Sem 2 Week 11

Week 11 a slightly less busy week then others but in the lead up to a week off with no deadlines that happens.

Monday

Ok well a pretty normal Monday, team meeting and group meeting. I got some work done during the team meeting but not as much as id like (still lots to do). Very little work got done by me once we moved from the meeting room. Once I left for my Clayton class I just didn’t see the point (the lecture is worthless, well all the ones ive been to have been), so I waited and just went home.

Tuesday

Well it was off to work before uni, which was ok. Had my building safety briefing and met the mobile content editor who I will be working with quite a bit from now on, hopefully this should set me and Woods up to do this work from home/uni. Made it to uni for lectures (well I attended one skipped the other) the IE lecture about the expo was very interesting and lots to try and work out. I skipped my other lecture for the day and instead watched wall-e. It’s quite a good movie. Went to class and watched 2 presentations then it was off home a lot earlier then normal for that class.

Wednesday

Wednesday was software eng at Clayton and before class I met up with my team mate and we set up a lot of work to be done in the week off. It wasn’t that bad of a class and I got a little work done, until I got a call from the Police. Basically it was to organise a time for me to come in and give a statement about the night I called the police for a girl that had been robed. No biggy really, some people blew this out of proportion. So I spent the rest of the class planning which bus I would need to take and when to leave uni, and then I went to the Police station gave my statement and got a lift home (unfortunately there was no siren use).

Thursday

Thursday started with 3 hr at work with almost nothing to do and no internet. This was soooooo boring so I did a whole heap of IE work, im quite surprised at how much I had gotten done. I also hadn’t been paid so I talked to my boss and he rang the pay department and if im not paid in next weeks cycle there will be problems, so I guess ill just have to budget a little till then. Then it was off to uni for a pretty standard afternoon, of HCI Tutorial, wasting time, and sitting through HCI lecture. The lecture was soooo annoying, im in IT I have a laptop and I haven’t written any notes since I got the laptop it just doesn’t happen, why write when I can type, but the lecturer had the great idea to ban laptops because so many people find his class boring and don’t turn up, and then of those that do (me for example) spend some time scanning the lecture slides from online then quietly surf the net. Probably not the best thing to do but meh its how I feign interest in that lecture.

Friday

Well Friday was to say the least relaxing. Did very little all day then went to a mates place and drank for a while. It was a really good night, I met his neighbours (at like 1-2am), I opened and finished a bottle of good ole Jack Daniels and then a short walk home with a little rearranging of construction signs along the way.

Saturday

The best way to start a Saturday is with a call from the previous nights drinking buddy with them feeling like absolute shit, when your feeling like you’ve just had the best nights sleep in weeks without any hint of a hangover, and that’s what I woke up too (don’t mix your drinks kiddies, or you'll be the one with the hangover it seems). So with it being grand final day, with 2 grand final parties to try and get too, a 21st that night we worked out what we would do for the day. With more of an interest on catching up with people we decided to hit up both parties for a while and headed off. In the end after a detour to my mates brothers for his birthday between both parties we saw very little of the match but made it to the second party in time for presentations and the spa. Before too long though it was time to go home and get ready for the 21st. The theme of which was something starting with E, and I went Eighties. Anyway it was a really good party and meant another late one but then getting a taxi was hell, especially with it being grand final day and the house we were at being blacklisted (ie no taxis to that address), so in the end my younger sister woke my older sister up and so I got a ride home and didn’t have to walk all the way home.

Sunday

So it seems it’s been another day of doing nothing while awake, but apparently when im asleep I can find my set of keys to my parent’s cars and produce them for dad when he can’t find his key to mums car, all without waking up. I had no idea about this till later I saw said keys on the stairs instead of where I keep my keys and that’s when I got told what happened. I went and helped a friend with her laptop but it seems its hard drive is dead (well that’s what the BSOD was saying) so I think she’s going to have to wait for her dad to get back from overseas to do much with it. Then I procrastinated and am finally doing my blog at 3 in the morning because the internet can be very interesting when you’re not in the mood to do a blog.

Things to do this week

• Tax
• IE Work
• Software Eng Work
• HCI Assignment
• Get Paid
• Party (three 21sts in 2 nights)

Sem 2 Week 10

So week 10 and a busy week it’s been, two deadlines down 3 to go and still exams are coming up. Although hopefully there will be some relief with only 1 week until the week break from classes, but not from work to be done.

