very little today, which i guess is what labour day is all about. and i'm surprisingly comfortable with it. i know what i have to do going forward, things might not be how i want them to be but they're certainly a lot better than they could be.

and i even did a couple of french lessons.

inflection point

so i tried to get back to bed around noon as i'd been woken early, and instead of passing out i lay there with my eyes closed feeling miserable. i thought and i dwelled and then suddenly understood what's happened...

i've been working for this company for half a year. at the beginning it was tough because it was too lax and we were working with C-players, now it's tough because megaman and darn have brought in a slavedriver culture and behave as if they're A-player only even though they're only B-players. so from one imbalance to the other, only this side of the scales is unfriendly and stressful.

it's not just that it's demoralizing and demotivating, i just realized that i'm properly depressed. the only thing that really gets me going is training, and i think i can explain my addiction to training as it being the only form of endorphin release i get. not that it wouldn't be exciting and awesome in any event, it's just that work occupies the rest of my neural activity and it's exactly the opposite of satisfying.

as i said to my mum after the revelation, this year is a sacrifice and a means to an end. also, i was willing to take any job in order to get here and just because i was enjoying this one doesn't mean that i shouldn't slog through after it becomes undesirable. i have half a year to go and i need to put learning french at the top of my priority list: if i can't get permanent residence then this will all have been for naught.

so i don't like darn and darn doesn't like me. i don't have faith in what he and megaman are doing, i don't like their management style, i don't like the office politic that's been developing. but i need to make this work, and if that means putting on a happy face and playing possum then that's what i'll have to do. as much as it pains me to say this, i'm going to start picking my battles and try to make things as bearable as i can.

---on a completely different note, godmother prepared a great dinner last night and we all ate it under the stars while enjoying perfect weather to close a perfect day. it really was great, even my uncle was surprisingly pleasant.

i went straight from there to see the world's end, and i thoroughly enjoyed myself. what a clever, funny movie! a great finish to the cornetto series. i caught the last metro home and read until i passed out.

...

i was woken up early by a phone call from the real estate agent with good news; i'd spend the next hour sending emails and trying to get my thoughts straight. as i sat down at the computer i received a request from a fellow student who's been tasked with taking over my webmaster responsibilities - i was so excited that they finally found someone i had to sort that out first :P

community season 4 is on netflix, so i've now watched a couple of episodes - they're on form again :)

---i've spent a ridiculous amount of time with the online dating sites. i've gotten more comfortable sending messages, at least.

a week to reflect - ii

[... continued]

pg called last week and it was really nice speaking to her. she's decided she's done with england and resigned herself to being israeli... oh, well.

---dating:

i've been keeping an eye on the dating sites; i've so far seen a couple of profiles that were worth trying to communicate with. most of the girls online are either totally unattractive physically or entirely uninteresting.

last week at ju-jitsu i was paired up with a sexy, large girl with a great attitude and who's so naturally flexible that she's practically impossible to submit. i was almost too attracted to her to focus on the task at hand, with jiu-jitsu things get pretty intimate...

a really cute girl "claimed" me in boxing friday night, and i'm kicking myself for have missed two perfectly good opportunities to ask her out. dammit!

---training:

hayfever makes for difficult training.

our boxing instructor made me feel like shit last week, but this week he made it clear that the grief he was giving me was actually his way of saying i've established myself. when i realized that my enthusiasm returned even stronger than before. so much so that i've been happily working through my jump rope issues: my new rope needs to be whipped down on every stroke and it's an insanely tough workout. by the time we've warmed up my arms are already strained and then i add actual boxing... i'm already feeling a lot tougher after just a few days of that!

one of the guys was sweating profusely the other night and our instructor was giving him shit for it. i couldn't resist:
"oh my god, that's disgusting! i've never seen anyone sweat so much!"
as soon as everyone realized what i was referring to we all had a good laugh :)

i was surprised to learn that the beginner mats' jiu-jitsu instructor's jewish - i heard him talking about the birthright program with another guy and felt like i was in the twilight zone.

i'm gonna miss boxing with scrapper. there's a noticeable difference working with a friend who you know you can push and who knows can push you. one embarrassing incident, though - he was talking to the substitute instructor and i thought he was done. i made as if to strike him and then realized that all eyes were still on him...

