from: me
sent: Feb 4, 9:41am
Great little story I forgot to tell you. Yesterday I was sitting next to my rhythm partner before the lesson and I took off my sweatpants and he looks over and goes, "woah. was not expecting that." hahahaha it was great.
Showing posts with label awkward. Show all posts
Showing posts with label awkward. Show all posts
Sunday, February 14, 2010
Friday, February 27, 2009
thoughtstream 1
I have such conflicting interests. My body needs sleep (really, really badly..) but my mind doesn't want to give up on this day yet; I haven't accomplished enough to pass that line at which I can go to sleep satisfied with what I did (though when do I ever reach that point anyway?).
The 320 (algorithms) exam was seriously my worst exam experience ever. I never felt so helpless looking at problems before. To not be able to even start, or formulate like half an idea, felt pathetic. I gave up mentally way before I ran out of time. The few others I've talked to came out with similarly bad feelings on it, but I doubt any of them left as much blank as I did. I should try to get 100s on everything from now on in that class. (But is that even possible?)
I think part of my reluctance to work might be that I sit at my desk for so much time that I'm actually just sick of being in this spot. In one of Ted's tweets he said he was going to work in the rooftop lounge. I'm thinking I should try working there, or in Starbucks, or even in the library (which would be a first for me). I think of "The Publick Cup" - the coffee shop by the Yale campus where Rebecca and I spent the afternoon on the Saturday of the Yale/Brown band roadtrip. The atmosphere put me in the most pleasant mood the whole time. I also think daylight helps.. So maybe I will try working in Starbucks (in Commons, or the 34th/Walnut one might be a good change as well; I love the upstairs part) or the rooftop lounge. Anything to help my work efficiency and focus is a good thing...
Dance:
This time there were more than twice as many girls as guys, but actually it turned out to be alright. I'm really starting to like that one guy who's usually there; he's really friendly and easy to joke around with when we're both not quite sure we're doing it right. He definitely helped make the lesson fun for me tonight. I wish I knew his name. Also, the instructor was one I hadn't met before - Gene - and...eh, he seemed to focus a little less on form and more on teaching us steps than Christy or Wendi. I liked the traveling step we did in waltz, and I'm happy we did some tango, since I'm out of practice with it. That gaucho move was hilarious, but I'm thinking someday instead of laughing at its initially-seeming awkwardness, I'm going to really enjoy it. Also:
1) I danced with Aaron for the last tango sequence and of course, still felt a bit awkward sometimes. ugh.
2) I want ballroom heels. They would be good practice I'm sure, and if I compete (?...!) I'm sure I'd need a pair anyway. Unfortunately,
3) Those shoes would make me even taller. They'd probably make me taller than a few more of the guys. Sometimes I wish I was a cute short height.
4) As usual, Colin was oh-so-nicely dressed. If I remember right, tonight was an argyle sweater vest. Seriously, he has such style. I want to do something like take a picture of him and send it in to a fashion blog.
I walked the five blocks back after dance quite slowly while listening to one of the songs on Kenny G's Rhythm & Romance album - I think it was the [kind of] title track. Somehow, the music was perfect for Locust Walk in the night. It wasn't too cold out, so I kind of made it into a nice stroll. When I got back, I was tired enough that I didn't think I could really do work, and all I wanted was cuddling and a movie. Neither of those were fulfilled, and I didn't do anything, just spent some time sitting and feeling sad. There's a lot of comfort in physical closeness to another human being, I think, and that's probably why I want it so much when I'm tired like this. ... I have to thank David though, who noticed from my Pidgin status that I seemed kind of down and invited me to hang out if I wanted. :)
Running into Dan while I was with Tatini at Commons made me think again that we (Tatini and whoever included, if they want) really need to hang out more. I hardly get to talk to Dan - maybe just at the beginning of 320 since a bunch of us are usually there a little early. I feel a little like I could be losing him, which is quite sad.
I am eating too many scones and muffins and other such things and substituting them for actual meals. I doubt this is good. I also want to eat at all random times these days. Damnit, I don't want to add to my stomach.
Phillip wasn't at either of the team lessons this week, so I texted him saying "where've you been" and now he thinks "someone has been missing me a lot". Uhh, or that's just what he wants to think. I missed him a little though.
While I was trying get my thinking going and produce anything of value on the 320 exam today, I realized I had a compilation of songs from my Pandora station going through my head constantly. I guess I'm listening to it too much. Maybe it's more distracting than I think, as well, but it would feel so empty for me to try to do homework in silence.
How do you become friends with someone? Usually I don't even think about this because it happens by itself. It also seems to purposefully not-happen all by itself just as naturally. I want to break that pattern, but I'd have to be not so shy as I have been, to do that.
Xav is so cute. I was heading out of the lobby and he was just coming in, so he jumps over in front of me to catch my attention and gives me a hug. :) (I think I would like the friendliness that seems to be more of a social norm in Europe. Or at least that's my uneducated perception of it.) I was telling him a bit about how I joined team and what the team lessons are like, and I feel bad that every couple of sentences I have to say "hmm?" because I didn't catch what he said, with his French accent. Anyway he doesn't seem to mind. I definitely need to figure out when we can go to Chris's again, because he even asked me on a Facebook comment and it's just too adorable of a night to pass up.
I want to go shopping - clothes, shoes, earrings. It's girly of me, I know, but I embrace that.
I think I might read (for fun, not school) before I go to sleep...it's relaxing.
The 320 (algorithms) exam was seriously my worst exam experience ever. I never felt so helpless looking at problems before. To not be able to even start, or formulate like half an idea, felt pathetic. I gave up mentally way before I ran out of time. The few others I've talked to came out with similarly bad feelings on it, but I doubt any of them left as much blank as I did. I should try to get 100s on everything from now on in that class. (But is that even possible?)
I think part of my reluctance to work might be that I sit at my desk for so much time that I'm actually just sick of being in this spot. In one of Ted's tweets he said he was going to work in the rooftop lounge. I'm thinking I should try working there, or in Starbucks, or even in the library (which would be a first for me). I think of "The Publick Cup" - the coffee shop by the Yale campus where Rebecca and I spent the afternoon on the Saturday of the Yale/Brown band roadtrip. The atmosphere put me in the most pleasant mood the whole time. I also think daylight helps.. So maybe I will try working in Starbucks (in Commons, or the 34th/Walnut one might be a good change as well; I love the upstairs part) or the rooftop lounge. Anything to help my work efficiency and focus is a good thing...
