Entries this day: Eric Interview Work Yumiko_made_UCow's_japanese_side and_now_my_update

Eric

9:32am JST Friday 23 May 2008 (day 13939)

Saw Eric T ex-from Kawasaki Nova in Motosumiyoshi station this morning! He was headed to Japanese lesson and we chatted a bit. He's lookin' for translation work, but has savings (hmmm; what a good idea!) so he's okay for now.

I had to sprint off to get my train at the last second, but I ended up at the first second *after* my train left. Ah well.

Interview

12:07pm JST Friday 23 May 2008 (day 13939)

Just quickly capturing this moment on the train after having to pry myself out of the office with Yumiko (who has always been so patient with me) asking a question I simply did not understand, and trying to get SVN resynced cause she didn't understand me telling her *not* to upload her images to the live server as well; I will use SVN to move them to the main server. I told her just the test server, and she immediately uploaded another image to the live server; dang. so I quickly triaged by simply giving up on checking the files were the same, and just assuming she knew what she was doing (used to work, but SVN means we have new wasy).. oops I m at my station.

1:37pm JST

That went pretty well; the guy said he didn't see any DB jobs at the moment, but new jobs come in every day.

Work

9:19pm JST Friday 23 May 2008 (day 13939)

Just finished work, and am on the train now in Shibuya station before it heads home, well, before it takes me most of the way to my home.

I got good shtuff done at work, from begining to end working on getting the award images 9they call them seals) that are like, "you're great!" cause they reached "level N" where N is between 1 and 5.

Oh, the issue I was having at first that was p ing me o: one of the include files had some extra cariage returns at the bottom of the file, so the headers couldn't be sent, . well, they were sent, but not interpreted as such because of the preceding spacs. I erased those few carriage returns, added a coment saying they should stay gone, and it worked. Well, it worked after I completed all the changes I had started making while I was smashing through the code to find the problem.

The code is much nicer now; it was one big try/if/then/for-looping/catch extravaganza, but now it's got functions, each of which are pretty easy to read.

Now it's still the same structure as above, but the for-loop is in a function, and all the bits between the ifs and thens are in functions. anyway who cares. I'm glad I got it working, though I can't say it's the nicest code I've ever crafted.

In other news,...

Yumiko made UCow's japanese side

9:27pm JST Friday 23 May 2008 (day 13939)

Yumiko added the Japanese I wanted to the picture of Uncle Cow in a bamboo clump. I'm a bit concerned that the proportions are going to be off, but fuckit; gotta start somewheres. This is my homework for I-group; I'm supposed to get the proofs in to Kinko's before Monday.

Jimmy da Magnet got the English side all perfected; I wonder if he'd do the Japanese one as well, especially considering (1) it took a while to do; (2) the work might be redone by whoever prints it (3) it's the weekend (4) the card proportions may be wonky.

I just need to be careful *not* to let these concerns keep me from getting *anything* done on it; perhaps I can just take them both to Kinkos (*) and be done with it.

(*) Travis always says, "not to Kinko's; they're too expensive," but then I haven't looked for any alternatives.

Actually I have; I looked at the cards at Pink Cow, hoping to find a "printed by" note on the bottom of one, but didn't find such.

and now my update

Ahoy maties!

While I wish that meant I plan to sail again around the world on Peace Boat, it actually just means
I often spend a lot of time wondering what to write as the opening!  I'm glad I got past that and
can let ya know what's up!

I'm probably changing jobs soon, but I don't know to what job yet!  I was informed on Monday that
our company is losing business / money / sales / desire to pay me after June 25th...  So, since I
went against the advice of my personal coach and put "all" (not actually, but most) of my savings
toward my debt, I now have very little savings to float me past any gaps in income and need to find
(a) new job(s) pronto!

But the good news is I'm officially out of debt (except for pesky $200 that I didn't realize I still
owe my mom and bro for shoulder stuff back in the day), so I have plenty of space on my credit card
to go back into debt if necessary!  Muwahahahaa! Hahah!  I'm just kidding!  probably.

If I didn't really like Ami, then I would probably ditch Japan and head over to Shanghai, where a
friend of mine says he can basically get me a job on the spot.  Ami is open to the idea of coming
with me, but "not right now," as we say when referring to the Mysterious Future!

In the week since the end-of-job announcement, I've been working hard at work *and* searching for
new jobs online.  I've done two interviews so far (thanks, Kellie!) and have another scheduled for
Monday.  This weekend I'm planning to spread my resume around the internet like spam and get some
business cards made!

No, not business cards for myself; business cards for Uncle Cow!  I've got the proofs done for the
English side of the cards (thanks, Jimmy!) and got the Japanese side almost done, but not quite
cropped to size yet.  The cards will be oh-so-great, and I'll certainly put the images on Uncle
Cow's website when they're ready!

Uncle Cow, by the way, is visiting the United States right now (thanks, Gleb!) so I hope he comes
back with lots of great pictures!

In other news, my art exhibition will be at Pink Cow in July!  I haven't gotten a date confirmed for
the opening party, but hopefully I'll know soon!  And speaking of July, my 14,000th day will be July
23rd!  That's right, 14,000 days will have passed since my grand entrance into this place we call
Earth.  My 14,000th day celebration will be held at Pink Cow in Shibuya, so there will be a second
chance to pimp my art!

Monday morning has arrived, and I've been intending to send this out for the past couple of days, so
right now is the big moment!

Hugs and Love to All
   - Rob!

8:19am JST Monday 26 May 2008 (day 13942)

I sent this this morning!