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Garden 2009
April 14, 2009
Taken in fading light. The gravel has only been down for a week or so with the paving in for about a month.

Searched for Work got 83 results

Trains, trains, such a pain

Being a non-driver I often find myself at the mercy of the vagaries of the public transport system. In general I find public transport, especially trains, reasonably punctual and reliable. However, last week and, as it turns out, this week, the service delivered has been less than sterling. This of course is to be expected as I am back working in an office (Edinburgh). Lets review the litany of issues: 1. Mon 2nd. 0827 service from Linlithgow to Edinburgh Park cancelled. 2. Tue 3th. 0744 ser...

February 10, 2009 9:11 AM

New day, new job

So, I've made my escape from the well known Investment Bank based in Glasgow and started working for a very well known Health Care provider in Edinburgh. So far it seems good, I've actually been doing Java, but of course its early doors at the moment. The one thing that I would say is a bit of a hassle is the travel. You're talking about 2 taxis and 4 trains each day - roughly 2 hours 45 mins a day. No doubt though I'll get that shaved down as I master the timetables. The project Im working o...

August 21, 2008 8:49 AM

I'm losing my sK1llZ0r5

So it's 9pm and I'm still stuck in the office: supporting User Acceptance Testing (UAT) in New York. The thing is, it isn't UAT because they're testing existing functionality that wasn't affected by the change - a bug fix. In other words they are doing regression testing - which I have to "support" in real time. Taking into account the above, plus the fact that I've done almost no Java since I've been here, plus the fact that I'm getting added to the "support rota" i.e. fulltime support as op...

July 7, 2008 9:11 PM

Karma or coincidence?

So I had two job interviews last week: One with the Scottish Legal Aid Board in Edinburgh and then one with HSBC in Stirling. Both of them were the usual Java/J2EE/database centric work. "Can you do this?" - yes. "Have you ever used this?" - yes. Etc etc. To be honest I find it hard to get excited about these type of roles as they usually involve you having to become very knowledgable about some rather uninteresting problem domain and I'll be frank - I don't like filling my head up with all that...

July 28, 2006 11:07 AM

Loyal Plastic Robot

So I'm back among the land of the dead i.e. back at work. I've spent the last few few weeks setting up a Limited Company (LS Tierney Ltd), speaking to accountants, agencies etc. Basically I'm now set set up to be an IT Contracter/Consultant. Within less than two weeks of starting to look for contracts I got one - which surprised me, then again it didn't. So I'm now in a three month role with Mott MacDonald (http://www.mottmac.com). I've only been here for two...

February 21, 2006 8:43 AM

So, I've decided to take my work back underground

Exciting news! I've quit my job! Yes it has come of a bit of a shock to me too. The reason(s) why? Well, to paraphrase Chuck D - multiple and several. I of course have to be careful what I say because these days you get sued for the contents of your personal blog - whatever happened to freedom of speech eh? Der reasons (in no order of relevance): 1. I didn't like some of the people. Don't get me wrong it wasn't open warfare or anything like it and I'm sure they didn't even know but a ...

January 21, 2006 8:45 AM

Sold a Pup

I'm hoping that this post will prove a cathartic exercise, I am hoping that it will help lay my demons to rest. Let me explain: When I was hired for my current position within my current company I was hired to work on team 'Purple' (not the real name you understand). So I went out and bought Purple books and mentally prepared myself for Purple related work. When I actually started I was, eventually, told I would be working on team 'Blue' (not the real name you understand). This was okay even tho...

December 13, 2005 9:27 AM

Shame on you

I arrived late into work today, late by almost two hours. Some would say this is a very bad thing, some would say it's a good thing - I myself sit in the middle, quite near nonchalont. What was the reason for this unexpected lateness? The trains were delayed. Why? Well this is where we come to the point of the story or rather one of the points: As we were heading into Edinburgh, in fact just outside, the train slowly drew to a halt to the conductor announcing "The train will be delayed due to an...

November 29, 2005 11:47 AM

Same old, same old

So I get into work this morning and naturally the first thing I do is check this website - naturally it isn't working: "Connection handle is not currently associated with a ManagedConnection" - *groan*. A quick restart of JBoss did the trick so that led to suspect that the issue was with how JBoss and the DB (mySQL) were getting on. I've had previous problems with mySQL going to sleep after a while of inactivity but TBH I would have expected the JBoss connection managing to deal with this transp...

