In the Rough - The Blog of Joel McDonald Jr.

I have to admit that while enjoying reading the many LJ’s from my wonderful comrades in various institutes of higher education, though many seem to be quite liberal, I’m not quite sure if I have that on campus university spirit that seems to radiate from everyone. Desire to attain the papers saying I studied something that will help me in my professional career: Yes. Desire to attain the headaches of dorm life, random roommates, gay pride rallies, drunken classmates: No. I have a friend at Old Dominion University in Norfolk and I’ve visited the campus and dorms a couple of times and from what I saw and heard I don’t have a desire to attend. Anyway, that was just a few thoughts on that. A little random really, with no argument for the correct way to do things, just some thoughts. On to my so-called-life! Yay! Our phone systems at my office are working! Wait…what do you mean there are still outlets not connected. UGH! Luckily that seemed to be the only glitch while I was actually at the office. Earlier that morning I tackled a boot sector problem on my laptop. It seems that the Linux boot selector fouled up and wouldn’t let the computer boot to windows (and considering I uninstalled Linux a while ago for space, there was nothing else to boot to either). Luckily I was able to find that hidden command that I have to search for every time to make MS-DOS the main boot sector. Darn LILO. Got it fixed and running though which is a good thing as I was worried that it was fried which would leave me without a computer at the office as the one we have on order is not expected for another week. Payday is tomorrow….I hope. I expect a bit of uncertainty and inconsistency with the company’s cash flow for a couple of months. We are however meeting our marketing goals which are great, now we need to land the deals or the whole works was for naught. It would incredibly suck if this company tanked. No other company will hire me because I’d only be around short term and because I need the money, I’d have to result to taking leave from administrative duties to flipping burgers or something. That would really suck. A word on my car: It looked like it was smoking a cigar from the cloud that trailed me this morning. 

Peace!

Well today was the first day that HRC (Hampton Roads Contractors for those that were wondering) conducted some kind of business from the new office. The phone company was scheduled to install the first round of phone lines between 8AM and 12PM. I suppose they finally arrived around 11:30AM. We thought we were good to go until the phone guy informed us that the phones that we had acquired won’t work with our new phone lines. Turns out that our phones were meant for a business phone system, which is located upstairs. Tomorrow we have to have another company come out and install and set that up for us. I felt a little helpless as I’m not a telephone expert by any means. I suppose all of us have our limits, no one can know everything. Which brings me to my next point.

I love driving my car. I really do. I enjoy the freedom that it gives me. It’s wonderful. Well, it would be wonderful if I didn’t have the notorious “check engine” light come on every time I get going somewhere. Question: Who has time to take their car to the shop via impulse by a vague light on the dashboard? What irks me even more is that I don’t understand the wonderful heap of technology that is under my hood. Yeah, I can understand the physics behind engines and what not but I have no clue when it comes to…well…much of anything else about automobiles.Do I feel a bit helpless? Oh yeah. Must be that kind of a day as I mentioned feeling helpless two times in one entry. Let’s move on.

Tried moving a desk in the office today and it fell apart on me. After about an hour I finally resorted to putting it back together with a power drill and really long screws. I think the desk is studier now then before I demolished it. It came down to two choices: fix the desk or throw it in the dumpster, which would leave us one desk short. Luckily…all my diligent screwing worked and the desk lives again. Oh how I miss theatre (inside joke between those who know).

I liked writing my first blog entry soo much earlier I thought I’d do two in the same day! Is that legal in the blog world? Who cares! It’s my blog! <big grin> Anyway, I thought this entry should actually be about my daily activities! So let’s light the fires and kick the tires!

7AM - Alarm goes off. Amazingly I’m quite awake considering the 2AM bedtime earlier this morning. After pondering just how much time I would really need to get ready for the day, I decide the reset the alarm for 30 more minutes of blissful slumber.

7:30AM - Alarm once again goes off. This time I’m a little groggier than the first time around. I proceed to get ready for what I think is going to be a wonderful start to my week.