...

friday night a couple of the guys invited me to spar with them after the class. the primary objective was for me to learn to defend myself. i didn't really get that far, but it was a bloody good start. i gotta say that it's terrifying to see or almost-see a punch coming for you and it's really hard for me to keep my eyes open and feet grounded. every moment is breathless anticipation of being tagged, and with these guys tags are pretty jarring.

even more upsetting was taking an opportunity to beat up on one of them and realizing too late that i'd thrown all my technique out the window and didn't have my hands up. shit!

...

i began today with an awesome sparring session; it was my first time in the octagon and while we started with boxing we ended up with muay thai.

i do not have what it takes to stare down a spinning backfist.
i do not have what it takes to stare down a spinning backfist.
i do not have what it takes to stare down a spinning backfist.

---last thursday (august 22^nd):

it appears that the metro braking system isn't automated. i witnessed a train stopping too late, and all the people waiting to get out got to watch us for a minute before continuing on to the next station. what a bummer!

...

how 'bout that? all it took to make a shitty day great was an early happy hour, great jiu-jitsu and killer kickboxing, and a stupidly delicious chinese meal out.

---friday:

waking up: muscles relaxed, brain relaxed, window fan whirring, the perfect combination to make me want to just lie in bed and slip in and out of consciousness. but alarms. and crunch time. and reality.

i left very late on friday night, picked up scrapper and took him for indian on the way to vfmp's with thunderstone. the meal was delicious, and thunderstone was brilliant. we played until 3 or 4am with vfmp and his buddies, great beer and games, fun attitude and non-stop funny commentary.

the pre-dawn air was wonderful! it was a little chilly, though, and i was ready to crash. on our way home the taxi driver tried to gas us (he closed the windows before letting rip with a most offensive fart) and drove so fast we were sure he was suicidal.

---saturday:

scrapper and i went to see kickass ii, which was especially cool because we'd seen the first one together. we both enjoyed it immensely, although it wasn't quite as wonderful as the first one. i was surprised by how great jim carrey was and it makes him even more of an asshole for hating on the film.

we went to sports experts so scrapper could pick up some things and i saw a lumogreen hoodie from under armor that was so brilliant i wasn't sure i could pull it off. it would take some mulling over later before i decided that i had to have it.

godmother told me that things were happening on monkland and we decided to check it out, very fortunately running into newk'd. we enjoyed the little street festival, then went to maz for a night of booze, awesome pool and air hockey, breaking to have dinner at shaika across the road (nice place!) and to catch the tail end of a pretty good hip hop performance.

newk'd's girlfriend was defeated in pool by a psychotic dude who took himself way to seriously, and they asked me to please avenge them. getting the rules sorted out was a negotiation, and at one point he became certain that newk'd had talked shit about him and i needed to calm him down. i kicked his ass in spite of large quantities of alcohol and my focus difficulties, and walked out feeling like a hero.

...

i'm not at liberty to share who scored the quote of the day:
"my ex-girlfriend, who was black - i mean she's still black but she was my girlfriend..."

---sunday:

waking up late and hitting starbucks to Get Shit Done without disturbing scrapper or being distracted by him. we did some major shopping at loblaws where i managed to piss him off (my reaction to his not hearing me wasn't particularly considerate), and we proceeded to saint laurent which was supposed to be like monkland the day before but it kind of sucked. i picked up dodgy indian food as we entered and i regretted it almost immediately - the experience of it, not after-effects. to make up for that we went to aux vivres which was awesome.

we walked through la fontaine, sitting down to chat for a while, and i was surprised to see it actually filled with water :P
on our way to piknic electronik scrapper had an epiphany relating to a philosophical point we've been discussing for years now, and he took that with to the party. piknic wasn't great, something about the crowd was a bit weird, but dj bliss was bloody amazing and we enjoyed that.

we got home late, watched devilman: the birth and then passed out. the movie was entertaining, but it's totally weird that the biggest action sequence was boring.

i went to bed feeling the purest exhaustion i've felt in a long time.

---monday:

morning: "beauty snooze" - i was very lucky to wake up on time without my alarm...

after training: it was great training and weather that made me feel good. the indian place was closed so we did chinese, i burned my mouth and was pretty upset with myself because it would have tasted even better otherwise.

we spent the evening discussing biological technological applications and capped it with a reading from ryan north - to be or not to be. it's genius!

---tuesday:
epic dreams of revolution. wearing wednesday socks threw my sense of what day it was out of whack.

there was a dinner fail, we didn't find anything to watch on netflix and closed the day playing a card game scrapper'd picked up that was pretty good.

