National Handwriting Day

I just read that today is National Handwriting day.  And I want to say thank you.

The image you see there is my impeccably neat cursive handwriting. Taught to me by the wonderful Ms. Colon of St. John Vianney School in the Castle Hill area of the Bronx.  The school closed in 2010 due to cuts.  Some people don’t value education anymore, most people undervalue the merits of private school as well.

I am no longer a practicing Catholic. There are things that I just don’t agree with that go on in All religious institutions, and the Roman Catholic Church is just one of these.  I still hold beliefs and have a very strong faith which I consider deeply important to me, as well as intensely personal.  However there is something that I do feel strongly about.  If I had not gone to Catholic School as a child I would not be as smart, independent, or self-aware as I am today.  I belive it whole heartedly.

Being raised in The Bronx, in the house my grandparents bought the year I was born, we were not rich. We were not poor either, we were just in the middle. Everyone worked, and we all lived in the same house.  My Grandparents, my aunt, my mom, myself and my brothers.  They could afford to send all four of us (my aunt and brother are the same age) to catholic school.  We hated it.  There was a lot of homework, a mean nun (who was not really mean at all, had a heart of gold and devoted her life to all of us) and we had to go to church.  As kids, we thought it was rough, and we hated it.  But as an adult, I am so grateful for the experience.

Living in a neighborhood with a mix if homes, apartments, and public housing buildings all around in the middle of the 80′s in NYC, was full of adventure.  Because of it, I think I have been a grown up all my life.  For instance, I know what gunshots sound like on New Years Day, I know what someone under the influence of crack looks like, and I know how to play manhunt in the projects.  I learned about other dangers, 1990 was a particularly rough year for our little neighborhood.  I grew up fast in my little corner of the world, and grew up prepared for danger, as well as joy.

Of all the little things I learned in SJV in my 5 years as a student there, the most important was how to write. Not only how to write on paper, but how to make script, and how to make words.  My first year there I didn’t know much writing.  I was a print writer.  This is what I was taught in my previous schools and I was left-handed, which made all the books hard to follow.  It wasn’t until Ms. Colon sat me down with a cursive book and turned it to the left hand slant position that I was able to even make a cursive ABC.

This wouldn’t have happened in public school, and it didn’t because I was there for three years.  Never once did a teacher take pity on my and show me how to do something.  I was in fourth grade and hadn’t learned how to write properly, or even clearly.

Because of St John Vianney School and Ms. Colon, I learned to write confidently as a left-handed writer and then went on to teach my little cousin, who is also left-handed (and newly added an ESQ to her name) how to write like me.

That’s when education changed for me. I had hurdled this one obstacle.  Nothing was a hard as learning to write in the cursive form, at least not for me.  After that I was able to master new things, like Algebra, and Science, and Reading two books a week. I felt that if I could take risks in learning, I could learn more.  I joined the Chess Club and learned about strategy. I joined the girl scout troop and got a zillion badges. I joined the Recorder Club, and learned music, sang in the school plays and learned music as another language.

Of those things, I still can play the recorder, yes, I still sing, if given bribes, and have learned many more instruments in my years. But the one thing that I still do, that I think Ms. Colon would be most proud of is I still write, in cursive, every day.  I keep a journal, and write in it.   The image above was part of today’s entry.  The post you just read was transcribed from my cursive notes taken this morning.  So thank you Ms. Colon, for teaching me to write and inspiring me to learn.

Do you still write in cursive?  How’s your handwriting?

Do you listen to Podcasts?

I often found that during a stressful day at work, I needed something to make me focus in on my work and drown out the world around me. I started listening to podcasts in 2005 when the Ricky Gervais Podcast was offered for free by Guardian Unlimited and later subscribed to them on Audible.

Since then I have listened to a number of podcasts of different genres.  Some are humourous, while others are informational. Instead of only downloading them from iTunes or Podcast Alley, now I use the Stitcher App for some of the ones that are more frequent than the number of times I sync my devices.

With me not working at this very moment, I find it comforting that I still have part my daily routine. Each week, a certain number of podcasts are updated on my device and I still listen to them as I go about my day.  It’s a good way to stay away from the TV trap that unemployment sometimes brings as well as keep me entertained and motivated to do things other than be stagnant.  I can go for a walk, run errands, take them with me in the car, and even listen while I cook, clean and look for employment.

I do knit a lot, and take my knitting to the library, and so it also is helpful to drown out the noise of the outside world and just relax. In short, I feel that podcasts have made me more productive.

I used to see them as a little reward for having to stare at the same spreadsheet for 6 hours straight. Now I see them as a reason to get up and go.

