I’ve actually been blogging for longer but those other blog posts are lost in the time past. I still have an Advogato presence and I read it every so often to remind myself that this blog really has not evolved that far.

For about 6 years total and 3 years with this content, I’ve been catching various and unusual flights of fancy, bits of realism, science, technology, fantasy.  Most or all emanating from my own curious grasp on life and reality. I’ve reached the decision point that there really is no reality and that’s okay. We just need the concept because without it, the universe is too big and honking. We also need to believe in a thing which we can define. The universe is beyond definition; but then again so are our feelings.

I’ll probably carry on blogging even though I believe that the actual reason we all blog has shifted subtly from empowering social institutions that seemed to spring up to help us catalog, link, and manage. Sites like Technorati seem to have a place. But I’d openly question what we use them for?  We know we need to have special institutions that help us mark our way through the kazillion or so weblogs and find that signal in the noise.

I’d openly admit to being part of the noise. My signal ratio is low and I cannot help it. Perhaps one day, this blog will become some other social fabric; but I’ll always remember what RWR told me more than a few times:

“Remember where you are and what you are doing”

I’m trying RWR. So much has changed that marking that reality is difficult at times. But you were always there for me then.  Now I know where I need to be when I am there and I have an idea these days what I should do. This weblog is not an anchor or a social statement. Its a mile marker and a directional beacon for me.

Now I tend to remember those days with some degree of desire of almost a love lost. I get buried in memories of those days sometimes and wander around only engaging in theoretical field surveys, walking at 30m separate. Listening to the quiet. Archeologists can be very solitary beasts but not when the professional meetings come up. Then all that repressed social energy comes bounding out. Beers are drunk, people are drunk.

Someone told me the chief advantage of growing older is to remember all the things and dwell a bit on those that might have been. Memories of the times get more cherished and we fade in and out of reality. We gather those memories like solitary flames burning on candles that light our path. Slowly but surely each of the flames of those days are snuffed out and we find ourselves with new flames, new desires. Careers tend to move on but I will always be an anthropologist. I’ll always think and feel and do it. its a active not a passive. If you have never done it, you will never know and movies and docu-dramas cannot get you close. Its a unique thing to touch human past, try to interpret with an imperfect record what culture, life, society, religion may have been.

I would say if you ever get a chance to take a field class and you’re curious. Do it. You most likely will meet this interesting new breed unlike any other new breed. Technology and IT and Services and Linux and it all pales in comparison. Its archeology and I miss it.

One of the jobs I had was managing the production of a rather large and sensitive NEPA Environmental Impact Statement. Those things try to catalog and define all the sensitive resources, issues with groundwater, soil, contamination. Then they’re produced in a descriptive and fact-based report that has to satisfy the EPA. One day, I was kinda managing it or drinking coffee or discussing the latest practical joke we were going to play on our admin assistant who seemed destined for that kind of joking. Imagine the cross of a Valley Girl and a Born Again Christian. Linda was delightedly both. I digress; but hey I own the space. One weekend someone stole all the comfort funds we collected for food and drinks and Linda ws heard to say that the “thief was going to Hell”. We took all the cash again and left a note for her in place of the money saying, “thanks for the money; the thief from Hell”. Of course we thought that was funnier than our manager. But Karla laughed behind her hand I have always thought.

Anyways, one day I got a call from the Air Police squadron that someone was running around on Air Force property naked. We had sub-contracted with a firm to do biological evaluations of Desert Tortoise habitat and sure enough these guys decided for some reason to just get closer to nature than walking on it. We all laughed a great deal but the APs were serious. We had to go out and discuss the “nakedidity” with the malefactors. Well, I just thought this was terribly funny and the cops thought it was serious and our Air Force Environmental Programs chief thought that the entire thing was crazed and that the biologists were touched by spring heat or something. Well, as you can tell; that was the place to be when it was the place to be. The biologist, botanist, and I laughed a great deal and we took pictures. A bunch of scampering biologists all naked counting desert tortoises. It was rather a sublime moment.

Perhaps as sublime as an archeologist rambling through the Sierra Nevada singing Police songs because the wildlife biologist told us to make a lot of noise or we would attract unwelcome big bear curiosity. I can still hear that voice singing “roxanne, ..”

So its the place to be and memories revive every so often other times. Its perhaps a sign of advancing age that I remember with such crystal clarity the events of the day and wonder what separates me from them. There is time and space and people. All three have moved on and there are different spirals and trajectories of all the lives. But I’m happy now with work, with play, and with life. I have a job where everything is not cut out in its shapes. I’m required to build things where there was nothing previous.

What better place to be than be a habilis and be a builder?

1. This pup is fast and its like driving a race car all stripped down compared to my Visa 64 install which seems kind of syrupy slow.
2. I’ve figured out how to install stuff on it like Office Pro 2007, Yahoo Widgets, and even the wondrous Blogjet for writing these blogposts. The applications run at least as fast as on my XP Pro build and faster by degrees than on Vista X64.
3. The interface is malleable but there is some power under that thar hood. It seems to be very responsive and those surly UAC errors I never see. Thank!!