Dance:
This time there were more than twice as many girls as guys, but actually it turned out to be alright. I'm really starting to like that one guy who's usually there; he's really friendly and easy to joke around with when we're both not quite sure we're doing it right. He definitely helped make the lesson fun for me tonight. I wish I knew his name. Also, the instructor was one I hadn't met before - Gene - and...eh, he seemed to focus a little less on form and more on teaching us steps than Christy or Wendi. I liked the traveling step we did in waltz, and I'm happy we did some tango, since I'm out of practice with it. That gaucho move was hilarious, but I'm thinking someday instead of laughing at its initially-seeming awkwardness, I'm going to really enjoy it. Also:
1) I danced with Aaron for the last tango sequence and of course, still felt a bit awkward sometimes. ugh.
2) I want ballroom heels. They would be good practice I'm sure, and if I compete (?...!) I'm sure I'd need a pair anyway. Unfortunately,
3) Those shoes would make me even taller. They'd probably make me taller than a few more of the guys. Sometimes I wish I was a cute short height.
4) As usual, Colin was oh-so-nicely dressed. If I remember right, tonight was an argyle sweater vest. Seriously, he has such style. I want to do something like take a picture of him and send it in to a fashion blog.
I walked the five blocks back after dance quite slowly while listening to one of the songs on Kenny G's Rhythm & Romance album - I think it was the [kind of] title track. Somehow, the music was perfect for Locust Walk in the night. It wasn't too cold out, so I kind of made it into a nice stroll. When I got back, I was tired enough that I didn't think I could really do work, and all I wanted was cuddling and a movie. Neither of those were fulfilled, and I didn't do anything, just spent some time sitting and feeling sad. There's a lot of comfort in physical closeness to another human being, I think, and that's probably why I want it so much when I'm tired like this. ... I have to thank David though, who noticed from my Pidgin status that I seemed kind of down and invited me to hang out if I wanted. :)
Running into Dan while I was with Tatini at Commons made me think again that we (Tatini and whoever included, if they want) really need to hang out more. I hardly get to talk to Dan - maybe just at the beginning of 320 since a bunch of us are usually there a little early. I feel a little like I could be losing him, which is quite sad.
I am eating too many scones and muffins and other such things and substituting them for actual meals. I doubt this is good. I also want to eat at all random times these days. Damnit, I don't want to add to my stomach.
Phillip wasn't at either of the team lessons this week, so I texted him saying "where've you been" and now he thinks "someone has been missing me a lot". Uhh, or that's just what he wants to think. I missed him a little though.
While I was trying get my thinking going and produce anything of value on the 320 exam today, I realized I had a compilation of songs from my Pandora station going through my head constantly. I guess I'm listening to it too much. Maybe it's more distracting than I think, as well, but it would feel so empty for me to try to do homework in silence.
How do you become friends with someone? Usually I don't even think about this because it happens by itself. It also seems to purposefully not-happen all by itself just as naturally. I want to break that pattern, but I'd have to be not so shy as I have been, to do that.
Xav is so cute. I was heading out of the lobby and he was just coming in, so he jumps over in front of me to catch my attention and gives me a hug. :) (I think I would like the friendliness that seems to be more of a social norm in Europe. Or at least that's my uneducated perception of it.) I was telling him a bit about how I joined team and what the team lessons are like, and I feel bad that every couple of sentences I have to say "hmm?" because I didn't catch what he said, with his French accent. Anyway he doesn't seem to mind. I definitely need to figure out when we can go to Chris's again, because he even asked me on a Facebook comment and it's just too adorable of a night to pass up.
I want to go shopping - clothes, shoes, earrings. It's girly of me, I know, but I embrace that.
I think I might read (for fun, not school) before I go to sleep...it's relaxing.
Tuesday, February 24, 2009
All the guys in my mind/life
My mind keeps going back to this. There are too many situations to think about. And as I try to manage the thoughts, I find myself sorting these guys into groups.
There are some with whom I am good friends. I am comfortable with them and our interactions are fun and easygoing. And from my point of view, we are particularly close if we share our guy/girl stories with each other, which is an exchange I find enjoyable and interesting. I value these friendships a lot.
There are some who I only know a little, but who are so so friendly to me, such truly nice human beings, that the usually short interactions I happen to have with them here and there in my life just brighten up my days so much. They make me happy, just being with them for a bit - I want to say, "I just LOVE him!" I feel so glad to have come across them in my life, even if I never end up having more of a friendship with them (though I'm sure I'd like to).
There are some who I know, and who know me, and maybe we talk sometimes but not too often, and I'm at least somewhat comfortable around them. I want to talk with them and get to know them more, but I'm a little too shy, or I'm not sure they have enough reciprocal interest, or I sense that maybe I wouldn't quite fit into their lives. I guess I might also include here a few with whom I've lost a previous connection which I think I would like to rebuild. There are occasional little steps forward, but usually they are just little steps that probably fade anyway in the big picture. (And I mean all of this in a friendship sense, mainly.)
And then there are a few who I have a sense might have some level of interest in me. Maybe I should think a little more about what I'm doing in the various situations I'm in with these guys, because usually I play it by ear and try to be my friendly (I hope) self. I have genuinely had fun times with them though. But to be most fair to them, I should work out what I think I feel, and make sure to act accordingly and honestly. The problem is how ridiculously indecisive I usually am.
On the flip side, there's the crush(es?)...I can only think of one right now whom I've labeled in my mind as a crush. I've been thinking a little about crushes, and realized I don't really know what to do about them. Usually it's a "like from afar" situation; you don't really talk to them much, just kind of glance over at them when you happen to be in the same room for awhile and try to not be awkward when you do happen to interact. If they contact you, or pay you a few moments' attention, you react similarly to "i am filled with ridiculous giddy excitement. hahahha" (quoting myself to a friend). The thing is, it's all kind of meaningless. This attraction has to be mostly superficial, because you don't know the person well enough for it to be more deeply based, anyway. Maybe you can get to know them more, but then it's almost like picking someone randomly, because a crush-level attraction is no guarantee for an attraction on the personality level (which is extremely important, I believe). Once I got this far in my thinking, I felt kind of sad that it's probably pointless to hold onto this crush (or any, basically)...yet, I don't want to give up, because those silly moments of excitement do come along with it all, and I have something to hold onto, no matter how much it might not really matter. If it could turn out to matter, I would probably be ridiculously happy.
Finally, the category which no guy is filling for me right now - one who I really like, with whom I feel comfortable and compatible; we laugh easily and I want to talk with and spend time around him, and I want something more intense than friendship with him. Such is most elusive though, it seems.
There are some with whom I am good friends. I am comfortable with them and our interactions are fun and easygoing. And from my point of view, we are particularly close if we share our guy/girl stories with each other, which is an exchange I find enjoyable and interesting. I value these friendships a lot.
There are some who I only know a little, but who are so so friendly to me, such truly nice human beings, that the usually short interactions I happen to have with them here and there in my life just brighten up my days so much. They make me happy, just being with them for a bit - I want to say, "I just LOVE him!" I feel so glad to have come across them in my life, even if I never end up having more of a friendship with them (though I'm sure I'd like to).
