54 days to go

Day +25.

As the title says, I have 54 days of work left before School goes full-time. 

I am just friggin' excited about this. I am really looking forward to being able to focus my energies primarily on the research, with no work issues to distract me.

My office at home is now fantastically well set up, as I just got a new MacBook Pro (17") and Thunderbolt display. All on it's own, the thunderbolt display is great — the added bonus is that the thunderbolt connection makes it work as a FireWire and USB hub. So, as I take the laptop between home and University, I only have to unplug the power and the thunderbolt connection. Doesn't seem like a big deal, I am sure, but to someone who has been plugging and unplugging almost daily for the last two years, it feels big to me :).

At the U, I have a MacMini, so if I am just going in for an hour or so, I can just leave everything. I also have a spare display that I may bring for the laptop, or just use it's beauty of a 1920x1200 display.

I got to do a bit of Rails programming today. Always nice to move tests from "Error" to "Fail" ;). I think, however, I will have to curtail that soon. I've been working on a proof of concept for a friend and it has been quite a bit of fun. The issue, however, is that it takes away from the little bit of time I have for programming and research related to the PhD.

On that note — status check of the goals:

• Started the LQPL server - loads programs and single steps through code
• Did some "flow" documentation of the main modules created due to separating the server and client code.
• I've been exercising lightly and regularly the last week.

So, progress is happening (yay!)

Hectic life - depressing life?

In your 50s, the typical "Americana" picture is of a greying, somewhat overweight man that is the boss in the corner office. Hmmm.

Wow, I'm a cliché! :) Other than that my corner office is a cubicle. - See a photo.

However, I don't feel like that old guy. In the past few months I've:

• Learned Mac Cocoa programming;
• Learned iPhone/iPad programming;
• Introduced myself to the Flickr API;
• Introduced myself to the Amazon Web Services API;
• Updated and fixed bugs in my quantum programming language;
• Come to love the effectiveness of texting to communicate;
• Procrastinated heavily regarding my PhD comprehensive exam;
• Fixed various proofs in my paper on Inverse Categories;
• Worked;
• Played;
• Loved.

The most significant thing for me over the past few months, though, is starting to apply the "Getting Things Done" philosophy from David Allen. At the moment, I'm using a spreadsheet on a USB thumb drive with a variety of tabs in in. One for projects, another for the next actions, another for project details, one for roles and one for delegated items. If you've ever read GTD, you'll see that is primarily the "horizontal axes" of the system. I have not yet been taking the time to do that vertical axes, the goals, principles, vision of my life.

Why, you (probably don't) ask?

Well, at the moment, it is because I have this exam staring at me 3 and 1/2 months from now. If I can finish that, that feels like a significant milestone and then I can take some time to re-asses, look at goals and so forth.

Then again, what is the real story....

The real story is... most likely I don't write those things down as I believe they would force me to consider what I am doing day to day and I would then have to make some changes. Changes are tough, not fun and a lot of work.

So, bringing this back to the title - "Hectic life - depressing life?". I don't believe that for a second. I may be a human being, but I really seem to be happiest when I'm a human doing. The small trick in that is - I have to be doing the right things. The right things for me. When I avoid looking at goals, vision, purpose, I start getting this vague feeling I am not doing the right things. For example - was learning all this Mac and iPhone programming the right thing when I have a comprehensive exam around the corner and I'm not fully prepared for it.

We'll see.