Some Days in the Life - August 4, 1999
For those of you who go to "current" first, I've got four entries from the Ithaca trip that have been saved up and are now perfectly reachable in the sidebar. I may extend those entries after today, so that you can always see the most recent posts over there. Or, I may not, I don't know.
Anyway, there's lots of great journal action here on Some Days in the Life today, I can tell you.
Yesterday and today haven't been great. One of my summer workers -- a student during the year -- did a bonehead thing which I won't go into. It had nothing to do with my office and everything to do with the Academy. I won't go into particulars, save this much -- I hate firing people. I just hate it. It's a terrible thing, especially when you like the person, which I do in this case.
He'll be back in the fall, and we'll see what happens. I hope things go well for him, but it has me less than perky right at the moment.
Chasing down administrative details got in the way of my class yesterday, so my prep time was weak (which I warned my Team Leader about). We toured the facility a bit. I showed them the nerve center. And then we went outside and sat under trees in the grass and I talked about systems administration and resource allocation, using whatever dog-chewed sticks I could find to make my points.
I think they like me. But then, people like subintelligent clowns, too. And, for that matter, WWF Wrestling.
I made up for yesterday this morning. I had a Powerpoint presentation of tons of review materials, which we went over and I tried to prime in their heads. The final is tomorrow, and we will see. That's all. We'll just... see.
In a matter of some coincidence and some not, Josh, a new summer worker, has started here today, and just in time, apparently. We came close to being fully staffed, and then lost it. Ah well.
Mason and I went out and got dinner last night, as a place out in Conway called Merlino's. It was good food, though the coffee was tepid. It was notable that no prostitutes solicited us on the way in, putting Conway one up on Utica. (Or one down, depending on how you look at these things). We then went home and I did class prep for today and occasionally looked at my computer or the television. I was in full out zone, as evidenced by the fact that I left the television on, of all things, the Game Show Network.
To Tell the Truth and What's My Line weren't all that interesting and were pretty pointless even when they first went on the air. They haven't aged well now that they've been cancelled for decades. I don't think there are any real panel shows left on television. And Match Game? Don't get me started on Gene Rayburn.
There was one show on that was cool, though. It was called Inquizition, and it featured a stark, airplane hanger set with a british man (whose face we never saw) drinking wine and reading questions rapid fire in a monotone, with the contestants pressing buttons to answer and their score building up. Said man was terse and annoyed with the entire proceedings, weeding them out one by one until a winner was declared, and then he left.
It was starkly refreshing. A little like Jeapordy if Alex Trebek had the power of life and death and no desire to be liked. I recommend it.
In other employment news, Jon (who some time back you'll recall flew up from Florida and interviewed with us) was hired as a web developer. He'll be up mid-month. This is a very cool thing. The place is beginning to shape up.
Back to it. I want to go home and sleep now.
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