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Nothing ever happens in the time one expects, does it? I took delivery of a new ergonomic desk today that needed a service call to get set up properly. They originally told me the guys would arrive in the morning, but they didn’t get here until 4pm. And my monitor and work area were all disassembled waiting for them to put the desk in place, so there went most of my productivity today. Oh well, it is now installed and I quite like it. I have been reading a lot recently about how bad it is to be sitting all day, or to be in just one position all day, and I had been researching standing desk solutions, but all of them were really ugly. Then I found this one (see below) and really loved the look of it. After saving for a few months and with the help of an Architect’s discount (thanks Bob!) I finally ordered it. So far, I love it. And it moves really smoothly from sitting to standing and back, all on the hydraulic support piston in the center (and with no electricity needed). I feel healthier already.
I am all packed and ready, we leave in a few minutes for the SFO airport. The last few days have been a great catching up period with my friends here in San Francisco (and I have no doubt gained a few pounds from all the over-eating). I will be glad to get back to the familiar surroundings of New York and my apartment, however. I have a ton of work to do, and haven’t been all that productive while here, although I wouldn’t trade the time with friends for it. At the end of our lives, no one regrets working less and spending more time with loved ones. These are the things that really matter. Outside of the friendship and reunions, the things that have impressed me about San Francisco this trip are how much the architecture and makeup of various parts of the city has changed; having my memory jogged about how amazing a place this always is with regard to food; and how very, very much colder 50 degrees can feel in San Francisco compared to any place else.
Satori, Stephen on January 18, 2012 @ 10:56 pm — 0 comments
Both of you probably noticed that my site has been down/gone black for the past 24 hours or so in solidarity with other sites and in protest over SOPA/PIPA. (The action seems to have been a big success, btw.)
We now return to your regularly scheduled blogging…
When you are acquainted with a lot of people who move around a lot, it is always a good idea when arriving in a new place to see which of your friends still live or have moved from the place you are visiting. This is easily done with something like facebook, where you can search your friends by city. Sure, it leaves out people who aren’t on facebook, who don’t put in their current city, or who live just outside the city (yet still in the same general area), but it will give you a general list of who is there. For people like me with a lot of acquaintances and a terrible memory, this is a great tool. And sometimes one is surprised to find that friends from one city have moved into the city one is visiting. Such was the case with my friend Guillermo, who I met in Buenas Aires a few years ago, and have seen at various times in New York where I live and in Barcelona, where he lived until he moved to San Francisco (temporarily) about a month ago. We just had a lovely coffee at Fourbarrel and then lunch at Serpentine (another great SF restaurant). Guillermo is a bit of a nomad like me, and we have lived in a lot of the same places. He lived in Mexico City for a while and spent time in Mumbai, and we even realized we know a person in common from there this morning. All these intersections and commonalities fascinate me, it is so striking how small the world can be.
I write this from a coffee shop in San Francisco, working it mobile-office, old-style. The last couple days have been great, hanging out with old friends and eating well. Today I will do some work and rediscover a bit of old SF. The weather is cool but sunny. The only annoying thing is this overbearing asshole pontificating to his friend on the phone next to me. He keeps peppering his conversation with phrases like “You’ve got to OWN it, that is what I am sayin’” and “How he takes what I say is HIS responsibility, not MINE”. Then he goes on to tell the sad sack on the other end what he can do to improve his life, and it all sounds like pablum straight out of the self-help bookshelf at the local Barnes and Noble. I have to admit it is even more irksome because he is loud and has a southern accent, which gives to his haughty attitude and even more annoying tenor. He keeps talking endlessly about how he handled things with his ex boyfriend, how he knows what to do in every situation. He looks a bit like Colonel Sanders with those top horn rimmed glasses, if the colonel were a bit younger, gay and self-important.
Satori, Stephen on January 11, 2012 @ 10:45 am — 0 comments
And a little play. I have been busier work-wise than I thought I would be out here, but such is life and I am not complaining. And in between, there are meals with friends. Dallas and I had breakfast and conversation at La Conversation, Dustin and I had lunch and fortune cookies. And Maureen, Beth and I had dinner at JiRaffe and reminisced about the LA Weekly (where we all worked together several years ago). The weather has been beautiful and even with all the work, I am glad I came. Change of pace and environment is always a wonderful tonic for me.
