Boom Baby!

I'm in the first month of turning 35, and it seems to be off to a racing start. I've

- bought a new car
- quit my job of 9+ years!
- accepted an offer with a new company.

My last day was Friday April 30th. I spent the weekend taking care of my daughter who caught a stomach virus of some sort. (Lots of puking, but no fever).

While I am still getting ready for my next job, I feel like a great weight has been lifted. I realize now, what a fog I had been in. I will miss my colleagues at IBM, lots of good friends that I plan to keep in touch with, but my brain is suddenly free of worrying about what to do next and I can feel my curiosity and mental processes changing. It is extremely uplifting.

Doing lots of reading and getting caught up on house projects before I start the new job. Look for more posts moving forward as I start orienting myself towards some new goals.

Sharpening the Ax

I haven't been doing a lot of coding the past few weeks, but I have been working and studying. Getting familiar with Algorithms and Patterns. Going back and looking at algorithms for the first time since I was in university was interesting. In may ways easier for me to pick up now than it was then. What seemed pointless then has much more meaning to me now. I suspect that's the difference experience makes. I see a project in my future to actually play with the lowlevel algorithm implementations for a good exercise.

At a higher level I've been looking at Patterns. I've been exposed over the years to various Patterns from the GoF. MVC, Facade I've put to practice in quite a few projects, but this was a chance to look at all the patterns. I ended up reading "Head First Design Patterns". What a great book! Highly recommended to anyone trying to see what's what with Patterns. An engaging well written book that put even my old friends MVC and Facade into a new light for me.

Reading Seth Godin's "Linchpin" as well. Inspiring read. Reminds me of Daniel Pink's Brand New Mind. Important to recognize we've entered an era that forces us to compete against the world on skills. Internalizing the lessons learned from the luxury brands : there is more to compete on than price. Service, quality and customization can still pay off.

I realized recently that part of the reason this resonates so well with me is that these are the same messages my father gave me growing up. Looking at it from a different perspective it helps motivate me towards some new goals and projects.

Found a Project!

After some discussion with Inna came up with an interesting side project. Going to try and get a prototype going in Google App Engine. Looking to try and get a prototype up and running within the week. It is good practice on my Python development skills. Be interesting to see how far I could take this. Might also have some javascript practice in as well. I'd like to build the basic infrastructure first then enhance with AJAX/JS over time.

Other items that I'm thinking about:
- Learning Core Data for ObjectiveC
- picking up some functional langs : Erlang, Scala

Making progress in my algorithm and patterns refresher. I must admit the patters are more fun than the algorithms, but all good for stretching the head into shape.

Lent 2010

I'm not a practicing catholic, but my wife's family has a strong Catholic background. A few years ago I started practicing Lent with the family. In previous years I've used it steady my eating habits and curb my processed carbs.

This year I'm taking a more Additive Step, doing something positive instead of removing something negative. I'm working on doing some application development work. So what's on target? Not sure yet. I have a few more iPhone apps percolating in head. Maybe another Web App. Experimenting with Clouds? Something with Firefox?

Perhaps a mix of all 4. I plan to post daily updates and see where it takes me. Goal is to have an idea by Friday and start the process.

New Year New Goals!

Happy New Year! Welcome to 2010.

Lots going on this year. Lots of plans and projects in the works. I plan to use this blog to think out loud. I'll be posting progress on different projects as the continue. The focus is on my personal development. I am looking at spawning some other blogs to handle other projects, but first I need to get back into the habit of posting on this one :)

Cheers!

head in the cloud?

Well a cloud of windows at any rate.

It is interesting I can figure out how diffused my head is by watching the number of open browser windows I keep. I have 2-3 instances of firefox with 3-8 windows each holding 2-10 tabs. That's alot of material I'm juggling. It takes a lot of work to get down to 1 window with 1 tab. Lots of open loops I need to close.

Closing those loops will be a relief.

I am working to declutter the house. I think I need to stay sharp about cleaning out my virtual desktop as well. Too many windows and too many project to track what is going on. Close windows and complete tasks.

Anybody out there?

Lots going on that I'm trying to wrap my head around. Might be a good time to start posting out again.

For most of the year I've been keeping my journal old school -- pen and paper. It helped keep my brains in order and kept me moving forward, but I'm starting to get back in a mode where I need to discuss my ideas. Or at least vent them semi-publically.

What am I working on
- Sekret Project 2 - well it's secret!
- iPhone development - fixing up LibrayList. Looking to build some additional apps
- Self education - building skills in the following
- Algorithms
- Learning Python
- UNIX/POSIX

- General Education -- recently involved in a panel to look at how education can be improved with cloud computing. Very intersting topic near and dear to me. Looking to spend more time thinking and talking on the topic.
- Public accountability -- need to give myself some accountability to help me work my goals.