Day Job
Posts about my day job at Dell
I've recently become involved in some projects outside of my company, Starlit Sky Games, and it's going to take me atleast another year to finish my next project for SSG. At my day job, I'm being kept busier as well. I've also been making great strides in my personal life. I just don't have the time to maintain this website, which is still on outdated 2 year old version of Community Server.
In short, I will be e-moving and shutting down this site over the next few weeks. For those who want to keep up with me, there will be several ways: I am TOgburn on gmail, myspace (http://www.myspace.com/togburn), and my new blog on spaces.live.com (http://togburn.spaces.live.com). All future posts will be on my spaces.live.
So, my divorce has been over for a while. In the end I got pretty darn close to what I wanted, which is much more than I was led to believe I would get in the biased Texas (US?) family law system. We have joint custody, with me having a little over half of Alexandria's time and determining primary residence and I had to give up very little. Of course, my attorney suggested I not talk about it or my daughter online anymore, so if you want details contact me privately. Suffice it to say, if there is something you feel strongly enough about, go for it; the only real loss would be if you never try.
Since then... Starlit Sky Games is back on track. I've begun work on my next game which will be an old-school 2d platformer and I will be looking for artist (anime style) and musician contractors soon. More on that in a future post.
Also, I've met a brilliant, sexy woman, but she needs to relax a little with a good massage. Yes, I know you are googling me now and that is an offer. ;)
Future posts will be a little more professional and business oriented, but I had to indulge my loyal friends who have been wondering if I was still alive and asking for an update.
My work laptop had a hard drive failure the middle of last week. I was working at about 8:00 pm when I heard the drive start scratching and struggling to read. Two minutes later I got a blue screen and a refusal to boot or even recognize the drive existed. Recovering from a hard drive crash is hard. Well, more annoying than hard. I backed up my dev data on a weekly basis, so I really only lost a few days worth of work. The annoying part is I didn't back up my favorites, RSS feeds, and Start Menu settings. Basically all the little things that really make a computer yours and make it comfortable. In the end, it's probably better to get a fresh start on favorites and feeds; if I can't remember it then I probably don't need to waste my time on it. But it's still really annoying to lose all those links I used once in a blue moon, but that took forever to find in the first place. I'm currently using a loaner laptop while I wait for my new one to be ordered. My old one was just a few months beyond old enough to be fully depricated so they couldn't fix it and I had to get a new one.
I do plan to add all those little things to my backup scripts so I don't have to go through this again.
I just got back from my day job trip to India Sunday night. I was supposed to get back Saturday, but there was a little problem in the Narita Airport after a few inches of snow.
All together it was an excellent trip. There was some concern before I went because all of my co-workers there were new to the team. However after the first day I saw it wouldn't be an issue. They were all competent and very eager to learn and get the work done. We didn't get through everything I would have liked to, but we made enough progress that I feel confident any issues can be resolved once everyone is back from vacations, etc.
It was a very exhausting trip. I woke up at 6 am (slept in late from my usual 4:30 am), got to work around 9 am, stayed until 7 pm, then worked again from 10 pm - 1 am so I could work with my co-workers in the US on questions that had come up during the day. I went to the mall Wednesday evening for an hour or two, but other than that I didn't do any tourist stuff. There just wasn't time with all the work we needed to complete and with me getting there Monday afternoon and leaving Friday afternoon. Next time I will have to definitely plan to stay through the weekend so I can enjoy it a little.
I'm back from the holidays. We drove up to visit my family in Kentucky for Christmas. Imagine my wife, the baby, 2 dogs, and myself all stuffed into my truck with our stuff for an 1100 mile drive. With all the stops, that came out to about 18 hours of driving. On the way up there, we stopped halfway for the night. On the way back, Ann decided she was ready to be home so I got to drive straight through. I was tired when we finally got home. The dogs did ok; Turbo slept almost the whole way there and back while Sky stared nervously out the window. I think she was afraid we were going to leave her somewhere so she was memorizing the way home. :)
Alexandria slept most of the way too. She really didn't like Tennessee and cried during most of the drive through it. I think it is because all the big hills and corresponding change in air pressure made her ears hurt. She drools a lot because she hasn't learned she's supposed to swallow yet. I think if she was beyond that she would have been ok. She got to meet her great-grandmother, her grandfather (her grandma was there when she was born), and her aunts and uncles. We got pictures of everyone holding her, they were all excited.