When I was planning this trip, 5 days (ok, 4.5) in LA seemed like a lot. I thought I could enjoy myself, see a few friends, get some work done, relax. I think that relax part just went the way of the Dodo. I already feel guilty and slightly overwhelmed by how many people there are to see, but such is life. Someone always feels left out, but there just aren’t enough hours in the day to see everyone I know that lives here. Plus, I have actual paying work to do. That said, the climate is beautiful, and I have been working with the door open to perfect weather most of the day. I arrived around 10am and had a lovely lunch with my friend Jose who picked me up from the airport, then came to Dallas’ house (in WeHo where I am staying) to get settled in and down to some work. I have a few client meetings while I am here, but I am determined to have some fun along with. La la la….
I am a technology professional who has never flown with Virgin America before, but my brand associations (due to your marketing) were of a hip, modern airline with up to date conveniences. And so when I was planning on booking my current travel to LA, SF, and back to New York, I decided to try out Virgin America. Your website and system have made me never want to fly with you again, and I haven’t even boarded the first plane. Here is a brief list of the problems I have encountered:
1. Unable to book multi part itinerary on your site and had to call in to book travel
2. When logging into my account (anytime over the past several days), site is slow and unresponsive
3. After logging in, I am often logged out mysteriously while trying to make changes
4. Unable to make changes to itinerary using your site
5. Trying to get to seat mapping/changes results in wrong or no information showing, or a wiped out seat selection
6. Once checked in, no option for paperless boarding pass
7. On my iPhone, no app available for Virgin America (for check in, travel alerts, boarding pass, info)
In short, using your company has been a royal pain before even boarding my first flight with you. Congrats to your marketing guys anyway for duping me into believing you had a handle on the modern, internet-connected world when clearly you do not.
Most sincerely,
Stephen
Satori, Stephen on January 7, 2012 @ 12:12 pm — 1 comment
I have a veritable explosion of work at the moment. Trying to wrap up a few things before Monday, because I am heading to LA and SF for about 10 days, and while I will be working mobile, it is always less productive than when at my larger monitor at home. The new year has started off well with regard to work, that is for sure. I am really looking forward to going back to California, which will always feel a bit of a homecoming. After all, I lived there for about 13 years, and it is true to say I would not be doing what I am doing now if I hadn’t. It is really funny to think how small events can completely reshape your life over the long haul. It was early 1995, and having returned from living in France 18 months earlier, I was working in a planning office in SOMA doing things as various as model building, light graphic design work, and mac support. I was invited to a dinner party and struck up a conversation with the woman sitting next to me. After explaining to her the type of work that I did, she told me that she thought I would be great in the field of “Quality Assurance“. I asked her to explain what the hell that was and she told me it was basically testing out new software for bugs and quirks. Further, she told me that her boyfriend, who worked at Apple, was trying to hire a few QA engineers, and that I should send her my resume to forward to him. I told her, right, pull the other one, but she assured me she was serious and I promised to send her my resume. I went home thinking that I was not even sure what she was talking about, and as excited as I was by the prospect of working for Apple, I really felt that I had no relevant experience — so I didn’t send the resume.
As fate would have it, I ran into her on the street a few days later. She asked why I hadn’t sent my resume and I admitted to her that I didn’t have one with the appropriate experience, and surmised that it was probably a waste of time anyway. She told me to just put one together, listing exactly the type of work that I had told her about, and she would forward it, what could it hurt? Reluctantly, I pulled one together and sent it off to her, expecting that to be the end of it.
One week later, I had a job at Apple Computer.
I worked there for a couple of years, and learned a ton about QA, the software-making process, Apple, and the industry. This led me to many other technology driven jobs and pursuits, in companies large and small and places far and wide. It is amazing to look back on the last 17 years and see where it has all led. And all from a simple conversation one evening with a stranger at a dinner party.
Satori, Stephen on January 4, 2012 @ 9:17 am — 0 comments
I have been getting a lot of great feedback on and contacts from my new site, and I am thrilled. It has been picked up by a few design sites, and this has resulted in a fairly large traffic spike. One of the gratifying things in building it is seeing how far I’ve come in the last 3 years. There are all kinds of programming and design skills I have acquired in that time. And with the experience, the time necessary for me to complete projects has likewise gone down, making me a better bargain for my clients (since at least for now, my rates haven’t moved). When one is going about one’s daily business, these things can be somewhat invisible, as they are incremental. But building my new site and portfolio have made them come into focus, and while pleased with what I have learned, can see how very much more there is to learn. There are a host of truly amazing designers and programmers out there that inspire me daily. What I love about the web so much is how open it is to sharing. There are thousands of places to learn from and borrow from and get direct help with problems. It is obvious that this spirit of sharing results in an explosion of creativity and progress (much of which would be undone by hateful laws like SOPA).