There are some who I know, and who know me, and maybe we talk sometimes but not too often, and I'm at least somewhat comfortable around them. I want to talk with them and get to know them more, but I'm a little too shy, or I'm not sure they have enough reciprocal interest, or I sense that maybe I wouldn't quite fit into their lives. I guess I might also include here a few with whom I've lost a previous connection which I think I would like to rebuild. There are occasional little steps forward, but usually they are just little steps that probably fade anyway in the big picture. (And I mean all of this in a friendship sense, mainly.)
And then there are a few who I have a sense might have some level of interest in me. Maybe I should think a little more about what I'm doing in the various situations I'm in with these guys, because usually I play it by ear and try to be my friendly (I hope) self. I have genuinely had fun times with them though. But to be most fair to them, I should work out what I think I feel, and make sure to act accordingly and honestly. The problem is how ridiculously indecisive I usually am.
On the flip side, there's the crush(es?)...I can only think of one right now whom I've labeled in my mind as a crush. I've been thinking a little about crushes, and realized I don't really know what to do about them. Usually it's a "like from afar" situation; you don't really talk to them much, just kind of glance over at them when you happen to be in the same room for awhile and try to not be awkward when you do happen to interact. If they contact you, or pay you a few moments' attention, you react similarly to "i am filled with ridiculous giddy excitement. hahahha" (quoting myself to a friend). The thing is, it's all kind of meaningless. This attraction has to be mostly superficial, because you don't know the person well enough for it to be more deeply based, anyway. Maybe you can get to know them more, but then it's almost like picking someone randomly, because a crush-level attraction is no guarantee for an attraction on the personality level (which is extremely important, I believe). Once I got this far in my thinking, I felt kind of sad that it's probably pointless to hold onto this crush (or any, basically)...yet, I don't want to give up, because those silly moments of excitement do come along with it all, and I have something to hold onto, no matter how much it might not really matter. If it could turn out to matter, I would probably be ridiculously happy.
Finally, the category which no guy is filling for me right now - one who I really like, with whom I feel comfortable and compatible; we laugh easily and I want to talk with and spend time around him, and I want something more intense than friendship with him. Such is most elusive though, it seems.
Sunday, January 25, 2009
length of post is not in proportion to enjoyment of subject
Today was the first day of this quarter of the social lessons run by PLBD. I think I forgot how much I really like dance. When I go, I'm friendly, I chat with people, smile a lot, joke around... A lot of it's probably because I can't help but be in such a good mood there. And there's almost always a bit of awkwardness mixed in, especially in the earlier weeks when we don't know what we're doing, and we don't know each other, etc. But that helps cuz most of us are in the same boat. And for some reason, people that dance just seem to generally be friendly. I get to move, to music, with someone else. Plus Garincha is just so completely awesome; he is funny and makes it so much fun with his personality. I just love it. It makes life good.
Oh yeah, and today, we danced hustle to What is Love and Pump up the Jam. somuchfunnnn :D
I need to go social dancing moreeeee.
Oh yeah, and today, we danced hustle to What is Love and Pump up the Jam. somuchfunnnn :D
I need to go social dancing moreeeee.
Tuesday, July 8, 2008
All in a day's work.
*
7:00am - Wake up. Obviously wish I could go back to sleep for like 5 more hours.
7:00-7:10am - Lie in bed trying to rest for a little extra time without falling asleep (cuz I don't think I have any more alarms set to rescue me if I did that).
7:15am - Realize Mom has just turned on the water for a shower so I can't start mine.
7:15-7:25am - Eat cereal, turn on computer, start it running a backup cuz I'm obsessive like that.
7:25-7:35am - Return to bedroom and begin debating what to wear.
7:35-7:55am - Shower.
7:55-8:05am - Finish debating what to wear, and get dressed. Put hair in clip and hope it dries okay, put on earrings and shoes.
8:05-8:20am - Eat rest of breakfast (fruit), brush teeth, etc/get ready to go.
8:20-9:10am - Drive to work. Notice van's gas tank is only 1/4 full, decide not to be ridiculous and maybe I'll stop and fill it on the way home. Listen to clips of ridiculous country versions of popular songs...since when was Elvis Duran (sp?) on Q102? Wasn't he always on Z100? Classify cars I see on the road: ugly or not (haha).
9:20am - Sit down at my desk at work.
9:20-9:30am - Write/respond to emails re: intern stuff.
9:30-10:40am - Begin getting cold and possibly thinking about Matt's sweatshirt. Would it be weird if I borrowed it when he wasn't even there yet?
Fix issue of scrollbars appearing in Firefox when a link was focused by moving overflow:auto to the form instead of an enclosing div, and thus still beating the FF invisible cursor bug!
Begin playing around with positioning to see if I can get relatively good agreement of appearance between IE/FF.
Get distracted when I hear Jeff, Chandra**, and Sunita start talking about Thunderbird vs. Yahoo vs. Outlook vs. whatever other email options there are; chime in that Thunderbird is a standalone application.
Chat with the three of them about email, texting ("Why don't you just call? I don't get it" says Jeff, just like my parents, and of course I can't come up with a convincing explanation...haha), rotary phones ("You had one? No way!" - Jeff again), area codes (yes, you really do have to dial it now; that's been in place for years!)...
Listen to the Jeff/Steve movie debate.
11:15am - Turn back to my work, wonder if Matt's even coming in today, assume that since it's past the latest arrival time I knew of (10:30 or so), assume he isn't showing up.
11:30am - Hear Matt talking, saying he has come in for the training at 1pm... Decide that since that means I can't go to lunch with him anyway, I'll go from 1:30-2 and make up for some of that time I spent talking with the others.
11:30am-1:30pm - Fix up some of the positioning stuff and another minor unexpected behavior that popped up. Painstakingly decide that maybe I'm done with this stuff and wonder if I should bother Matt to tell him (and ask if I should do any more on the positioning); decide not to, and begin looking into the html source of the next thing Matt had told me to work on.
12:57pm - Matt leaves for his training and I'm pretty much alone in the rectangle.
1:30-1:55pm - Eat lunch; read some articles in WSJ; continue being cold in the cafeteria.
1:55-2:05pm - Go outside because I'm really looking forward to warming up in the sun. Sit down in the courtyard and begin reading the WSJ page I stole (it's the Technology page and has both Alcatel-Lucent and DreamWorks on it!); get visited by curious little worm-like bugs crawling up my legs and attempt to flick them all off.
2:05-5:10pm - Return to my desk. Start getting cold right away and really want Matt's sweatshirt; consider emailing him (hoping he gets it on his iPhone and could respond); decide this is a little pathetic and don't do it.
Matt shows up for a second; feel too awkward and I don't ask for his sweatshirt after all.