So, what exactly do I listen to?  I have some standards, as well as some guilty pleasures that aren’t exactly appropriate for all audiences. And that is the beauty of if.  You can listen to whatever you want.  Most are weekly, some are monthly and a few are daily.  You can pretty much set it up so to listen to as much or as little as you want.

Some of my standards include:

• NPR’s Wait, Wait, Don’t Tell Me - This is a news quiz show podcast and probably one of the more popular podcasts out there.  It’s both hilarious and witty while still being informational.  As I have said before I get all my news from comedians.
• This American Life - I like a good story and I have never been disappointing by this show. Except when they are in repeats.  But that’s only because I listen to regularly.
• WNYC’s RadioLab - Science is always cool to me. And this show is thought provoking and very smart.
• Savage Love Podcast - I started listening to Dan Savage about a year ago when it came up on my suggestions. I thought, hey a show about love and relationships, I have those. I thought it would be like Dr. Drew Pinsky.  I was WRONG! This is way better. This is a headphones only podcast.
•  Cast On - Hosted from Wales by Brenda Dayne, this is a show about knitting, but also about finding inspiration in your art. I love her voice and I love this show. I can’t wait each week to hear it.  It’s probably my favorite show.

Some of my Guilty Pleasures are:

• Kevin Smith’s Smodcast and Jay and Silent Bob Get Old – I love almost everything on this network. I love Kevin Smith and I know some people don’t but I get it, and I get him and what he is trying to do. I listen to several of these shows weekly and enjoy them very much.
• Dork Trek and The Delta Quadrant - With the release of Star Trek on Netflix there has been resurgence of Trek-Casts as new groups of people are re watching and re-capping episodes.  I am a long time Star Trek fan, and an admitted dork about it. I know more than most girls my age should.  I love these shows.  Dork Trek covers TNG, and if you know Trek you can guess what the other one covers.
• Mysterious Universe - There are two things that will make you an instant guilty pleasure.  Aliens and Australians. This show has both!  Also it scared the crap out of me last week with tales of Black Eyed Kids. And if you need to know anything about me, you need to know that evil kids scare the crap outta me.

Of course there are more, and I am sure you are wondering what else I can fit into a week or two’s worth of podcasts.  But honestly if you really think about how much time the average worker sits in front of their TV’s computers, or on a car, train, plane etc, you can imagine how much time could fill with some interesting content.

So, what podcasts do you listen to?

ON STRIKE – Against SOPA AND PIPA

Today, we are striking against censorship. Join us in this historic moment: tell Congress to stop this bill now!

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Strike Against SOPA and PIPA

Hi Folks.  If you don’t know what SOPA is, please look it up, but don’t do it tomorrow as many sites will be blacked out including Wikipedia.  The internet has been and should always be protected by Free Speech. Tomorrow will be the biggest protest in the world. It is a very important day and I sorry that it has come to this.  I support the right to post anything, as stupid as it may seem on the internet. I also support the right to not read or look for anything you find distasteful. The choice should be OURS not the US Government’s.

This site will be blacked out tomorrow and I will also not be on Twitter or Facebook either.  In fact, if anyone needs me I will be watching network TV in my living room not looking at the web. I suspect I will get a lot of knitting and reading done. I know I am not popular like Reddit and Wikipedia, but I am standing in solidarity with others so that our freedoms remain free.

I just read that Google will be joining the strike, and I am really hoping that this is true.

If you have a website, please go to http://www.sopastrike.com/ and join the protest, get the word out and don’t let them take away our internet!

Protect-IP (PIPA) wants to allow the government to shut out sites that they don’t like.  We don’t know what this means.  We don’t know what they consider sites that they find inappropriate.  What would happen if they don’t like what we say on our blogs, or on Facebook, or even in comments on CNN and other sites.  SOPA and PIPA will NOT STOP PIRACY!  There will always be piracy and criminals will always find a way to commit crimes.  The most dangerous part of these government measures is the vast censorship that makes the web less safe and less reliable.  Do not allow the government  to move to the whims of the entertainment companies.  Do not allow the government to censor American Internet.

What does SOPA mean to you?  Lets say you post a video of your kid on You Tube, and it has a song that you love.  That song is copyright protected, and SOPA can block You Tube unless they cancel your account.  You could also go to Jail for up to 5 years.  ALl so that Grandma could see little Johnny dancing to Beyoncé’s “Put a Ring On It”.

As an artist, and musician and a writer, I hate this.  One of the best outlets for creativity have been You Tube, Twitter, Facebook, and other social sites that allow us to share our creativity.  What would happen to the United States is we could not share our talents with the rest of the world?  I will tell you what.  It would make us stupider and less creative.  For a country that is already in danger of looking like a bunch of Jersey Shore and Kardashian wannabe’s this is just the first stone in the well of our stupidity.