November 14, 2005 9:03 AM

Must try harder

So it's been about a week since I've last written anything: I've been busy in work, well I say busy but more correctly, it's been intense. The three other developers that I'm working with are all s**t hot - easily the best development team I've been in and that is meant as no disrespect to anybody else I've worked with (you know who you are). They are intelligent, motivated and experienced - it's been a long time since I've felt bottom of the class I can tell you! The obvious benefit is that I'l...

May 19, 2005 11:56 PM

New day, new job

Okay, so here's the scoop. I've started in my new job, www.cognia.com, and have been working here for almost two days. At first it was the usual new job jitters; "What's his name", "Where's the toilet", "What am I doing here..." etc etc but already I'm starting to feel *reasonably* settled in - I guess it helps that it's a small team and I'm in a room with only three people. The project is slated to last for three years(!) so obviously we're not in too much of a rush at the moment, still in the ...

May 10, 2005 4:53 PM

End of (an era?)

Well I've finished up where I, used to, work. No more for me the ad-hoc and contradictory decisions of the technically illiterate - I hope. As I guess is the norm in situations like this I'm starting to feel a bit nervous about moving to the my new place; it's no longer the shining Camelot on the horizon; it's now an actuality.... My last day/week in my old job was, not surpisingly, very boring. Contrary to what I'm sure a few people felt I did do some work as it helped to pass the time a bit...

May 5, 2005 11:28 AM

The name is Fan, Fan Dan

We've got a new guy started in my department, I won't mention his name, and I've been working with him. Anyway, he "happened to mention" to my boss, not Shrek, that he wanted the credit for the stuff we've been working on as he's "done all" of the work. Now fair do's, he has done most of it as I haven't exactly been setting the heather alight, but all? No chance. This is yet another reason I will be happy to get out of here as soon as possible.

April 26, 2005 1:29 PM

Blue, blue, electric blue, that's the colour of my room

I think one of the reasons I forget to update this blog as often as I should is because I'm too stoned - no only jokin - I think it's because I look at the message which reminds you of your last visit and think that that date indicates when the blog was last updated: I shall add this to the "to-do" list for the upgraded version which is growing larger by the day. Maybe I should just start doing a wee bit at a time to get back in to the swing of it. On a slightly more melancholy note. It's now...

April 22, 2005 7:22 PM

Hot off the press

Well after much huffing, puffing and waiting I've handed in my notice where I work at the moment: I got my new contract, Ts and Cs etc, emailed to me today. I'm not going to miss the place much but I will definitely miss the people. They're a good bunch, apart from the obvious exceptions (Ed: Shrek?), and if I could take them with me, I would. Altogether - aw!

April 12, 2005 5:16 PM

He said, she said

She Said: Lawrence Tierney. He has still not received his offer letter and would like to hand his notice in today, can you possibly email it to him, lord0@hotmail.co.uk. He said: Would love to but I am in NY at the moment Yvonne, I also spoke to him on Friday and he should go ahead and hand in his notice, I still need to pick up his references but that should not be problem. She said: Sorry about the contract this message is from Ken below. Please read and come back to me I said: F**...

April 12, 2005 8:44 AM

The latest

As per seems to be the norm with anything I get involved with my prospective move to this new company has thus far run anything but smoothly: tWo weeks after "getting the nod" I am still waiting on the contract arriving. The dude phoned me on Thursday of last week to say that it had been posted, on Thursday evening, and he expected it to arrive Friday/Saturday - yeah right. I don't doubt that everything is cool I merely find the waiting a tad tiresome; all the more so because this place, my curr...

April 11, 2005 9:12 AM

Break out the champagne (not quite)

Well, I got the job! The agency phoned me on Tuesday at about 9am to say that I had been successful in my application and that the contract would be in the post that day. However (isn't there always a snag?), I haven't received it yet. At the moment I'm willing to put this down to the vagaries of the Royal Mail but on a slightly worrying note I've been unable to get hold of my contact at the agency via email. Of course this could be and probably is just a coincidence but I will phone them anyway...