Continue setting up this new thing I'm working on. Look over some of Matt's code and admire its structure as usual. Decide to rework a section of my code for like the 3rd time.
4:40pm - Receive email from Matt that I'm probably going to have to "talk" at this pizza lunch thing on Thursday. Wonder if he means I'll have to give some kind of presentation, or if he's telling me not to be shy, haha.
5:10-5:20pm - "Register" for intern lunch thing tomorrow. Input my hours for the past week online.
5:20pm - Before leaving, ask Matt about the email; he says I might just have to say a little something about what I'm doing as an intern. Laugh and tell him it would've been legit if he'd been referring to me being shy :P
5:25pm - Step outside and relax into the warmth as I walk through the parking lot, a little walk which always brings back a hint of a crazy little memory...
--
*all times are approximate.
**I really hope I'm spelling his name right.
7:00am - Wake up. Obviously wish I could go back to sleep for like 5 more hours.
7:00-7:10am - Lie in bed trying to rest for a little extra time without falling asleep (cuz I don't think I have any more alarms set to rescue me if I did that).
7:15am - Realize Mom has just turned on the water for a shower so I can't start mine.
7:15-7:25am - Eat cereal, turn on computer, start it running a backup cuz I'm obsessive like that.
7:25-7:35am - Return to bedroom and begin debating what to wear.
7:35-7:55am - Shower.
7:55-8:05am - Finish debating what to wear, and get dressed. Put hair in clip and hope it dries okay, put on earrings and shoes.
8:05-8:20am - Eat rest of breakfast (fruit), brush teeth, etc/get ready to go.
8:20-9:10am - Drive to work. Notice van's gas tank is only 1/4 full, decide not to be ridiculous and maybe I'll stop and fill it on the way home. Listen to clips of ridiculous country versions of popular songs...since when was Elvis Duran (sp?) on Q102? Wasn't he always on Z100? Classify cars I see on the road: ugly or not (haha).
9:20am - Sit down at my desk at work.
9:20-9:30am - Write/respond to emails re: intern stuff.
9:30-10:40am - Begin getting cold and possibly thinking about Matt's sweatshirt. Would it be weird if I borrowed it when he wasn't even there yet?
Fix issue of scrollbars appearing in Firefox when a link was focused by moving overflow:auto to the form instead of an enclosing div, and thus still beating the FF invisible cursor bug!
Begin playing around with positioning to see if I can get relatively good agreement of appearance between IE/FF.
Get distracted when I hear Jeff, Chandra**, and Sunita start talking about Thunderbird vs. Yahoo vs. Outlook vs. whatever other email options there are; chime in that Thunderbird is a standalone application.
Chat with the three of them about email, texting ("Why don't you just call? I don't get it" says Jeff, just like my parents, and of course I can't come up with a convincing explanation...haha), rotary phones ("You had one? No way!" - Jeff again), area codes (yes, you really do have to dial it now; that's been in place for years!)...
Listen to the Jeff/Steve movie debate.
11:15am - Turn back to my work, wonder if Matt's even coming in today, assume that since it's past the latest arrival time I knew of (10:30 or so), assume he isn't showing up.
11:30am - Hear Matt talking, saying he has come in for the training at 1pm... Decide that since that means I can't go to lunch with him anyway, I'll go from 1:30-2 and make up for some of that time I spent talking with the others.
11:30am-1:30pm - Fix up some of the positioning stuff and another minor unexpected behavior that popped up. Painstakingly decide that maybe I'm done with this stuff and wonder if I should bother Matt to tell him (and ask if I should do any more on the positioning); decide not to, and begin looking into the html source of the next thing Matt had told me to work on.
12:57pm - Matt leaves for his training and I'm pretty much alone in the rectangle.
1:30-1:55pm - Eat lunch; read some articles in WSJ; continue being cold in the cafeteria.
1:55-2:05pm - Go outside because I'm really looking forward to warming up in the sun. Sit down in the courtyard and begin reading the WSJ page I stole (it's the Technology page and has both Alcatel-Lucent and DreamWorks on it!); get visited by curious little worm-like bugs crawling up my legs and attempt to flick them all off.
2:05-5:10pm - Return to my desk. Start getting cold right away and really want Matt's sweatshirt; consider emailing him (hoping he gets it on his iPhone and could respond); decide this is a little pathetic and don't do it.
Matt shows up for a second; feel too awkward and I don't ask for his sweatshirt after all.
Continue setting up this new thing I'm working on. Look over some of Matt's code and admire its structure as usual. Decide to rework a section of my code for like the 3rd time.
4:40pm - Receive email from Matt that I'm probably going to have to "talk" at this pizza lunch thing on Thursday. Wonder if he means I'll have to give some kind of presentation, or if he's telling me not to be shy, haha.
5:10-5:20pm - "Register" for intern lunch thing tomorrow. Input my hours for the past week online.
5:20pm - Before leaving, ask Matt about the email; he says I might just have to say a little something about what I'm doing as an intern. Laugh and tell him it would've been legit if he'd been referring to me being shy :P
5:25pm - Step outside and relax into the warmth as I walk through the parking lot, a little walk which always brings back a hint of a crazy little memory...
--
*all times are approximate.
**I really hope I'm spelling his name right.
Sunday, July 6, 2008
I. Love. Work.
Disclaimer: I don't exactly mean that as a blanket statement. Often "work" is stressful (eg computer science classes) or rather boring (eg physics, Animal Behavior textbook sometimes). What I'm referring to here is my internship at Dow Jones. Now, just to bring us up to speed a bit here, what I've been doing so far is almost completely JavaScript programming. I've been writing (and expanding) scripts to create interactive user experiences, such as with HTML forms. This probably sounds deceptively simple. Make this box on the page disappear when the mouse moves outside it. Fill the form input fields with default messages ("Enter your password here") and make them go blank when the user goes to type something in that field. This actually still seems very basic (even to me when I think about it), but I always end up running into many problems: browser differences, lack of browser compatibility with W3C standards, Javascript/DOM quirks, browser bugs...yeah. All these issues tend to pile up and make things stretch on for h-o-u-r-s of debugging. Fun stuff! I've actually been compiling a list of reference websites, programmers' blog posts, and coding forum threads that have helped me figure these things out; maybe I should post it sometime so other people could reference it. Okay, now that I've talked about what I'm doing, I can say that I like it well enough. Debugging gets pretty frustrating, and my brain can get tired staring at the same code every day for hours...but I don't hate it. It's pretty cool when it works. I even get a taste of that programmer's momentary euphoria ("HOLY SHIT IT WORKS!") when I figure out some annoying bug. :)
But anyway, on to why I really love work: the people. As I think I mentioned before, during the time before I actually started working there, I was pretty petrified of Dow Jones. It's this huge international company, I thought, and I'm going to go work in a corporate environment in an office building on a big "campus". But now that I've been there awhile, I've learned what probably should've been obvious: the people that work there are really just people, too. Some are married, some play video games, some are from India (and have varying degrees of accents, haha), some love to play foosball, and...well okay, I don't know all that much about them. But the best part is, they (or at least the ones that aren't so quiet) like to joke around and have fun, so a few times every day I find myself laughing at something or other that's going on in my "rectangle"...
