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Is it time to start the Flickr photostream? I’m thinking that it’s time that I started to make use of the sites out there (such as Flickr) and not just wait for my own vaporware site to appear which will have some super awesome super duper gallery (as pictured in my head)

Anyone else using Flickr or experience with? My brother was pretty amazed I didn’t actively use Flickr.

Interesting that jon would post about feeling ungrateful about work. Lately, i’ve been finding myself to be quite ungrateful, not so happy with work I guess. Insurance (as i was telling Grace), is not a very happy thing, nobody likes insurance, nobody likes paying for insurance so I get the blunt end of everything, a conversation can start off with the client being all cheerful but the minute you tell them their brand new vehicle is costing them more insurance prem, they go all sour and yell. The reality of it is, insurance rates are filed with FSCO (the governing body) so nobody can change the rates even if you complained, but i suppose (like everybody in life), we all want to be heard, and these people probably want to be heard, knowing full well that i cannot do anything about their rates.

Bearing this in mind, work becomes somewhat a drag, this year more so because no Gtalk and people aren’t as fast in responding to emails. And this year, I do property insurance and the company is trying to launch this initiative CRM (customer relationship management) [re: organizational behaviour..for those who’ve taken it], so they want us to handle not only auto and property insurance, but handle new insurance policies (traditionally sent to sales department). That way we can build ‘multiple’ relationships with the client and they aren’t transfered so much. Good idea, but for a department that is already stretched thin with the volume of calls, it doesn’t really work that well. The service level (dictated by number of calls waiting, etc) for us is typically 56% while sales stands at 100% for most of the day.

So this year, it’s been a drag every morning going to work, hearing a ton of problems then going home drained and hearing the occasional nag. Last night, I just ranted to Grace about how crappy work is and she told me to think of 10 things that make me happy/grateful about today… I’ve not given it much thought yet, but at first thought, I think it’ll be really hard, in that I really don’t know what I could say I’m happy about..kinda sad? I feel like, I want to purchase this lens, not even sure which one yet, and somehow that would bring “happiness” but as with all toys in life, its only temporary and clearly doesn’t solve the problem. Sure the job is well paid compared to many other students and its comfortable…but still not that satisfied with it.

How can I be more grateful about things?

I guess this goes here? So I just had a meeting.. and I just got the heads up on a new project I’m on.. and it’s probably one of the biggest projects I’ve gotten so far.. one of those portfolio building ones.

I actually get to design the student recruitment portal for a university. Time to start working.. hard. It’s always hard to see how “good you have it” when you’re in “it”. If I want to go into design.. I probably couldn’t have a better position than where I am now.. having gotten into this company through web programming.. but now maneuvered myself into the design department and pretty much designing on a consistent basis.. I suppose its the other spam-junk which really weighs me down.

Thinking about it.. makes me feel so ungrateful.. I have my cake and I’m eating it too, getting paid as a programmer (more than a starting design job for sure) and getting to design stuff with fairly minimal programming. Maybe full-time school isn’t such a good idea. It would probably be better to do part time while continuing to work.. a large part of the appeal of full-time school is the fun of it I think.

So yeah I have been playing with my camera for a few days, pretty happy about it, though there isn’t much to “wow” about – I did play with Phil’s camera for quite a bit so I know my way around most of the controls. But regardless I do intend to read the manual :P.

Heh the night I got my camera jon told me to take a few shots to make sure the camera works… it didn’t really cross my mind that the camera wouldn’t work, so I dug out my old CF card just to try… and the first shot I took was complete black *gasp*. Freaked me out a bit, until I realize my settings were all off (and the room was pretty dark).

Anyhow the 17-85 is no impressive sharp L lens but I think it gives me a lot of room to play with for now. So no impressive sharp pictures, but monkey is happy.

Oh and I definitely need to get used to taking off and putting back on the lens cap =p

as the may long weekend quickly approaches, we should definately start to plan out what is on the agenda..as to recordings? any ideas of what songs to try..etc?