March 31, 2005 11:07 PM

Get me outta here dude

I've not writen for ages and I feel quite bad about that. I've been extremely pissed awf in with my work recently and because of that, I think, I've been tired and unable to concentrate in general. I've been trying to get to bed earlier, no beers etc during the evening but I still seem to lack energy. Maybe we're like plants; in the spring we need to be fed, some sort of vitamins etc, as our bodies move into a slightly higher gear - dunno. Working on the assumption that it is my job that's dr...

March 26, 2005 1:43 PM

Party on dude

I was out last night for a "works night out". As it turned out only about eight or nine peeps showed up in the end. We started off in Firewater on Sauchiehall St, which I was pleasantly surprised with: it's kinda like an upmarket "rock" pub. As it turns out it belongs to the same people who own the Solid Rock and Rufus T's - I guess they must have seen a gap in the market. Anyway it's a good boozer; cool music, comfy couches etc. From there we went on to the Variety Bar and from there to the Sub...

March 6, 2005 11:12 AM

Another one bites the dust

Dag nab it! I didn't get that job with the mob in Edinburgh I had been to see last week. According to the agency I was allegedly *over qualified* for the developers role and had I got in earlier I would have been a shoe in for the Senior Developer slot - "I smell Sh**t". So that's that gubbed. TBH i'm not overly bothered about it as getting in and out of Edinburgh, especially Leith, would have been a nightmare; I would have spent about 4 hours a day travelling - still it would've nice to get to ...

February 18, 2005 7:42 AM

Magic roundabout

I had my second interview with that mob in Edinburgh last night: I suppose the fact that they were willing to speak to me outside of office hours is in itself a good sign - well that's what I'm telling myself anyway. I was sold a bit of a dummy by the burd at agency as she said it would be an informal chat with some more of the technical chaps but as it turns out there was a written paper AND I had to give a presentation! It started of quite shady but I seemed to recover it by the end. Still, yo...

February 10, 2005 8:06 AM

Funny old world

As it turns out I must've come across reasonably well in the recent interview I had (see below); the bird from the agency phoned to say that the company are keen to get me in ASAP for the second interview. Problem is I don't know if I'm interested anymore......

February 1, 2005 10:10 PM

Fair Friday

Well I had the day off today, obstensively for a day out in Edinburgh with Jackie, reading between the lines it was for an interview. As is their want the agency, who had contacted me, made the prospective company sound *cool and interesting* however having spoke to them the technological environment seems even more backward than where I am at the moment: they use 80% Perl, 20% Java - with no plans to move towards more Java and mySQL with no plans to update to any sort of Enterprise DB - I'm lik...

January 28, 2005 9:12 PM

It's that time of year again

I've got my appraisal today, in about an hour, with TFM and Shrek. I have to admit that this is the most nonchalont that I've felt before such an occasion: I've become a tad cynical of the whole process and of our department's managerial component in general. Anything what I say or do is irrelevant and given the fact that I know Shrek doesn't rate me the only real option I have left to me is sit and nod - standard operating procedure in this gaff. Anyway, we'll see what happens. I've not had any...

October 26, 2004 8:51 AM

Weekend update

I don't think I've ever commented on the real world as such in this blog but I have to say a couple of words about Ken Bigley: the British hostage who was killed in Iraq. Now I understand that it's a f**ked up situation over there and that lots of people, from each side, are getting hurt and killed on a daily basis and I understand that the "terrorists/freedom fighters" (depending on what side of the fence you are on) believe they are doing the right thing, and if they win history may even say t...

October 10, 2004 11:32 AM

Grey days

A lot a people find writing, among other things, a relaxing and cleansing experience. Now, I'm not saying that what I'm doing here is writing but you get the jist.... My work has been an absolute nightmare for the last couple of weeks i.e. exactly since Shrek/Benny/Plug started - I suppose it's not entirely his fault as nothing ever is and that he must be feeling vulnerable starting a new job but he really doesn't make it easy for anyone. He's managed to get on the wrong side of just about ev...

October 19, 2004 11:19 PM

Problem Child

According to my new boss, who I haven't thought up a stupid name for yet, I have an attitude problem/bad attitude - this is after a five minute conversation - and "can be replaced". Nice one. Of course, I wasn't told this directly, rather via an "insider" - deep throat if you will. :-) On a lighter note I got a copy *cof cof* of Service Pack 2 from the Dark Destroyer so if you're reading (and I know you are) - cheers On a lighter

October 7, 2004 8:24 PM

He shoots, he scores.