This past Thursday turned out to be quite the interesting day. I managed to make it to my desk by like 9:20am (not bad, not bad). A little while later Jeff (who sits on the other side of Matt, who is next to me) comments to me that it's too quiet without Sunita around. [Side note: Sunita and Jeff, and sometimes Matt, always seem to get something funny going...and get me laughing...haha.] Shortly after this, Steve calls across the rectangle to Jeff to ask if he's heard that Alex Rodriguez's wife has left him for Lenny Kravitz. We then find out that everyone else around knows who Lenny Kravitz is except Jeff. This leads to a small bunch of us gathering around Jeff's desk while he looks up Lenny Kravitz on YouTube. Steve and Jeff start debating the wife's decision and trying to figure out whether the girls go for jocks or rock stars more. I'm afraid to take sides, but I have to say I'd probably prefer a rock star (point for Steve)... I do say that baseball is not boring to me and I really do enjoy watching it (point for Jeff--even! haha). Then, I don't know how it happened but we got back to the topic (from the other day) of palm reading, and (please please forgive the likely misspelling of these names) Shilpa says she actually somewhat knows how to do it, and so a few of us are getting our palms read... When it's my turn she says that the lines in my hand aren't very deep (so it's harder to read) - and Sunita goes, "Well, maybe she just hasn't matured yet!" hahaha we all get a good laugh out of that, and Jeff tries to amend it by suggesting that I'm not developed! hahahaha I'm mildly embarrassed but mostly just laughing and enjoying it all... And somewhere in the midst of this, around 10:30, Matt shows up, sees us all crowded around Jeff's desk and goes "Hey guys...what's goin on?" and it's just great. Eventually "play time's over" Jeff says, and as we're sitting back down at our desks maybe 45 minutes after we left them, Jeff explains to Matt, "See, this is why we all come in early, it's not to work..." haha I love it.
So the rest of the morning goes by, and noon arrives, which is the time Jeff and some others usually start thinking about heading downstairs to lunch. They know that usually Matt (and I) go later on, around 1 or so, but Jeff says we can always come join them if we want... So at maybe 12:30 Matt says to me, "Come on, let's go eat with them" and we head downstairs to the cafeteria. The table ends up being as follows, assuming I remember correctly, starting from the corner to my right: Jeff, an Indian guy whose name I don't know, me, Tushar(?), Steve; on the other side, Paul, Yuriy, Matt, Brian, and Chandra (spelling again?). Jeff was surprised to see Matt and even more surprised to see me, and I said Matt brought me. I was pretty quiet during lunch, listening to the stories people were telling; Jeff mentioned that "Sunita managed to insult everybody this morning" and I said "even me!" and then we briefly relayed what had been said during the palm readings... So even though I only participated a little bit in the discussion (Jeff's "wow...wow..." at my being born in 1987 - so young! haha), it was still nice to be around everybody. :)
As lunch is ending and everyone's getting up to head back upstairs, I'm sorta thinking about how Matt and I usually walk around the campus outside during lunch hour, but assuming we don't have enough time for it and it might be a little weird if we left the rest of them on the way back. However Matt turned left when the rest of them turned right, and I was like "haha I feel sketchy" but I was glad we got to go outside and make one lap around the building and chat. (Okay, so we talked about high school gym/health class, but hey. It was still entertaining.)
After we came inside, I dutifully debugged for the next few hours...don't recall anything too funny from the afternoon...then left early since we were going to the Red Bank fireworks (but that can be another post maybe). Anyhow, overall, it was a good day. I'm so glad I like the people at work :)
But anyway, on to why I really love work: the people. As I think I mentioned before, during the time before I actually started working there, I was pretty petrified of Dow Jones. It's this huge international company, I thought, and I'm going to go work in a corporate environment in an office building on a big "campus". But now that I've been there awhile, I've learned what probably should've been obvious: the people that work there are really just people, too. Some are married, some play video games, some are from India (and have varying degrees of accents, haha), some love to play foosball, and...well okay, I don't know all that much about them. But the best part is, they (or at least the ones that aren't so quiet) like to joke around and have fun, so a few times every day I find myself laughing at something or other that's going on in my "rectangle"...
This past Thursday turned out to be quite the interesting day. I managed to make it to my desk by like 9:20am (not bad, not bad). A little while later Jeff (who sits on the other side of Matt, who is next to me) comments to me that it's too quiet without Sunita around. [Side note: Sunita and Jeff, and sometimes Matt, always seem to get something funny going...and get me laughing...haha.] Shortly after this, Steve calls across the rectangle to Jeff to ask if he's heard that Alex Rodriguez's wife has left him for Lenny Kravitz. We then find out that everyone else around knows who Lenny Kravitz is except Jeff. This leads to a small bunch of us gathering around Jeff's desk while he looks up Lenny Kravitz on YouTube. Steve and Jeff start debating the wife's decision and trying to figure out whether the girls go for jocks or rock stars more. I'm afraid to take sides, but I have to say I'd probably prefer a rock star (point for Steve)... I do say that baseball is not boring to me and I really do enjoy watching it (point for Jeff--even! haha). Then, I don't know how it happened but we got back to the topic (from the other day) of palm reading, and (please please forgive the likely misspelling of these names) Shilpa says she actually somewhat knows how to do it, and so a few of us are getting our palms read... When it's my turn she says that the lines in my hand aren't very deep (so it's harder to read) - and Sunita goes, "Well, maybe she just hasn't matured yet!" hahaha we all get a good laugh out of that, and Jeff tries to amend it by suggesting that I'm not developed! hahahaha I'm mildly embarrassed but mostly just laughing and enjoying it all... And somewhere in the midst of this, around 10:30, Matt shows up, sees us all crowded around Jeff's desk and goes "Hey guys...what's goin on?" and it's just great. Eventually "play time's over" Jeff says, and as we're sitting back down at our desks maybe 45 minutes after we left them, Jeff explains to Matt, "See, this is why we all come in early, it's not to work..." haha I love it.
