Weekend!
I’ve got my passport and my international driving license. I have the disks with the reports I need to take out there and my notes to read while showing the reports.
I’m bringing about 3 pairs of jeans, 2 pairs of slacks, 11 shirts, 12 pairs of undies, 12 pairs of socks, and my slippers.
I have my cpap, my laptop, and my Gameboy is charging and I have the games and the usb charger and the headphones.
I will be wearing jeans, a comfortable short-sleeved shirt with two large breast pockets, and my Doc Martens with the laces only looped up one of the three possible eyelet levels for easy slip-on/easy slip-off at security.
Leaving Sunday, getting back on the 1st of July… which is nice, because we have Monday, the 4th, off. So I come home to a 3-day weekend that is also a 3-day weekend for Maribou. I’ve also got the Tuesday off but I’ll probably go into work anyway because I’ll be antsy in the pantsy because I’ll be waking up at 3AM for a week after I get home.
As such, this weekend will be devoted to laundry and groceries and making sure that Maribou has everything that she needs to be able to put up with me not being around for a couple of weeks. (We stocked up on her favorite fizzy drinks and apples and I’ll be making 5 liters of my spaghetti sauce.)
We’ve also got a couple of dates scheduled this weekend: on Friday night? We’re going to a baseball game. Like, a real one. Well, it’s AAA. Even so, it’s a real live sporting event where the outcome is, to the best of my knowledge, not pre-determined. And Saturday night, well. I just told her “we should go on a date” and she agreed so we’ll cross that bridge when we get to it.
I’m sure I’m forgetting something. I hate it when I’m forgetting something.
So… what’s on your docket?
(Image is Tristan and Isolde Drinking the Love Potion by Gautier Map from the Messire Lancelot du Lac. He did most of his stuff in the 12th and 13th century so I figure it’s in the public domain.)
I start a new implementation project on Monday that is going to run until probably the first part of August. Luckily, it is nearby, so I won’t be doing any flying and I can sleep in my own bed every night, but it will double my commute times…so that should be fun.
This weekend is going to be about relaxing and maybe trying to spend a little quality time with the daughters for Father’s Day. I will miss my own dad, as usual, but my father-in-law makes a pretty good surrogate so we’ll go see him and he and I can hover over the grill drinking beer.Report
Happy Father’s Day, everyone!
Beer and grilling sounds mighty fine…Report
Dude, you’re packing like there are no laundry facilities Over There. I’ve not been but I’m willing to wager rather a large amount of money that there not only are places to get those undies washed, but people who will do it for you while you work or while you sleep. Not sure if your expense account will pay for that to happen but seems like reasonable odds there too.
As for me, after last weekend being spent with my father from out of town, this weekend will be for my mother-in-law from out of town. Tonight, though, is a rare bachelor night. I’m enjoying it with a play through of Jeff Beck’s 1968 master piece “Truth” album and a few fingers of usquebaugh.Report
My boss said he’d pay for luggage but he wouldn’t pay for laundry.
There are no bad people. Only bad incentives.Report
Working for the weekend. But my dad and I are doing an early Father’s Day thing (since we both work the day of) and going to the Washington Brewer’s Festival out in Redmond, which we’ve gone to every year for the last few years. Should be fun.Report
Survived week one of Summer Madness Fest 2K16. Probably hanging in tomorrow, lil’un birthday party Saturday afternoon, then adult friend birthday party Saturday evening. Sunday brings yet-to-be-determined Father’s Day funtivities of one type or another.
The boys better go big this year… I did keep them both alive for almost all of it!Report
I’ll be flying through Doha airport that weekend for a work trip of my own that weekend, but not until Sunday night.
Unfortunately, this weekend will likely involve at least one day of coming into the office.Report
Dude. That’s awesome.
Dude. That sucks.Report
I want you to have sooooo much fun on your trip. Travel is amazing, even if you have to work while doing it.
Speaking of… I’ll be running away this weekend. Only a few hours from home, but I only have two obligations. 1. Have fun without ever looking at a clock.
2. Run an errand for my son.
I already don’t want to return home.Report
When I took trips to Annapolis, I was happy to the point where it irritated the heck out of Maribou.
“Hey! Guess what! I’m going to see Jason Kuznicki and Boegiboe this weekend! You wouldn’t believe the quality of the Italian food! And they have real bagels here!”
When I go to Qatar, we mostly just talk about how we can’t wait until I come back and how much the kitties will miss me (I’m the one who usually feeds them) and how much Maribou will miss me (I’m the one who usually cooks) and how much I will miss them all.
This trip is no different.Report
Dude… if you want REAL bagels, come here.Report
I’ll get there! Eventually!!!
Before that happens, however, I’m hoping this year’s leaguefest will happen to have surprisingly decent bagels nearby.
