weill aspects

originally posted february 13, 2003

welcome to real life

My hours at work are getting longer already. I have cable and all the other things I need. I am alone for Valentine's Day, but I turn 22 the following day. Real life has set in.

they mean business

The Internet bubble has long since burst. I can't expect to make billions from an IPO and retire at 26. On the other hand, I'm lucky to be working for a company that is growing at a time when many companies are laying off thousands and moving development offshore. About the only remnants of the dot-com era are the foosball table and the anecdotes told by more experienced employees.

The attitude is very laid-back. The closest thing to an "old timer" is someone who was hired a few months ago. There are 43 employees at the company by my count, and I'm number 39. My first couple of weeks were spent getting familiarized with the company's technology and attending project meetings. I even got called to come in on my first Saturday as part of a monthly tech meeting.

The atmosphere is casual, but that doesn't mean that the work is light. As I was leaving work on my first day, I saw a co-worker coming in. He left 22 hours later. I've seen 19-hour shifts, 25-hour shifts, and heard tales of shifts as long as 31 hours. Today I was at work from 9:00 AM to 7:00 PM, my longest shift so far at a paltry ten hours. I thought that such ridiculous hours were just for college. We don't get paid overtime at work. I know how to work at home, but I hope that it won't be necessary too often.

Foosball is to CombineNet as golf is to more formal businesses. In the "Developer's Den," exhausted engineers come to play strategy games, sprawl out on our soft couches, and foos. It's a fun environment to work in, although my foosing skills are poor. I will need to train hard to get ahead.

it's home

After three attempts, I have cable. Unfortunately, I won't be able to watch it at all if I get stuck at work all the time. Guess I need a VCR, TiVo, or something else to watch the TV for me. Some of my co-workers say they don't need cable, but that's because they have girlfriends, wives, or otherwise meaningful lives. I have cable, and it is good.

This place is as complete as it's going to be: three rugs, a few chairs, and all the modern conveniences I need. Unfortunately, concrete floors not covered by rugs are cold in the winter time. With electric heat and no interior walls, I learned the hard way about one of the hidden costs associated with a loft. It cost $130 to power my apartment in January. One of my co-workers also lives in the building; he was billed $150. No problem, I thought: Pennsylvania made the progressive decision to deregulate its energy market a few years ago. I can choose my energy supplier. As luck would have it, three suppliers serve Pittsburgh. My current supplier charges a comparative rate of 5.83¢/kWh. For about 8¢/kWh, I can buy my energy from environmentally-friendly suppliers. The cheapest supplier is 5.67¢/kWh, for a savings of about $2 per month. Woo hoo.

social burn

Without any homework to do, I actually have time at night to watch TV or preferably do fun things out in the Strip District. The neighborhood gets its name from its narrow shape -- about 22 blocks by three blocks -- but has gained notoriety lately for the various bars that have started to include exotic dancers. One of them, just six blocks from my apartment building, was just seized by the feds for being a drug distribution center. It's nice to see the news highlight how our community is uniting, even if it is just to fight one form of vice.

Believe it or not, I lasted three years at college without drinking beer. I only started drinking the stuff when I was in Japan last summer, since it's considered rude in Japan to refuse something that is offered by one's family. The Strip features a few brewpubs including the Foundry, the Church, and Valhalla. I've been to the first two with friends, and they're great places to hang out. The Foundry features free wireless Internet and ten or more custom microbrews; the Church offers a surreal experience where giant brewing tanks occupy the pulpit and patrons sit on pews reconfigured into table seating. Mmm, sacrilicious.

I've been back to campus several times and I've gone out with friends from campus many times as well. There's only one problem with this: my friends from college will only be at college for a little while longer. I need to make the jump towards meeting more people in the area. There are a handful of singles events in the area, but I'm stuck between a rock and a hard place: not really interested in college nights, but three years shy of the youngest age range for other events.

Things are nice and quiet at home. I have bills to pay, and a source of income with which to pay them. Now I just need to have more fun.

Back to February 2003, or to the year 2003.

Where am I?

This is Weill Aspects, the official news archive of Jason Weill Web Productions. All articles posted to the front page end up here. This page was generated automatically by a series of Perl scripts.

Articles in Weill Aspects are organized solely by date. You may find the Google search in the left column to be useful if you are looking for an article but do not know the date on which it was posted.

Weill Aspects is composed of static web pages generated as appropriate when a new article is posted. It was developed in May 2001 as a way of managing the content on this site. I also used it extensively while in Japan, during which time I did not have continuous access to the Internet. I was able to write daily updates during July and August 2002, pack the files onto a CD-R or memory device, and upload them from the Internet-connected computers at school.

These scripts are all hacked together in less than elegant fashion, and I don't plan to release them. Some of the design that went into Aspects also was used to develop Livestat, a suite of Perl scripts to process statistics for academic competition tournaments. Livestat is available freely.