The Outhouse

May 28, 2009 at 7:14 am (Life)

outhouseI know…I have not been doing much blogging of late.  It’s spring, and projects definitely trump blogging any day!

My latest project is a new tool shed which is a replica of an old “back house”.  For several years I have been looking around for a vintage one to dismantle and move to my back yard for conversion into a tool shed, but most of the ones I have found are in such disrepair that it just wasn’t worth it.  A few weeks ago Ken actually suggested that we build one ourselves.  This was interesting since I’m usually the one who cooks up projects, but after thinking about it for a while I realized that there was an ulterior motive; the new tool shed will get my gardening stuff out of the barn leaving more room for the Professor to spread out.  It was kind of a win-win for everyone.

The basic shape was framed up in no time, and since I wanted cedar shingles Ken gladly handed over the hammer for that particular brand of tedium.  It’s not hard to see why having a house shingled in cedar is so pricey…it’s a lot of work!  While I was busy shingling, Ken fabricated a door (complete with a crescent moon) and attached a simple tin roof.  He added some shelves, and my little tool shed was done!

The outhouse came out great; it holds  all my gardening stuff in close proximity to the house (and I have a lot of it) and smells wonderfully of cedar inside.  It’s so handy and roomy that I don’t even mind being displaced from the barn!

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The New Kid on the Block

May 1, 2009 at 6:28 am (Rants, Work)

I’m settling into my new routine and it’s going fairly well in spite of some pretty sizable adjustments that I hadn’t anticipated.  The new hours are ok and I’m getting used to the busier, noisier office setting.  What has been harder to get used to is having to rely on other people for everyday things.

At the district, if I needed access to something I had it simply by virtue of being the Network Administrator.  At the RIC it’s a totally different scenario because of the fact that it’s a data center with numerous tiers of authority.  I was happily adding users the other day and discovered that I had permission to one container but not another, necessitating a request for a change in permissions.   If a file needs to be restored I have to open a support ticket and wait until the backup guy can restore it.  My requests for extra permissions or an errant file are quickly granted, but I always feel like the resident pest.

This scenario is typical of how large organizations work and understandable from the standpoint of security, but it has seriously hampered my ‘get it done’ approach.  Having spent nearly ten years running my networks alone, it has been an interesting exercise for me to suddenly have to work in a team environment; fortunately for me I don’t bring my ego to work with me!

There are other things about the new job that are not as easy to understand, such as why I still do not have voicemail.  When I queried my manager about it, he said something to effect that I needed justification for it.  This is French for “we are too cheap to pay for licenses for everyone”, but I was too stunned by that response to even formulate an answer.  How about the justification that I’m an IT professional who routinely gets calls from customers who probably wonder what sort of lame organization I’m working for that can’t even provide me with voice mail? Geez….

For now I’m choosing my battles, but if the stupidity layer gets too thick, I may have to pick up my toys and play elsewhere.

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