Erin Hughes.com

So Eric is 7. I almost can not believe it. My little guy is not so little any more. This year he lost 5 teeth, grew about 10 cm or more, and really developed more into his own person, with his own friends, and interests. He doesn't want to come to with me every time I go to rugby any more, and now on the weekends he lets me sleep and watches cartoons or plays games by himself. He is smart strong and tries to be fair with everyone. I am very proud of what a great young man he is turning into. Here is a shot of him cutting his birthday cake. I told him that I was bringing his birthday presents home when I came home from work, and then came in the house empty handed. Later after he cut the cake and we ate it, I sent him to draw the bath and snuck outside and got his presents. Here he is with one of the 2 or 3 sets of Legos that I got him. A big mid-evil castle complete with Orgs and gold smiths. I think he had a pretty excellent birthday. Definitely much better than last year.

Really WTF. I am from New York, I want Obama to win. I know that MY WHOLE state will go Dem, that is why Hillary carpet bagged her ass up there. Even with that can we at least try to cover the election with a little bit of "truthieness". NEW YORK 0% of the precincts reporting. 0% votes counted. But hey what the heck, lets tick this one of for Obama.

There were many aspects of the project that I was very detached from. Like billing. Frequently while I was setting up for the next set of upgrades I would be approached with billing questions. I simply was not involved in billing decisions and while I had made my "advice" known I know no one cared what I said it was the smile and nod parade as they went past my desk on the way to the meeting I was not invited to. Later this became OK with me, as unfortunate as it may be, I learned to accept the Japanese way. Meetings are so superiors can tell inferiors what to do. Formally. Very little real "working things out happen there", mostly it was you do this and you do that. As a constant student of people, and knowledge of my own persona abilities and handicaps, I learned ways around this. I would catch managers in the hall and chat to them politely about the situation and try to get their opinions on what then wanted and needed done. Then after understanding the problem, I would either offer a host of solutions or step back and try to find a solution, only to return later to the same person with a sorted solution in the hallway or over lunch or in the smoking area ... even though I do not smoke, to get what the engineering side wanted, and what make the business side needed happen.

So it is finished. There is allot of things I have been neglecting over the past 6-9 months. This blog is one of them. About 2 years ago I saw the first boss I had in Tokyo in the lobby of the building I work in. He said "You finally made it." "The only people who believed I could not do it were you and my wife." I replied. In some ways I regret that statement, even though it was true. About my former boss, I owe him allot. I was in a pretty messed up place when we met and he helped me out, allot. When we met I had nothing. He recognized my talent but later did not exactly know how to apply it. None the less he gave me a good salary and in addition and set me up in a place in Tokyo. No small feat at that time because just getting a place, a tiny 1 bedroom apartment took almost 5000 American dollars, and involved jumping through more hoops than a circus seal. He fronted it all for me and managed me paying him back out of my salary over 6-7 months. I left that job after 9 months. I learned allot during that period, mostly about Linux and Linux based systems, but also about who I was and would become. My boss I think learned allot as well. About me and about dealing with non-japanese employees, who were not afraid to loose everything and starting again. I am sure that his whole office is better off for all the shit him and I went through together. Flash back to today. This week I migrated my last servers out of a VERY costly data center. To a more cost efficient situation closer to the office I work at.