lexrobertson.ca

So the majority of a month has past since I posted. First let’s say Birthday shout outs to Gma, Mel, and Kev. I still haven’t mailed the birthday cards so they’re all going to be very late I’m afraid, but the post office is on my errand schedule tomorrow.

Work has been busy, but I did still manage to accomplish two things.
1) I put my average km per week up to about 10 km per week – I was at 7 (1 km a day) before I busted up my ankle in August. Admittedly my one ankle is complaining. Not damaged, but complaining so I’ll be laying off for a couple of days.
2) I got my first assignment of the year in on time.

I’ve got one due Sunday and another due Wed which will probably have to be finished on Sunday too since I’ll be flying to Indonesia on Monday and remain there for the week. Slow internet connections do not bode well for getting a distance assignment in on time.

Otherwise two things I came across recently have been taking up space in my brain:

“What I Wish “They” Had Told Me When I Started Out In Librarianship
1. There really is a tension between being an employee and being a professional.
2. Know what you believe in.
3. In your first three years, become a ranking practitioner-expert in one great thing that becomes your “brand”.
4. You and not your employer, are in charge of your morale and fully responsible for your own feelings.
5. Presentation is more important than you think.
6. Take the long view of any job, even if it is a temporary job.
7. I wish someone had told me how much librarians could strengthen their leadership skills, knowledge, network and resume through volunteer work in associations.
8. I wish someone had told me the simple truth that the higher up you go in any organization, the more ambiguity you have on your plate.
9. You must be a skilled advocate.
10. Finally, I wish I had the benefit of some frank talk about when to quit”
(Quoting Wendy Newman found via another blog)

I think this is a good list for any profession, not just Librarians, and it is point number 10 that weighs the most heavily on my mind right now. However, when I look at the way things are right now points 1 and 4 also strike me as being very relevant to the situation in which I find myself now.

The other quote that recently struck me was:
“It’s how I learned that where you are can absolutely play a part in who you are.”
(The Girls’ Global Guide to Guys, Theresa Alan – yes it’s fluff reading but even workaholics with homework to do need breaks ya know)

I guess that’s all in the news for now folks. I should let people know that now is a good time to make requests if you’ve got something from Asia that you want.

So for the past two weeks I’d managed to keep myself to a reasonable number of hours (for me and this job – approx. 50/wk) and got two weekends off in a row (neither was quite how I planned, but I did get some time away from the office).

It looks like it’s going to get crazy again for a while. One client has asked for some changes. There’s an educational technology expo Thursday and Friday of this week (which it turns out they want to demo the not nearly finished enough project at) and in addition there’s more customized demos coming down the pipe. The server situation is stalled because the data center we normally work with apparently didn’t read the ‘non-rank mounting’ part of my request for a quotation correctly and thus resulted hilarity and panic. We should hopefully have it all sorted out later today. Just in time for more meetings – which will probably take up most of the day similar to yesterday – and I’ll end up working late trying to get the non-meeting stuff done.

The person who I was eyeing as being capable of holding down the fort when I leave to come back may not be joining the company after all. It would be nice if they did because they’d have a very good open source background. We’ll I guess it’s time to get started and see how much I can do – which will determine if I get to go practice my mandarin this evening or if I’ll be trapped in my office trying to make a deadline that may or may not be possible.

Still no sign of my course materials. Starting to worry me a bit since iirc courses are starting this week in Saskatoon. Other than that I guess a ‘gentle’ reminder that I’d like people to provide their blog links on the Roll Call post below so I can start to actually fill out the links section.

I’ve no idea for how long, but yesterday I discovered a friend’s blog I hadn’t realized existed and ever since a comment posted here I’ve been searching for another one. As a result:

Roll Call!

I haven’t actually put any links on here yet, but I think it’s time I did. So will y’all please provide a comment or an e-mail with a link. If you don’t want me to post it please still send it for my benefit, but tell me not to post it okay?

I’m hoping this return to functioning lasts a while – here’s hoping!

Somedays I know that there was a time when I didn’t need the internet every day. But recently I really have trouble recalling what that was like.

On to the review:
At the beginning of August I knew I had a decision to make. One I’d been putting off for a couple of months. Eventually I set a deadline for myself – the 15th.

I had a couple of chats with my boss, I asked for feedback from you guys, and I thought about it. In the end I decided that I’d take the full year. I registered and I formally told my boss. So far we’re holding off on telling the other members of my team formally until we get the project and production schedule formally set for the rest of the year. Which has been delayed because we’re still looking for people to complete the roster. However, the count down has begun – 86 days and counting. I haven’t purchased the air tickets yet – but I’ve picked the flights on the 1st of December I’ll be taking. My exams are the 9th and possibly the 10th so I’ll have a week to study and get over the jet lag.

It’s been a serious decision month. In addition to the decision about school I’ve tentatively made a short list of criteria that any jobs need to meet. Any job in the IT field in Canada shouldn’t have a problem meeting them so they are really for measuring out of country opportunities.

Then I sprained my ankle and had to not meet my goal of running every day this month. I’ve written something every day – some of the blog posts are definitely short and not very insightful. Most of the hand written posts are lengthy and definitely not meant for public consumption. But I believe that I have actually cleaned out some space in my brain. Not much, but some. So not a perfect month, but at least it feels like forward progress instead of stalling out or going backwards.