A lot has been happening behind the scenes lately. Erin and I are getting our own apartments, I'm going to go back to school in January, and going to work only part-time.

In the spirit of new beginnings, I'm taking some time away from WoW - not completely, but I don't want to play as much as I have been in the past. I'll still be getting on, albeit irregularly, and will be helping with the HoD site when it's needed. I want to start DJing again, I want to play music again, and I want to get on top of all of my other hobbies. Speaking of hobbies, YOT has entered a comatose state. I let the domain expire because I have a hard time caring anymore. I occasionally see Ava on IRC (when I remember to get on, I'm sorry!), but anywhere else I could see YOT's denizens has just become rather unbearable (pun entirely intentional; miss you Shodan). I can't take the spew that is LJ, or the crotch-burn that is MySpace. Facebook is marginally better. If ten different people contact me and ask me to renew and revive it, I will, otherwise, let it burn.

Details:

Family

My dad has been unable to work for more than 2 years now (3 in February of 2008). He lost his house earlier this year and my sister and him bunkered up in an apartment until Life became less of a bitch and more of a mistress. Last week, the IRS called my dad (they called him) to let him know that his application for benefits was not only being approved, but was going to be more than he expected, and that they were going to pay him retroactively for the last year and a half. This means my dad can hopefully stop worrying and stressing over money and start trying to get well, or at least learn how to enjoy life better. His benefits won't solve all of his problems, but they'll definitely help.

My oldest sister finished her pharmacy technician training and was certified recently. She's working on finding a place to do her externship and she is really excited. I'm really excited for her, and I'm really proud of her. It takes a whole hell of a lot to pick yourself up, trudge yourself through school and just do it.

My youngest sister's boyfriend, a brother to me really, recently got into some trouble but it looks like that will be blowing over. I hope everything with him will be alright.

Work

Work has been going really well. I'm learning a lot and getting a lot of really great experience. I wouldn't say I'm having great experiences, but I'm at least getting some time behind the wheel, so to speak. I don't know how much more I should say as a professional.

However quirky work tends to be as a freelance developer, I've been learning a ton (did I mention that?). Next on the list to learn is how to tackle a site with the visitor stress of something like http://www.google.com (load distribution basically). I'd also like to dabble in profiling my code (xdebug anyone?) and implementing things like code caching properly.

I'm learning how to deal with people, and I'm learning more about myself as a developer. I don't have to take shit like all of my previous hourly jobs. This isn't to say that I'm an arrogant bastard who won't listen to anyone; not at all. I am still working on improving my confidence (and skill), but I mean that it's nice to be able to influence a project instead of just carrying out orders. 'The customer is always right,' is usually true, but not by nature of them ultimately sending me checks anymore.

One of the things I'm enjoying most is being able to work on many different projects at the same time. What would take me as a hobby four months to crank out in my spare time, I get to do in a week and I get to see the result of other people enjoying what I'm doing as well.

I still hate IE, but now with more ammunition: I recently discovered that IE can't handle SSL connections with cache control headers. *Yawn* - taking a knee to IE again. But for how long?

Life

Erin and I have decided to get our own apartments. At first, I was apprehensive, but now am quite excited about the idea. I have to respect someone strong enough to realize that they have to go after what they want. In that vein, I'm buying a clue and going to go back to school in January for real this time. Every time I've tried to go back to school, I'm come up with some excuse not to, and as excusable or not may they have been, I've already told my employer that I'll be going something like half-time and he's been nothing but supportive. I'll be working mostly from home (or campus rather) so it will fit in with me going back to school beautifully.

While back in school I'm going to take stuff that I want to take, not just stuff that will help get a degree. I'm lining up a physics class, a couple philosophy courses and a calculus course. I have yet to work out loans yet, but I have a while until that needs to happen. I've also already found another apartment in the same complex, so I'm really excited about that as well.

Wall Of Text crits you for 15,000 damage!
You suffer a crushing blow.
You die.