Monday

Nothing terribly unusual happened today it was a usual team meeting and trying to get something done followed by a group meeting with some interesting information from other people. But then in the afternoon I made my lecture for Software eng although my team mate didn’t so that means no actual work got done.

Tuesday

So this week I had to go into work to get a move on with the new Flicks site that was going up later in the week, but as usual Rodeo (people making the site) hadn’t put it into the CMS quite yet so it was just a lazy day converting work I was sure Woods was meant to be doing over the weekend. I made it to uni in time for the lecture and then wasted my time before I went to my Intro to Security class. This was terribly boring once more but my team mate for this subject and me sorted out what we were each covering for the assignment and so then we could start on this, although I didn’t start till Sunday.

Wednesday

Well Wednesday has never really been an enjoyable day and today was no exception in the morning, it was software eng and with a lot of documents due Friday I knew it would be busy. Due to needing to work with another team we basically got nothing done except set up what needed to be done and then we were waiting for their email. I wasn’t needed at work today because for once Woods was pulling his weight and the CMS for Flicks still wasn’t up. So it was off home, and with the weather being as nice as it was and me having had little more then 6 hrs sleep most night I decided to take the afternoon off and chill. Well think woods had the same idea cause about 3 in the arvo he called up said he’s on his way and it was off to his with a few of the boys for beers and a chill in the sun. It ended up as a really good arvo/night and was quite relaxing. I had planned to get some work done in the evening but that fell through badly.

Thursday

It had been decided the night before by me that I needed to ski class and go to work to meet with a bloke from Sydney who basically controls weather or not I will have a job, and thankfully the contract with the other company is valid till January so im pretty certain I have a job till then. Before this there was a fair bit of waiting because we got most of the work done earlier then normal, due to me because Woods was writing an article for that days paper, but once we were both finished we went to the press conference but it was ending so we missed out there. Eventually I got to uni but it was too late to go to my lecture so I got a very late lunch and tried to get some work done for the 2 deadlines I had coming up, Friday and Monday.

Friday

Well today I had a lot of documenting to do but decided to do it from home via msn with my team mate, and in the end we got everything done quite well compared to the first stage and in a little earlier so it was a little less stressful then normal. Now we just have to start on the final stage of coding which will be very hard.

Saturday

I have decided that Saturday is my day off and im not doing any work on Saturday, I needed the break just doing nothing but I find it’s still not enough, but deadlines don’t care so I knew Sunday would be a big day of working hard. I did go to the footy and watch Harvey’s last game and the Saints get knocked out of the finals. It’s disappointing, but I knew going in that there was very little chance of winning but with a lot of hope. Although I did make the big screen in one of the crowd shots so that was funny.

Sunday

Well Sunday was a bad day, it was off to a slow start and so I knew that meant a late night would be coming up. I got my team mates work quite late so that was quite annoying but once I had it I fitted it into the document I had created finished mine off (mostly all of it) and was happy with it by 1:30 so I got some sleep, and I would have to submit it once I got to uni on Monday.

All in all a pretty busy week for the most part, I ended up starting my tax on Saturday and so I am nearly finished that and hope too early this week so I get some more cash, because work is also due to pay me this Wednesday or else I will go onto contractor rates and earn even more. Although I have decided that im not going to waste my money on gadgets or a new laptop I want, im going to save it and see if I can get my own set of wheels sometime after exams or before the end of the year at least, well that’s the plan anyway. Hopefully my tax refund can be my spending money once that comes through. Well just this week to get through and then a week without classes hooray finally.

Sem 2 Week 9

Well week 9 and deadlines are fast approaching and im doing nowhere near as much work as I need to. Ahh well so onto the week that was.

Monday

Well the usual team meeting started the day off and a reshuffle of tasks means im now working for Benji on screens for the training manual and testing where I can. So basically im doing all the steps of the training manual and capturing a screen shot of each step, and any errors I will get dye to look at before I do my proper testing. The rest of the day was pretty un-eventful though so all in all not too bad a day.

Tuesday

Ok well this was quite an interesting day with the winner of blog of the week being discussed and then the real reason for the award going the way it did. Which is to say that because the winner complained enough, they won blog of the week, not necessarily because it was the best blog. This is really annoying because it has taken me a long time to write even decent blogs let alone good ones, and when I did a really good blog for once others would also do better themselves, and so I missed out. I can take not winning because my blog isn’t the best, because it’s a competition, but to win through complaining, well that’s just downright unfair upsetting and not cool, it also makes it very hard for me to continue to put the effort in, thinking that is the best way to win the weekly award, when it makes no sense vs complaining loudly and often.

