Quick rundown of what has happened so far this week.

Monday: Held training on Fetch and DNS. This went well. David B. is not back yet, but there is not much needing attention. I spent some time in the afternoon faxing letters to my representative and senators asking them “Please don’t give up my civil liberties today” – see www.eff.org for the Draconian wiretap provisions and other concessions to the “wish list” of law enforcement. I got my three reps, then went on to bulk-fax the members of the conference committee.

Tuesday: More training, this time by Bruce on how Gladiator works, excellent info. Went to the dentist at 3:00 but he decided the filling was OK and didn’t need to be replaced. Apparently the reason for sensitivity is receding gum line, exposing the root where the enamel coating is not as strong, coupled with an overall lack of Sensodyne toothpaste in my system. Got back to work at 4:00 but still failed to meet with David B. Oh well.

Tuesday night: Brought home hamburgers and actually cooked them on the barbeque, which had been left behind by a previous roommate and which I had never used. This took longer than I thought it would because the coals weren’t very hot or weren’t as close to the cooking surface or something. C helped by making meat into patties and making tater tots, which was entirely cool. The hamburgers turned out to be hockey-puck sized but it was good.

Wednesday: Final day of training. Got Ray T. to explain about index build and Wendy H. to explain about multimedia. Got to spend some time talking to David B. in two meetings and one-on-one. The problem with Shopping index push causing QI problems is pretty well understood now, and David is working with Bret to figure out whether the broadcasts can be controlled. David and I agree that we should be monitoring Relevance and now that some tools and scripts are available, this should be do-able. We also agreed that there should be more communication between various departments, both meetings of managers and informal stuff like bulletin boards and chat.

Wednesday night: Went with M and C to Pasta Pomodoro, in SJ. Good stuff. Now I just need to get back into the habit of exercising. Also went to the bookstore and picked up slurpees on the way home.