---wednesday:

a sense over the whole night that i wasn't quite sleeping, just waiting. i woke up hurting badly and exhausted, and dragged myself to the office to meet with moonlighter and then escape. the meetings took longer than expected, but i returned home and napped for about forty five minutes and that made a world of difference.

even so, i attacked the code that i was supposed to be manipulating and after hours of struggling still couldn't figure out if i should write it from scratch or just keep trying. i was most unhappy.

boxing: sweaty yet relaxed, practicing defense. i need a lot more of that.

we just made it in time for a big and delicious indian dinner, then went downtown for an uninspiring beer before returning home. i was properly tired and even fell asleep on the metro...

---thursday:

scrapper's alarm failed so it's good i was planning on seeing him to the airport. i'd discovered a taxi iphone app and organizing the ride there was nice and easy. we had coffee, said goodbye and i went straight to the office.

three coffees and i was still feeling weak. i left late and was feeling wasted, i was on my way to kickboxing and i simply couldn't understand why i was still going... i must be seriously addicted. most of the lesson was disappointing, but some of it was useful and we had a good finish so we i left it was with a sense that it had been worth it. my evening disappeared in the internets and i went to bed relatively early.

---friday:

i woke up feeling pretty good.

happy hour: excellent lunch money game! i'd bought it based on a vague memory, the kinds of things that came out were a lot of fun.

there's something magical about walking in the rain all the way to get food at subway and finding it closed. i learned about twerking and hurriedly finished my application to mars one.

i watched the second episode of black mirror on scrapper's recommendation and was blown away by it.

---saturday:

i began the day realizing that nobody cares about my laundry problems. and i'm not the only one with them. and the dryer doesn't work again.

i posted the previous entry, took a slow meandre downtown with a decent cup of coffee, and bought the luminous green hoodie i'd seen with scrapper the week before. apparently retail therapy doesn't work if you don't like shopping. i'm glad i got what i needed, but that's as far as it goes...

i ate a crappy tofu meal, and between the ride downtown and back played plenty of penny arcade: gamers versus evil. i love that game.

vfmp and his boyfriend came over for thunderstone and lunch money, i made a quick salad dinner and we headed to the village to watch the ufc fights live at a sports bar. it was a pretty awesome night.


---today:

i'm now hurriedly finishing this before heading to godmother's for dinner. i woke up early for sparring, and walked out of the gym into the most beautiful, hot summery day of blue skies and pleasant breezes. i had a quick subway lunch and am proud of myself for not getting involved in the ridiculously uninformed bible debate between two women sitting near me, then took my snowboard to poubelle du ski for renewal.

in retrospect, i should have bought the board but it was too late by the time i realized it. in the meanwhile, i'll enjoy another year of any damage being their problem. i got groovy new boots - bright orange with "nitro" written across them. so my new boots tell me "memento mori". how appropriate...

a week to reflect - i

let's see if i have what it takes to summarize this past week. it's been a bit nuts.

---work:

when the network goes down i become my own email.

...

ceh caught me when already really tired and droned on and on about things that don't interest me to the point where my vision blurred and i was struggling to stifle my yawns. all i wanted to say was "i don't actually care, can we just finish with the work?" but he's a bit nuts and i didn't want to upset him. the cto already complained about walking past his cubicle and finding him repeatedly and violently slamming his keyboard on the desk...

...

we have a new front-end developer who lacks in experience and education but makes up for it with enthusiasm. unfortunately, that cost me a good hour or so trying to explain how svn works. it was emotional.

during happy hour yesterday we were playing lunch money and really enjoying it. one of darn's developers asked for suggestions when playing a "humiliation" card. we'd gone with pantsing and a wet-willy before, the last thing we were expecting was for the new guy (creeper) to ask "how about fingering his asshole? that'd be pretty humiliating!"

we were all stunned. he's tying with ceh on inappropriate things to say to co-workers.

...

last week we said goodbye to our interns and one of our star players; i handled the exit interviews. it's nice to close a term on a positive note in both directions!

...

at one point during the week i needed to get stuff done and was told to work from home to avoid distractions. unfortunately, that meant leaving darn in charge and that's a recipe for disaster. what actually happened, though, was that i spent hours at home trying to decipher one of darn's developers' code (he's a great coder, but not into readability) while unable to use our software or development tools because mac.

i have been suffering my macbook since february and i can't believe i've lasted this long. i returned to work, interrupted darn sharing his opinions on a technical issue he wasn't familiar with, and spent a few hours configuring a new windows machine. i'm now off mac, all that's left to do is wipe it properly and return it to the company. the new machine has shitty battery life and i'll miss mac's touchpad, but otherwise it's perfect and lets me get shit done!

