June, 2005:

My first official day on the new job is July 17th. That’s a Sunday. On Monday, the 18th, I’m scheduled for training at 9am…. in Tampa, FL. It’s a two week course in learning how to do the jobs of the people that our applications support. The first week we learn how to do their job, and the second week we do it.

This is both good news and bad news.

The good news is that, not only is this the first time anyone’s ever attempted to teach me what our “customers” do every day, but it’s the first time that I’m going to be trained in a fashion that I will most likely agree with. The fact that I’ll actually do their jobs for a week means that I will have a much greater knowledge of the internal dynamics of their job than I ever could get in a classroom setting.

It’s also good news because I’ll get to go to Tampa and spend a weekend there. It’s a great opportunity for some wonderful photography. Tampa isn’t a place I’d want to live, but there’s a lot to do in the city and I’m very excited to have a chance to look at it through my lenses. Additionally, while I’ll have to be “social” and spend a little bit of evening and weekend time with the two coworkers that will be traveling with me, I’ll be alone as well. It’s a lot easier to get good shots when I’m shooting alone or with like minded people than when I’m in a group with other goals and agendas.

The bad news is that I’ll have to be away from Jess for 2 weeks. I told her that she could come with me, as long as she didn’t mind being alone during the day. But, she’s not sure she can get away from work for that long and she doesn’t think it’s worth the airfare for just the weekend. So, it looks like we’ll be apart. I’d love to have her there and show her around, but, I’m not sure what to expect on this first trip. So, it’s probably good that she isn’t going, just in case I have less personal time than I am anticipating. But I sure am going to miss her.

It’s also bad news that it looks like my coworkers and I will be in the same hotel and sharing a rental car. So, it might be more difficult and more expensive to get around at night and on the weekend alone. It looks like my hotel is right on the edge of downtown and very close to the harbor, so, maybe it won’t be too hard to be without a vehicle. I’m working on getting a laptop. If I can’t get one from work on such short notice, maybe I’ll buy one. I’ve always wanted one. If not, then I’ll have to watch what images I keep, as I only have 1GB of compact flash storage. 1.5GB if I steal Jess’ card too.

The other bad news is that I am going to miss “John’s”:http://livejournal.com/users/gotardz/ going away party, and “Justin’s”:http://gentlenews.com/ housewarming party, which are one and the same on the 23rd. Additionally, I’m going to miss my Mom’s birthday, also on the 23rd. I’m quite bummed about that. If the world revolved around me, I’d order all events moved to the 16th or the 30th, but… alas… it doesn’t. I’m pretty sure Jess is still going to go, so take good care of her for me. No. Not like that. Well. Okay. But just a little. And only if you’re sharing too.

girl with pale lips and bold eyes

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Another great shot of Erica. I really enjoyed shooting her. By far, she is one of the most versatile women I’ve ever worked with. And she’s hot too.

Your comments and suggestions are appreciated, as always.

I’ve taken a new job within the same company I work for now. I was given my offer yesterday. I officially start on July 17th, however, prior to that, I’m transitioning another existing employee to handle my previous duties. Therefore, I’ll be much less available during the day than usual and this trend is likely to remain for the foreseeable future. If all goes well, you’ll see see life updates, photographs, and technical bits from me — they’ll just come in the morning, at night, or on weekends, instead of during the day. Please don’t think that I don’t love you any more.

Send me email chock full with the details of your personal lives, and leave me lots of comments just as you always have, and I’ll do the same. I just may not get a chance to write to you until the evening comes.

The new job should be wonderful. I’ll have a manager that knows how to be a manager. I’ll have peers that are more than willing to tow their end of the line. I’ll have plenty of room for advancement. I’ll be in a top performing team that regularly receives awards. I’ll get to wear a hat I really like wearing for a much larger portion of the time — designing systems and processes and overseeing their creation while providing input to make the project more successful along the way. The only downside is that, when I do have to program, it’s most likely going to be in Perl. On top of that, though I’ve yet to see any code, if I am to judge it stereotypically based on who wrote it, I’m going to guess that it is mostly a huge pile of brute force programming with no thought for maintainability of future improvements. I’m probably right.

I’m also a little concerned about my old group. Quite honestly, I don’t know that the employee taking my work can handle all of his work and all of mine. Additionally, there are a lot of things that I am knee deep in that I learn as I go, and I don’t know that he’s quite ready to learn how to do that, I know the department doesn’t have the time or money to train him. But, that’s their problem. If they want me, and see a value in me, then they should fight to keep me and reward me appropriately when I’m around. Instead, they shove me on the back burner, constantly taking away my team mates, and my projects, yet throwing to me the stuff they know they can’t handle any other way and then they close their eyes and turn their backs knowing I’ll get the work done. It will be hard for me to be terse with him when he has questions after the transition period, but, if I’m not, I’ll be working *both* of these jobs forever, and they’ll never realize how much I did for them.