Now because of this how do we know any of the past results were not due to political reasons or someone complaining instead of just the best blog? Well the best blog is always going to be a subjective measurement, but I just thought that the judges would judge on each blogs merit not all the other noise that is made. Surely one weeks result can’t be allowed to affect the next, I mean come on its “Blog of the WEEK” not blog that had the most complaining behind it, or the most skilful manipulation of the judges. If the system is not kept fair for the rest of this year the blog of the week should be scrapped and blogging made into a hurdle requirement just to avoid this drama next time.

Well after all of that it was off to other classes and a start on more group assignments was made. So I know what needs to be done and can eventually start on it (probably next Tuesday just before class knowing me)

Wednesday

Well it was off to Clayton well before class to get some work done on software engineering, but with plenty of time to the next deadline (1 week) we were pretty slack. It seemed most of the other teams were also being slack because very few attended the class and I left quite early to head into work. Work is going really well and im quite enjoying it, which always helps. It was a short afternoon because most of the content was not yet available. A night of relaxation at “house night” that had a nicer level of attendance then the past few weeks it was a good way to end the night.

Thursday

Well this day started off interestingly with my ride to work calling me saying that he is sick, so it was a scramble to get to work but I got there only a little later then I expected. Much work got done and before long I was off to uni, went to class and then sat through one of the smallest lectures ive been too but I know I need to go or there’s no hope of me passing the unit.
In the evening it was off for some buzz and sing star at Cladis, which I think I helped the other teams more then mine but hey that happens. Then it was off to the Nott to try catch up with woods to work out how to get to work. Well id missed him and his phone had run out of power a few hours ago so there was a few of us looking to talk to him but I got on to another mate he was helping so I finally organised the next mornings trip to work. So another busy day for me once again.

Friday

Well this was a bad start to the day with me missing the alarm and finally waking up about 10 mins before I was due to leave. Well I postponed my ride coming to get me and got ready in record speed, and then it was away to work. It was a pretty slow day but enough work got done and everyone was out of the office around 2ish, and so it was off home. With a bit of time to relax so I rested up cause I have not been getting enough sleep during the week, too many early starts and late nights. Then eventually it was time to go out so off I went into the city via bens place and we made it in just before 9 and so we made it in for free. It was a really good night and I thoroughly enjoyed myself.

As someone that likes driving and is used to it I drove few mates home. This meant I took a much different way home and in the end stopped me from getting home for about an extra hour. What happened after I dropped the last few people home was that I got flagged down by someone that had just been robbed. The girl who flagged me down told me she had been robbed so I pulled over and called the cops, I spoke to the operator initially and then she did and then back to me. I was warned to look for shock so I got her to sit in the car and gave the best description of where we were I could. Then it was hazard lights on and time to wait for the police, which ended up taking around 20 mins. Once the police arrived it was time to tell all I knew which was basically nothing, because I had missed the actual incident. Once I had passed on my details and all I had seen, I was told I could go and that I may be called, so I left. One of the things the officer had mentioned is that the night was quite a busy one manly due to the full moon because normally the shift was quiet. The worst part of this for me was that it occurred extremely close to where I used to do youth group in high school and this is an area I knew fairly well, so it was a bit of a shock to me as well, for this to happen in this area.

Saturday

Well this was one heck of a wasted day, with all the work I had planned to do this weekend and none of it done I have to say this day was wasted. I was up late I lazed abut home and my use of my parents cars has pretty much been removed (pending me cleaning up my room, but there’s bugger all chance of that with all the work I need to get done). Anyway the night was ahead of me and with the Saints playing for the prelim spot it was a good night ahead of me, and even better because we beat the Pies, an are moving on to the hawks next week who we did beat towards the end of the year. So GO SAINTS.

Sunday

Well today hasn’t been a total loss I got a lot of procrastination done early and that made work the only option as the night moved on. Still I didn’t get anywhere near as much done as id wanted too, but that’s what happens when you get forced to move to a table with a view of foxtel and there’s docos on the rise of Vegas via the mob. Quite interesting actually but slows down work to a grinding halt, and I can safely say that Underbelly makes writing my blog almost impossible. Anyway that’s over and so is this week of blogging basically.

