"WiFi'd Out"
Man, where's the time go? Keeps on slippin' as they say. Plenty of stuff has happened.
Firstly I finished out that week of training the replacement (obviously). By the second day I started to realize I didn't have to cover everything in the first day. It was okay to slow down and just cover the one thing at a time. Which I did. Started going through the most important things more than once and first, then covering the other stuff.
He seemed ready to take over by the time I left. At least I preferred to think so anyway. I wrote out another how-to document for him. He seemed happy with that also. I kept trying to get someone to follow through once and test it. But no one did. I was having way too good of a time writing that document out. I think that sort of thing is what I would enjoy the most. The kind of thing I just sit and concentrate on and all time just kind of melts away. Like a blog but even more fun...er.
Anyway my last day was August 3rd. They all seemed to appreciate me a lot more as I was leaving. But then I approached that particular job from a rather strange place which had a significant bearing on how I interpreted and the impression I first made on everyone. As I've mentioned I left the SBC job, was unemployed for a month and got a new job at a place downtown. That one ended rather abruptly after 2 1/2 days. At which point I was both depressed and unemployed (not a good combo) for another month. That's when I got the job of which I referring. It was a bad place. But it served its purpose of getting me back into the world of the living and ready for a much better real job. A rebound job, if you will. Having fully rebounded through that job I was then ready to work for someone else.
Ok, fine: keeping in mind I am in now way shape or form an official representative of this company, merely a low-level employee, I will tell you who I now work for. Intel, I work for Intel.
The title of my last post was supposed to be a clue. Not a very good clue, but a clue.
As of this writing I will be starting week four tomorrow (Monday). So far I have been merely baby-sitting racks upon racks of computers. As best I can anyway. Ya see they have these automated processes where-by software is auto-magically tested. They need the computers up on running ready to run a test. Sometimes they go down. I'm supposed to get them back up. Sometimes easier said then done. In any case that's currently my job: keeping them up and going. Yes, it's at least as exciting as it sounds. At least it pays 1.3 times better than my last "rebound" job.
I keep thinking there must be, ya know, something else I'm supposed to be doing. Don't know what exactly. I hate that.
In keeping track of the status of all those computers I've started to utilize fancy things like MS Excel and its exciting "autofilter" feature. It's like, you know, super-fantastic. Maybe by the time I leave this job (I'm always assuming as much) I'll know A LOT about Excel. I'm going to assume that's a good thing.
I've decided if I can make it through Jan. 1st in the job it will have served it's purpose. The fall is a terrible time for hiring ya see. When you've been jumping job to job as long as I have you pickup on patterns like this. September is alright, maybe even October. But November/December? Forget about it. Just take a vacation. But starting January it's back to the hiring. Or I could serve the whole year contract. That'd be nice. And convenient since it ends right in late July/early August so I'll have a little while to find a new job before NEXT year's fall season of non-hiring.
Of course, there has been other news besides the work-related kind. For instance my sister has had a baby girl.
I was there, the first day of the new baby, in the hospital. I got to hold her and everything. And what a sweet little baby she is. Already gots mom and dad wrapped around her little finger and doesn't even know it. And amazingly bright too. I mean I'm not sure how you can decide such a thing on a baby that was literally born yesterday but yes, the baby seems really smart for a newborn. To me. And my sister was surprisingly inclusive when it came to having my hold and feed the baby. I think I'm going to be really close to this kid. Maybe not parent-close, but you know...close.
It was such an exciting and fun thing, the thought my little sister having her own baby. Yes, I am getting older.
For Christmas I'm thinking about buying a bunch of kid's movies. You know, the classics like
The Wizard of Oz, some Disney cartoons,
The Princess Bride, etc. Perhaps I'll hatch some kind of scheme whereby I contact the relatives and we print up a list and split the movies out amongst us. I'm sure there's like twenty of them kind movies we could pick up. That'd be expensive for any one of us.
Other news? Lets see. I did buy a PlayStation Portable. Ya, I know what you're thinking: "why?". Well I kept hearing how easy it was to down-grade them to put [fully legitimate] "home brew" applications on them. And how easy it was to come across units with the right firmware for said fully legitimate firmware down-grading for homebrew. So I bought one "refurbished" online. Unfortunately this unit had the latest non-downgradable firmware. Which defeated the whole purpose of the purchase, didn't it? So in a moment of weakness I bought another PSP. This time a new one. I could use a fancy warranty anyway (right?). So What started as a plan for a rather cheap PSP toy turned rather expensive rather quickly. I now have it doing what I set out to have to though. So there ya go.
Lastly, so to speak, I was having trouble with my desktop PC's WiFi connection. It would disconnect then re-connect ever 30 to 60 seconds. Sometimes it would stay connected longer, sometimes not. So I decided on a trip to Fry's to pick up a new router. One of them fancy "Draft N" routers that are supposed to go far and possibly really fast. I even had the highest reviewed ones all printed out. Then I saw the connect-via-power lines option. So I decided the hell with it, I'll just abandon WiFi on the desktop and get the Ethernet-via-power instead. I got it home, got it all connected and...well it WAS working perfectly. Until about mid-way through this blog entry. Now it seems off-and-on. I seem to have an IP address. I'm just not connected currently. And the "repair connection" feature seems to have trouble giving me a new IP address. My roommate can connect via WiFi so I don't think it's the router or cable modem/internet service. That only leaves the stupid Ethernet-via-power as the possible cause. This very annoying. That was expensive too.
So I tried switching Ethernet ports on the back of my desktop and at least currently I seem to be online. So I think I'll real quick publish this while I have the chance.