...

overall this past week has been unbelievably frustrating and demotivating. darn has not only been a right prick (i've actually felt like hitting him on more than one occasion) but he's been sidestepping me and keeping me out of the loop. he and the two developers megaman brought in have done a bang-up job of forming their own private team. moonlighter and the cto are still into secrecy and merging surprises into our codebase. i don't have the energy to deal with this kind of shit.

newk'd has been disappointing of late, considering that we're friendly out of the office i felt bad dumping on him when he didn't perform. having said that, it's not like he's not trying and there are some things he does very well. when i told darn to get him to do one of those things, darn responded with "he's not credible". not only was that absolute bullshit, he said it in front of a new intern and that's not cool at all.

during crunch, there were days when i was in the office for more than eleven hours. in order to train and spend time with scrapper i was going in early, and there were a couple of late nights. since the arrival of darn and the institution of arbitrary deadlines i've found myself entirely uninterested in investing more hours in the office. it's actually become quite depressing. yesterday we demonstrated our progress and everyone was very excited, but leaving the office i found myself thinking about how disconnected i feel and wondering how much i've actually contributed to the current project. the hours i spent on development were mostly spent struggling with the environment and not actually coding, and most of my input has been in advising others or working on the tool chain. darn's developers are good even if they're not amazing, and they're at least getting shit done.

not only is this all not particularly fulfilling, but it doesn't amount to much when quantifying my involvement in the project. i'm not satisfied at all.

[continued...]

gir's in the house!

how is this possible?! how can it be half past midnight as i write this? online dating websites take an inordinate amount of time, as does preparing food and getting started with awesome crossover fanfic. it involves gir, that's all i'm saying :)

---today began with a much better wake-up than yesterday. i was still tense from yesterday, but aside from an unprofessional slip or two i managed to keep my feelings in check. even when i was being shouted at by an irate cto who berated me for not using functionality that nobody told me about and that hasn't been implemented yet.
it didn't ease my mind to learn that we're in artificial overdrive / crunch mode because megaman and darn have realized that their planning was unrealistic. i have training and scrapper to attend to, i told them i'd do every second day.

it was one of those days. i couldn't make a move without someone either waiting for me or popping up with an emergency, so of the list of things that i had to do in the morning i achieved absolutely nothing all day.

the only positive things that happened at work were
1) getting over the unpleasantries with the cto and having a productive meeting after he realized who was at fault
2) receiving my custom gir iphone case

i was supposed to meet with bnw this evening but she caught something at the convention: i had to choose between using that time for work or running off to training because after yesterday i'd rather do tuesdays and thursdays if i have to choose. sod that, i thought, and made a hasty exit.

i rushed out, then suddenly remembered throwing my life-proof case out with the cardboard box the new case came in. i rushed back to find the recycling bin empty, and was all "oh, shit!" until i hurried off and stuck my hand in my pocket. then i was all "no, shit!"
i've been doing things like that for the last while. it's not cool.

---i returned home to find that scrapper had managed to sort out the keys. awesome! and now we know why the building demands such a high deposit, the damn things actually cost $25 (O_o)

it was a super make-up-for-yesterday kickboxing session, i worked exceptionally hard and sorted myself out a bit. i worked with a boxing kid who calls himself prince, who was gassed out by the time i was finished drilling him. it was his turn next and he decided i deserved to feel the same; he completely exaggerated but i refused to give in, i took inspiration from the beast and went absolutely beserk. it took me more than five minutes after the class ended to get my breath back! the beast and prince invited me to join them on the punching bags, and i spent half the time kicking and the other half fixing prince's kicks.

overall, i feel good about my earlier decision to abandon ship.

scrapper and i had planned to meet up for dinner on the plateau, but he called to say he needed some time alone. after briefly chatting with my mom, i went online and the night disappeared.

scrapper's back, it sounds like he had a productive time. i'm now ready to go to bed, all is okay with the world. for now, and that's all anyone ever has :)

down with sickness

this morning darn informed me that i'm responsible for improving morale.
"oh. you mean i'm good cop and you're bad cop?"
"yeah."
i looked into his eyes and saw that he was soulless.

