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My mind rebels at stagnation. Give me problems, give me work, give me the most abstruse cryptogram, or the most intricate analysis, and I am in my own proper atmosphere. I can dispense then with artificial stimulants. But I abhor the dull routine of existence. I crave for mental exaltation. |
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Thursday, January 29, 1998
Back to work today. I'm starting a new policy; I want to make sure I'm visible! It's too easy for them to forget about me behind the red velvet curtains. So I finally brought the large bag of vitamin C drops in from the car (I bought them some days ago), put them in the beautiful wooden bowl my mother made, and made the rounds of the halls in our wing. I passed out vitamin C candies (choice of orange, lemon or pink grapefruit) to all team members who didn't have their door shut or who looked like they needed it. A healthy team is a happy team!
I found out that while I was home yesterday, two program managers created some cool web pages that use IE's databinding to interact with the development task database. All I had to do was make a few tweaks, and we had up-to-the-minute status reports on our team website! Databinding is one of the coolest things that IE does. A great illustration of separating the form from the content. It's also one of the first things I dealt with when I joined this team, a year ago! (this link needs IE4.) The sample website I worked on then still bears a resemblance to the Amazon.com site we modeled it on.
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I got some nice mail today, giving me sympathy on my sick day yesterday. This also gave me the chance to exchange private gossip with online friends, both about my life and other people's lives.
Nrrdboy of geek tragedies has been reading Sherlock Holmes. I've always liked those stories! Holmes has a Vulcanesque quality to him. I think I have (or had, or had from the library) the Annotated Sherlock Holmes, which is great for all the little details that add to the the stories. I also liked the Firesign Theater radio play on Holmes.
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I went to dance class tonight at the Russian Center. I stopped on the way and bought a sandwich at QFC, since I hadn't had lunch earlier. I ordered a grilled sandwich on foccacia bread, and I was amused when the deli worker suggested I take the little sticker on a piece of paper and pay for the sandwich while it was cooking. I planned on munching on the sandwich while continuing my walk to the Russian Center, but when I unwrapped it, I found that the sandwich maker hadn't really cut it all the way in half. Instead of taking a neat half of the sandwich out of the bag at one time, I had to break it into messy chunks and eat it inelegantly while walking.
It's a pleasant walk to and from the Russian Center, as long as it is only sprinkling as it was tonight. The northern end of Capitol Hill has some beatiful Victorian homes, and I like to peek in the windows while walking in the dusk, and criticize people's decor.
Once again I was way early for class, so I sat on the couch and chatted with fellow students. We learned a new step tonight: the mini-dip or little dip. I'm about 80 percent there. The step involves both dancers doing a lunge or knee-bend, then turning around and balancing each other while standing on one foot, snapping the fingers meanwhile. I kept ending up on the wrong foot!
They announced that there would be a live band on February 12, the last class of this session. Once again it's Monty Banks and the High Rollers. Should be fun!
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