Athaclena Moves in 2018 - redux

[Athaclena]

Hi! I'm Athaclena. If you're new\haven't read any of my threads, you can find out more about me and my crazy consultant\travel life from other threads linked below. I've been in almost every challenge for ALMOST 2 years now making small changes.

 

Hubby and I have realized it's not worth trying to do ANYTHING to our current house to sell, we just need to pack up and get out. So the great purge & pack has begun and my goals are more related to THAT than diet.

 

1) Take your probiotic, you'll thank yourself later

2) Keep an eye on the diet. Keep up with skipping the fries, eating veggies and the morning shakes.

3) If you're home, pick a spot and clear it. Throw it away, pack it for the move, drop it in the giveaway box. It all needs to GO - or be ready to go.

I'm not sure if we can pull off a move by the end of the year, but I'm certainly going to try!!!

[zeroh13]

4 hours ago, Athaclena said:

I'm not sure if we can pull off a move by the end of the year, but I'm certainly going to try!!!

Good luck!

[fleaball]

You can do eet!

[Bean Sidhe]

I know you will get it all done. Its amazing how picking one spot for 5 minutes can make a huge improvement.

Good luck

[Athaclena]

Work is really being a soul-sucking monster right now. So much so that I was pinged by a recruiter with the right keywords in her email. So we're chatting in a few minutes.....

I've been reviewing this stinker of a project - and while dealing with the client is grueling, our company culture is a big part of the problem and this shines a BIIIIIG spotlight on it. So I'm not going to look a gift horse in the mouth and at least see what else is going on out there in the low unemployment world.....

Oh - diet is fine. And will be deep diving into cleaning up\out 2 rooms this weekend partially because someone, somehow brought fleas into the house. Only a few at this point, but they can explode easily so kitties have been treated and once I've cycled through all of the stuff to be washed in that room (today), the steamer and vacuum are coming to the party in that room - and I'm cleaning out my office to give it the same treatment as the CLOSEST room with carpet. But this could end up with us that closer to being packed up to sell....

Movement afoot!

[Athaclena]

Talked to the recruiter. Looks like base pay is ABOUT the same. HIgher bonus $$ and less travel. Plus learning new things and increasing my skillset. So she now has my resume and I may be speaking to others on the team next week....

And yes, I've been unemployed in the 22 years I've been at this career - for 1.5 days when a contract was cancelled right after I took it. That's how long it took for me to post my resume, interview and have a solid job offer for more $$. Having a Swiss Army of Technology resume has it's perks LOL.

[Athaclena]

Made progress on the "packing to move" front.

Guest room is cleaned out and cleaned. Made some good headway on the master bedroom. This week I'm going to try to work on my office.....

[Bean Sidhe]

First off, I am sorry that work has been so difficult. Maybe the recruiter thing will pan out to be better (if you decide to go that way).

Glad to hear there is progress on the packing to move front. I Know it must feel great to be getting so much cleaned out and done. Good luck on the office. I know for us that is always the worst part since there is papers and things to go through.

Hope things continue to do well.

[Athaclena]

Last night there were fries. So many fries......

Then I came home and worked a few more hours *sigh*.....

But I'm eyeing my office and planning my plan of attack for packing it up.

I'm also determining if - or when - I want to "open up" my search for new employment. If I saw actual movement on hiring for our group I'd be more willing to wait it out a bit longer. But I'm also not sure if I want to rock that particular boat while I'm in the middle of packing up to move either.....

We'll see how this week goes on "the project". If I could just get through this I can at least think I've made it past that big hurdle and be back to "normal" for a bit  

I do realize this post is a bit scattered - but so is my brain LOL.

[Athaclena]

I think the interview went well. We'll see if I make it to the next round - and if they offer enough $$ to make it worth my while to make the jump..... It'll be a lot less travel - NOW hubby is like - but that'll be fewer hotel points won't it? I guess he's gotten accustomed to me not being home LOL.

This weekend's "pack to move" plans I'm focusing on my office. Which is fine since I'm monitoring a client's upgrade this weekend and need to stay close - just in case....

[Athaclena]

I have good and bad news.

 

The light at the end of the tunnel on the project? It was a train. Upgrade did NOT finish this weekend NOR today due to various factors - so it's going into tomorrow *sigh*. It could be worse, we could be rolling back and trying again in DECEMBER - but we're working through it this week in hopes that we can get it done and proceed with production this weekend (fingers crossed WITHOUT all of these issues which are ENVIRONMENT related, not our software).

In other news, round 2 interview is Friday with the Executive Director - so I have THAT going for me!

Made some progress in the cleaning of the office - but there were Fries Sunday night. I SEVERELY LIMITED them, but I had them. 

