On welcome employment

[da]

So after my first two weeks at the new job, I feel I can now say something more interesting than "I'm here, I'm busy."

I'm working at the same University as d., in a position I'd describe as "Tech Support Plus Plus". I'm supposed to be the Debian expert for the IT staff attached to the Computer Science department. Usually, my work will be "things that improve the infrastructure of the CS department" such as simplifying printing from Unix, and making users' X11 environments more friendly. I'm also responsible for the undergraduate CS Graphics Lab, which has associated professors and TAs who I'll fix problems for.

I spent a chunk of the first two weeks getting my office arranged (soon to be re-arranged, as we're all moving into a renovated, nicer space in a neighbouring building).

As I first arrived, my co-worker Phil won my everlasting esteem for finding me a disinfectant spray bottle and towels, even before I asked. My predecessor left the office in... a somewhat titchy state. (That discovery set the general tone for looking into my predecessor's work as well.)

The work so far? It hasn't been particularly challenging, as it's mostly been garden-variety system administration tasks to go with the start of the new term, but there are signs that this will change soon. There are at least four larger projects my boss wants to see me accomplish by December, and he's encouraged me to find additional useful work of my own choice. Yay.

The environment? Collegial, I suppose. I'm finding it surprisingly nice to have people stop by my office to engage me in technical conversations. This surprise probably sounds wacky to my friends besides mynatt (who, like me, has worked from home the last few years)... But it's a welcome change to me. I'm a more social creature than I've been letting myself believe.

Comments

[arcticturtle.livejournal.com]

*snrk*

Ah, the sometimes easygoing hygenic standards of nerd-dom. Gotta love 'em.

drop-ins

[(Anonymous)]

As someone else who worked from home for years, and recently "got a real job", I am nodding in agreement. People stop in even to ask if I know where we keep X (on the network, I mean, not in which cupboard) or how to do X. It's so refreshing, even several months in, to have that sort of interaction.

--fishbot

Re: drop-ins

[da-lj.livejournal.com]

Fishy!

On this note, one thing I'm worried about, is that since we're both fully employed now, we won't feel as strong a need to hang out with perl geeks once a month and the local Mongers will die out... Eh, as long as it continues to be easy to hold meetings, I'm sure we'll be fine.

Re: drop-ins

[(Anonymous)]

Yeah... I was late for the last meeting, and then everyone was too tired for beer afterwards. It's not the 'fully' employed that gets me, it's the triply-employed.

The monthly meetings aren't in danger, but my recreational coding is. I got three lines into my colour thing, and haven't picked it back up. And the rhyming thing. Not to mention a dozen other cool ideas that I've probably already forgotten. Ah well.

Re: drop-ins

[da-lj.livejournal.com]

Heh. Feel free to toss stuff up on the wiki for me to play with, either for colour or rhyming.

In fact, I think I owe Lloyd a reference...

The magazine looks great BTW. Stylistically. Haven't gotten into content yet. :)

Re: drop-ins

[(Anonymous)]

Thanks. I didn't do anything but the style, so you can stop now if you wish. ;) I was very pleased overall, if not completely.

I can probably put up some pseudo-code for my ideas for the quilting/colour project. That would be a start. Fortunately with Perl, going from pseudocode to code is often a no-op.

--fishbot

[mynatt.livejournal.com]

Nice to hear you're adjusting well to the new work environment. I'm sure it will happen one day for me too -- I hope I take it as well :)

[da-lj.livejournal.com]

Thanks. I keep meaning to check in with openflows' chat... I imagine people are happy about the Buffalo artist getting a speaking engagement in TO... and I heard through the grapevine that CBC opensourced some software recently... Why do I have the feeling (y)our boss may have been involved? :)

[mynatt.livejournal.com]

Heh, I don't think the CBC's decision to release the code behind zed.cbc.ca had much to do with us, although Jesse's appearances on TV & radio about open source probably didn't hurt.

Err, the Buffalo artist?

[da-lj.livejournal.com]

gee, that wasn't too general, was it? sorry, I was in a hurry...

Eric's friend, Steven Kurtz...

Supporters of Kurtz -- and they are many, and growing (more than 150 people showed up last weekend at Toronto's Ryerson University to hear him speak) -- are convinced he is a victim of "politically motivated persecution" fuelled by the paranoia that has gripped America in the wake of 9/11. Politically motivated, they say, because Kurtz is an active member of the Critical Art Ensemble, a collective little-known beyond the avant-garde art world that Kurtz co-founded in 1986 to explore "the intersections between art, technology, radical politics and critical theory."

[mynatt.livejournal.com]

Oh, him! No-one's mentioned that in #chat, so I've just pasted the link you sent now. Geez, for some reason I thought he'd already been cleared of all charges. I hope he gets off... *crosses fingers*

...Eric just said thanks for the link. He says that this has had the small benefit of making his books sell much better, which will help offset Steven's legal bills slightly. At least that's some small consolation.

PS: I just received your xmas letter. Thanks! One of these years I'll get around to writing one myself. :)

[da-lj.livejournal.com]

Re: the benefit of noteriety: hopefully he won't be writing his next books from jail... I've been looking for information about whether the government might have a case (eg., if he was actually keeping bacteria in less-than-legal conditions) but I haven't been able to come up with that information.

[melted-snowball.livejournal.com]

I had thought that they were actually charging him on account of mail fraud, for sending bacteria samples through the mail without proper labelling.

There are interesting questions about what sorts of things ought be restricted in their use. What I understand about his work makes me not uncomfortable with what he was doing. But I don't believe that the long arm of the state has no place preventing people from turning their homes into unregistered BL-2 facilities.

[mynatt.livejournal.com]

The article Daniel linked above says the charge is mail & wire fraud related to *purchasing* the bacteria (from a legit supplier). If he were trying to make anthrax I'd understand but as I recall he was just brewing up harmless strains of e. coli and getting them to form pretty cultures.

[melted-snowball.livejournal.com]

Right, so that puts it in BL-1 land, not BL-2; less scary, certainly.

I guess my general point (which again, this guy doesn't illustrate) is that I do think it's appropriate to set limits on what private people can own from biotech catalogs.

It sort of annoys me that this is being done reactively, and reacting to stupid cases. (Yay justice systems...)