Anxiously Awaiting

As you can gather from my other posts I don’t really have alot of free time. This is especially aggrovating because I just recently bought a cool new game from Bethesda called Oblivion. It’s better than Morrowind in the sense that it’s more mature in game play and concept, and it’s still completely open ended and nonlinear. One of my favorite things about Morrowind was the fact that it had so many distractions from the main quest. Unlike most console RPG’s or MMO’s, this game allows you to explore a huge world and interact with the NPC’s in various cool ways (you can even get a little guy to follow you around after you conquer the arena) and not ever have to touch the main storyline quests until you are good and ready.

I tend toward one player RPG’s, or MMO’s that don’t require group play (like Diablo 2)–mainly because most of the people playing those games are idiots. Guild Wars is a perfect example of this. It’s very frustrating when you are facing certain doom in the Underworld and the n00b warrior in your group runs off and aggro’s 3 level 32 bosses who promptly walk over and whack your entire party in less than a minute. MMO’s have their advantages. I like playing with other people, I just don’t like being forced to play with other people.

Other than Diablo 2, Oblivion and Morrowind are the closest I have found so far that mimic exactly what I would like in a game. I was a frequent of Diablo 2 for around 6 years before I finally got bored with the hacking and the impossibility of getting the really rare stuff. I never saw above an Jah rune the entire 6 years I played. Oblivion’s awesome graphics coupled with its open ended playstyle makes it a good chunk of eyecandy for me. Although, my card tends to choke if you set the resolution beyond 1024×768. I made the mistake of making it mad last night and it blue screened me.

Okay, normally I don’t post on the weekend, but this is worth it. Justin, Cindy, and I were on our way back from the gym to his house on Northside when this blacked out charger pulls out from the shell station at the hemphill-northside intersection. I’m thinking okay, blacked out charger, 24′ chromed out rims, gotta be a rich black dood. Hey that’s all cool. Then we catch a glimpse of the video camera attached to the car. On top of that, he’s blasting rap music and rapping along with it, and theres another dood in the back playing with controls to the camera. Wow.

Here’s a formula I think we all can agree with:

Black man rapping + pimped out charger + some model chick bouncing in the passenger seat + expensive video camera = RAP VIDEO.

Nice. We followed the car around for about a minute until it parted ways at the 17th-Northside intersection. Yeah, the next time you are watching a rap video, look for a little white mustang with two doods and a chick in it. We be big pimpin’.

I’m guilty of it. You’re guilty of it. We all have at one time or another answered our personal cell phone while working. And, unless you are Eric, you probably answered in what as known as: The Work Voice. You know the low tone “I’m trying to sound professional so I won’t alert the boss that I am having a personal call” voice. This phenomenon mostly occurs during the early months of employment, and has been known to overflow into lunch breaks.

Recently I have mostly abandoned the use of the work voice. I have gotten to know the upper echelon of management, and I in addition I have the advantage of being “The Intern!1″ I have, however, learned that there are still some areas that are considered “Work Voice Zones.” Specifically, certain attorneys or partners in my firm seem to carry an AOE (Area of Effect) WVZ. It is also to my advantage that instead of answering the phone and being ridiculed (by Eric); I can simply not answer the phone and call the party back when I am out of a “Work Voice Zone”.

Work Voice Zones are not only limited to places where you work. I submit that these entities extend into other parts of the world. Examples are the waiting room in Doctor’s offices, Libraries, Classrooms, courtrooms, and the conference rooms where I work. It’s hard to escape using the work voice in these areas mainly because we have been conditioned to do so. It’s not a bad thing, it’s just funny.

I was sitting here eating my home made turkey + roast beef sandwich and I thought to myself, “I really like lunch breaks.” I’m the kind of guy who can sit in front of a computer and crank out a project in about 8 hours, but I realize that I always must take small snack breaks every 3 hours or so and munch on some craisens or a raw tomato (my favorite). This habitual snacking could be a reason why my waistline isn’t as trim as I would like it to be, but nevertheless it is my favorite part of the day. Whenever I do get the munchies I usually eat something moderately healthy. Unless of course there are brownies in the fridge. Brownies are my dietary cryptonite.

Where to begin? I picked up another contract job. I am now the project manager on one of these jobs–which brings a multitude of responsibilities in addition to my application layer work I have to finish–and this new contract job is a decent chunk of code. Last night I went to bed at 4:00am after working on some stuff for Job A only to rise at 8:00 to get ready for Japanese class at 9:30. In addition I have a harsh deadline of two weeks for Job B. Talk about a hardcore test in time management. So here I sit amongst a multitude of printer explosions (my least favorite type of problem to troubleshoot) writing away my thoughts.

It’s these times when it is hardest to be happy that I find myself at the most peace. I don’t know why but I tend to operate the most efficiently under tight deadlines and alot of stress. I think it has something to do with being indecisive. My “iron will” is a centerpiece for jokes among some of my friends, and I think when Im overwhelmed I don’t have time to analyze things and second guess myself. So I do what comes natural. I go with the gut feeling. That’s probably why I enjoy being under high stress. Maybe I’m masochistic, maybe I’m crazy, or maybe I’m most motivated when I have a hurricane knocking at my door.

Nevertheless, I am excited about both projects. One project employs a cool new technology called Open Laszlo and the other is a massively complex database system. I have no doubts that I will come away from these projects with a load of skills and experience that will help me the next time I get myself into a crazy situation like this. But hey, I like pain.