Passed my Prince2 (PRojects IN Controlled Environments), foundation exam, with a stunning 79% result. It should look good on my CV if nothing else.

September 19, 2004 5:22 PM

Court Roundup

I've been getting a bit lazy with posting over the last week or two, well not lazy as such but work has been such a pain in the arse that I haven't found time for much else. So instead of my usual eloquent prose I'll just give you a run down of the "big" items. 1. Work is pissing me off: I told TFM that I didn't want the Project Managers job (he foolishly put me on a trail period) as it involves too much bulls**t and I don't get to do any hands on coding. He's very sympathetic but "at the mom...

September 12, 2004 8:26 AM

Sick

I was off work for two days "sick" - sick of the place more like. The stupid rules, the incompetant managerial and directorial structure. I'm almost at the walk out the door stage. I've come to recognise it; when it's time to go......hmmmmmm. I was hoping to have heard from lastminute but as per the agency involved, *groan*, is f**king me about: suddenly the dude is too busy to take my calls. That's what you get for paying these monkeys minimum wage to sort your career out. Got Doom 3. Not ba...

August 18, 2004 11:12 PM

The longest day.........er interview

Had my interview with AllHotels/LastMinute this morning and it seemed to go reasonably well. They are looking for two Perl/Java or Java/Perl developers. I guess if it's the former then I should be a shoe in and even if it's the latter I should be in with a good shout. The only problem is the perennial one; somebody may do it for less money - well you get what you pay for. I gave it my best shot and the interview itself lasted almost two hours instead of the predicted one hour so that can only be...

August 11, 2004 6:39 PM

T minus 3 days and counting

It's getting nearer by the day 'til I take over from Ian as Project Manager - I'd like to say I'm looking forward to it and I guess in some respects I am but I have to admit I'm not looking forward to TFM's guaranteed criticism of any and all paperwork which I produce. I'm not suggesting this would be any sort of personal vendetta as he does it with everybody but I still know that it'll rub me the wrong way - it's not exactly a good way to motivate your staff: they realise that no matter what th...

August 2, 2004 9:02 PM

Does the torture never stop?

It's the end of another day in work. I have to admit that given my initial reservations the "paired programming" has proved more successful than I originally thought it would be. Allan knows his stuff, albeit he's from a Java background, and it's good to hear the opinion of somebody who hasn't, yet, been brainwashed by our companies cut'n'paste/slash'nburn approach to development. TFM has been off "sick" for the last few days, cheeky c**t told me to watch my time off aswell, so it's made for a p...

July 27, 2004 5:47 PM

Bow down before the one you serve

After many months of haggling and to-ing and fro-ing I've been offered a promotion ("Again?" I hear you say). Well yes, but this time I was given and accepted a written agreement. So come the 9th of August I'll be a Project Manager. I mean Project Manager in my companies sense of the word which is more like a senior/lead programmer for any other company but hey ho it's more money and I get a laptop so who am I to complain?

July 22, 2004 5:46 PM

Klingons on the starboard port

Who'd have thought that the Sun J2EE RI Application Server uses the same default port as MSN Messenger? Not me anyway :-(

July 19, 2004 9:09 PM

Diplomatic Immunity

Lucky me: I've been assigned to "pair program" with the FNG, who happens to be South African. He's allegedly got 6 months of Java experience and that's it - the joy. So not only am I now surrounded by losers I've got to work at a losers pace aswell *groan*. We're going through to Fife on Saturday for Jackie's sister-in-law's, who confusingly enough is called Jackie, 40th birthday party. That should be okay tho' as her family usually put on a good show unlike my bunch of disfunctional losers ;...

July 15, 2004 5:36 PM

New day same old s**t

Taking this oppo to fire in a post: I'm waiting for a meeting to start, should be in the next 5 mins. So what's been going on? Well after much huffing and "puffing" (*cof cof*) I've got the shower up and running. The dude fae Mazco sold me a dummy with the switch he supplied - he gave me 13amp switch when in fact I needed a 30 amp switch - nice one. Basically the shower would work for about 2 mins and then fry the fuse - anyway it's working now which is the main thing. My work in general main...