Due to the trip and the neccessary sleeping afterwards, I didn't get much work done on my game. I think that's ok, though. It was much better to take an actual vacation, get away from computers, and just spend quality time relaxing and catching up with family. Oh, I forgot to mention this before. Turns out my sister is pregnant after years of doctors telling her she couldn't have children. The baby is due in March I think. They don't know if it is a boy or a girl because it was hiding during the ultrasound as opposed to Alexandria you wanted the world to know she was a girl. ;)
In my day job, I might be going to India for a week. That would be fun. Getting to meet many of the people I've worked with over the past few years, training them so we can work on some future projects together, travelling first class, ... On the other hand, if I don't go it would mean I don't have to spend a week away from my baby. I can see the bright side either way so I'll be happy either way. I'm also trying to feng shui my cubicle a little bit. I've added one of those little waterfalls to the corner of my desk (south west I believe). I'm also considering getting a mirror so I can see the entry behind me and maybe a little plant.
2006 will be the best year ever. Happy New Year.
I have been listening to Earl Nightingale's "Lead
the Field" series every night this week when I walk my dogs. I've
made it through most of the way, past the magic word, acres of
diamonds, etc... I vaguely even remember some of it.
:) However, the phrase above did jump out at me and stuck in my
head. It wasn't even a main concept of his, it was just a
supporting phrase mentioned once. When I heard it, my life ran
through my head and I realized how true it really is. I was
discontent with the environment I grew up in and wanted to get out, I
worked hard and the universe converged to help me move. I was
flat broke and had the shadow of moving back home to my parents
house looming overhead, again I worked hard and the universe rewarded
me with a job. I was discontent with my job so I worked hard and
did much more than the job required. It paid off quickly with me
getting big raises and promotions every year. Then something
changed. The stock market crashed and the company I worked for
had massive layoffs. I lost many good friends to that time.
For a long while I felt partly responsible, after all I was the one
writing programs to automate their jobs and made them redundant.
I made the job so easy it could be done with the click of a few buttons
and shipped over seas. I still feel that way sometimes, but I
know there's really nothing I could have, or should have, done
differently. Anyway, at that point something inside me
changed. I was just grateful to have a job and stay in the status
quo. Losing so many friends and money in the market made me focus
my discontent on my job. Having a manager that I didn't like
didn't really help the situation either. My motivation suddenly
went from doing the best job possible to working my 8 hours a day and
getting out of there to feel sorry for myself. I did a darn good
job of that if I say so myself. After all, I'm salaried now, why
should I put in all those extra hours if I'm not getting paid for
them. I'd worked hard for years and it was time to enjoy it.
Now, though, my original motivation is starting to
come back. I'm discontent with my environment and want better for
myself and my family. I was offered an opportunity at my day job
that would give me a lot of opportunities to learn new stuff and put me
in the spotlight more. Sure, I don't really like the attention
and would much rather just be another anonymous individual, but my
discontent is starting to build back up to be more than
discomfort. So I took it and I plan on my career starting to sky
rocket again after years of being on a plateau.
I just need to rememer to keep my discontent focused on what I'm really
discontent with and can affect, rather than focusing on something
meaningless that I can only complain about.
