Mike Nicholson

Hey everyone.

I'm out roller blading again. I'm sitting on a bench facing the bay next to the San Mateo bridge. The sun is setting, its hot out (80s) and the wind is fierce enough that the bay waters are spraying lightly against my face. I don't know how I fell out of this habit. It's quite pretty out and the exercise feels great.

My job hunt is going well. My first batch of job applications is starting to result in interviews. It bothers me... I like my job, but I hate what my company has become. It has so much going for it and yet it's making such stupid decisions. I can only hope that my new workplace has an exercise option that is anywhere near this beautiful.

Posted by at 7:00 PM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

My job place has recently gone from kind of boring but OK to really unpleasant. The war between the developers and the sales team has gone to a whole new level and the new CEO has sided with the sales team.

In this war, I try to stay neutral although I'm often used as a tool by either side. It's a real shame because my boss is a jerk, but my friends on the other side are using me as a tool just the same. I think it's time for me to bump my job hunt up from casual to aggressive At least a headhunter has found me and realizes my market potential.

Of course with all this strange stuff going on at work, I've stopped caring about my job. What does this mean? I'm brushing the dust off of my racing helmet and reclaiming other nearly forgotten hobbies.

This past Wednesday I took the day off and hit the go kart track with Steve and his old buddy Mike (not me, a different Mike).We took advantage of the noon to 2:30 pm all-you-can-drive promotion.Two and a half hours may not seem like much, but keep in mind that an endurance race is only 45 min. During our time on the track we disabled 5 go-karts, including one blown engine, and we all left dripping in sweat and somewhat injured.

For the first time since I discovered automotive racing, I had driven enough. My desire to drive was temporarily fulfilled. It was on par with the fun of a day at the track, although different. The best part is the price. It was less than 1/3 the cost of a day at the track.

Anyone want to join us next time we go? Do any of you have what it takes?

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I'm currently on my way back from a client job in San Francisco. Due to some client mismanagement I've been spending a lot of time there. The company is AtomShockwave. They're a popular game and media distributor.

While working on site has been stressful since I'm trying to do a difficult task without letting the client know that they've purchased crappy software, it has made me realize some things. Visiting AtomShockwave has been to me the equivalent of a citizen of a poor communist visiting a rich western country for the first time. The saying is indeed wrong. The grass can really be greener on the other side of the fence. I never realized how unplesant my workplace is until now.

At AtomShockwave employees all have real equipment. They have monitors that don't flicker, and ergonomic keyboards. They even all have those nice webbing chairs. Furthermore, the number of young employees is much higher, as is the number of women.

Even though I just negotiated a big raise, it may be time for me to move on. I want a job that is fun. I want to play on a company softball team and play video games with my coworkers on monday nights. I want a job that I'd enjoy enough to work seventy hours per week and not be angry.

Any company suggestions? Other than google...

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Some good news.

I'm now the owner of a house. It has walls, a roof, and even dirt under it.

How did I accomplish this so fast with a condo near my office costing a cool million? Easy... The house is in st louis. No, I'm not moving, it's a rental property.

You can buy 10 houses or more in st louis for the cost of a condo in redwood shores. Pretty crazy, eh? I think ill avoid the scarry high real estate here and just gather gobs of land elsewhere.

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I am very disappointed with the response of our government to the people of New Orleans in the wake of Hurricane Katrina. I've read articles where photographers comment that they have to throw away most of their photos due to the presence of bodies (in respect to the dead) and other articles which comment on crowds forming for evacuation and supplies. When these crowds dissipate, bodies are left behind. People are dying in line.

Some people might comment that there is no way to help because all the roads have been destroyed. Well, for they should see what our grandparent's government was capable of. Back just after WWII, the soviets blocked access to Berlin. The US along with France and Brittan, both recovering from incredible destruction, supported the entire city of Berlin through the air drop of everything from food, to milk, to candy for the children. Why in this modern day and age can we not do this let alone go beyond it?

I'm so disappointed in the so called progress that we have made.

For more information on the Berlin Airlift:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Berlin_airlift

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