---my day didn't begin right because i got up early and exhausted to make up for the hours i'd take off later. the work day began with aota, she was stressed and i bothered her by asking for help with something she felt i should know and i walked away feeling guilty and irritated. the morning sped by and i headed off for my month and a half follow-up eye exam.

i skipped lunch because i had shit to do and was going to be losing hours anyway, so i arrived on time for my appointment but really hungry. i asked how long i'd have to wait and was told a couple of minutes. half an hour dragged on by, i got up and asked what was going on because by that stage i could've left, eaten something and returned instead of sitting burning time on an empty stomache. on the one hand i didn't want to be an ass, on the other i wanted them to know that they'd done me wrong. they told me another few minutes, which annoyed me even though this time it really was just a couple of minutes. then i went through the eye exam and my eyes couldn't focus at all when i was using both of them.

this is becoming a thing.

eventually the surgeon got to me and he told me that it all makes sense and that i should come right eventually. my next appointment is in four months. we'll see. to be fair, though, while i am having trouble with my sight it's so much better than before! i can see everything well but i just can't do detail in a hurry...

i returned to the office, wolfed down lunch and got sidetracked by a design review and an intern who'd built something on top of a major logic fail that i had to talk him through slowly just to explain where the problem was.

*sigh*

suddenly it was time to leave already and i'd barely achieved anything.

---i left for boxing and continued to bury myself in walter isaacson - steve jobs. it's as interesting and readable as everyone who pushed me to read it insisted, but it intrigues me that i see so much of myself in descriptions of his behaviour. not only in my underlying attitude to life but in the way i've always seen the world: my mother has always complained about my inability to see shades of grey. i'm definitely not as much of an asshole about it, though. at least i don't think i am...

---scrapper and i headed off to boxing. i forgot that he wouldn't be able to join the advanced class until we were already on our way and i felt bad about that. then we started warmup with the jump rope and i was failing and getting frustrated to the point where all the suck from the rest of the day focused into laser beams of anger and self-loathing that washed over me everytime i saw my reflection. and by self-loathing, i mean that "screw you!" look you might give yourself if you're staring at the mirror and seeing someone who looks just like you and is making you look bad.

the instructor walked in and when i asked the instructor if scrapper could join he responded in a way that made me feel small and stupid. for the rest of the class it was as if everything i did was pissing him off, i just couldn't get shit right and he was noticing it all. i felt like i was disappointing him as much as i was disappointing myself and my frustration levels kept rising. in restrospect, i think i actually did quite well but it doesn't matter.

he paired me up with a guy i'm friendly with but who's a beginner and doesn't really seem to be into training. a part of me felt that i was paired with him as a punishment. if it wasn't a punishment, i made it so by bringing my shit into things. i pushed him the same why i push everyone (and everyone pushes me, that's what training's all about) but he doesn't want to improve so we were both aggravated. the situation kinda improved, but then towards the end we did an uppercut drill. i got really annoyed with the way he was holding the pads, and then when it was his turn i got really annoyed with how he was hitting. it was only at the end that he pointed out how unfair this was and he was visibly upset; i realized he was right and i apologized profusely but you can't take stupid back.

fuck.

it was on that note that i left training. i'd gone to a dark place and i was seething all the way home. fortunately, talking it out with scrapper helped - it was about all sorts of things, obviously, not just a single day. it was about work and sacrifice and lessers of two evils, about expectations and outlooks and reality not being precisely what i need even though i'm aware of how ungrateful that may be considering that *knocks wood* things are going really well for me. sometimes i feel like i'm all the toys of the hundred-acre wood rolled into one.

---on a positive note my left leg is still tender and sore but it's definitely better.

...

this online dating thing is weird. according to match.com i'm missing out on all sorts of action by not subscribing, and the only way to find out if they're messing with me is to pay $20. FINE. but how come the other sites don't require cash up front?

profiling

this weekend has been all about anime, with a short break for mixed martial arts and a little bit of sightseeing and family. overall, it's been great!

---friday:

at 5am scrapper walked in, two hours earlier than expected. i wasn't in a state to greet so i'm glad i'd left him a note the night before.

in the morning i'd spent some time preparing for otakuthon by going through the schedule to highlight points of interest. they used the guidebook app which is really clever.

when switching trains on my way to work one kid sprinted across, not realizing that the other train would leave at least five minutes later. even so, the transport system is reliable and i don't feel that it's worth one's dignity to run.

