Got a new computer at work as part of the upgrade process for our upcoming database overhaul. The computer itself is pretty neat. It's about as wide as my hands together and square, and then maybe 3 cm thick, and it works great. But ( Read more... )

Over a year ago, we switched to JIRA at work. If you're not familiar, JIRA is a project-tracking software suite for assigning projects, marking progress, giving credit to different people who do different parts of said projects, and providing metrics for efficiency and accuracy ( Read more... )

And it wasn't nearly as boring or terrible as I expected it to be ( Read more... )

The Grim Reaper was stalking our halls, as my father puts it. We had a bit of warning, and it turned out to be almost a year to the day since the last time this happened, but I managed to avoid it and am still gainfully employed. And that after spending some time taking the recommendations of The Antidote into account and meditating on the ( Read more... )

Yesterday was a team building day at work. As much as I complained about it, it was actually pretty well-run and inoffensive. No stupid trust fall exercises or silly games, the icebreaker was just "introduce yourself to a couple people you haven't met," and the majority of the day was talking about what it is exactly our department does--summary: ( Read more... )

Warning: this post is a little First World whiny, if that bothers you ( Read more... )

I originally got the iPhone 5S over the 5 because of the pedometer after I saw that LoseIt included step tracking and would automatically adjust your calorie thresholds based on distance walked. Even though I know that calorie counting is worthless, I still do it because of my mania for self-quantification. Originally, I'd just walk as much as I ( Read more... )

Insert appropriate sound effect hereWe got our yearly bonus checks today and the notice of how much our raises would be for the next fiscal year. My yearly review back in December was really good--4.1/5, on a "no one ever gets a 5" scale--so I’ve been looking forward to seeing what the amounts would be for a while. Well, my raise was stereotypical ( Read more... )

Spoilered for people who don't care due to discussion of eating habits and food: ( Clicky )

So, I've been thinking for a couple months that I should really learn to code. I actually originally got into Penn's School of Engineering for Computer Science after taking a programming class focusing on C++ in high school, and with visions of string.h and void main()[1] dancing in my head, I went off to Penn, where they proceeded to focus on ( Read more... )