It's all a dream - random ramblings

1/24/08 - Awwww hail noooo!
What! what! what....hail in Southern California. Little pee sized balls of ice rained done on the good residents of Ventura this evening. Some of my neighbors stuck their heads out side their doors to see if it was real and shortly regretted doing that. Perhaps if it hailed here more often then they would have known ice balls falling from the sky hurt when they hit you.

For some bonus excitement we also got lightening, thunder and a tornado today. I, for one, welcome the apocalypse.

11/1 - I only got 4 little trick or treaters this year. After extensive testing with the happy pumpkin/scary pumpkin to trick or treater ratio I can now firmly say that I get more trick or treaters the years I carve happy pumpkins. Now these results are not going to stop me from carving scary pumpkins but it does make me concerned that my neighbors are raising little scaredy cat kids. Maybe next year I'll carve a 2 faced pumpkin that looks happy from the front to lure the trick or treaters in then when they get to the door they will be petrified with fear.

10/27 - The hills are alive with fire.....Actually the closest fire to me is about 30 miles away but you couldn't tell it from the sky outside. At 2pm it was dark enough to have to turn on lights inside.

10/9 - Aaaahhhhhhh!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Well self employment has been a bit busier than I ever could have expected. Lots of things to learn means lot of work and late nights. It's good to be busy but I need to find a way to balance a life while doing this. There are days when the only time I emerge from my apartment is when I go to check the mail. The only upside of this is I may never have to wear pants again.

9/23 - Bad boys, bad boys
Watcha gonna do, watcha gonna do
when they come for you
I was hit by a drunk hit and run driver today. It was a weird experience. I saw the guy slam into the car in front of him waiting at the red light. He sat there for a few seconds then put it into reverse and drove the 20 feet back were I had stopped and drove into me and kept on the gas for a bit after he had hit me. I had to keep my foot on the brakes to keep from being pushed back while at the same time keeping my horn blaring at him. He pulled forward then paused, I got out of my car to check my car and he took off. I got back into my car to follow him but got stuck at the red light and lost him.

Turns out the other guy that he hit had called the cops and was following the guy until the cops could get there. When the cops caught up the guy wouldn't pull over. They had to force him over and then he resisted arrest to the point where they almost tasered him. The cop that came to take my statement sounded kind of disappointed that they didn't get to taser him.

3/6 - I dropped all my tax forms and info off to my tax man last Monday and still have not heard anything back from him. Hmm...I'm beginning to wonder if this is a bad thing. I've always done my own taxes in the past. They've never really been that hard, but now that I'm self employed I decided it was time to pay someone to do my taxes hoping they would have a much better understanding of tax law then myself. I had spent many hours reading tax documents at the IRS web site and guessed about what I could or could not write off. I entered my best guess numbers in a free tax program (TaxAct.com - highly recommended) and it came out saying I owed between $2000-$3000. Eek! So I'm really hoping the tax man can sacrifice a chicken or do some other kind of black magic to bring that number down a little.

2/24 - The Amgen Tour of California rolled through town today so I had to head up to Santa Barbara to check out the festivities for myself. I got to the start of the race a couple hours before it actually started so I could mill around, bump into cyclist and poke at expensive bikes. I was also able to score a little bit of swag. I got myself some Jelly Belly jelly beans, a tiny little pink t-mobile jersey pin and Michael Rogers (from T-mobile) autograph.

1/12 - Ah...what a screwed up time the end of 2006 was. Let's see, where to start.....Well I had been looking for a new job for a while. My old job was fine but there was this little nagging problem of having to wonder if I was going to get paid every month. I like to work, but I like getting paid as well so it was time to move on. After many different interviews I decided to accept a position with a company in Santa Barbara. Everything seemed great. They are a profitable company that were willing to give me a fair salary and looked to be a good place to work. I gave my 2-weeks notice and started planning my new and improved life.

I started my new job ready to dive into the challenges of redesigning their company store and improving their business. When I arrived they showed me my new "office." I personally would not use the word office to describe a small wooden desk surrounded by boxes in the hallway in front of someone else's door, but that's what they choose so we'll go with it for now. Okay so I sit down and try to get a feel for their business. Uh, oh - well it turns out that maybe they didn't expect me to need to use a computer with programs on it or full access to the internet to accomplish my work.

So I spent the first week doing nothing but looking at their web sites and making notes for their improvement while waiting for the approval to get some programs for my computer. On the second week I got my first real assignments. Research companies to develop an online catalog and help them close a deal with another development company. While doing my first task I discovered that they were not only blocking sites like my space and online chat but also a good half of the internet - all personal web sites, web hosting sites, shareware sites, and on and on. They hired me as their Web/IT manager and yet were unwilling to give me full access to the internet....sigh. Fine I'll work closing the deal with the development company will I look at the "you're been blocked" screens on my computer.

So a standard deal is worked out with a split payment structure, 50% up front 50% on finish. I present it to my supervisor who wants me to bully the development company into not getting paid until after the three month project is over. This is where I'm learning that bullying/threatening people inside and outside the company to get your way is common practice here...mmmkay.

So after two weeks exactly of sitting at my crappy little desk in the middle of the freezing hallway I have had enough. I go into my supervisors office (a real office) and tell him that I am extremely unhappy and the position isn't working out so I'm quitting. He is very surprised that I could possibly be unhappy their and asks me to stay and let him know what things are making me unhappy and he will fix them. Fine, I go to my freezing desk and type up my list of demands and email it to him.The issues were things like, too many blocked sites, uncomfortable desk, seat, environment in the thorough fare, cold, big brother issues (you were being constantly watched), no music or headphones to drown out the den of noise all around me (I actually got in trouble for wearing headphones, even though a number of other people were doing the same), little sketched out about the weird control issues with contractors, and why the need to threaten everybody to get something accomplished.

Of these items they were willing to get me a space heater and that's it. Their solution to the blocked sites was for me to email MIS every-time I encountered a blocked site I wanted to see and they would unblock them one by one. So needless to say I quite my new job. I figured life was too short to feel as miserable as I did every day after coming home from that.

What am I doing now you ask? Well, I decided to try to make a go out of working for myself. The time is right so I might as well give it a try. If it doesn't work out I will start looking for another job.