July 14, 2004 5:47 PM

Good day turns sour

I had one of those days today which starts off good and then as we circle the sun gets worse and worse... ....I went into work this morning full of the joys of spring, well as full as you can be when you're going to your work. Aye, so I thought I had a nice controlled day of Bugzilla ahead of me - little did I know. I got an invite to a meeting that TFM and Chunk were holding; all of the "senior" guys were there. Near the end TFM turns to me and says, and I paraphrase, "So what do you think L...

May 19, 2004 8:23 PM

Oracle SQL Tuning Day 1

First day of my Oracle SQL Tuning course. So far so good. Should be going for lunch soon which will no doubt be a pleasant change from the usual fayre of cheese rolls..........I hope.......

May 5, 2004 12:33 PM

From Roy "Chubby" Tait to Bubbleheed to Chunk

Hurraah! We have a new "Senior Project Manager", and I use that term in it's loosest possible sense. He kinda looks like the mongo guy from the Goonies; the guy with the mad teeth and weird ear? I cannae mind that character's name so he's just gonna get called "Chunk" for the moment. My first impression when I met the dude were that he wasn't exactly an Erwin Rommel, lead from the front, motivate the troops, sort-a-guy. A week later and my opinion still hasn't changed. He's not even been introdu...

April 28, 2004 2:02 PM

Double Duh

I just, for some inexplicable reason, started updating NetBeans which should take approximately 13 hours or some such nonsense. I was heading up to bed aswell. The latest in the saga which is my work.....I heard from a source, lets just call him "deep-throat", that TFM regarded my letter knocking back their "offer" as a my final word on the matter - which it wasn't *meant* to be. Ho hum, another fine plan crashes and burns. Anyway NetBeans has finished whatever it felt it needed to do so I...

April 27, 2004 11:04 PM

Yukk - got da cold

Yuk, I've got the cold. I'm hoping that it goes the way that they usually seem to i.e. you get one *bad* day and then the rest is just getting better day by day. Didn't do much much last night, playing Counter-Strike trying to get back to where I was a couple of months ago. I was floating around the mid-table mediocrity level of play, so I guess that's a bit of improvement over the last week or so. I seem to struggle when up against a lot of snipers/AWP whores - ach well. Haven't heard bac...

April 27, 2004 8:42 AM

To accept or not accept

At long last I got offered a payrise and promotion in work: Project Manager at �23K a year. I've knocked it back tho' cos I think that it should be a slightly higher rate of pay. I wrote a letter in response back to Scott, trying to be polite as possible, saying "thanks, but without an increase in the remuneration no thanks". I gave him the letter this morning and so far he hasn't said a word............

April 26, 2004 1:50 PM

Thank Crunchie

It's Friday lunchtime and I'm just taking a wee breather before plunging headlong into the afternoon. Between myself and Kendo we've managed to iron out most of the bugs in Tracker, certainly all the show stoppers anyway. Hopefully the rest of my day will be spent pottering around in some code and the time will fly by....... I was playing Counter-Strike last night and managed, at long last, to hook up with Nicholas a.k.a "Scathe". Unsurpisingly it was the worst I'd played in about six months ...

April 23, 2004 2:30 PM

Dog day Wednesday

Man I've had a hard day at work today. Just trawling my way through a bug-list which, for a while at least, was growing faster than we were dealing with the errors. It looks like we've broken the back of it though: down to 20 outstanding out of a total of about 200. I guess you can say we've decimated it - literally. Hmmm.....is decimated reducing to 10% or reducing by 10%? Answers on a postcard please. I chinned Scott today about my appraisal etc and he said I should hear something by Friday...

April 21, 2004 5:52 PM

Cocked, locked and ready to rock

Lunchtime on the last day of the training: Scott's on the phone trying to wangle earlier flights back to Glasgow cos it looks like the course will finish at about 4'o'clock and our flights ain't until 8. Grrr......just heard the good news that we can move our flights but it gonna cost us �350 so I guess that's that out of the window. I now have the joy of hanging around in the airport for an hour or two but I guess we can go to the bar and have one or two Stella - *cof cof* We went to see "St...

April 16, 2004 1:03 PM

Londinium

Okay so I'm in London with Scott and it's lunchtime on the second day of my training - one day to go. The flight down from Glasgow and the transfers from Heathrow etc went very smoothly; everything was on time, no breakages etc etc. British Airways, leather seats - mmmmm, suits you sir. Do you want it, hmmmm? Do you? The flat we're staying in is owned by the company, well at least by the boss, it's round about Canary Wharf. I expected it to be nice but I wasn't expecting a �500,000 luxury ...

