granny van
I moved up to UT this year in a Honda Odessey that my family has been ‘borrowing’ from my grandma, and I’ve decided the alure of a sports car is very much gone for me… I’d rather have the spacious headroom and ability to take friends over fast small cars (like my saturn that actually rubs on my head). I don’t think i’ve quite filled up the van with people yet, but I’ve already hauled around things for my apartment, and been asked by others to help with furniture and also bike moving.
Anyways, back to austin means back to friends. Everyone is here (‘cept coco for some absurd reason). Its fun visiting peoples places and seeing how they are living. I’m also curious to see if our sleeping arangements are going to work out in my apartment. So far we’ve all kept similar schedules that it doesn’t matter if we have a seperate study room or not, but homework will be coming up soon. To start the year off we through a party and it was a big hit i think, I even met one of the intro Turing Scholar students at the party before I got to meet all of them at the welcome meeting. I think the guy was a friend of clay who was a friend of mike… or something, but he ended up at our place that night. It was funny when he recognized me at the welcome meeting, I think he was hesitant to say we had seen each other at a party. He said “didn’t i meet you two days ago” and when i said party he kinda looked side to side to see if its kosher to say in the middle of all the CS nerds
gearing up
After Ultimate Frisbee I was starving and a hookah sounded nice, so i slipped on down to the number one SA hookah bar cafe: Shisha’s. I looked around for anyone sitting alone when i got there (hooking alone is just boring) but didn’t see anyone, but after I got my oh-so-yummy falafel wrap this girl came up and asked if I was eating alone and if I wanted company. I joined her at her table with and was introduced to some new friends: Pricilla (the friendly girl) and her two cohorts Chis and Joscelyn. Turns out we are all bored here and San Antonio, and we are all moving up to Austin for school on the 19th (actually pricilla is going to Baylor). We talked for probably 2 hours just about random people and UT and austin, and eventually come to the conclusion that we should have a going-off-to-austin party next week. It was such a random event meeting 3 people and becoming good friends because we all felt so bored in San Antonio. It really made my week to find more people like me in San Antonio, especially people I can hang out with in Austin too. Anyways, I’m happy and (somehow) not quite tired yet (work starts in 7.5 hours). New friends are so cool
Dr. Robison, PhD of Computer Science… hmmm I like it
My recent feelings toward my job here at SwRI has been that while the field i’m working in is kinda cool, and the people I’m working with tend to be the fun, non-corporate-droid types… I keep feeling that I wouldn’t be happy here for a long term job. I think I finally boiled it down to the lack of new things. You work on projects that you don’t pick, you work with the same people over and over. Sure there is lots of traveling and thats fun, but travel is to install systems, your personal interactions just aren’t that extensive. I spent the summer sitting in my cubicle alone all day.
But isn’t that what I said I wanted to do? I spent a summer working at Sea World, and I hated dealing with stupid customers that have you by the balls because they are paying you. Then I worked as a PC technician, and the small business jobs were cool, but the residential clients still drove me nuts. Both years I looked forward to a job alone with no annoying people, and here I am and now I’m worried that my circle of friends is set for the rest of my life as the 10 people around my hall. In what job can I talk to interesting people and not sit in my office all day yet still do the programming that I truly do enjoy?
Right now I’m thinking being a professor would be really good. Its the only job I can think of where you interact with cool people (both students and other professors), you get to travel (conferences, talks), you get to decide what you’re working on, and your projects don’t have to all be money making, fine-tuned products (only your papers have to be fine-tuned). Plus, how cool would Dr. Luke Robison sound? Oh I know professors have long hours, but they also get to stay in thriving, alive environments. And one more word for you: “Tenure”. SwRI is a cool place, but it still seems dead compared to UT.
Time for some audience participation: Can anyone suggest another job that is dynamic and interesting yet stable for long term employment, and provides a fair amount of personal interaction without having to bend over for a client?