A few dislikes to even the road a bit:

1. Installing was fun and it did not like my activation code at first and insisted it was wrong. Then when I wanted to activate it, it spat out some silly DNS non-existant error. Hey! If you wanna tell me to re-enter the code that technet gave me, just ask!
2. Adding roles requires rebooting. Why? On that other OS, I can add a so-called role or feature and I don’t need to reboot at all. It still means mucho power cycle events for a new system
3. Desktop Experience is cool but it takes a bit to get it right. How about enabling it if I install its feature? Perhaps I really want it if I go so far as to choose it?

Final thoughts on the whole thing are varied; but to tell the truth; I like it. I like its stripped down and ready to run nature. I’ve never really hated Microsoft; but I’ve liked other things better. This OS gets me closer to being a powerful under-the-hood thing with great visuals. Its interesting that people donate lots of blogposts about making this into a workstation and draw criticisms about the Vista client side. If both share similar code bases, I don’t get how Vista can be so poky and this can be electric.

Anyways, I am gonna use it for fun and frolic and try different sets of roles and features out. Technet makes the habilis in me smile!

Well, back to Bill. Bill knew that world and then he left and therein is the story. I’ve wondered a few times what it would feel like to simply leave it all behind. Perhaps do a Alexander SuperTramp Into the Wild thing. I could drive my laptop into a ditch and burn it up. Leave behind the monikers of dead linux ISO images and disks. Stop all the things that frustrate me with the world of IT and services…

But then reality bitch slaps me across my skinny (er) face. And I hear it singing its swan song:

Dood. You ain’t leaving nothing behind because there is nowhere to move to. You cannot leave a thing behind if you have nothing to move toward.

I tell it,

Forward and toward and behind are relative concepts so stop with the slapping already.

It tells me,

Sure. Now go figure out why the appliance you are playing with won’t boot.

So off I go. I ain’t gonna leave this behind because behind is a term that does not apply any longer. I made my changes and now I’m at a place, doing a thing that seems enjoyable. So moving and grooving and being take on different core meanings. Thanks for the slap; but I did not need it.

Writing the Next Blog Post…

There is no next blog post. Because by the time the pressure  builds up like eating too much Navy bean soup; the next blog post has become this one and when I scan back across what I’ve done; I say: “Holy Cow. I hope people don’t actually read this meaningless drivel”. If you do, I’m sorry that I can’t write momentous dialogue the top 100 and talk about trains of clues and social dialoging and things to do with RSS.

Lets be honest here. Doing Linux is fun and I enjoy it. Doing it as a primary work objective can have a high suckage factor and I’ve been with so many companies that did it, lived it, and died with it; that I need to be at a place that uses is but is not ruled by it I think. The place I’m at now sees its worth but does not live and die by its mandates. Perhaps I’m lazy and I gravitate toward the actual tools I’ll need to get a thing done. I tried using VMware workstation or player for a day and it was uncomfortable. I wanted to just go home and get my native XP laptop because it seemed more comfortable. Now, no one tells me I “must run X or Y to be cool”. Instead, I just do what I need to do and like its said here before “what I must do”.

I’m thankful for Linux and open source applications still rule my systems. The Mozillas, OpenOffice.org’s, GIMPs, and others that are cross platform make my day easier and more productive. I can live with/out the Office killer apps but I’m there with Office 2007, exchange, etc. I do synchronize Outlook to google calendar and then goosync that to my phone. If you want to share calendars with a mobile phone, here is my way of doing it:

1. sync outlook to google calendar using google’s outlook synchronization tool
2. sync google calendar to Treo with goosync
3. done…

I don’t think I need some terribly complex synchronization factor and instead I just use google calendar as a medium of sorts. I don’t need multiple outlook integration since I use our company’s exchange server for that. I don’t really care about address books and I can manually update the address book server on goosync.

But what about the new job you may ask? Well, its different folks. Its going to take me a bit of time to “wind down” from doing enterprise stuff. This is smaller and has different needs and I’ve been responding to enterprise stuff for awhile now. I need wind down time but I’m already getting closer. I like what I have to do and where its going to take me.

Now I move on to another thing which means an update of sorts to the life story of this blog. The blog is a wondrous catalog of the places and things I’ve touched and those that have touched me. I still consider the stories of those around me and what I learned from such a group of friends, colleagues, and even enemies. Lets be clear; you will learn from friends and enemies as well.

I’m moving ever farther afield from the days of Linux for the most part. Leaving the startup ethic of the open source behind me with small, silent steps. My drumbeat echoes a new place and my steps behind me rapidly disappear. Their method is only known to me and I can still discern those days of desert solitude when I touched the face of so many archeologists behind me there in desert dunes and foothills.

Bye Mani and Scott. You guys were the best. Bye Visa Products. I enjoyed all the work and play. Bye GSI and KeyLogic. You guys were the best and I’ll treasure the memories. Two guys with initials will always stand out in my memories. AJ and JB. Thanks.

On to the next thing. Wish me well. I’m leaving a few things behind and I’ll be focusing more in the Windows world going forward. So, as the ultimate habilis that I am; I shift my boundaries to that reality. Truth be told, I’ve never really been an OS bigot. Ask anyone that knows me. I use the tools.

I plan on posting Monday here what the next thing is but this weekend I claim for eating, drinking, and family.