The Week to Come

Well onto the things I know are coming up, lots of study time will need to be found by me to get all my work done and meet my deadlines, I know ive got a fair bit due Friday for software eng and then Monday for intro to security has a big assignment due. Then there’s all the other work ill still need to do, and my work with the mX will surely ramp up in the second half of the week with a new mSite going live on Thursday, though im pretty sure I get paid either this Wednesday or next (im hoping its this Wednesday). I still need to organise myself a pyramid rock ticket in the next day or 2 and get my tax in but where ill have time for that I don’t know.

Sem 2 Week 8

Ahh so week 8 is here, but where is mid semester break. Ben said it best in his blog that by now we have had a weeks rest, well no one has and I for one am missing it terribly. I just need the time to catch up on some of the many things that I have been slacking off on lately. I am really hanging out for that week of sleep ins. Anyway onto my week that was.

Monday was a pretty good day I was at uni at a normal time for the morning group meeting. I didn’t get much work done but I did give trying to talk to the server guy a go (damn meetings) because that would make it heaps easier for testing and documenting, by having the site on the uni servers instead of only on Dze’s laptop. During the group meeting Cladz Jake and myself went to Jakes house to pick up supplies for some Birthday celebrations that had occurred over the weekend, this made the class very filling (lunch, lollies and cake, how will we beat that this week). At the end of the meeting I went to see the server guy then once that failed miserably I decided to skip my afternoon lecture at Clayton and go into work. This went well and in the end im happy I went in, much work was done then, because woods wanted me to come along to an industry thingy (mobile Mondays or something like that) we hung round at transport bar for drinks and dinner. Well in any case this was turning into quite a good night, many beers were drunk, drunken footballers were greeted (and filmed, and with 2 of our drinking buddies working at newspapers the video was in high demand), more beers were drunk and then it was time to head off to mobile Mondays for a couple of hours. Mobile Mondays is basically people drinking and networking with other people in similar industry’s, and all the people I met were pretty cool to talk to. Anyway eventually that bar closed so me and woods decided to head home because we were going back into work the following morning.

Tuesday was a very hard day because I was damn tired. I was up exceptionally early to get into the city to go to work. Anyway eventually I made it in to uni and got the footage from the previous nights greetings (me shaking fevs hand). Then there was another 4 hours of uni still to do. Although the break we had between my first class and the second allowed Ben Cladz and myself to get in touch with the server guy and that means we now have our site working on the uni servers. The afternoon/evening class was ok and I found out I passed the previous week’s unit test. Then it was planning for the group assignment (damn research assignments.) which hopefully shouldn’t be too hard to do in the end. And with an abnormally early night that was the end of Tuesday.

Wednesday I started early due to another group assignment with stage 1 being due this Friday. We got no where near enough done, but we are now starting stage 2 much earlier. I was quite happy that when I checking with woods to find out if it was worth heading into work and he was just about done so I had no need, it was home time and that meant more freaking programming. In the evening I had a brainstorming session with woods (so basically it turns out we (well mainly woods, im happy with the little work I do) are trying to push new stuff into our work, but aint allowed to say anything more). Then it was off to bens for house night (sans house) and to chill. Was a good way to relax midweek.

Thursday was an early start but instead of the extreme early a ride with dad involves I caught the train with woods. We got most of the work done before I had to head to uni with only a few things needing to be checked by rodeo (the system guys that can change the non-standard stuff), and so once I got to class I spent about half of class time finishing it off. The rest of the day went fine, and I even found time to drop into the pub for an hr and a bit.

Friday was my worst day of the week doing Eiffel programming all day with my partner via msn (I was too lazy to go to Clayton). Well we got most of it done but to nowhere near a good standard, but at least we have stage 2 to hopefully make up for this. Friday night it was time to chill with the boys and we ended up at Eddies with beers wii and then the movie In Bruges (shortly after we started it was time to get food, damn hungry jacks being shut so that meant pizza). Anyway a few beers were drunk (I only had like maybe one, thank you full license) and then it was home at something resembling a reasonable hour.

Saturday was an ok day slept in really well, and then in the arvo it was off to the movies (the older sister had freeish gold class upgrades) to see Tropic Thunder in gold class. DAMN gold class is good, so roomy and comfortable, and best of all no carrying your own drinks and popcorn in. Saturday night was Carla and Claudia’s 21st, which was a really good night. The photos are up on facebook so no more needs to be said about this, the pictures tell the story.