So I'm still working trying to get this whole stolen credit card issue
resolved. I'm am seriously considering just getting a new card
because my credit card company is being ridiculous. They still
haven't reversed the charges off my account a month later, even though
I have sent them the affadavit with the charges listed and the police
report number and everything else they have asked for. I'm a
charter member for pete's sake, I've had the card for well over 10
years. It's not like I'm trying to defraud you. Give me my
money back. They advertise all over their site that you should
set up recurring charges so that you don't have to mess with paying
bills. Well, all those recurring charges are now being denied and
I'm getting collection and disconnect notices. AT&T
Mastercard from CitiBank, get your act together. There are
commercials all over the tv about how if your card is stolen, the money
will be back in your account the next day. What they don't tell
you is that applies if there's only one charge made. If it is
used multiple times before the theft is discovered then you are out of
luck.
IGC 2005 (Indie Games Con) was fun. I got to meet a lot of new
people and see what everyone else has been able to accomplish.
I've started spending more time working on my games. Well, not as
much as I should since I recorded IGC and some of the sessions and I've
spent some time compiling the videos so I can post them for others to
download. I'll get them posted as soon as I'm able to pay my web
host (recurring bill on cc) and am sure it will stay up. I also
stayed for the Indie Torque Boot Camp. If you are a T2D developer
I wouldn't recommend it. For TGE and TSE, if you've got the time
and money, it's worth it. If you are using TGE or TSE and your
game has even the slightest chance to have multiplayer included, I
would highly recommend it. Everything that is covered is in the
documentation, the real difference is in the why. The docs tell
you how everything works, the TBC tells you why Garage Games did things
the way they did and how you can best use that to your advantage.
Alexandria is really growing. She had her 2 month doctor
appointment yesterday and was 10 pounds 13 ounces. That's 3
pounds in 2 months and puts her squarely in the middle of normal.
She also had to get a couple of shots and really didn't like that, but
as soon as I picked her up again she quieted down. I really do
spoil her and she knows it. :) She's been lifting up her head and
trying to roll over. She can get herself up on her side, but then
doesn't know where to go from there. Or maybe she just likes that
position. She's also trying to move around when we lay her on her
stomach. She pushes with her legs, but hasn't quite figured out
that she needs to move her arms too.
In my day job, I might start working from home permanently, except for
going in to the office once a week for team meetings and then on other
days as needed. Still, 4 days a week from home will be
great. It will give me the chance to get more done with fewer
interruptions, save me some gas money, and most importantly - let me
see my daughter grow up.
We had a cold front move in over the weekend, so we went from highs of
95 / lows of 65 to highs of 70 / lows of 40. Over the weekend the
wind was strong so it felt really cold. Yesterday and today it's
just been cold, which is nice. As long as the wind isn't blowing,
I like it.
Wow, I didn't realize it, but it has been 3 weeks since my last
post. I've been so tired at home and so busy at work that the
time is just slipping away. Alexandria and Ann are doing
well. We are all just trying to get into a nice schedule, well,
all except Alexandria. She changes her schedule almost every
day. One day she wants to stay up late, the next she wants to
stay up in the middle of the day or early morning. She is staying
up a lot more now. When she was first born she slept all the time
except to eat. Now she stays up for a few hours sometimes.
Warning to anyone thinking about becoming a parent: babies are cute,
what comes out both ends is not; babies are cute when they are sleeping
or smiling, not so cute when they are screaming for an hour at 2:00
am. Think carefully about whether you are ready to completely
forget the rest of the world for a while, you will have moments of pure
joy and moments of pure misery. The moments of joy always cause
you to instantly forget the moments of misery.
On my diet, well I haven't been to focused on it. I've been
eating salads most days and junk food on others. Overall I am
still at 231 pounds so while I haven't lost any more, at least I
haven't gained any with my indescretions. Now that things
are getting semi normal with a semblance of a schedule, I definitely
plan to get back on track towards my goal of less than 200 pounds.
In game development, I haven't really done much of this either. I
am going to jump right back in with a renewed focus. I am
attending the
Indie Games Conference and Torque Boot Camp. I plan
to get plenty of motivation from seeing what others have done, and some
training to help take my productivity to the next level.
