I had a meeitng with the graphic design team at my work today. They have a webpage they want put on an interactive CD. I think they have this preconception that a programmer can't possibly have a clue about graphic design.

The one worker explained the image size in inches and the other commented, "You will have to talk to Paul in pixels."

Now people are getting attacked in broad daylight. I think I should just buy a tazer.

TO: ALL STAFF
FROM: CARL THOMAS, CHIEF, SAFETY AND SECURITY
RE: PERSONAL SAFETY
DATE: MONDAY, JUNE 5

Please be advised that on Friday, June 2 at approximately 5 pm, a RPCI staff person was robbed by a man riding a bike. This incident took place in a deserted part of the campus near Oak Street. Buffalo Police were called immediately and are working closely with Roswell Park and the Buffalo Niagara Medical Campus to address this issue.

I am beginning to love formulas and flow charts. Who knew an art degree would lead to logic and math problems.

Okay three salmon meals in 48 hours is excessive.

I started to work on my thesis for ten minutes when I dicovered I am not meant for editing and re-editing words in human language. To me right now, human language is such a totally inefficient to express what my project was about. I have already written about 300,000 lines of code and 2034 journals encompassing 326,085 words. When is enough, enough?

Anhow, so on to the interesting stuff, life coaches. I don't want one but the TV show I was watching in the background involved 3 straight men going to a life coach (the actress who also plays Dr. Quinn) to learn how to get women to love them. What is this life coach business all about? Is it even real. So i typed it into google, just google it (GOOGLE - life coach). It seems like it is all the rage and maybe it will give someone here a career option they hadn't though of. Is it just a fnacy name for a therapist or is it just something for rich people with too much time.

If I ever get a life coach, please just kill me. Please.

On a side note:

After months of disputes over the future of ground zero, state and city officials finally brought in the heavy equipment and began construction on Thursday on the 1,776-foot Freedom Tower that will rise at the World Trade Centre site.

Just thinking about that building makes me shudder. There is no way I wouldn ever go in it. In fact I would rather use the microwave when slightly open. Why build something that is screaming target so much.

You may notice it is dark in this pic. Well, the electricity is all dead at work. I was in the middle of writing up what I did to a bunch of projects when it died. I feel bad for the guy next to me who was in the middle of programming.



It' scary to watch a lot of electrical things die at once. I wonder if my computer will be affected? Is this how the end of the world will begin.

From the sound of people talking, a bunch of people lost stuff. My question is, do we get to go home with no electricity?

It was funny to see how many people were concerned the elevators not working when there are stairs.

For some reason everyone else has left their cubicles for the hall. Maybe because they don't have internet access like I do.

Word is the water is off as well. The bathrooms are solid dark with no windows so everyone is chatting about the drama of what it like to use the bathroom in the dark with no water.

Luckily, it was noted, we have a hand sanitizer despener of the wall.

Then we had a technology free meeting with pen and paper. Fieldtrip time.

In the end I got to go home to work. Ironically, I hate being home an dworking. I would rather be anywhere else that is less distracting. Not to mention I have to walk back tonight because I have no way of reachign (e:trry) to tell him no to pick me up.

At first I loved it. I was like this is so great and then I started to realize why I hated it before. If everything was programmed or everything was made with the UI it would be fine but the fact that some stuff can get changed in the UI and then its not obvious in the programming is annoying. Right now I have a movie clip that unfortunately got scaled in an unfavorable way. It is really annoying me.

Don't worry these are not real patient's skin, but pictures off of google.





I am way happy to be programming for helping to cure cancer rather than for some stupid social networking bullshit. I just realized that yesterday. I have all kinds of plans now on what cool stuff I can make.

Mitch,
After careful consideration, I have decided not to pursue another career right now as I really enjoy my job at Roswell. I appologize for taking so long to get back to you.

Thank you for your time.

Best of luck,
Paul Visco

This is like the tenth job offer this month but it is so hard to want to leave the benefits of being a state employee with long term job security.

The top of my semi-outdated ( I have made so much new stuff) says:

I am looking for a challenging full-time PHP/SQL/XML/JS/AJAX web programming/design job with benefits such as health insurance in my home town of Buffalo, NY. I have an amazing web development job in Buffalo, NY. Now I want one that pays me more than $50,000.

I changed it this because I was sick of job offers that were less than what I had going on. I mean who goes in that direction.

Then I got this email today.

Hi Paul,

I came across your resume (Google search on 'buffalo resume "content management"
Perl MySQL')

I am looking for a knowledgeable, creative and self-motivated person in Buffalo with
web/software development and content management system experience that is interested in playing a key role in the development and growth of my company, COMAND Solutions.

The intention is for that person to eventually become the Chief Technology
Officer.

Required Skills:
1. Web Page Development with HTML and JavaScript
2. Programming experience with PHP and Perl
3. SQL (more specifically MySQL)
4. Linux system administration including set up and maintenance of RedHat/Fedora
servers with Apache, PHP, MySQL, etc.
5. Excellent organization and communication

Initial Responsibilities:
1. Develop, implement and maintain client web sites (HTML, JavaScript, PHP, MySQL)
in webCOMAND, our content management system.
2. Manage collection of remote webCOMAND, email and backup servers.
3. Manage and prioritize webCOMAND feature requests and bug reports.

Future Responsibilities:
1. Project management, including project specification, estimates and delegation to
a small team of developers.
2. Find, develop and implement systems to improve and automate company operations.
3. Help develop webCOMAND.

You can learn a little more about COMAND Solutions and webCOMAND at:


From what I see online, it looks like you may be the perfect candidate, except that you seem to already have a job at Roswell Park. However, I think this opportunity may be far more interesting to you and offers a lot more potential, as far as long-term growth. It is also a work from home position, which may or may not be more appealing to you.

Let me know if this is something you might be interested in and we can discuss everything in more detail.

Thank you,
Mitch

Mitch,
I may be interested in your position. I believe you are correct when you said, "it looks like you may be the perfect candidate for the job." I have a lot of experience and capability that I could transfer to that position.

At this point I would like to learn more about the nature of your company and more importantly the long term prospects of what you are proposing. Google returned no results for ("command solutions" buffalo) and webcommand.com appears to just be a list of links by associated by keyword.

While money might lure my interest to a new project, the longterm stability and benefits of my current Programmer/Analyst position at Roswell also have to be factored in.

Hope to hear from your soon.

Thank you for your time,
Paul Visco

I wonder where this will go. I imagine nothing will rip me away from Roswell.

I totally get absorbed in the form maker API I was making at work and forgot to take a break. I am so angry with myself because I promised I wouldn't do that anymore after 5 years of virtually no breaks at Canisius.

This was all my fault I just forgot to go until 6:59. I get out at 7PM. The thing is I always wait for terry till 8. I f his stupid phone wasn't broken I could have just called to say I am walking home, but as I have to wait anyways - I decided I would spend $11 on a fancy dinner at the hotel next door to roswell. Their food is amazing.

The guy next to me if freaking about about how he has some paycut and won't be able to afford the $500 trips to toronto on the weekends. His attorney says this and that. Blah, blah,blah Ans his property value need to be re-evaluated Thank god he has no debt, he says to some woman he is with.

In the end he decided it wuld be okay because his lower salary is still higher than most people in Buffalo.

This is a chicken focaccia sandwich. Nothing about this type of bread says focaccia to me. At least it tastes really, really good.