---when i got into the office i spoke to megaman about my contract. i don't know what his deal is, this is the fourth time i've spoken to him about it and the third time that i've explained to him that the issues i originally had with it are non-issues and that we can proceed. it's weird dealing with a director who doesn't recall important details. in the afternoon i finally got a copy of it and we signed it: i'm finally officially working. and now i can get my options package :)
[now i just need to hang in another half a year until some of them vest]

---i walked in on darn giving the developers a hard time, and i'm annoyed that we didn't discuss it first. he's taking a hard line on the team and in one fell swoop he's flipped our culture. not necessarily for the worse - i won't say it's not good to have someone crack a whip - but i'm worried that the suddenness might over-stress the already stressed.

regardless, i think my role has been de-facto redefined and that's actually okay with me.

---ceh wanted to move because he claimed there were too many distractions on his side of the office, so i invited him to make the cubicle next to mine his. later he approached me and darn to complain that he couldn't work under those conditions, and we followed him while sharing puzzled looks as we suspected that he was hallucinating. it turned out he wasn't, but what was bothering him so much that he simply left the office was an intermittent and soft electrical snapping noise coming from the ceiling. he was shocked that it didn't bother me. we were shocked that it was distressing him.

---i went in for a massage, and about halfway through the massage therapist and i both registered that there were muscles in my back that when pressed were causing me to reflexively raise my legs. it was weird. anyway, it turned out that i needed that massage even more than i thought.

---i opened up thunderstone for happy hour and we had a good game. afterwards scrapper and i headed off to the convention. forget the videos, the stalls, the events, the panels, the videogames, and the karioke cafe. the biggest draw by far was the cosplay! it was unreal. literally. some of it was jaw-dropping, so ridiculously well-done that it seemed to distort reality! there were plenty more reasonable attempts that were clever or entertaining or both, some inappropriate or boring and some that were so bad and so wrong that we couldn't help but find them endearing.

we went to a panel entitled "the bad fanfiction panel: whathastobedone" that was, for me, quite disappointing. i was expecting it to be led by authorities who had something to offer and it was basically a handful of nobodies who weren't really good with talking to an audience. they didn't really share the horror stories, they just explained how much the horror stories had horrified them. such a tease! some of the readings were funny but they focused on "bad english" and not on "bad writing".

we focused more on a gorgeous jill valentine in the row in front of us. i was attracted even though she was vocally reminding me of annoying girls i've studied with.

i did walk away inspired to write some very specific fanfiction, and talking to scrapper about it had the two of us putting together a crazy crossover universe that works beautifully and would be so much fun to write! added to the list of things i really need / want to do. maybe it'll serve as a distraction from some of the others :P

---we got home really late and hadn't done shopping, so we ate at harvey's again. it's insane how slow those people are. i appreciate that it's not a bad burger at stupid o'clock in the morning, but still... they made us feel that if you want a reasonably good burger done reasonably quickly you'd do better to make it yourself.

i was exhausted but scrapper had been talking about a "dib shirt"... so i headed to vistaprint to put it together. between vistaprint and pixlr it really is fun and easy to put a good shirt together :)

---saturday:

i got very little sleep, i don't know why. i went downtown for a quick haircut and received very positive news about some offers on my apartment. after sending back instructions scrapper and i had lunch at subway and i picked up some good coffee before we headed back to the con.

we walked into the 404's improv, some of which was funny and some of which sucked. meh. we walked out of that and into an interesting-sounding panel covering academic enquiry into anime. the first panelist was interesting but the second spoke in french, which was unfortunately a deal-breaker. we walked in to a screening of fan parodies: some of it was unintelligible, some of it was cute and amusing and a couple of things we saw were absolute masterpieces, brilliant and hysterically funny. we had to skip the "masquerade pre-show" to reach the other side of town in time.

as the weekend progressed i felt less weird about ogling beautiful girls dressed up ultra-sexy. i (wishful thinkingly) feel like we're getting closer to a time when dressing that crazy will become normal...

---switching to fight night mode was awkward, but manageable. from giant herds of nerds to tough guys and mafiosos with real-worldly well-dressed women. it was a night of great fights, very few disappointments and some incredible action: all but one tristar fighter won, and seeing as we were there to support tristar we were pretty excited! it helped that we had excellent seats right near the octagon and could actually see what was going on without looking at the screens.

...

scrapper and i took great pleasure in coming up with inappropriate nicknames and entry music for fighters. like calling oneself "the hobbit" and stepping into the octagon to michael jackson - bad, for example.