Steve Pavlina posted his new personal development topic today,
The light at the end of the tunnel, and posed this question: Where are you right now - the light or the tunnel?
I am definitely in the tunnel. My dream from the time I was a kid
and played my first game (Beach head) on a Commodore 64 was to be a
game programmer. Well, except for those years I wanted to be an
orthopaedic surgeon when game programming was still there, just in the
background. I spent many nights as a kid programming small games in MS
Dos and q-basic. It takes advantage of my talents in math and logical
thinking, provides me entertainment, and lets me help others by
entertaining them. It is also a constant learning activity due to ever
changing system requirements and advances. I really enjoy helping and
entertaining people and learning. If I didn't have to worry about
money, then whatever I chose to do would involve my own personal growth
and helping others. I like to think ti would be game development, but
maybe not.
I moved to Austin because it was such a big game programming
community, and I didn't really want to live in California. The first
jobs I applied for were with game companies. I still remember going
into the Iguana lobby and handing over my woe-fully inadequate resume
and demo on a floppy disk. It was a wonderful atmosphere to just be
in; with the excitement, relaxed attitudes, and arcade games in the
hall. :) Of course looking back now I never had a chance. I was a kid
from a small town with no idea what it took, and quick-basic just
wouldn't cut it. As I ran out of money, my options quickly opened up
to any job that would allow me to survive and not have to move back
home. I ended up at Dell, where I am now a corporate programmer.
It's a great job that almost pays the bills and allows my
soon-to-be-three family to live comfortably enough. That's the reason
I stick with it, even though it is boring and I hate it most of the
time. There are some times it's nice, but for the most part if I were
starting my life over I wouldn't have picked it. I know that now I am
one of the best programmers out there when I apply myself and could go
almost anywhere. I get an email from different recruiters every few
weeks. But I'm not really interested in moving to another boring
corporate job working on the same program for 7 more years and
literally counting the hours of each and every day until I can go
home. I'm ground down; I've just become apathetic about the situation
- reserved myself to living through it - and not going anywhere anytime
soon. I don't have a zest for living anymore. I get off work at 2:30
pm and don't go to bed until about 11, but I usually don't do much of
anything productive in that time. I'm just so sick of work and my
situation that it's depressing and I've lost the drive to be
exceptional. When I'm not putting in more hours for work I tend to
just veg in front of the tv or only half-heartedly work on my game.
With a baby that could be born at any moment and our debt I just
feel trapped. Maybe it is just my ego saying I need the health
insurance and the steady paycheck, but it's still a very real feeling
of unease at the idea of being unemployed or even just not being able
to take care of all of my families needs.
So what am I going to do. Maybe nothing in the end, but I have to
try. If you've been following my blog you already know I've been
working on my physical being and that is helping clear my mind and give
me more energy. But I think that's not enough. I've been waiting for
the baby to come before I took my vacation this year. That would give
me a couple of weeks away from the grind to refresh and work on myself
in between lack of sleep and diaper changes. But reading the article
brought my recent private thoughts out into the public. I need to find
a manhole in this tunnel and get a breathe of fresh air. I'm going to
request to take off next week for vacation and just spend the time on
game and personal development. At the end of the week either I'll find
I don't currently have the personal drive to do it or I just don't find
it as enjoyable as before and need to find something else, or maybe it
will totally renew my energy and I'll rediscover the joy and spend more
time on it with the goal of doing it full time. Either way it should
help me get oriented in this tunnel and get started in the right
direction for finding the light.
Yesterday was my BPI presentation at our directors'
all-hands meeting. That was terrifying, but I think I did
ok. I estimate there were about 150+ people there. My
personal to myself feedback: I made good eye contact across the
whole audience and didn't use too many 'ahhs' and 'umms'. I also
got the only laugh during the three BPI presentations. What I
need to work on: I didn't move around very much and use the floor
space and I found myself sometimes reading off the slides on the screen
behind me. I did have a few people tell me afterwards that it was
good and some others that asked questions or had ideas, so I know
atleast some were paying attention.