Seriously. Here, they don’t rise right because the altitude prevents some important processes from happening. So we can’t even have the “hard water” debate.Report
If I make it out there, I’ll bring some. They’ll be a few hours old which will technically make them inedible, but as a Coloradan, they’ll still probably be the best ones you’ve ever had.Report
When I was in Annapolis semi-regularly, I drove up to New Jersey and got some of the bagels in Tom’s River.
Those were pretty good.Report
Do you have a connection in TR? That’s a bit of a ways from Annapolis, no?Report
Yeah, a friend lives up there. We hit the usual hot spots. Enjoyed some bagels, ate at an Italian place that had “famiglia” in the name, hit the (trashed by the storm) boardwalk.Report
Good luck in Quatar… goodness it’s gonna be especially hot there this time of year I’d imagine.Report
Qatar, which I think is pronounced like gutter in the local dialect. ;).Report
And it’s Ramadan!
No religion.Report
Nice, so easy reservations during prime dining hour?Report
Are you old enough to remember when everything was closed on Sunday?
It’s kinda like that.Report
The one time I went to the Gulf I left in early May and it felt like an NC August. I don’t ever want to be there in July.Report
When water is closer to boiling than to freezing, you’re going to have a bad time.Report
Indeed. February in Bahrain was quite pleasant, though. It even rained once or twice.Report
Observation: I would die*.
*No, really, even inside with the air conditioning on I would die.Report
Alluding to the story of Tristan and Isolde in the cover pic while talking about going on a journey to the far side of the world for your boss is…interesting. 🙂Report
Maribou already gave me crap about that.Report
Researching engineering departments at local colleges. My company has fantastic education benefits, I’ve settled into my job pretty thoroughly, so I’ve been mulling into branching out. (I have a BS and MS in Computer Science. Was thinking Mechanical or Chemical engineering for…reasons.).
I think if I pull the trigger, I’m just gonna retake all the math classes. There’s at least five classes I’ve taken that are required (Cal I-III, Linear Algebra, Differential Equations) in any engineering program, but I haven’t touched that kind of math in 20 years. Sure, it’ll add at least a year to any program, but….that’s kind of fundamental. I don’t want to be trying to learn one thing while struggling to relearn the math I should already know.Report
Out of curiosity @morat20 why not EE? I have been thinking about going back for that…Report
ME is somewhat applicable to my current job (admittedly, it’d give me the most basic of concepts of what are users do with the tools we make — we do stuff for metal fatigue and fracture).
Chem E, however — I live in Houston. We live and breathe chemical engineering down here. I’ve got multiple contacts in the industry, and I suspect I can leverage having both a CE and a CS degree pretty hard.
I like the job I do and the company I work for it, it’s just….I’ve never really been in any positions with a lot of advancement potential. Team lead slots were about it. (The manager’s jobs went primarily to engineers, because us software developers were supporting engineers. They wanted managers that could understand the primary work — the actual engineering, whether electrical, mechanical, aerospace, etc).
So if I want to advance past “team lead” in my current job, I need an engineering degree. Or an MBA. I’ve considered the MBA. But hand to god, I really STILL don’t know what an MBA really is or what it gets you.
And if I want to branch out from the job I’m in, chemical engineering (plus a CS degree and decades programming experience?) opens a ton of well paying doors.
And if I wanted to try to move to the civil service branch of government (I work for NASA as a contractor), having an engineering degree — branching out fairly far from my base education — looks good on the resume. (My company sadly won’t shell out for doctorates).
But honestly, any bachelor’s or Master’s degree I can get through my company. Even go to law school.
Having said that: Does anyone have an MBA? I mean jokes on TV aside, what’s that get you?Report
What do you like to do? Are you a stay in the office and run this computer model kinda guy, or do you like going out into the field and see how the machine/model thing is holding up. Would you rather watch processes in an operation to make sure everything is running smooth.Report
More of an office/design type. I like solving problems, I like coming up with solid solutions, and I like challenges.
I’ve also realized I’ve had a growing urge (over the last decade or so) to move into a more challenging position, one that involves leading and coordinating.
My career has been small teams, folded into larger engineering groups — so management was from the engineers. And the teams were small, so there weren’t really “project managers” — it was developers and team leads, and the latter were older developers with a side-job in documentation and budget meetings.
Part of it is wanting to maybe get my hands on something that becomes…real. The software I create and support is good stuff — people design airplanes with this stuff, and I get to meet the people who do it. But it’s gotten a bit abstract, I suppose — especially because the actual computational core is designed by engineers. It’s often fairly black box. I suspect I’d enjoy the work more if those were my solutions going into place. (Users appreciate a functioning system, but what they’re after is that engineering core that does the stuff they want).
Part of it is looking at management and thinking “I could do that, and I think do that better”. And down here, that’s engineers and MBAs. (And seriously, I really DON’T know what exactly an MBA entails and what it’s really worth. I could get my company to pay for me to get one though).
If I wanted to move up into the real project management stuff with software, it requires much larger teams than what’s really common down here.Report
Management kinda sucks where ever you go. I think I’ve met two or three managers who were really good at it. I am not sure where you run into large project management teams. Typically in industrial or civil work I usually see only a dozen or less engineers and managers for fairly large projects.