Ladies and Gentlemen:

One-by-one our government is taking away our freedoms and liberties in the name of homeland security, reduced alcoholism, the war on drugs and other projects. In most cases, we’ve sat by and watched the freedoms slip away. But now, under the false pretense that they are protecting our children, our government and the new “Obscenity Prosecution Task Force” is “taking away our pornography”:http://web.morons.org/article.jsp?sectionid=1&id=6351. Recent reevaluations of US law (“18 USC 2257″:http://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/scripts/ts_search.pl?title=18&sec=2257) written to keep minors out of pornography has made it nearly impossible for any consenting adult to view pornography on the Internet.

In short, these new evaluations require all websites to hold very detailed and well indexed records of the name, address, and all aliases of all persons appearing nude on any website. With this in place, all anonymous sites like ratemyboobs.com, mobog.com, and tangotime.com will either shut themselves down or run the risk of being “caught”. Further more, it is now much more difficult for honest-to-goodness professional porn markers to distribute their work online as the stipulations for record keeping are hard to maintain and the business must keep it doors open to the government at any time for evaluation and records checks.

Luckily, at least for now, posting a picture of yourself on your own website (provided you are of age — I’m not sure what the stipulations are about minors publishing nude photos of themselves) is still legal. Or, at least, it would be fairly trivial for you to produce a record of yourself if it were required of you. But, under the right circumstances, our great government can now search your home for those records and will be free to prosecute you for other offenses that it happens to find evidence of while searching your home. So, if you happen to be an individual that does anything else the government might take offense to (which, in Texas, in some cases, includes simply owning a dildo, or practicing oral sex) posting nude pictures of yourself might not be a good idea any more.

Photographers, like myself, who happen to have a few nude images in their portfolios are now burdened with retroactively locating, and documenting all models that appear nude on their site. Or, you know, I could just take it all down to save me from the work. Of course, that’s exactly what our government wants.

This is just one more little step. There are “many, many more federal statutes”:http://my.execpc.com/~xxxlaw/federalstatutes.htm just waiting to be reinterpreted in a way that affects you. Isn’t it time that we as consenting, mature adults determined what is and is not obscene for ourselves?

I’m as guilty as you are. I’ve sat and watched them take away my freedoms one-by-one. I willingly live in a state that refuses to allow me to purchase alcohol on Sunday morning because… well.. that’s bad… or something. Thankfully, this matter is being “fought in court”:http://www.wired.com/news/politics/0,1283,67991,00.html?tw=rss.TOP by people who care more about your freedoms than you do — mostly, of course, because they require these freedoms to make money.

This evaluation is taking place in the Justice Department, mostly by officials that were appointed by leaders that we’ve elected in the past. In other words, in most cases we didn’t actually elect them. Therefore, we can’t exactly just not reelect them next time. But, we can let our men and women of congress know that we will not tolerate our freedoms being taken away and that, if they don’t actively pursue the reinstatement our rights, then we will not actively pursue their reelection. We can let our judges and court officials know this as well. We can write our mayors, and our governors asking for more freedom in the interpretation provided at thier respective levels.

At the very least, if you must sit by and watch your freedoms go down the drain, take a few pictures of yourself and “send them to me”:http://revjim.net/page/distractions while you still can. I’ll protect my right to look at them and your right to send them with everything I have in me.

a powered factory by the water

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I took this a few weeks ago on a fairly productive photo lunch break. I’m not too fond of it, but Jess really liked it and I trust her eye.

Your comments and suggestions are appreciated, as always.

Dear Mr. Ear Doctor–

Okay, so you were right. Taking a diuretic for just one or two days isn’t enough to feel its effects. Now that I’ve taken it for 2 weeks straight, I’m feeling it. I’m sorry I ever doubted you.

But, that brings me to a new question:

Am I going to have to pee once every hour for as long as I’m on this stuff, because that’s a bit excessive, don’t you think?

Also, while peeing a lot sure is a fun way to spend the day, is that all these pills are going to do or are they actually going to make me feel better at some point?

Thanks for your time,
Jim

the way we were

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As part of my effort to care less about where the rest of the world is going and to do my own thing, I ran around Dallas for a bit last Friday with my camera at my side. My time wasn’t as productive as I’d have liked it to be but I’m working up to it.

This is one of the better images from that day.

As always, your comments and suggestions are appreciated.

killing time

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This was taken just as the sun was setting the other night at the Drive-In. There were all of these kids playing in front of the screens while waiting for it to get dark enough to start the movie. It made me wish I had brought a frisbee.

This was posted using Flickr. I’m pretty sure I’m going to be moving most of my photo stuff that way. At least until I build some software of my own. It does a lot of things I want it to do and makes life really easy for me. And right now, that matters most.

I haven’t been to a drive-in in years.

This just makes me sad.