---it was a surprisingly chilly night. we were tired. we went to a pizza place near saint laurent for "dinner" (i ate crappy fries) and then went home. as we walked in scrapper realized he'd lost my spare keys... serious bummer :(

---sunday:

a good night's sleep, but it only felt that way after i woke up early and went back to bed.

we left the final day of the con having arrived at the following conclusion: overall, the lesson learned this weekend was that buying tickets was a waste of cash as most of the fun can be had in the public areas where all the cosplayers congregate anyway.

we walked around the port for a bit and then headed up to the plateau. we walked through the tams and it's the first time i've seen it! it's really, really cool. i love how montrealers celebrate summer and just generally being in montreal :)

i may have gotten a bit too much sun. i went to godmother's for dinner, i joined yang for a long walking of the dog that included excellent sorbet from yeh, and yin drove me to the metro station and we said goodbye as she'll be returning to vancouver tomorrow morning.


---after a couple of conversations today i decided to try dating online. i spent ages setting up an account at match.com only to discover how expensive their subscriptions are and that you can't do much without them. jdate at least lets you make initial contact without paying them...

ripped and bearded

two things noticeably ripped today: me and my mr. price '99 specials. the latter on a desk drawer as i got up, i'm really unhappy about it. the former i might be exaggerating somewhat but i'm definitely feeling strong, solid and muscle-y.

on a style note, i've been under pressure and lazy this week and i'm sporting a light beard again. i'm trying to decide if i should keep it or not.

---i started the day by confronting the poor building secretary with my laundry issues. apparently the whole reason for the closing hours is for security and that it's security from whoever's tampering with the machines. it's 2013, FFS, i told her that security cameras are super cheap to install and their closing hours obviously aren't making a difference anyway. i hope she'll pass along my complaints as she promised.

on the one hand, dealing with shit like this is why it's easier to own one's own condo, but on the other i've now heard things about the hidden costs of ownership that make me wonder if it's truly a good investment in montreal...

---before leaving for work i checked my email and was disturbed to find a message from megaman informing me that an urgent case i opened yesterday was about to be delivered into the dark clutches of our backlog. i couldn't understand what wasn't clear about its relevance until i read over what i'd written and realized that i'd taken a pre-approval email and copied and pasted it, and without context it had ceased to be the explicit task i'd had in mind at the time.

it's been that kind of a week.

dealing with that made me late for work... nobody cared, though.

---jira fail: a predecessor had custom-defined a resolution called "unresolved", which atlassian specifically advises not doing. rescue seemed really complicated and unpleasant from the few sources i found online and i was super-proud of myself for finding a sneakier, simpler way to handle it ^_^
[if you've read this far you probably care, all that was needed to untangle things was to rename the custom resolution. i don't know why nobody else thought of that]

i caught cls struggling with a method i'd asked him to implement, and we got to play on the whiteboard for half an hour until we figured out how to handle it. it's the most complex issue i've worked on in ages, and it was a lot of fun!

during the past week i've asked dang for the task list for the current project a number of times and today he finally sent it. once i'd looked at the wireframe, i realized that i've actually been assigned a huge task requiring skills i haven't exercised since last october. hah! i spent an hour or so visualizing use cases and designing the underlying data structures, all the while trying to figure out how i'm going to handle my regular responsibilities in addition to actually developing software. i'm only half-complaining ;)

i was already in a hurry when the ceo called me in for a personal chat; he wanted my opinion on where we stand and how i feel about things, but he also wanted to discuss the secret project i was introduced to yesterday. the evangelist in me came out. i explained to him that he shouldn't even think about what we could do with it until i've had a chance to study it and figure out what it really is: he appreciated it when i told him that while our current plan would be served by it, it could produce a whole other business and anything he learns about it now will only serve to pigeonhole what might be capable of breaking the box.

i hope i'm right about all this.

---i arrived a bit late for training, and there was only one guy kickboxing so i joined him for the warmup as we'd be sparring. but then the slow guy showed up a few minutes later and we certainly wouldn't be sparring with him around, so i changed shirts again and hit the bjj mats. the kid instructing us put me with two real beginners so that i could help him out; amidst all the advising i did actually learn a thing or two.

a cute girl from the bjj joined the advanced kickboxing class (there's a half-hour with no overlap) and threw the numbers out, so i volunteered to do impact with her. she wasn't hitting me very hard so the instructor came over to demonstrate... until now, that's meant knocking me out. while he did wind me with one of his liver shots, i was totally stoked to find that i've toughened up enough over the last couple of months that i can now take his soft punches. i'm pretty sure i'm not ready for his real ones yet, but it's a big improvement nonetheless :)

the beginner's class was good, i worked with the beast and after the way he finished his ten straight minutes of power kicks i felt ashamed with what i'd done with mine. he was visibly wiped out and then suddenly went into beserker mode, each kick harder than the last and i was so taken by surprise he almost broke through the thai pads into my face!

