This post is kind of a hodge-podge of rambling thoughts. So much so, that I couldn’t think of any reasonable title.

Lots of stuff has occurred this week. Some good, and some, unfortunately, really bad.

We’ll start with the good:

  • I had a decent week at work. We got a lot done, and I got to work on some new stuff (although not a lot). Particularly bright is the prospect of starting new development. We had reviews of functional designs that I wrote much earlier this year (before our new development efforts were postponed).
  • My parents will be coming this weekend to see Will. We haven’t seen them in quite some time. They were in Ireland and Scotland for a couple of weeks. The last time we tried to meet up with them, my mom, sadly, fell ill. They will definitely be tickled to see Will – who has grown a little bigger since they last saw him, is talking quite a bit more (and better) since they last saw him, and is halfway potty-trained.
  • I had been wanting to share a link on this blog for some time, but have been unable to dig up the link. The other day, while looking for something else in my Inbox, I randomly happened upon it. It’s a demented “mind-melting” page – complete with appropriate music (courtesy of Danny Elfman circa 1985). Check it out here.

Unfortunately, a couple of not-so-good things happened. A long-time, good friend of mine and his wife lost their dog this week (the dog was struck by a car on a busy road and suffered major, irreparable spinal damage). Also, a co-worker of mine had to suddenly leave work yesterday upon hearing the news that his grandfather had died.

Some other, more neutral news:

  • My Camaro will supposedly be out of the shop sometime next week. The mechanic has now had the car for ten weeks. Progress has been dismally slow. At first the mechanic seemed unsure of the problem. He managed to get repairs funded by the manufacturer of the new bearings (one of which, the pinion bearing, was already making noises again). After that he thinks he may have found a root cause: the collar on the differential housing, where the driveshaft U-joint meets the pinion, was imperfect. This week he said that the machine shop that was fixing this problem had finally finished. So it should be one more week to reinstall everything in the rear end. He also said that he has the tools to reprogram the onboard computer for the new gear ratio, which will finally fix the speedometer, too.
  • Another friend of mine will soon be adding his website to our SliceHost server (which we affectionately call Prime Web).
  • My boss at work, Scott, spoke with his new boss2 (who previously used to be a competitor), and our team has had its good fortune confirmed: we are likely to be the least affected by the acquisition – due to the space in which our product competes compared to the offerings of Global Energy (with whom NewEnergy is now one).
  • Our projects in Ireland are, thankfully, coming close to finish. The go-live date for all of them is November, 1st – just a few weeks away. And, luckily, our software is shaping up nicely for this deadline.

That about covers the goings-on ’round these parts. Y’all come back now, ya hear?