The other presenters went through the actual BPI
process and detailed findings on each of the steps, and were dry to me
(admittedly I was nervous and not paying a lot of attention).
They stood right next to the screen and read from it and pointed out
items, so I don't feel so bad about my not moving around a lot and only
reading a little. They were partially hidden behind the podium
while I was to the side and in front of it. They also went a
little over their 10 minutes. For mine, I just gave an overview
of the history of the project, current status and issues, changes being
made, and expected positive results. All very high level
stuff. I had 6 slides to their 20+ and mine only took about 6
minutes. With it being so late in the day I'm sure some people
were probably appreciative of that. :)
End result, I made it through alive and it seemed to
go over ok. I was very nervous standing up there, but I did
it. I just need to keep putting myself in those situations so I
can improve, even if the voice in my head is screaming no.
At the end of 3 weeks on the South Beach Diet and 1 week on Phase 2, I
am at 242 pounds. A loss of only 4 during the week. I can
almost definitely say now that exercise plays a very large role in the
weight loss: the days I exercised more I lost, the days I didn't
I stayed the same. My plan is still to be 230 or below when my
mom gets here on August 22, so I have 14 days to lose 12+ pounds.
That means 2 weeks of exercise and maybe going back to phase 1.
In baby news, at our appointment on Friday the doctor said Ann was 1cm
and 70% effaced. meaning the baby is on it's way soon. She
estimated the baby to be 6 pounds or so, and guessed she would be here
in about 3 weeks if the exam didn't cause her to come. That would
put the birth around August 26th. The ultrasound doctor said
around September 6th, I said around August 16th, so that's pretty close
to the middle. My mom says it's going to happen on August 18th or
19th, because that's when the next full moon is. Right now we
plan on namig her Alexandria Intera Ogburn. I'm absolutely set on
the first name, Ann is still deciding on a Thai name for the
middle. She's asked her mom to send her a book of Thai baby
names, but I think (hope?) it won't get here in time. We are so
ready for this baby, especially Ann. It's been so hot and the
baby is riding so low she's having a hard time walking and starting to
have some back pain.
Over the weekend we went baby shopping and spent way too much, but also
got some great deals. We were at Walmart getting some baby
clothes and were in line paying $2 - $10 each when they came on the
intercom and said all baby clothes were being marked down to $1.
You wouldn't believe how quickly we got out of line and went back to
the baby section to get them all marked down and grab some more.
Plus it was the tax free weekend for back to school, so we got lots of
cute clothes for cheap. Then as we were pulling out of the
parking lot I saw my old car, the Trans Am I traded in for my
Avalanche. Of course I had to follow the guy next door to Lowes
and talk to him. They gave me $8000 for it on trade and sold it
to him for $7500. He said he had traded in his truck and so only
had to pay $6250, and that it was exactly the car he was looking for;
the right color, everything. I don't know what kind of truck he
traded or it's value, but atleast it seems like Hewlitt Chevrolet
didn't rip either one of us off too much.
In day job news, I found out Friday that I have to give a presentation
on Tuesday at our All Hands meeting on a Process Improvement project
I'm working on. That left me very little time to create the
presentation. Since it is at an all-hands meeting, that means
several hundred people. Oh my god, oh my god; I am so terrified
just thinking about it. I've only given one speach at
Toastmasters and that was hard, and it was only about 10 - 15
people. I must think positive thoughts: I will do good, I
will do good, maybe the baby will be born tonight so I don't have to do
it :),... I will do good. I'll let you know how it goes.
I was back down to 249 this morning. I didn't really feel hungry
last night so I didn't eat a big dinner, just some string cheese and a
V8. I also walked the dogs but didn't ride thexercise bike
afterwards. My next goal, to get far enough under 250 that I
don't get back above it this coming weekend.