Sunday was fathers day and I think dad is pretty happy with what I got for him (and if my sisters give me money, they can say they helped), even though he had very little time to play with it because once he got home from golf it was time to get ready for the footy. Well the saints were playing for a week off, but well we didn’t get the week off. We were soundly beaten all round but at least we are still in the finals, there’s hope yet.

Well this is the latest ive posted one of these blogs but last night I just couldn’t really think any of this, I just chilled with a DVD I had picked up cheap on Saturday and then some sleep but that always ends up being too few hours of sleep and not enough of the TV shows ive been dl’ing. Well here’s to this week and hopefully a better and more productive one then last week.

Sem 2 Week 7

Week 7 started off very early but the lure of a car for the week was enough to just grin and bear it. With this extremely early start I was at uni way before 9 so I got some good quality procrastination in, although with the early up and the not quite early enough to bed I was so tired I got to have a nap before the group meeting started. The nap was good, and so was my timing waking back up just before anyone else turned up. I guess y habit of starting the week on next to no sleep is a bad one because I found it very hard to concentrate enough to work and this needs to change, time for at least 7 hrs a night I think. The rest of the day went smoothly except that I missed my partner in another subject at the lecture I have at Clayton, no big loss because I thought id see him on Wednesday but that was a bust as well. I spoke to Woods who got me the position at the MX and he made it back from Sydney this evening, and so a few of us went to his for a couple of beers and a catch up. Was a good night but could have been better if I hadn’t had to get such an early night due to the early start I had planned to start work.

Tuesday was a very early start again, and before long I was in the city at the MX and staring work. Work isn’t that bad it’s just the teething problems there are when working with a new system. All up this meant that I missed our group meeting and the lecture, I thought I would be back in time but just missed out, so Woods and I finished off the work for the day and I drove him home before heading back to go and sit a Unit Test, thank god that is out of the way. This wasn’t too bad although the negative marking could get me in the end (2 points for a correct 0 for un-answered, -1 for a wrong answer), oh well ill find out my results eventually.

Wednesday I was at uni early but still had not heard from my partner so I went to the library where I got an email about 20 mins before class stating that my partner for my Clayton subject was sick. Well this sucks so I guessed that the work was up to me, but during the class I divvied up the work and sent him some to do while starting my own sections. After class I went home and then straight on into the city to meet up with Woods and head on into the MX. We got the last of the content up on the site and we were ready for it to go live on Thursday.

Thursday I went to Vicroads before uni and within 45 mins of getting there I had my full licence. I was very stoked about this and was quite excited for the rest of the day, even though they need to get there stories straight, with one guy saying I need P’s up until the 26th of next month (or this month cause this has gone way too late), but then the photo chick taking my probationary license and telling me I can go to the car now and take off my P’s, I liked her option so I followed that. I was too excited to work for the entire day so I got through my classes, and then in the evening I talked to a few of the boys that frequent the Nott, and with a few of them going I went up there for a couple of hours. It was good to see them all again because I had missed the previous few weeks, and the pub was pretty quiet for once although once you see the bouncers all run inside you know something’s up. Well im sure something was but I didn’t see anything with everyone crowded round having a look I saw nothing. Ahh well the night started to get late so I went home and was in bed extremely early for a night at the Nott.

Friday I got up nice and early (yeah about 9, but normally its my day off), and worked quite well through my work that was due at 5. Eventually my partner got in contact with me and we finished the work before 5 (4:50ish) although blackboard had gone down so once it was back up I submitted and that was in. My mind was so gone from such a long day just working and so I had neglected my IE work, although I had spoken to Cladi about this, it still don’t feel good not to get things I should have done, and this shows me that I need to start getting proactive and working as soon as I can. I attribute this to my excitement with the new job and then having to do most of a group assignment on my own on Wednesday and Friday. Friday night I just hung round home then went to a mate’s place for a few hours to recover after the stress of the group assignment.

Even after a big day of work on Friday I still had more to do on Saturday and Sunday and I should have done more then I did on Saturday but in the end I got a fair bit of rest done and no where near enough work. IE and IT security had been piling up so I got some done, but when Sunday came around I still had too much to do to go to the footy and I was quite disappointed, because it was the saints playing for finals ladder position. Well I saw bits and pieces of the game through my work, but I took a break to watch the last quarter and in the end we made it to 4th on percentage, so this means a tough first week but a definite second or third week match, and no travel in the first week of the finals.

Well its onto a new week and probably plenty of work to do, well I need to step up and get it done this week as early as I can, or ill be swamped again, at least I have this written down for once I might actually do it.