refried.org

I have two new jobs as of this week. Neither have anything to do with what I went to school for, but both will help prepare me for motherhood! I started working on Monday in the Kids' Room at the gym that I go to. Today I will start a Nanny job. This is for a family that lives in my neighborhood. I'll be helping the kids get ready for school in the morning and meet them at the bus in the afternoon. I'm glad to be getting out of the house! It was getting old being home all day.

After nearly two years working as a contractor at Chevron Energy Solutions, I had my last day this week. I was working through a contracting agency called Minneapolis Drafting Services. Since Chevron had to pay me and Minneapolis Drafting for my services, we had been talking about setting up an independent contract for a few months. This contract would be a benefit to both Chevron and I.

Earlier this week, we had come to a verbal agreement and were waiting for the contracts manager to get it in writing. A few days later, the terms changed and I was not able to accept them. The problem was that they wanted to treat me like an employee while calling me a contractor. With a little research, I found that I was going to get the short end of the stick with this deal. Even after I pointed out some facts that I found on the IRS website, they didn't want to change the terms.

So, I'm unemployed and looking for short term contracts to keep me busy until I'm ready to work full time again (hopefully I'll have word next week about when I'll be going to NY for an evaluation on my headaches). Anyone need help with a house design or drafting?

I'm back home after another trip to Georgia. I was a little nervous about getting stuck in the Atlanta airport due to weather yesterday but I didn't have any trouble at all. I think the storm mostly came through on Monday night. I woke up and heard the rain and wind whipping against the window. Tuesday was a nice, sunny day though, It was actually less humid then before the storm so it was nice. I'm glad to be home and plan on staying here for a while!

I have been traveling so much that sometimes I wake up at night (in my own bed) and am not sure where I am. Two weeks ago I went to Maine for Amanda and Pat's wedding. I stayed for 4 days and within 12 hours of being back in MN, I was on a plane headed for Gerogia. I went for a week to work at Fort Benning.

This Thursday I will be driving to North Dakota with Leslie and our three dogs. We will stay until Sunday when I will jump on another plane for a short trip back to Benning. I'll be there just until Tuesday night when I will be home hopefully for a while!

I enjoyed my first week at Red Hat. Sunday I flew down to Raleigh, NC to attend orientation on Monday and Tuesday. I was really impressed how in-depth the orientation went. It was more than filling out hiring papers and letting you know where the bathroom is. Red Hat really wants its new employees to understand what Red Hat is all about, how it got to be that way, and that all employees are part of the process. From open source licenses to their subscription model to the product line to the support organization, it was all explained (from about 20,000 feet).

Wednesday was my first day in the Minneapolis office which is located just north of the river on Hennepin Ave (at Riverplace if you're familiar with the area). The first thing I did was configure my workstation so I could log in and get my email. After that I started learning the ropes, console servers, the SAN, clusters, the test drivers, etc. That kept me busy enough that I waited until Saturday to get Fedora Core and IceWM installed on my workstation.

Friday was my last day working for Silicon Graphics. I started there over five years ago in the OS Test group where I helped start the Linux Test Project. I got to see Altix grow up from Itanium prototypes to Altix 350 and Prism. I survived every layoff in the last five years, but decided not to wait around for the next one. I had an opportunity to go to Red Hat and I took it. I start there on Monday.

I'd like to say to everyone I left at SGI, "I'm sorry guys, but it was a good time for me to leave. It's been great working with all of you. I hope we can work together in the future."

One of the benefits of working for Silicon Graphics is that we get a three week sabbatical every five years. This June will be my five year anniversary. Heather and I are planning on driving back East to visit friends and family. We don't know the dates quite yet but we're open to suggestions.