[Athaclena]

Update after our evening update call - that train was a FREIGHT TRAIN.... HOLY HELL CAN THIS PROJECT JUST BE OVER?

[Bean Sidhe]

11 hours ago, Athaclena said:

Update after our evening update call - that train was a FREIGHT TRAIN.... HOLY HELL CAN THIS PROJECT JUST BE OVER?

 

Since I think I remember you played Stardew Valley. (hopefully I am not wrong) This is the train I immediately thought of.

 

 

Hope you were able to get out of the way. Although its not so bad if your not standing In the tunnel.

[Athaclena]

5 hours ago, Bean Sidhe said:

Since I think I remember you played Stardew Valley. (hopefully I am not wrong) This is the train I immediately thought of.

I don't - but that graphic is awesome!

 

So - this should tell you my current headspace.

 

When my alarm went off this morning I was wondering why the heck my alarm was going off so early on a Saturday. Only to learn when I looked at my phone that it was Tuesday.

And it's gone downhill from there...... found another previously before not seen bug in our app...... and while I'm not on the team to fix it, I think it's harder that way sometimes. FML.

I will not drown my sorrows in fries is my new mantra - along with no day drinking....

[Bean Sidhe]

18 hours ago, Athaclena said:

I don't - but that graphic is awesome!

 

Now I can't remember who did. but I am glad the graphic still works.

 

18 hours ago, Athaclena said:

So - this should tell you my current headspace.

 

When my alarm went off this morning I was wondering why the heck my alarm was going off so early on a Saturday. Only to learn when I looked at my phone that it was Tuesday.

 

I totally get this. Hopefully today goes better.

 

 

18 hours ago, Athaclena said:

And it's gone downhill from there...... found another previously before not seen bug in our app...... and while I'm not on the team to fix it, I think it's harder that way sometimes. FML.

 

Oh, its that point of "It will take me 30 minutes to fix it or 3 days for the fixing team to do it." Hopefully they figure it out.

 

18 hours ago, Athaclena said:

I will not drown my sorrows in fries is my new mantra - along with no day drinking....

I think this is a very vaild mantra. Not going to lie, I may have had cheese fries last night due to my day. It was worth it.

[Athaclena]

I had 1 serving (minus a couple that hubby stole) of Chic fil A fries along with my Chic fil A sandwhich with Extra Pickles. I'm not sorry LOL.

 

So - here's how yesterday finally panned out.

1) Going to redo the migration in this environment soup to nuts to vet out that IN FACT we've quashed all the issues AND that "bug" we found - while probably still needs to be looked at - was caused BECAUSE the client killed and restarted a process. NOW - killing that process should have rolled things back to a "clean" state - so there's STILL a bug - but word to the wise - don't kill stuff that's WORKING because you didn't like where the log file went. That can be changed at a later date. Seriously. That one little thing was the straw that forced us to move EVERYTHING. FML.

2) Run "normal" processes in that environment this weekend and next because they won't do production without any further testing and next weekend as the main technical guy on the client side is vacation and completely unavailable. While there's a backup, one guy on the client side is "completely uncomfortable" having the backup do it. Again. THIS GUY. FML.

3) Unless something goes HORRIBLY wrong - we're a "go" for production 11/16 evening through 11/18. Technical guy is only REALLY unavailable Saturday during the day but can get his backup on track and my co-worker and I can babysit with him through the rest. One other isn't available that weekend - but he's been a naysaying SOB the entire project (see step 2) so to me that's just a bonus LOL.

So - while the project end IS delayed another 2 weeks - it's still DONE before Thanksgiving. *knock furiously on wood* This project has SO MANY moving parts I am NOT counting my chickens before they hatch!

And then, there's always interview #2 on Friday  Who knows, maybe I'll be starting somewhere new after Thanksgiving. Hmmm.... maybe in THAT case I'll go to Dreamhack Atlanta the weekend before Turkey Day with hubby 

[Athaclena]

Major drama late yesterday at work. All caused by customer that TRIED to blame us - but I seem to have successfully put the "kibosh" on that. Upshot is the migration is still ongoing (slow because of some things in THIS environment - one of *four*) and we didn't start over. Again. I'm so over it....

Hubby seems to have gotten a cold. BTW - Chronic Migraine + other chronic pain + sinus pressure sucks. Poor hubby is MISERABLE.....

I avoided fries last night. So there's that.....

[Athaclena]

Email at 6pm - "Oh I promised them you'd get that analysis to them by 7am". FML

Yes, it realistically only takes 15 minutes (and, in fact, I just completed it) - but I could have done it AT ANY TIME TODAY if I knew it was needed first thing in the morning!

