Friday, November 30, 2007 6:09 PM
Haven't posted in a long time. Looking at what I've writtten so far, most of myposts have been essays, rather than journal articles. There's been a bit of mayhem going on over here and I haven't had anything I felt driven to talk about at length. But today, this is a bit of a blog post.
We have a new government in Australia. The Labor party have replaced the conservative coalition that's been running the country for the last decade. It's been a decade of boom, but it's hard to know how much credit to give old Johnni Howard and co: frankly, they'd have been criminally incompetent not to make money out of China's new hunger for our mineral resources. The country got wealthy, but the old government didn't spend much of the surpluses besides giving out some tax cuts. Even the Iraq war didn't put much of a dent in our profits. Meanwhile, our infrastructure is aging, our healthcare and education systems are crumbling, and we still don't have proper broadband like the rest of the developed (and not-so-developed) world. The new Labor government at least claim that they have policies to rectify all of that. About bloody time Australia joined the 21st century.
But it no longer matters as to me, personally: I have a new job starting next week and I'll be working remotely for a European company. So, while I'm still here, I've really been brain-drained a second time. This is an ideal position for me; it's more a research than a development gig and I'll finally get to use the stuff I went to University for in the real world. I get to concentrate on innovating and I'm out of the maintenance/release cycle for a while. I couldn't be happier, truth be told.
Left my old job last week. I was sad to see the back of my team, after only 6 months, but it's a choice between doing the work I've always wanted to versus rehashign the work I've done before. No contest, really. Sunday I'm flying to the States for planning and preparation meetings.
My HP laptop died on the weekend, which highly inconvenient. Haven't been able to find a shop that's prepared to maintain it for me, because it's out of warranty and I bought it overseas. It's a small fix, but they claim that getting the parts will be a problem... although my machine was manufactured in China just like the rest of HP's stock. So I had to rush out and buy and set up a new laptop. Went for Fujitsu this time; they're the only brand besides Sony who still manufacture in Japan. My experience with Japanese laptops has been like my experience with Japanese cars: they keep going forever. So far I'm pleased; it's twice as powerful and 2/3 of the weight of my old HP.
Off to finish packing. 2008 is going to be a very different year for me; I'm looking forward to getting down and dirty with the sort of computer science I've never been able to practice before.
Excelsior!
-- Jason Franks