April 15, 2004 1:29 PM

And theres more

What I didn't mention is that I've got a noob Graeme working with me who tries hard ;-) Scott (boss) again hinted at a promotion and payrise etc.

April 1, 2004 8:25 PM

Almost Friday

It's been a pretty long week but Friday is now just a few hours away - yee haw - cue the weekend and a Celtic homegame, on a Saturday at 3pm! Dunno if Davids going he was saying something about being ill, we'll see. Been really busy in work. Tracker v4.9.1 is going into test in a week or so and I've got a bug list as long as my arm......

April 1, 2004 8:24 PM

Appraisal

Had my appraisal in work today. All seemed to go pretty well apart from the fact that my Project Manager labelled me "too outspoken" - which if I'm being truthful I guess I am. I'm aware of it, though I suppose I just behave that way because in a sense I have no responsibility in terms of subordinate staff etc etc. Still we should get the letters which detail any payrises etc in a couple of weeks so we'll see.

March 25, 2004 6:01 PM

Now that I think about it

I'm pretty sure I've made a complete tit of myself in work - yet again. I don't know what it is that drives me to self-destruct in this micro fashion every 6 months or so. The weather, stress, too much rich food, etc, etc.

March 23, 2004 12:31 AM

Hear ma training coming

I'm now into the second week of my Oracle training and I have to admit it's been pretty good. I've learned loads about Oracle and I feel now that I actually have a handle on it for the first time, do ya know what I mean? I can see all the edges of the problem. I have to admit in a selfish sort of way that getting an hour for lunch, tea breaks, home at a decent time etc etc sure hasn't hurt either infact the above has led to me looking forward to going to the training. A lesson BiP might wanna le...

March 17, 2004 10:36 PM

Too much like hard work

Man this training malarky is too much like hard work dude. I'm just at this terminal banging in SQL statements all day - saying that I guess it's good practice.

March 9, 2004 10:18 AM

Oracle Training - Day 1

Sitting "ecletics" offices during a tea-break on the first day of my Oracle Introduction to 9i SQL course. So far so not scary. This bunch of stuff looks pretty basic but to be fair I've already picked up a few tips, if not actual new things. On the plus side we are getting sent to Saninios for lunch - woo hoo!

March 8, 2004 11:14 AM

Everything is relative

I'm sitting in work thinking bad things about my colleagues. Some of them I want to stab and some worse than that (depending on what way you look at it). It really just depends on your point of view I guess.

February 20, 2004 5:07 PM

Bubblehead - gone but not forgotten

Did I mention that my boss Bubblehead has left? He left a week ago i.e. last Friday. What does this mean to me? Well, for a kick off it means that my payrise has been put on hold indefinitely - quelle surprise. We met him in the boozers that night and it was revealed to me that some of my collegues who IMHO are nowhere near as good at their jobs as I am are getting paid up to 5K a year more than me - pah pah pah.

February 20, 2004 9:25 AM

Time will tell

Once again I'm meant to have a meeting to discuss *possible* payrise - etc etc. Surprisingly enough I haven't actually been told if the meeting is happening so I guess that I just have to wait and see.......as per. Anyway I've got a s**t load of stuff to do as I boldly said to my PM at the start of the week to pile the work on me which he of course did. So dear readers I'll catch you later after a fun day of parsing XML in and out of mySQL (which has no XML support) - nice :-)

February 11, 2004 9:27 AM

The final countdown

Well today is my the end of my working week, I'm in work at the moment. It's Jackies birthday tommorow but being the well prepared sort of chap that I am I've go all of her pressies bought and wrapped.

June 22, 2002 1:24 PM

All work and no play makes me

Well this is my sixth day in a row at work and I've still got tommorow - Saturday - to go. In a way working tommorow won't be too much of a hardship as Jackie and her mates will be in the house getting ready for their night out in the town - I think I may actually have been banned from being there when they're running around in their undies etc - boo! One of her mates, a bird called Julia, like a right old puff so I'll need to see if I can get her alone(ish) for a while.
My Redhat workstati...