So the rest of the morning goes by, and noon arrives, which is the time Jeff and some others usually start thinking about heading downstairs to lunch. They know that usually Matt (and I) go later on, around 1 or so, but Jeff says we can always come join them if we want... So at maybe 12:30 Matt says to me, "Come on, let's go eat with them" and we head downstairs to the cafeteria. The table ends up being as follows, assuming I remember correctly, starting from the corner to my right: Jeff, an Indian guy whose name I don't know, me, Tushar(?), Steve; on the other side, Paul, Yuriy, Matt, Brian, and Chandra (spelling again?). Jeff was surprised to see Matt and even more surprised to see me, and I said Matt brought me. I was pretty quiet during lunch, listening to the stories people were telling; Jeff mentioned that "Sunita managed to insult everybody this morning" and I said "even me!" and then we briefly relayed what had been said during the palm readings... So even though I only participated a little bit in the discussion (Jeff's "wow...wow..." at my being born in 1987 - so young! haha), it was still nice to be around everybody. :)
As lunch is ending and everyone's getting up to head back upstairs, I'm sorta thinking about how Matt and I usually walk around the campus outside during lunch hour, but assuming we don't have enough time for it and it might be a little weird if we left the rest of them on the way back. However Matt turned left when the rest of them turned right, and I was like "haha I feel sketchy" but I was glad we got to go outside and make one lap around the building and chat. (Okay, so we talked about high school gym/health class, but hey. It was still entertaining.)
After we came inside, I dutifully debugged for the next few hours...don't recall anything too funny from the afternoon...then left early since we were going to the Red Bank fireworks (but that can be another post maybe). Anyhow, overall, it was a good day. I'm so glad I like the people at work :)
Tuesday, June 10, 2008
My summer internship (the beginning)
Last summer, my job was through the Monmouth County Summer Employment Program; I worked for the Public Relations (and Member Services) departments for the county-wide library system. It was not a bad job by any means, and the PR people were very friendly and nice to me (which was great). However, for this summer, I wanted a job more related to the kinds of things I've learned so far in my major, Digital Media Design. (And maybe I'd even get to actually use some of them! haha.) So as the months of the spring semester went on, I watched people around me going to career fairs, updating their resumes, and getting internships. I'd thought a bit about where to start looking for jobs, but I didn't even write my resume until spring break. (It definitely took at least a solid day to condense my experience into one organized and pretty page.) I still applied to the county summer program (requesting something computer/design-related on the app), and googled around to look for anything interesting that'd be local (and I don't live in a city, or near one of any acknowledgeable size, so it's not so easy...). One night I really started panicking that I hadn't found something good, and stayed up really late rather frantically searching PennLink (Penn's Career Services job listing thing) but to pretty much no avail.
So what happened? Well, my mom turned out to save the day. Thanks to Google, she found an IT internship being offered by Dow Jones, and near enough to home, too. (They have locations in Princeton and South Brunswick.) The internship description was rather vague. It listed probably 30 technologies (programming languages, database stuff, and other words of which I don't really know the meaning :P) and said if you were familiar with any one or more of them, that would be enough. I was glad, because most of the job postings I'd found or seen had requirements that I just didn't fulfill, and it was getting discouraging. (How do people learn all this stuff anyway? I don't think there's enough time to teach us most of it in college...) I think Java and C++ and even Microsoft Access (lol) were on the list, so I figured I might as well go for it. I didn't really expect I'd be successful; I mean, "this is Dow Jones, how can I be good enough for that?!" I thought.
So I wrote a cover letter and completed the application online just after spring break, then waited for awhile... And suddenly I started being contacted (!!). An "Application Architect" from the Wall Street Journal first emailed me, then called my house the next day (my mom passed on the message to me). I called him back that same day and he interviewed me on the phone. I wasn't too hopeful though, because he asked me some things about Java and other stuff, and I don't think I gave a solid answer for any of them... Soon after that, I received another totally unrelated call, and had another phone interview, with people representing three different departments. And then there was a third call, with yet another group of people. I kept trying to get a good explanation from all these people about what they really did in their departments, but to be honest, I didn't understand most of what they were telling me haha. Thus, when I thought about it (and conferred with my parents; my dad tried to give me some clue about the terminology with which these people were explaining their jobs), it seemed that the first person I'd talked to would be the best match. The Wall Street Journal Online sounded good to me, and maybe I'd get to do some programming... So when another guy who works with the first one emailed to offer me the position, I decided to accept it.
Fast forward through more emails, a few more phone calls, the end of the school year, and a number of forms and info packets, and I was almost set up to be a Dow Jones employee. I had a couple weeks or so between getting home from Penn and the start of my job (the Tuesday right after Memorial Day), during which I enjoyed sleeping in, reading, shopping... and I worried that I wouldn't be good enough for the job. Seriously, I didn't know why he accepted me when I thought I'd done pretty badly on the phone interview. I kept telling my family and friends I was petrified, and of course they all said I'd be fine and not to worry so much. (Worrying is something I do too much in general, probably.)
One thing about this Dow Jones internship is that the complex ("campus", I think they actually call it) is in Princeton/Monmouth Junction. My parents of course think the value of this opportunity overshadows the hour-long commute, and I guess I didn't really know what to think of it. My dad helped map out a more back-roads route which would hopefully avoid the worst traffic, and on the Thursday before I was going to start, I got up early to practice driving there. We took Dad's truck and made it without a hitch (well, perhaps aside of being late :P); after making sure I knew how to get to the parking lot and entrance I'd been directed to use on my first day, we turned around and headed home.
A few days later, my first day arrived. I left my house around 7:45am...and shortly thereafter, realized I'd forgotten my purse at home. And obviously couldn't call home to tell anybody, because my phone was at home in it. So there was basically nothing to do except continue driving, else I'd be late. With the help of Google Maps printouts and two sets of written directions (mine and my dad's), I arrived at the Dow Jones entrance guard booth at 8:51am. (I know this because the guard labeled my one-day parking pass with the time.) I had survived the first trial of the day (driving there), but was still so nervous that the guard had to ask me to repeat my reason for being there because I wasn't loud enough...
I walked inside and told the guy at the reception office window that I was starting my internship. As he was looking me up and trying to call Matt (the guy who had interviewed me) and then trying to call Frank (the other guy who had emailed me) since Matt wasn't answering, and whatever else, he asked for my driver's license, and I was like "umm... I kind of.. forgot it..." (hahaha). Luckily he just asked me to spell my name and then gave me a visitor's badge. Then I headed over to HR, where I had another minorly embarrassing moment: the receptionist asked who my contact person was in HR, and without really thinking I mentioned Matt, then Frank... she was like, "Do you have your letter?" I finally realized she meant the guy whose name was on my official job offer letter. Oh well. Said guy came and filled out my I9 (luckily I had my passport with me despite not having my purse, so I didn't look illegal or anything). He took me back to the check-in window and got me a real Dow Jones employee badge (which, yes, I think is kind of cool, haha. It's retractable and I can scan it to unlock the building doors!) I went back to HR, where I called home to discover that my parents had realized my forgotten purse, Mom had called Matt to tell him, and Dad was already on his way to deliver it (oh brother).
