Other What currently makes your life awesome?

its a week late but my new shiny AC unit arrives tomorrow.

time to shove my carbon footprint up the suns fat arse.

 

"Reality" TV is the fakest of all the TVs.

 

Finally got the Asus Transformer T101H book working with the latest version of Windows 10.

Initially despite having available drivers I couldn't get any VGA drivers installed (said the device didn't meet the minimum specs.... ok...) and the touchscreen didn't work.

Thanks to a HP driver package installer and Device Manager fiddling I now have no unknown devices and everything works.

All of this because the initial install didn't have enough room to upgrade Win 10 to the latest version.

 

I'm replacing my bathroom door, so I finally got to recreate the scene from The Shining:

 

Did you say "Here's Johnny" with a manic grin, as you broke through?

 

Did you do it unannounced whilst the missus was in the bath?

 

Yes, of course

Alas, no. But she still doesn't know I've done it, she'll probably notice as we go to bed

 

*drops the mother fudging mic*

 

New job and moving to Brighton

 

Got a 2nd interview with a company I had one with last week.

Was booked for tomorrow but recruiter called me 40 minutes ago asking if I can do 4:30pm today instead.

I am taking that as a good sign they are actually interested in me for the role.

 

Well interview done and the words used was "Next time you hear from us, shouldn't be for a 3rd interview but an offer".

So feeling 95% confident about it, especially since the "Technical" questions were all around stuff I know about and have created documents for, in order to give the people I work with currently a "Basic" understanding of the equipment etc, since it's something that we may be using in the future and they have no training etc on it.

Then we had a chat after all the "Technical" questions and a good laugh and joke about things.

If I get offered the job though it could be anything from £10k per year to £16.5k more per year.

Now it's just that horrible waiting period where your stomach feel's like it's eating itself

 

Fingers crossed.

 

Weird but sweet working from home for a change. Wake up, do the morning routine and sit in front of the computer AND get paid to do so

 

Just remember to put pants on when you return to the office

 

Yeah, I've quite got used to that. Roll out of bed at 8 ish, enough time to get the essentials sorted out and get the coffee turned on before starting work at 8:30 downstairs. Then when 5pm hits, turn off PC and I'm already home. My wife works at home most days too which is quite nice, and I have the 4 cats always coming to say hi. Plus there is the easy access to snackos...

Then I go back into the office (currently 1 week in 4) and I have to get up at 6:30 so that I can get out and miss the traffic, and after 5 I then have a half hour (if in the car) or an hour( if on the bus) trip home, no mrs, no cats, and only the snacking noms that I brought with me...

I don't actually mind being in the office whilst I am here, I have better access to our servers (although the greater internet access is FAR worse than home), I have a better desk setup than home and the chair I have here is a lot better on my back, plus it is a change of scenery. However, its the before and after work additions that I REALLY have grown to dislike now...

Well that and the lack of cats. I miss my cats.

 

I think this is one of the biggest points, it's not that literally working from home is better than working in an office. It's everything else that gives it such a boost (for me at least). If my office was next door I wouldn't mind going in at least sometimes, change of scenery, see other people face to face etc. But now even my old commute which was only 15-20mins each way would seem like such a waste of time/money etc.

 

Remember, if the cats crash a zoom/skype/teams meeting, you are legally required to introduce them to the other attendees.

 

I've been home based for the last 10+ years. While it definitely has it's benefits and I don't know how I would ever go back to an office 9-5, or even a primarily office based job, it would be nice to be able to at least have the office option. It's a tough balance and some of things you might think are niceties early on are not so when you've done it for so long.

Being introduced to pets and discussing the various things that can be seen in everyone's background got old really quick when 15 minute intervals of small-talk started to get in the way of actually achieving anything in meetings, particularly when you're 5-8 hours ahead of everyone else... I was often the jerk saying "So Mr Snuffles is lovely and all, but can we please move along because some of us would like to go about our evenings". Fortunately now that everyone is more used to it most of that has worn off.

At my last employer I went in at least once per week just for a change to scenery and to catch up with people more socially. I definitely didn't get as much done, but that was okay.
And then I moved companies and my office was 2-3 hours away, but I went in once per month and regularly travelled within the UK to see clients.
And then I changed jobs and "my" office moved 3500 miles away, and I lost most regular touchpoints with anyone in the UK. But I regularly travelled and whilst being away for most of the week, 2-3 weeks per month was a pain, it was also nice.
And now there's no travel, and a lot of what the travel used to be probably won't be back to the way it was. Everyone being remote has improved general interaction/collaboration from my POV, but I'm hoping most will stay remote, as I really don't want to go back to the being the one voice on the speakerphone in a meeting room full of people. That said it's obvious some of my colleagues have been really phoning it in for the last 18 months, so some could do with getting back into the office.

 

In theory, yes. I would agree. However, I don't have a camera running for Teams meetings...

(Nobody wants/needs to see that...)

 

Nah. I'll put on a skirt (after coming out at the new place)