Slipping behind the curve slowly

My new ventures into modern communications has reached another stumbling block... seems Twitter is another of the modern web sites blocked by our companies Internet policy ! I think opinion of Twitter is somewhat divided, but to me it seemed the halfway house between blogging and having regular face to face contact with people - a way of keeping up with people's everyday smaller thoughts and feelings. My profile is here, if any other twitterers wanna buddy up incidentally

Few people blog about the daily little things, and if you don't see people regularly, these things tend to be left out of conversation in lieu of the bigger (bloggable) past events, so perhaps Twitter can help occupy this middle ground ? The little things are often as interesting, and much more individual and personable. Well, guess whilst I'm behind works Internet umbrella, I won't really know if it all works or not - short of doing it all via mobile phone...

Anyway, I can understand the reasoning for the restrictive blanket policy, but this "security over creativity" thing will restrict development towards being a well-rounded technologist. We talk internally about promoting AJAX and Web 2.0 within our tools at work, but then get blocked from trying out practical, successful examples of these ideas in action ! That's one of the main difference between my last small company employers vs the big corporate in general I guess.

And keeping abreast of new technology and learning about the new capabilities of modern software design is what enhances the software I produce and the reward that keeps me interested in a career within technology.

30

Life emergency !

Actually nothing to worry too much about - if you gaze down previous posts you may notice I have these as regularly as other people have pizza, but this one is given extra life-crisis validity by being close to my 30th birthday !

Therefore I am following it through more than other panics - hey, I've even updated and cleaned up my blog this time ! Now if I only I can get round to moving my old travel photos into my newer (and much sexier) online photo album, I'll be in good shape for blogging again :) One of the thing the spurred me on to include the increasingly inaccurately named "Exit Turner" in my cleanup was a lot of memories of people fired up from the guest book Mimi got me for my birthday.

Now, if you are reading this, there is a 95% chance you were included on her mails about this, but in case you are one of the few people I don't have an e-mail address for, Mimi brought a great big leather-bound black-paged book, and got people to either e-mail over photos and comments which she printed and stuck in the book, or on the night of my birthday people were left with metallic pens, stickers and other miscellany to fill the book with kind (or not so kind !) comments. The result is a very heartwarming collection of memories, embarrassments and kind words. It also makes me realise how lucky I am to have a gal like Mimi :)

Did I also mention I got a Godzilla vrs Monkeys birthday cake ? Awesome !!!

Anyhow, back to the life emergency. Essentially I am having "full circle" crisis - e.g. I am where I was 4-5 years ago, with nothing in motion to change this. But this time I am avoiding drastic measures and working on the little things instead. Making some plans, and thinking about what I want to be actually doing in 5 years etc... Of course the options and questions are greater now that many of my friends are buying houses, living with partners and even having kids (e.g. growing up).

All of this will have to wait though - I have a far more immediate work crisis I need to attend to !!!

Back soon ? Hope so

A quick treat for loyal viewers

Still here ? Gosh, I still have an audience !

Consider this fine video of my ninja rap skills as some form of loyalty reward :)

In other news, I'm still in the UK working in IT banking again. Kind of back to where I started before the trip ! But it pays the cash to buy new gadgets, toys and premium beers. All of which I have absolutely no spare time to enjoy :(

It's that darned job, maybe it's time to quit and travel again ;)

Long time - no word

If your reading this, you are probably suprised to see a new entry - not as suprised as I am to be writing one ! Four months of silence is probably enough to discourage even the keenest friend living far away, but if you are here, then I guess I am quite flattered you've made the effort !

Let me reward that effort with some brief life news - in March, the company I was working for lost a lot of there income as an investor pulled out. Being a small company, this is not entirely unexpected, but it did mean firing any "uneccasary" staff, of which I was one of them (anyone brought in the last year or so was part of an expansion effort - so nothing personal taken there !)

But a few weeks off and a little time to my self and I have got a new job lined up with UBS. Expect a bit more stability there, and an opppotuity to grow again. Also, some good IT banking wages to pay for some of these weekends away !

So does this blog entry mark the start of a new wave of blog entries ? Well, given I've had 6 weeks out of work and have only just found 10 mins to fit it in, I wouldn't hold your breath. But if you are catching up on general events and stuff, I always have my photo gallery on Smugmug - check out the holiday seciton for pictures of a recent weekend in Athens, nestling amongst other snowboard type galleries !

Happy anniversary home - the happy xmas entry

To all readers of "Exit Turner" - HAPPY CHRISTMAS and a VERY HAPPY NEW YEAR !

I shall be enjoying the fine powdery snow of both Europe and Canada over the next month, and I must say I'm rather excited ! Hope you all have a great 2006,

Turner

Happy anniversary home - the end of year thinky entry

It's been a whole year since I got home. And a few weeks - I've been a slack blogger these last few months. This slackness is partly due to being busy, but equally in being busy it's a reflection of how little time I put aside to consider where I am in life and where I'm going.

It has been psychologically interesting to consider the change of tone of my blog posts over the last few years. First I was a nervous blogger, putting down gossip and exciting stories to hold my minimal audiances attention. Then I grew in confidence and continued a gossipy style, with some reflections. Finally, during the travels, I think the blogs quickly covered off my activities and became more a place to sound off my thoughts and feelings of the time.

But now the blog entries have been reduced to monthly summaries with a little thought of the moment. They have been brief flashes of my world right there and then, and together they don't chart my years feelings and thoughts very well at all. And my journal simply gathers dust, of course. Non-electric things find less place in my London life.

I have come to believe that a good part of this is my time in the big city is quite dependant on relationships and social interactions that don't make for good blog material - any musing I might have over a certain encounter could easily be read by the other people involved, who then might be somewhat upset if I was blogging behind there back. Travelling was a more self-realising experiance - much less of my emotional growth was through long-term growth of relationships.

In more concluding words, whilst I feel some regret about the reduced use of my blog, I realise this is part of my becoming quite detached directionally and emotionally again - possibly from a lack of reflection on my life on any regular basis. Given the public nature of blogging, this is possibly best kept in journal form in many ways, but finding those minutes to sit down and write at the end of the day can be hard.