8:30AM - Leave house and head off to a 9AM interview with a company I’ve never heard off.

8:50AM - Arrive at building after passing it three times looking for the address. Wonders why there isn’t a law saying that address numbers bust be big enough to see from down the road. I walk into the building which is amazingly large and sparsely furnished. Wonders how much money they are paying for wasted space. Once I find the interviewer, Amy, she asked me to have a seat across the room while she finished some work. Five minutes later she gives me the company catalog to browse through. The company name was The Glass Baron. At first I thought it was a windshield company or something. Turns out they sell those fancy glass figures you find in the display cases at the mall.

9AM - She calls me over to the chair next to her desk. We proceed with the interview discussing past experience and my training/education in computers. Everything was going great until we got into my personal plans. Dialogue as follows, “So are you planning to go back to college?”, “Actually I’m planning to begin serving as a full time missionary in about 5 months.”, “Oh? What kind of mission?”, “A full time proselyting mission for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.”, “How long is that?”, “Two years.” Basically the interview ended there with the both of us apologizing for taking up each others time.

9:20AM - Arrive at Hardies to pick up a chicken breakfast biscuit. Wonders if this breakfast will be my breakfast of choice on interview mornings. I wait ridiculously long for a fast food breakfast.

10:10AM - Arrive at the new HRC Headquarters, which is where I will be hopefully employed until I leave for my mission. From the meeting the previous Thursday I assumed the office would be operating today. From the locked door, I guess I proved the true meaning of assume once again. Call one of the co-owners to find out that the phone system still had not been installed, but will be tomorrow morning. I am then advised to come to the office at that time.

10:30AM - Arrive home, change out of suit into long sleeve shirt and jeans. Basically bum around the house all day. My grandma is beginning to think I’m becoming a hermit.

Yeah…that was basically my day. Not the best start to the week, but hopefully things will get better. Anyway, I think I’ll browse the virtual world for a while longer, find something interesting to watch on the tele, and then hope on to VPChat…yeah…my main cyberspace vice (which could be counted as a virtue), and then get to bed around 2AM again. Peace!

The biggest Internet trend to hit net hipsters? Live Journal/Blogging. Everywhere I turn another friend is launching yet another blog, the most popular of these is the free service dubbed Live Journal. Frankly, I don’t understand fully the concept of these little pieces of cyberspace other than being empathetic to the desires of those whose blood isn’t laced with binary code to stake out little corners of the internet to call their own. It’s becoming easier and easier to publish to the web and I for one think it’s a great thing. Someone with virtually no internet experience can hop online and have a nice page up in minutes. I remember back to 6 years ago when my parents would not let me even entertain the idea of having a website stating that is was too expensive. Leave it to me to blaze the path of the internet forest and proclaim that yes, anyone can have a site on the web for free. The downside to this new era of the internet? Yep, you guessed it, pop-up/banner ads. EEK! How I hated those things. I suppose that’s the biggest reason why I made the plunge, in yet another trail blazing maneuver, and acquired a domain name for my site. Since that time I’ve (counts on hands) purchased or maintained six other domain names. Great stuff. Now anyone can do what I did 5 years ago without the hassles and politics. Almost every ISP offers a few megs of web space now, so now even my 1st grader sister actually has a site to call her own. (sighs). To contrast, it wasn’t until I was almost a freshman in high school that I had my own pages on the web. What is this world coming to? Anyway, back to the original topic…live journals. Now it’s even easier than ISP web space with the advent of live journals. I wonder who the genius was that figured out that online one way forums might be interesting. Truth is…they are. I would caution anyone who has provided me with a link to your blog…I actually do read them. To be fair, I’ll let you read mine too, except I’ll post on my own site…as would seem quite a logical action. I’m sure I’ll expand how I’m posting to include some nifty features and connect friend’s blogs and whatnot, but for now it’s going to remain at simple posts. Well, I think it’s time for a nap. Have fun everyone!