They are going to be putting in new carpeting tomorrow night at my day
job, so we have to pack up our stuff. Of course since it's
summer, some of my coworkers are on vacation which means I get to help
box up their cubes. What a mess: papers, magazines, books, and
trinkets stacked everywhere. It took me about an hour. It
just reminds me how nice it is to have a clean, minimalist approach to
my desk. It's going to take me all of 5 minutes to pack my stuff
and shutdown my computer. Most of my equipment still has the
moving labels on it from when I moved to this desk so I won't even have
to do that. :)
So yesterday I had almost the exact same food as Monday, except I also
had about 4 ounces of pepper-jack cheese during my evening snack.
This morning I weighed 254 pounds, another 2 lb loss. I walk my
dogs in the morning before work everyday, I think I'm also going to
start some exercising at night. After-all, I have a treadmill and
exercise bike sitting right behind the sofa that I sit my butt on all
evening while I'm watching tv. Even just 20-30 minutes should be
better than nothing. We'll see if I can get over some more of my
procrastinating ways...
In other news, my manager on vacation called from a castle in
Switzerland this morning. She was using her cell phone, in a
coffee shop, trying to use their wireless internet access. That
is so cool. The oldness of a castle being totally connected with
the newness of wireless internet and cell phones.
Today I received some data about an Order Processing system I developed for my day job at Dell.
The application I developed is the 4th largest order processing system
in revenue, closing in tightly on number three, and the 5th largest in
volume. Out of the leading systems, it has the largest average
order size by over 5 times.
I was feeling a little down about the app, but that has inspired
me. The main reason, the others were developed by teams of people
with all the usual suspects; project managers, developers, dba's, qa,
support. My little old app was managed, developed, tested, and
supported by me for, say, 5 or 6 years. I've now been able to get
support moved over to a real support team, and qa is slowly starting to
take over the testing, but for now I'm still the PM, Dev, and
DBA. All while also being a dev on one of the other leading
systems for the past few months. :)
If an individual can have that much of an impact while working within
the confines of a company, why shouldn't they as an indie game
developer also be able to have that much of an impact on the games
industry. Maybe my trend will continue outside of the office and
in 5 or 6 more years I'll be one of the top game development houses.
Two things to post about today since it has been a while.
The first, I gave my first speech at
Toastmasters
last Thursday after reading
Steve Pavlina's blog inspired me to join. I had a nice speech memorized, I knew how I was
going to move around the stage, and I was total confident. Then I
got up in front of everyone, smiled my way through my first sentence,
made eye contact with a few people, and totally forgot what I was going
to say. Suddenly I had gone from a centered confident person back
to my standby introvert that's terrified of talking to people.
Somehow I managed to stumble through it with a lot of pauses,
suprisingly few ah's and um's, and a few laughs from the
audience. Besides my confidence carrying over from my mind to my
actions, there's one other thing I need to work on. When I'm
thinking I look up and roll back on my heels. I did get 2 awards
out of it though, First Timer and Best Speech. First Timer is
easy. :) For the Best Speech, mine was the only of the 3 given
that was humorous and, honestly, not boring. The other 2 were
presentations people were practicing to give, so they were sort of
dry. Of course mine was a shoe in because I was the only one that
stayed within the time limit and was therefore the only eligible
speech, but I think I still would have won even with a little
competition.
The second topic,
The Hitchhikers Guide to the
Galaxy,
the
movie. I saw it on Sunday and I wouldn't suggest you
see it. If you have never read the books, then the movie will
make absolutely no sense to you. Several people I overheard when
leaving came up with the standard confusing-movie movie review:
WTF?. Those of us that have read the books and saw it came up
with the standard book-to-movie movie review: WTF?. A series of
books was compressed to 1 movie under 2 hours and it didn't work.
If you haven't read the books, definitely don't see it. If you
have read the books, you're likely also a fan and nothing I can say
will or should stop you from seeing it. I just really hope
Enders Game the movie
doesn't turn out that way...