How well do you know me? It’s possible that some of you know me better than I know myself. I have made a list of the 3-4 principles or ideas that I am most passionate about. See if your impression of me matches my idea of myself. Please rank items as to how important you think they are to me. Mark one item 10, one 9, etc. Mark 0 or just leave blank if you think I am not passionate about it.
Chapter 23 of Managing Your Manager (by Greg Connor) (posted as a comment elsewhere but I wanted to save it here too)
Wow, it has only been a day or so and my friends page grew by 76 entries? You guys are prolific. And that was only including like 1 comic. I drove M’s car to work because the battery was dead – luckily all it needed was a jump and some driving to get charged up, not a new battery like last time. That is all.
Made three jars of pickles. As an experiment (and because I ran out of cider vinegar) I substituted some rice wine vinegar and red raspberry vinegar for the cider vinegar.. so we will see what happens. Batch one made two jars 13. Kinda Sorta Sour Carrots and Asparagus Carrots, onions and garlic in one jar, asparagus, onions and garlic in second jar. 1.33 C cider vinegar 0.33 C red raspberry vinegar 0.33 C rice vinegar 1 C white win vinegar ...
Posted as a comment in someone else’s journal, but I want to save it here. Regarding common courtesy, and how small favors may not be returned or even noticed by others… I believe two things. 1. Common courtesy isn’t. People are either stupid or selfish a lot of the time. 2. If I’m going to expect people to act a certain way, I have to act that way myself. If the power of expectation has any real power, it should work when the belief/expectation is strong - strong enough to be unconscious and automatic. ...
Trip to Sac. Up at 6, shower, leave 6:50, get gas. Arrive Sac 9am. get settled in conf room, read email. I am there to meet with LM, and AN was there too. Before lunch, they mostly talked about monitoring and I listened in. I facilitate some communications between TP and SR. AIM is great but sometimes you just need to call. These two didn’t call each other for whatever reason, so I end up passing messages. I’m a great communicator but I’m not the only communicator. Anyway, after a bit they get settled in with AIM and I don’t need to pass messages anymore. I do some double-checking before fetching the main admin machine that all of SAC uses. Apparently it is not enough double-checking… questions start almost immediately after I do the deed. What’s my password, why can’t I ssh in any more, why is my shell changed from bash, etc. I had been handed some bad information, but instead of pointing fingers I decide to just address the pre-existing problems as if they were my problems. I think I scored points by being polite and listening to everyone. Anyway, the one task I did for the day had to be half-reversed because that was clobbering changes they were trying to make using the old system, so we will try again next week. I will not make my deadline but it was a soft deadline anyway and it’s more important to keep people happy and marching in the same direction. After lunch, I spent time getting LM set up on fetch, not really training but more just showing him where everything is. 3pm I wrap up the change event and go to the data center to say hello and reassure everyone. Just spending time talking seemed to do a world of good. Stayed until 5 pm. 5-7 drive home ...
Action packed day. Doesn’t feel very productive but I think I got a few things done that I wanted to. In at 7:06, caught up on email. 8am. Early integration meeting, worked on MS Project during meeting. My turn comes next to last anyway. 930. Find out our 930 meeting was moved to 11. Email KC back re OEM Answering more email questions and concerns re: fetch 11am. RH vs FE is on track, 2 good things were found out yesterday and this morning. I think we are 2/3 of the way there. 11:40 go to lunch with the team, cuban place, have mojitos and ropa vieja (skirt steak). 1:04 call in for meeting since we are still enroute to office. Had to pay $1 for no status on 1 item, but I saved 2 more by sending emails yesterday.Between 2 and 4, tried to focus on getting 1-2 machines fetched, but there were constant interruptions, so I decided to go with the flow instead. People are still concerned about fetch, apparently they didn’t get the passwords I printed like 3 weeks ago and left with sac boss. Oh well. Decided not to press my luck, it’s more important to show sac I am on their side than to cause bad feelings by charging ahead and stomping toes. Wrap up all email and head for home. ...
I signed the petition opposing the recall. Here is the petition link, in case anyone else is interested. The petition is open to people in California as well as outside California.
The What I did today series is an exercise to review at the end of the week to see if I am feeling more productive. But to everyone else it’s probably boring… Catch up on email. A second person needs reassuring in Sac. Send brief email. Fax from Network Solutions was on my chair. Call NSI, leave message. Find email with same message, forward to legal chick in pasadena who has pretty much stopped replying to my emails because I ask rude questions (like when are you going to do your job, lady?) 9am, meet with FE team re RH vs. FE. Score is RH 5, FE 0, but FE has a couple of plays yet to make. Identify what they are, set next meeting (now daily) Sac guy can’t talk at 11, and has sent more email. Send a more detailed mail. 10am, my staff meeting, everyone plays show and tell like normal. RH vs FE is hot and smoking, Fetch is going well so is not quite as smoking. 11am, read email, sac guy is not impressed by my bluster of an hour ago, so instead I go with the softball this time, start to email, then AIM, and get him on the phone. I agree that he’s right (or at least I sidestep the opportunity to say he’s wrong) and he will agree that it’s OK to do things the “expedient” way for now. DH machine has suddenly become a hot item, so I deflect it onto TP. Poor TP wasn’t the cause of the delay, but because at least three of our team were deflecting blame at each other in front of the end user, I stepped in and made it his problem. If the user had not been standing there I probably would have let them hash it out among themselves but I feel it is poor form to say “that’s not my problem” in front of a customer (even if it’s not my problem :) 12, lunch. spaghetti. mmm. never mind that I had spaghetti last night, it’s not Pomodoro but still good. 1, more change control, heads down, get folks pointed in the right direction, get some machines hammered out myself. Worked through 3:30 and missed my 3p with MV. Wrap up message for CC, and announce another CC for Friday. Talk to AN and agree that we shoudl go to Sac Friday (for 5-6 hours only, to come back Fri end of day). As pennance for missing MV meeting, I write up a proposal and send it off to him. I also write up another proposal for another item on tomorrow’s meeting. ...
Successful change control (1 of 3 this week) Lots of last-minute crap for the CC Had lunch: soup, fruit salad Tuesday staff meeting Postpone meeting with MV, he was busy Met with BOE team Set up meeting for FE vs. RH tomorrow Calmed down DR who was fired up about access for some reason Dinner: pasta pomodoro S and H came over to retrieve little cat Watched stargate with M (3 episodes?) Pedalled on bike ...