As of Friday at 4:30pm, I am officially unemployed.
Wednesday afternoon, my counterpart Johnny and I began testing how things would run after my departure by changing several key passwords and temporarily disabling my account. As a domain admin, not only does my account have carte blanche access to the network, but I also have access to our internal password database. Any password I didn’t have memorized, I could easily look up. That afternoon it hit me that, in the very near future, this organization I’ve been a part of for almost fifteen years would soon be continuing on without me.
Back when I quit Best Buy in 1994, my dad shared his “finger in a glass of water” theory with me. A company is like a glass of water. Now stick your finger in the water — that’s you. When you quit working there, you pull your finger out of the water. Notice there’s no hole in the water; the water just fills in where you were, and the overall level of the water drops a bit. That’s kind of how it works. The work will get done, but the water level may be a little low for the time being.
Occasionally my imagination gets the better of me, and as the week came to a close I began watching out for some imaginary security guard to put his hand on my shoulder and inform me, “It’s time.” That never happened — in fact, for the last two hours of my final shift, I was the only person working in my department. My last official work duty was disabling my own network accounts and turning in my physical keys. I’m proud to have built up that level of trust from my co-workers and employer.
I haven’t decided what to do during my stretch of unemployment, but I need to hurry — my new job officially begins Saturday at midnight. I had hoped to make it down to the unemployment office today to find out what kind of assistance I could apply for. I know that to get unemployment benefits you have to be looking for a new job, so I thought it might help that I already had another one lined up. Can you get your hands on a block of government cheese in less than 24 hours? I should look into that.
Photos from my Going Away Dinner at Chelino’s are here.
Congrats on your next adventure!
Just saw your Twitter update about the Pentax K-x. dpreview’s brief hands-on looks pretty good (http://www.dpreview.com/news/0909/09091702pentaxKXhandson.asp). I’d pass on it because of the light weight, red body, and movie mode, since I prefer a more substantial feeling camera and I’ve already got a camcorder… but those may be the features that appeal most to you!
Then again it’s rare to find a ‘bad’ DSLR these days – part of what makes choosing one so hard! Personally I have my heart set on a used Nikon D300 : ) Still waiting on the price to drop some more since the D300s just came out.
Whatever you buy, do consider going body-only and buying a better starter lens than what’s in the kit. It’ll make a huge difference in your photos, since the kit lens is usually nothing special, and it’s still useful when/if you do upgrade bodies. I want a quick 50mm prime for starters, but a nicer telephoto might be more practical instead.
Thanks Greg. I’ve got some negative feedback regarding Pentax’s point-and-shoot cameras and now what I’m worried about is that quality seeping over into their DSLR line. It’s true that in that range what you’re really buying is the lenses, which is another thing that worries me as they look to be proprietary to the Pentax line. Maybe I would be better off buying something a little more compatible.
For an additional $100 You can get a 50-300 lens as well, which I was considering buying as well. Also, the camera is available in four colors (black, white, red and blue). I kind of like the red one; the white one looks a lot like a Stormtrooper, but I suspect I would get it dirty real quick. The black one looks generic to me. Also while the movie mode isn’t a primary selling point, my current camera is old enough that it doesn’t record movies at all. While I don’t really need the 720p quality, it would be nice to be able to record a quick snippet in good quality and up it to YouTube with little hassle.
Good lord, the last thing you want is that horrible government cheese. I’m still convinced that it stems from early government experiments with Kevlar.
*shudders*
Horrible stuff, and horrible memories of it.
There’s a Chris Farley (as Motivational Speaker Matt Foley) quote somewhere that would be appropriate right now. But I’ve probably said enough.
At any rate, congrats. I’m about a week behind you.
I’m impressed that they let you stay for your two-weeks. In my experience, once you say give them a two-weeks notice they immediately walk you out. In IT the ability to ruin a business in 30 seconds is usually taken into consideration.
Well, again, it’s rare to find a “bad” DSLR, and even if you do run across one it’s pretty certain all the kinks will be worked out by next year’s model. These are expensive pieces of equipment that some people base their whole livelihood on, so companies really can’t afford to screw it up.
Two things that will help you make your decision:
* go to a camera store, pick up some cameras and take some test shots in the store. Your decision may well be made by the ergonomics of the cameras.
* if you live near photographer friends, buy into the same system that they use. That way you can borrow lenses off each other and share tips. My uncle and one of my friends in LR both shoot with Nikon, it’s helped sway me away from Canon in the past few months.
Seriously, in the end they’re all pretty much equivalent, and people have sunk so much money into their camera system that none of the major manufacturers are going away any time soon. Good photos come from the photographer, not the camera – so pick one that feels good and seems fun and practical to shoot with, thus inspiring you to shoot more : )
@Smack: As I told my boss, “I’m not going into the witness protection program when I walk out of here.” My new job is (A) Federal, (B) located across the street, and (C) in security — those three things were pretty good justification to let me stay.