Deep. Cleansing. Breaths. Catch up on Supernatural. And yes.... there were fries..... I'm pretty sure they're healthier than vodka. At least in the amounts I'm likely to drink it if I start.....

[Athaclena]

And new dumpster fire this morning on that project - GAH! Their guy missed a step putting something back after the restore..... looks like we don't HAVE to roll everything back and do it again though.

In other news, Interview #2 with the Executive Director seems like it will lead to a solid offer. So I have that going for me if all else fails LOL.

I will try to avoid fries today

[Bean Sidhe]

This project is a complete mess. Hopefully it got better or that second interview panned out.

Hoping some of the dumpster fires have been put out. Hows the "cleaning for the move" going? And fries can happen (especially given life currently) but hopefully you didn't eat all the fries.

 

Here is to hoping things have calmed down a bit.

[Athaclena]

Project is still on fire. HOW on fire depends on the day....

 

2nd interview went well. I'm pretty much waiting on an offer . They're busy too and the HR contact hasn't heard from the Director - but the Director literally told me on the phone that I was exactly the type of candidate he was looking for so - so I'm pretty sure there will be an offer. Whether or not we can land on a compensation package that gets me over there is the story. I've had ANOTHER dumpster fire dropped in my lap - but it's a different type of fire that's more "needs more interaction with a resource with real developer experience" than "everything is on fire because we've f'd everything up" fire - and THAT is the kind of fire I can put out quickly and have a happy client

I've been working so much, not much packing progress is being made - BUT - I did completely clean up 3/4 of my desk so there's progress and I now have a really nice workspace. I think that's helping a bit with the dumpster project because I'm not wallowing in a terrible project and surrounded by junk that needs to be gone through. I'm gonna try to KEEP it clean and continue to make progress.

There has been some drowning my stress in fries and food I should limit - largely because I've been too busy to cook so we've been defaulting to takeout, delivery and going out. I am not eating burgers & fries as much as I would have in the past - so there's SOME progress  What I need to do is learn how to drown my stress in a good salad LOL.

[Bean Sidhe]

I am sorry things went so bad with the project. Hopefully soon it will be over.

Good luck hearing from the second job. I can totally see that being a huge benefit. Fingers crossed that you can get what you want from it.

[Athaclena]

Still haven't heard from the other job - I honestly think it's just because of the holidays.....

I'm muddling through as best I can. There were lots of fries last week but I've kept it (somehow) to one serving this week.

The production migration has somehow NOT been postponed - I swear if all of these complaints from this client aren't actually showstoppers I wish they would just STFU. Production migration starts tonight and should be finished Monday Morning. I get to do my data validation then I'm shutting down and heading home for Thanksgiving and not giving a single F to this job.

I'm now working with another client trying to save a Q4 $1.4 MILLION deal. I think I have that under control but some of the other stuff coming from them is crazy. We had to pull an outside consultant in to do their install (because we HAVE NO RESOURCES) and they screwed up splitting the install across drives. They can expand c:\ - but not to the size we need - and they can't update the registry (which is what is needed to point the directories to the proper locations). So they want me to OK a lesser size - and how should they do other environments? There's been a ton of back and forth through the PM until I'm like - this is rediculous. They may not WANT to go through change control to make that registry change, but I'm putting my foot down. I've been in this business for 25 years across multiple industries - INCLUDING Gov't where sneezing requires a request in triplicate and 6 weeks notice - so don't tell me "it's not possible to update the registry". What if we found a bug? Would they not apply the hotfix? We WILL fix this implementation - I don't care if it takes 10 pages of documentation in triplicate and a 6 week lead time for change control. The implementation was incorrect and DOES NOT MATCH the agreed upon design. I don't care who falls on their sword. And all new servers should be to the PROPER SPEC WE OUTLINED.

Then, an hour later, after I've let a client know the reason I use a view in a query vs the underlying table is that it's best practice for supportablitiy during upgrades, the engineer assigned to the product comes back to state that NO - it's fine.


And I'm dealing with these people non-stop for the next 72 hours. I may have to put vodka in this chamomile tea.......

[Bean Sidhe]

Did the dumpster fire project ever finish or are you still working on it?

[Athaclena]

Did the dumpster fire project ever finish or are you still working on it?

They're in production but I understand there were some issues. I'm not sure exactly how "bad". I have tomorrow off as well but I may peek at my email.

Family Thanksgiving Day was awesome. After that was crap ton of family drama which included yelling, screaming, a near assault and a visit from the sheriff over "ruts in the road damaging a lawn". The ruts are due to that area being muddy, due to rain, were already THERE, the dirt road just needs to be MAINTAINED and nothing resembling a lawn was damaged. Several members of my "family" can drop off the face of the earth...

Can't Imagine why I don't go home often.

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