Finally, Frank came to fetch me from the HR office and took me upstairs where I was introduced to several people whose names I don't remember anymore lol. Matt still wasn't there, so someone showed me where the cafeteria is, and then we headed back towards where I'd entered (Building 5, by the way--though Building 1 and 5 are connected) and picked up my purse from Dad. Somewhere amidst hallway touring with somebody, we ran into Matt, finally. I discovered he is young after all, as I'd guessed from the phone conversation. (It feels weird to call him "young" when I'm years younger than everyone else there, haha, but it's all relative.)
So Matt and I walked around and talked, trying to figure out what I should work on for the summer. I told him I was up for anything, since I didn't know what to expect. Eventually he decided on something for me, and left me with the instructions to go through Javascript tutorials online. This sounded good to me, because after all, Javascript was one thing on my mental list of things I wanted to learn, so I dug in...
Lunch posed a bit of confusion for me. For some reason I could not understand, I'd been placed at a desk within what I now call a "rectangle" (defined by these cubicle wall things) containing nine desks total, but most of these were empty, and Matt wasn't even in the same large room as me, let alone my rectangle. So I walked over to another rectangle in another large room where I thought I remembered his desk was, but didn't see him there. However, several people in that rectangle looked up at me and one guy asked if I was looking for Matt. I said I thought I should tell him I was going to lunch, and the guy kinda laughed and said I didn't have to tell anyone I was going to lunch, then showed me where the cafeteria was for like my third time that day. At least they are friendly :) .
As the afternoon went on, I kept reading about Javascript (and some HTML, because I was only vaguely familiar with most of it), and as 5pm approached, I started wondering if I should go talk to Matt at all. Luckily he came to see how I was doing, and then briefly showed me a little more about what I should be looking up and what kind of code I'd be working with. He asked if I was good to go, and I said "Well.. can you tell me how to get out of here?" He laughed and walked me back to Building 5. I followed Dad's reverse directions, and managed to get home. And my first day had gone pretty well, I figured. :)
~~~
The next days included a variety of challenges and experiences. I eagerly worked on the Javascript tasks Matt gave me, looked up tons of little quirks, found out that Firefox usually does what I want and Internet Explorer doesn't (hahaha), and tried out extra things just to see if I could do them. Matt sometimes took me to a conference room and drew diagrams on the whiteboard to try to explain larger structures and concepts to me, and I usually was (sorta) able to understand. I found the cafeteria garbage cans and the nearest bathrooms, and read Tuesdays with Morrie during lunch, sitting in the comfy cafeteria lit by the sun coming through skylights. I found out that my "group" or whatever was in the process of moving into the rectangle, and gradually people populated most of the remaining empty desks. Matt is now next to me (though the desks are pretty wide, so he's probably at least 6 feet away), and next to him is Jeff. The next side has a "doorway" into the rectangle, but they've kinda blocked it with the whiteboard, haha. The next side (opposite mine) has Steve, Dean(?), and another guy whose name I don't know. The fourth side is moved away to make doorways, and two women whose names I also don't know sit there. I've come to recognize some other people who stop by the rectangle and/or apparently sit in nearby rectangles, but I mostly don't know names, especially the Indian ones. I think everyone I've talked to has been friendly, which is really great. Our rectangle is not without its silliness, either. This includes various goofing around, such as taking tables from the center of the rectangle and claiming them as extra desks, then placing stuff there and joking about opening a bazaar... throwing around a compactible (what?? Firefox spell-checking tells me that's not a word? oh well) Commerce Bank frisbee... joking about "Sue's balls" - these were golf balls, hahaha, but I guess guys will always be guys :P ... Steve getting Facebook... "I'm too sexy for my code" (because those center tables look like a runway LOL)... Oh man, there's more but I can't remember all of it. At least I'm learning that just because Dow Jones is a big intimidating-sounding company doesn't mean there aren't real normal people inside who like to have a good time :).
And speaking of that, one day, Jeff came over to me and asked if I played foosball, haha... I told him not really in awhile. I used to play really hardcore with Greg, back in the day, with that little table that caved down towards one end and the plastic players moved around and all...such good times though. So we went over to the "game room" or whatever and I requested to play defense (3 goalies? what? I guess that's the standard and ours was just old or something), but I am definitely out of practice, and my left hand is better for snapping the players, so I wasn't doing so well with the defenders (right hand). Jeff and I lost the first match to Steve and Dean(?), but then Steve left and someone else took his place, and Jeff and I switched positions so I played offense, and we won :).
...aaand that was a bit more than I planned, so I didn't get to the past few days, which were the original subject for this post.. but hey, it's all good.
So what happened? Well, my mom turned out to save the day. Thanks to Google, she found an IT internship being offered by Dow Jones, and near enough to home, too. (They have locations in Princeton and South Brunswick.) The internship description was rather vague. It listed probably 30 technologies (programming languages, database stuff, and other words of which I don't really know the meaning :P) and said if you were familiar with any one or more of them, that would be enough. I was glad, because most of the job postings I'd found or seen had requirements that I just didn't fulfill, and it was getting discouraging. (How do people learn all this stuff anyway? I don't think there's enough time to teach us most of it in college...) I think Java and C++ and even Microsoft Access (lol) were on the list, so I figured I might as well go for it. I didn't really expect I'd be successful; I mean, "this is Dow Jones, how can I be good enough for that?!" I thought.
So I wrote a cover letter and completed the application online just after spring break, then waited for awhile... And suddenly I started being contacted (!!). An "Application Architect" from the Wall Street Journal first emailed me, then called my house the next day (my mom passed on the message to me). I called him back that same day and he interviewed me on the phone. I wasn't too hopeful though, because he asked me some things about Java and other stuff, and I don't think I gave a solid answer for any of them... Soon after that, I received another totally unrelated call, and had another phone interview, with people representing three different departments. And then there was a third call, with yet another group of people. I kept trying to get a good explanation from all these people about what they really did in their departments, but to be honest, I didn't understand most of what they were telling me haha. Thus, when I thought about it (and conferred with my parents; my dad tried to give me some clue about the terminology with which these people were explaining their jobs), it seemed that the first person I'd talked to would be the best match. The Wall Street Journal Online sounded good to me, and maybe I'd get to do some programming... So when another guy who works with the first one emailed to offer me the position, I decided to accept it.
Fast forward through more emails, a few more phone calls, the end of the school year, and a number of forms and info packets, and I was almost set up to be a Dow Jones employee. I had a couple weeks or so between getting home from Penn and the start of my job (the Tuesday right after Memorial Day), during which I enjoyed sleeping in, reading, shopping... and I worried that I wouldn't be good enough for the job. Seriously, I didn't know why he accepted me when I thought I'd done pretty badly on the phone interview. I kept telling my family and friends I was petrified, and of course they all said I'd be fine and not to worry so much. (Worrying is something I do too much in general, probably.)