If your going into the lead and coordinate area it’s good to make sure they have the process of project development at least established and mapped out to some degree and do what it says to do. That position to be honest, is threading needles. You have to inspire people in a positive way to be productive and deliver, without being ‘command and control’.
I have been very lucky in that most of my work becomes real. Graduated with a bachelors in industrial engineering. My first job they stuck me in a design team as a design engineer. That was pretty cool. I was the first in the team to start 3D modeling with our cad software. We were designing ambulances, and it was pretty awesome to see the stuff on my screen turn into the real deal out on the production floor.
Design is just some damn fun work. Everything from auto parts to a 11,000 ton lift, sidewalks and driveways for fire stations, layouts of production facilities and work cells.
I know several ME guys that followed a similar path if that’s what your looking for. Admittedly it’s going to be slim pickings in this part of the country until the economy picks back up. We have a lot of smart folks shopping very few jobs at the moment.Report
Hence Chem E. Not only is it a rather difficult degree (and frankly, I do kind of like the challenge) but in Houston it’s a giant industry, one that I have a number of connections in.
Admittedly, my two chem e friends are quite fond of their degrees and wax rhapsodic about how widely sought those engineers are. They might be a bit biased, but if there’s anyplace in the US to make a living as one, Houston’s it.
Then again, the coursework is a bit daunting. The math doesn’t bother me (I’ve taken virtually all of it before, but I’d take it again for this. 20 year old calculus and differential equations are not really sufficient for ready use), but organic chemistry is apparently the big washout spot.
Then again, I’ve got chem-e friends who can help.
The MBA is more of an “Huh”. It is something I could go for, but aside from the obvious implications of the title, I’m not sure how it pans out real world. I know what chemical engineers do. I knew (before I graduated college the first time) what computer science majors did.
MBA’s? Not so much. Management stuff sorta? I mean what do you get hired for with a shiny MBA? What’s an MBA plus, say, CS degree and 20 years development experience say to your company? “Promote that guy!” or “He’s in the wrong job for that” or what?Report
MBA plus your main degree basically signals upper management that you could be team head, or department head. Its like being bilingual, you speak both management, and team worker.Report
I have a BS in Chem E, and partway through a MS in Comp. Eng (kind of an EE/CS dual major). The Chem E got me my first job (actually doing Chem E work) and in the door for the second (pretty much pure CS, working on a control systems, but the hiring manager thought my Chem E domain knowledge might be handy since the control systems were for uranium enrichment; it turned out to be pretty irrelevant and I’ve pushed electrons and photons ever since).
Chem E was fun as an undergrad in that it crossed so many disciplines – beyond the chemistry and specific chemical engineering, you had to know some mech (stress, fluid flow and heat transfer particularly, plus at my school the advanced control systems and numerical methods stuff was spun out from mech E), some high power EE, and a bit of civil (mostly plant construction, a bit of enviro). So go for it: you’ll probably gain a lot – I’m not sure about the schools in Houston (Rice?), but at mine (Berkeley) it was considered one of the hardest undergrad majors.
Regarding the math, I’m sure things have changed but it was really striking in the Chem E classes (compared to EE or mech) how almost everything real wound up being empirical formulas rather than anything that could be traced to the underlying differential equations and equations of state. Of course (kids these days) computers were weaker and a lot more expensive then, so probably FEMs really can work now.
To distinguish yourself from the crowd re math, I suggest you take a look at some heavy statistics, stochastic process, and system identification classes.Report
Thanks! At the moment I’m dreading a return to Cal 1-3, DE, and Linear Algebra. Like I said upthread, I haven’t used them in 20 years. I don’t feel comfortable trying to refresh them while using them. Might as well retake the math, even if it adds time to my degree. I’ve got that luxury, at least.
On the bright side, I’ve always been stronger at math I had an actual use for. LaPlace transforms I used in circuit classes, and so I actually understand them still — even if I haven’t used them in years. Basic differentiation and integration? That’s really clearly used in basic physics (the relationship between distance, velocity, and acceleration).
“Slope of the tangent line” I can visualize, but honestly why I understand it is the realization that that describes the current acceleration at a given point when you’re dealing with velocity. (And that the area under the curve is, clearly, distance).
I had real problems in differential equations simply because I never used them outside of the class at all, and real world problems weren’t really touched in class, (I did learn how to do them using computers, which is a fun guess and test method. Sorta). Of course, I was also 19 or 20, so…..probably not as studious as I should have been.Report
Batching it this weekend, as the wife deals with the remains of a horrible, very bad, no good week.
Can’t wait for her to get back. Will try to get some writing done.Report
Hope it gets better.Report
Thanks @joe-salReport
I’m going to a pig roast.Report
Have fun. Don’t melt in the heat.Report
28 hours on a plane.
My sleep schedule is resoundingly messed up.
But I am not dead yet.Report