June 21, 2002 6:24 PM

Another day another dollar

Today was one of my many cruddy nothing changes type episodes. Same old shit different day. Did get FTP working on Redhat.

June 19, 2002 11:23 PM

Yah boo, sux to you!

As you may have guessed from the above outburst, I did not the the job which I was after - am I so unskilled? I've not even had a letter from them yet saying "thanks but no thanks". This is what I get for putting my trust in people....
David, Karen and my young (' months old) nephew were round to visit us on Saturday, they ended up staying the night, suffice to say I was well ripped by the end of proceedings - at least I didn't get a hangover though.
My job in work has changed slightly i...

June 18, 2002 11:20 PM

One of these days and it won't

Went for a job interview today with a company in Rutherglen. I'd actually been to see them a few years ago - suffice to say they weren't interested - previously at least. It seemed to go okay but I'm a bit long in the tooth to get excited about that sort of thing these days. Sounded good mind you, Web Programmer in a dept. with eight other people all programming in Perl - pretty funky. Wait and see what happens.

June 10, 2002 8:52 PM

Cometh the hour........

I've got a website which I've been working on for a customer, which is nice, the only thing is I'm well behind schedule with it, which is bad. I hate to say it but I think the only way I'll get it finished in time is to cut back on the ganj and work in it at home aswell as in the office. See the dedication?
On an altogther more depressing point my brother in law's father died yesterday - which although natural, for us all, wasn't particularly good.

May 12, 2002 2:57 PM

Standing at the Crossroad

As mentioned previously my work-mate Gary is leaving to start at the Daily Mail Picture Desk. I think I could have been in with a shout for his job but to be honest it's not really where I am. So I'll keep plugging away where I am.
I wish I could just get a job working with a web design/new media firm. Even if I got paid the same as I do at the moment it wouldn't really matter. I just want to get settled in a job that I can concentrate on and start to build up my skills. Money isn't much of a...

May 7, 2002 10:15 AM

Rasta Man vibration

It's Friday night, quarter to eight, and I'm sitting in work - f**kin' typical. On the plus side I've found a cool internet radio station which seems to be playing mostly Reggae/Marley stuff. On the down side I think the guy must be running it in his house 'cos it ain't exactly the fastest.
I'm off to the football to see us *hopefully* thrash Dundee Utd and take another step closer to the league title - 2-in-a-row ya beauty! I'll need to stay reasonably sober though as surprise, surprise, I'm...

March 15, 2002 7:49 PM

Oops I did it again (not reall

I thought I'd made a cunt of a job in work yesterday but as it turns out I didn't, which was nice. The sad thing is it ruined the whole of my night last night - not even Caddyshack could lift my black mood. Still, it all turned out okay.
I'm *still* waiting on my big Redhat book arriving from Amazon. I ordered it almost a week ago - so much for the information superhighway!

March 12, 2002 11:42 AM

C'mon the Celtic.

It's Sunday and I'm sitting in work waiting for the Rangers Celtic game to start. I should of course be watching the game from in the pub not stuck here. I'm getting well and truly fed up with all these pish hours - late nights, backshifts, weekends - and the rub is it seems to be for no extra pay. I know I keep saying it but I'll need to get a new job. A nice 9-5, Mon-Fri, shot.
I could have went round to Davids to watch it but as mentioned above....
Oh joy, just had one of the photogra...

March 10, 2002 11:10 AM

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In work once again - completely bored and underused.
I've been installing and configuring RedHat on my local machine in the house which has been keeping me amused for the last few night but I've got to the stage where it's time buy a "BIG BOOK" - actually I've just ordered one from Amazon so maybe I'll be able to gewt the modem/printer working at last!
On a happier note my brother will become a fahter within the next couple of days which will mean I will be an uncle - cool.
Seriously ...

March 6, 2002 11:05 AM

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In work - it's Saturday - same old bullshit different day! Luckily enough it's also the busiest day of the week so I get to knock my pan in 'til about 9'o'clock tonight. No doubt my reward will come in heaven.

February 2, 2002 3:25 PM

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I'm in work - nothing new there. Had a puff before I got here! Ya bad boy!

January 30, 2002 2:32 PM

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I think, nay I know, that I've reached the stage where I gonna have to start job-hunting again. Basically I don't get paid enough and the hours are pish - and getting worse. If and when Gary leaves it means us few remaining suckers will have to work even crappier hours too.