One thing about this Dow Jones internship is that the complex ("campus", I think they actually call it) is in Princeton/Monmouth Junction. My parents of course think the value of this opportunity overshadows the hour-long commute, and I guess I didn't really know what to think of it. My dad helped map out a more back-roads route which would hopefully avoid the worst traffic, and on the Thursday before I was going to start, I got up early to practice driving there. We took Dad's truck and made it without a hitch (well, perhaps aside of being late :P); after making sure I knew how to get to the parking lot and entrance I'd been directed to use on my first day, we turned around and headed home.
A few days later, my first day arrived. I left my house around 7:45am...and shortly thereafter, realized I'd forgotten my purse at home. And obviously couldn't call home to tell anybody, because my phone was at home in it. So there was basically nothing to do except continue driving, else I'd be late. With the help of Google Maps printouts and two sets of written directions (mine and my dad's), I arrived at the Dow Jones entrance guard booth at 8:51am. (I know this because the guard labeled my one-day parking pass with the time.) I had survived the first trial of the day (driving there), but was still so nervous that the guard had to ask me to repeat my reason for being there because I wasn't loud enough...
I walked inside and told the guy at the reception office window that I was starting my internship. As he was looking me up and trying to call Matt (the guy who had interviewed me) and then trying to call Frank (the other guy who had emailed me) since Matt wasn't answering, and whatever else, he asked for my driver's license, and I was like "umm... I kind of.. forgot it..." (hahaha). Luckily he just asked me to spell my name and then gave me a visitor's badge. Then I headed over to HR, where I had another minorly embarrassing moment: the receptionist asked who my contact person was in HR, and without really thinking I mentioned Matt, then Frank... she was like, "Do you have your letter?" I finally realized she meant the guy whose name was on my official job offer letter. Oh well. Said guy came and filled out my I9 (luckily I had my passport with me despite not having my purse, so I didn't look illegal or anything). He took me back to the check-in window and got me a real Dow Jones employee badge (which, yes, I think is kind of cool, haha. It's retractable and I can scan it to unlock the building doors!) I went back to HR, where I called home to discover that my parents had realized my forgotten purse, Mom had called Matt to tell him, and Dad was already on his way to deliver it (oh brother).
Finally, Frank came to fetch me from the HR office and took me upstairs where I was introduced to several people whose names I don't remember anymore lol. Matt still wasn't there, so someone showed me where the cafeteria is, and then we headed back towards where I'd entered (Building 5, by the way--though Building 1 and 5 are connected) and picked up my purse from Dad. Somewhere amidst hallway touring with somebody, we ran into Matt, finally. I discovered he is young after all, as I'd guessed from the phone conversation. (It feels weird to call him "young" when I'm years younger than everyone else there, haha, but it's all relative.)
So Matt and I walked around and talked, trying to figure out what I should work on for the summer. I told him I was up for anything, since I didn't know what to expect. Eventually he decided on something for me, and left me with the instructions to go through Javascript tutorials online. This sounded good to me, because after all, Javascript was one thing on my mental list of things I wanted to learn, so I dug in...
Lunch posed a bit of confusion for me. For some reason I could not understand, I'd been placed at a desk within what I now call a "rectangle" (defined by these cubicle wall things) containing nine desks total, but most of these were empty, and Matt wasn't even in the same large room as me, let alone my rectangle. So I walked over to another rectangle in another large room where I thought I remembered his desk was, but didn't see him there. However, several people in that rectangle looked up at me and one guy asked if I was looking for Matt. I said I thought I should tell him I was going to lunch, and the guy kinda laughed and said I didn't have to tell anyone I was going to lunch, then showed me where the cafeteria was for like my third time that day. At least they are friendly :) .
As the afternoon went on, I kept reading about Javascript (and some HTML, because I was only vaguely familiar with most of it), and as 5pm approached, I started wondering if I should go talk to Matt at all. Luckily he came to see how I was doing, and then briefly showed me a little more about what I should be looking up and what kind of code I'd be working with. He asked if I was good to go, and I said "Well.. can you tell me how to get out of here?" He laughed and walked me back to Building 5. I followed Dad's reverse directions, and managed to get home. And my first day had gone pretty well, I figured. :)
~~~
The next days included a variety of challenges and experiences. I eagerly worked on the Javascript tasks Matt gave me, looked up tons of little quirks, found out that Firefox usually does what I want and Internet Explorer doesn't (hahaha), and tried out extra things just to see if I could do them. Matt sometimes took me to a conference room and drew diagrams on the whiteboard to try to explain larger structures and concepts to me, and I usually was (sorta) able to understand. I found the cafeteria garbage cans and the nearest bathrooms, and read Tuesdays with Morrie during lunch, sitting in the comfy cafeteria lit by the sun coming through skylights. I found out that my "group" or whatever was in the process of moving into the rectangle, and gradually people populated most of the remaining empty desks. Matt is now next to me (though the desks are pretty wide, so he's probably at least 6 feet away), and next to him is Jeff. The next side has a "doorway" into the rectangle, but they've kinda blocked it with the whiteboard, haha. The next side (opposite mine) has Steve, Dean(?), and another guy whose name I don't know. The fourth side is moved away to make doorways, and two women whose names I also don't know sit there. I've come to recognize some other people who stop by the rectangle and/or apparently sit in nearby rectangles, but I mostly don't know names, especially the Indian ones. I think everyone I've talked to has been friendly, which is really great. Our rectangle is not without its silliness, either. This includes various goofing around, such as taking tables from the center of the rectangle and claiming them as extra desks, then placing stuff there and joking about opening a bazaar... throwing around a compactible (what?? Firefox spell-checking tells me that's not a word? oh well) Commerce Bank frisbee... joking about "Sue's balls" - these were golf balls, hahaha, but I guess guys will always be guys :P ... Steve getting Facebook... "I'm too sexy for my code" (because those center tables look like a runway LOL)... Oh man, there's more but I can't remember all of it. At least I'm learning that just because Dow Jones is a big intimidating-sounding company doesn't mean there aren't real normal people inside who like to have a good time :).
And speaking of that, one day, Jeff came over to me and asked if I played foosball, haha... I told him not really in awhile. I used to play really hardcore with Greg, back in the day, with that little table that caved down towards one end and the plastic players moved around and all...such good times though. So we went over to the "game room" or whatever and I requested to play defense (3 goalies? what? I guess that's the standard and ours was just old or something), but I am definitely out of practice, and my left hand is better for snapping the players, so I wasn't doing so well with the defenders (right hand). Jeff and I lost the first match to Steve and Dean(?), but then Steve left and someone else took his place, and Jeff and I switched positions so I played offense, and we won :).
...aaand that was a bit more than I planned, so I didn't get to the past few days, which were the original subject for this post.. but hey, it's all good.
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