In Geek Central
Wednesday. Not only do they have a complementary breakfast at this Hilton, but they've got a complementary dinner. No big deal, this dinner, although the breakfast is fairly extensive. I don't eat dinner, of course, but I do drink wine when it's offered and I've had two glasses. The Public Television News Hour is playing as I'm writing and I'm thinking of getting on the commuter train that passes by a block away and checking out the downtown. I'm settling in, here in San Jose. I'm gone end of day Friday, and it's taken me three days to contemplate sticking my head out the door, but I'm beginning to wonder what this place looks like and what lies around the corner.
Thursday. So I got on the train and rode until things looked less suburban and there were (not very tall) buildings around. I like this trolly system. I called it a train, but trolly would be a better description. I bought a ticket after asking one of the passengers waiting on the platform how the system worked. “Buy a ticket at the machine for a buck and a half and it's good for the next two hours.” OK. That works.
I got on the train. No one was looking at tickets. I got off the train, I walked around the area (some nice reasonably up scale looking bars, some nice reasonably down scale looking bars) I took some pictures, a couple of which are posted here and then I got back on the trolly and returned to the Hilton. No one looked at my ticket. I guess they have somebody come through every now and then and check for miscreants. What do they do if you don't have a ticket? Does anyone really buy a ticket here? I have no idea, but the system is nice, the streets it runs along are nice and I would have wandered into one of those bars if I hadn't had a couple of glasses of wine before I started.
The instructor continues to blow a blizzard of material at us. Command line switches and their GUI eqivalents. Fascinating stuff. You don't learn the product just by attending a class: you go home, you set it up, you test; you test some more and then you roll it out, carefully. Am I up for doing another half assed job along with all of the other half assed jobs currently on my plate, half assed through lack of time and a need for an occasional night's sleep? Here in the geek capital of the universe (with certain exceptions)?
Gosh, Mr. Jimmy, what do you think will happen?
A little more wine will take care of the whine, naps in the lab will take care of the sleep, rationalization will take care of the remaining, here in geek central.
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