On an entirely different subject: I was looking round a good few webrings last night and I must admit that the quality of some of the homepages put me to shame. I was actually quite surprised with how good, graphically...

January 30, 2002 11:12 AM

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It looks like one of my work-mates, a guy called Gary, will be leaving to work at some newspaper or another. This in itself doesn't sound too bad I agree but it will no doubt mean a lot of major upheavals to my hours - which if you've been a fan of this column you will know that my hours are aleady one of my major bugbears. All in all it sounds like a bad idea from my point of view. Still I can't blame him for wanting to try it somewhere else.

January 26, 2002 1:47 PM

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Do you know what I hate?
Lots of things really but something happened yesterday which really "yanked my chain"......
In work and a guy from an agency phones asking me if I'm interested in a job, blah, blah, blah. He ends up phoning me four times in the one day and eventually ended up saying stuff like "You're my number one candidate" etc. Long and the short of it was that he asked if I could go for interview on Monday coming, he'd phone back with a time etc.
Can you guess what happe...

January 11, 2002 9:09 PM

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Phew.....I've just finished a very busy day at work. Well not quite finished but I'm over the hump if you know what I mean - still at least the time went quickly :-) .I'm gonna have a chilli enchilada that I brought in with me and take a well earned breather.
Last night I started to rewrite the guestbook to use the mysql account and I almost got it finished then I remembered that a book I have "Perl and mysql for the web" has the code for one in it. Not that I can't write it myself but I th...

January 4, 2002 6:50 PM

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Right then, i'm in work at the moment - I thought it would be an easy day - famous last words - I've not stopped since I got in (' hours ago). I'm in 'til 7 tonight so I won't get home until about 8 - ya boo. The plus is that thanx to my new minidisc player, courtesy of Santa, I'll at least have music as I trudge in grim death-march fashion to the bus station. I did not want to get up this morning!!

January 3, 2002 1:08 PM

Lies damn lies

The promotion which the "Senior Project Manager" in my work had offered to me seems to have been diluted by TFM - the IT Director. TFM is saying that there will be no official payscale for our department and as such I will receive no change in job title as the job of "Senior Programmer" which was offered to me no longer exists - nice. I guess what will happen is that they offer me a paltry wage rise for lots more responsibility. If that does turn out to be the case then I'll be forced to say "Th...

February 4, 2004 9:24 PM

Scanners

My head is absolutely bursting - I feel like the dude in scanners. I'm actually feeling a bit sick with it. I've been very lazy and not done any work on this site or any Java work in general recently. Talking of which a bunch of "special" guys in my dept are being sent on Java training - suffice to say that once again I am not among the chosen few - no change there then

January 29, 2004 10:59 AM

It's been a while

Okay, okay, I know it's been a while since my last entry but I've been nursing "the mother of all hangovers" - yesterday anyway. We; me, Linney and Bubblehead attended a "customer awareness day" on Tuesday which sounds pretty boring but when you realise that it was a free bar selling Stella you can see how it got messy very quickly. I didn't get home until after 1am in the morning....... My boss in work was yet again hinting that I had a promotion and/or a payrise coming (prompted no doubt by...

January 22, 2004 12:36 PM

God spare me

Friday, its f**kin draggin in but on an altogether lighter note the bold Paul has gone and got himself a new job! It's a contract number which pays �180/day, lasting 3 months - lucky wee bastard.

January 16, 2004 3:14 PM

Strap this on your sore ass Blain

A girl in work just said the following to me: "I can't believe how sore my ass is after last night". What is the world coming to dear reader?

January 15, 2004 12:30 PM

New day same old s**t

Yesterday was a nightmare in work. I seemed to get dumped on from all angles over "things" which were either outwith my control or infact nothing to do with me. Same old story I guess but it gets to be a pain in the ass after a while. Lots of stuff like "I'm sure I told you about that", "not my job" etc etc. Kind reader, you know how it goes. Here comes the boss!!

January 14, 2004 9:29 AM

The horror.......

Well I'm back at work and so far so good. Saying that though I've only been in for about three and a half hours. I thought I'd be getting payed today but it turns out it ain't until tommorow - aaargh!!! Suffice to say I wasn't expecting that. Everytime I check my online bank account I get a screen full of red stuff - scary.

January 5, 2004 12:46 PM