that shit was inspiring.

i got home to a very slow evening. i called bnw to plan our next meetup, and finally got a working version of a prototype for horseman delivered. i've been listening to all sorts of music (finally adding linkin park - hybrid theory to my earlier purchase of godsmack - good times, bad times) and i really don't understand how it's now 1.30am already O_o

my salads are perpetually improving; it's funny how washing and chopping leaves bothers me but chopping the green beans and broccoli from the microwave stir-fry doesn't.

anyway, scrapper's returning in six hours. gotta crash.

---(slowly) rebuilding my music collection on itunes gives me some startling insights into what i truly value and what i merely enjoy listening to. one of those insights is that nostalgia plays an enormous role in deciding whether something will make the cut. case in point: foo fighters. i love a lot of their stuff, but for me nothing beats their foo fighters album (1995), which was how i discovered them.

and that i'd rather buy an album that individual songs. i think that points to me being a bit cheap.

tango

allow me to elaborate: darn upset me yesterday by dismissing my concerns out of hand. i confronted him this morning, and when he reacted even more offensively i realized that that was a mistake. aota advised my going to the product manager, but i thought it'd be best if i tried megaman one more time before going over his head.

i didn't get an opportunity to say anything until we were already presenting our work so far at an all-hands. i knew that this wasn't the time to bring up a conflict but i couldn't see any other way, so i suppressed my irritation and "innocently" asked the product manager what he thought now that he could see what was already done.

he responded that we'd need to do what i'd been arguing against, and at that point i felt that i'd potentially antagonized darn for nothing as my question would no doubt be taken as a slight. either he didn't realize that i'd pushed past him or he's just good at keeping his feelings to himself because i didn't notice any signs and the rest of our interactions for the day were just fine.

once i'd accepted that they all really want to do this thing that i totally disagree with (i have my team's support, too), i came up with a way to implement a fail-safe so that if and when the executives realize the mistake we'll be able to undo the counterproductive logic without unraveling anything. i was quite proud of myself for that, megaman agreed immediately and darn allowed himself to be convinced in megaman's presence.

words for the week: "lackey" and "minion". aota was surprised that this is the first time i've thought of darn that way.

---wednesday:

it occurred to me this week that on the days i leave early for muay thai i should go to work earlier too - for the first time since i started working for this company i don't have a bank of overtime hours.

morning weather: drizzling pleasure. i'm so excited for winter!!!

our marketing head is a surfer, and i've been invited to join him surfing in san fransisco if we find a reason to get me down to our offices there :)

i spent large parts of today quietly getting shit done. other parts were spent going over designs with my team and it was really nice to get them onboard and to receive our cto's approval for everything. i think he's really beginning to trust us.

---so, while we've gotten him off our core development he's been doing r&d, and he called me over to see what he's been working on. when i realized what i was looking at my mind started doing backflips: he's secretly been doing some incredibly cool stuff and it's so crazy i'm actually going to have to study it and write a manual just so that we can introduce it to the team. as it doesn't fit in with our corporate plan, we're going to have to do this all off the clock and behind everyone's backs, which is pretty surreal and strangely motivating.

i told him to his face, explaining that it was a compliment, that he is truly crazy. you have to be crazy to build ridiculously ambitious things that generate new development paradigms.

---i found a large box waiting for me on my desk in the afternoon - thunderstone has arrived ^_^
that was really fast!

muay thai was interesting and was either relatively relaxed or i'm that much stronger than before. boxing was awesome and i learned a lot. the state of my shin is scaring me a little and i think i'd better play it safe and visit the doctor again. i really can't tell what's damaged and if it's the bone i'm going to have to do something about it...

---i was all excited to find the washing machines available when i got home, but when i returned downstairs with my laundry there was an "out of order" sign on the door again. wtf?!?! i'm really pissed off now, and i'm going to speak with the building owners tomorrow morning. it doesn't make sense that i'm not allowed to have a washing machine in my apartment, i'm not allowed to do laundry during the only hours i'm at home, and that for the second time in two weeks the only chance i've had to do laundry has been when the machines were out of order. that's bullshit.

---i was taking out the recycling when i found a can that scrapper had opened. i've never seen anyone botch opening a can before, i'm going to have to show him how to use the opener.

*shakes head*