These  bills that are facing Congress as we speak are mean to make the entertainment industry stronger.  As I am also against bullying, it is reprehensible to allow an entire industry to dictate what we are allowed to express online, or in public.

My plea to the Entertainment Industry is that  instead of censoring the public, in the USA, they instead realize that if they stop making the bad movies like Zookeeper, and instead focus on looking into the interest of the people they are trying to sell to, they will avoid most piracy.  I waited in line, in the rain in December to see movies that I loved.  I have two editions of the LOTR extended editions one in DVD and one in Blu-Ray because I loved them.  I own an extensive library of films that I love.

Here is the rundown:

• There will ALWAYS BE PIRACY! ALWAYS!  People have been making illegal copies of books since the pen and the  Guttenberg press.  People have been making copies of movies since the VHS was created.  People have been pirating music since Mozart!  A law has NEVER stopped criminals from committing crimes.  This is a flaw in thinking that making a law will change anything.

• Most piracy sites are not even based in the USA.

• Most people don’t pirate movies, or music. Most people will pay for things they love.  These are the people that SOPA affects.  SOPA will not change criminal minds.  People will still be able to pirate if SOPA goes into effect.  What people won’t be able to do, is go to sites they like and look for things they might buy if they had a preview.  Some things are worth a little free to get paid later in things like Live Concerts, Opening Weekends, and and Quality Entertainment.

The average American will pirate movies and music for two reasons.

1. It’s not quality and they are not sure they want to experience it (Sharktopus)  and
2. It’s not available in the US (everything on ITV).  So here are two opportunities to make money.  Make better quality films and make sure they are available to the public.

Give us more options and better channels give us better movies and stop blaming US and the USA for your problems.

Cable Companies wont let us pick our channels.  iTunes revoluntized the music industry by allowing  a la carte albums. Lets see the same for movies and TV.  I have been saying for years that I would rather pay the $50 we spend at the movies if I could just see the movie at home on cable opening weekend.  Make that happen!

The internet changed the way that the music industry works, the ebook changed the way books can be purchased, put more books in ebook form, come up with one standard, and one pricing plan so that Authors and Readers can connect.

So many artists have now be discovered on You Tube and My Space (yes, it’s still there) why can’t we see more of this in the entertainment industry.  I feel that SOPA and PIPA are a last-ditch effort to save themselves from bancrutpcy of a system that we don’t need.

In closing, making a real change won’t ever happen by passing laws.  It will however lead to boycotts of the entertainment industry and more pirating.  I support the boycott tomorrow.  I support the internet being free and uncensored.

My Superpower, and the Library

A little slow on the start this morning with the cold weather, it’s a frosty 17 degrees here on the East Coast.  Also my boyfriend bought me new k-cups for my coffee maker, which was sweet, but they are decaf.  This would not be a problem for a normal human being.

But I have a superpower.  I can taste decaf coffee. No really, I can taste it.  The chemical compound messes with the taste of the coffee.  Trust me, there is a definite difference in how it tastes and I can totally taste it.

Also since drinking full on Spanish style espresso right before bed since birth, (Cafe Bustello) is a thing in my house, you can imagine the effect that Decaf Coffee would have over me.  Or should I say lack of effect.  So I am up late, and started late this morning.

My email box is, as planned full, mostly junk and feed links but there are a few gems in there this morning.  So far it looks like I will be making two phone calls today.  That’s better than none yesterday.

Due to the weather, today is one of the days that I hate.  These are the ones when I have to stay home because all the cars have been taken for the people who live with me and have to actually go to work. Not that walking in my town is how you are imagining it.  The library is four blocks away, it’s just really cold out. So my walk to the library is out, at least until the afternoon and only if it gets above 20.

I have to say, the library is becoming a bit stale, I do wish it were bigger.  It’s a historical monument and so they don’t improve on anything.  There are two tables in the back for computer users and yesterday the one seat table was occupied, and there was a woman sitting at the four person table just sort of laying across it with her butt on one chair, one of her legs on either of the other two chairs and her bag on the fourth chair.  I was both pissed off and impressed by her audacity and comfort.   Needless to say, I sat somewhere else, did my work and left.

I could rant about my local library, but in reality I do love that it’s small, and quaint and that they don’t have a million copies of Twilight and instead have an amazing fiction section that has books that are actually out of print.  The rest of the selection is okay too, but I don’t go there to take out too many books, since I am a digital reader for the most part. I go for the free wifi and the quiet (though sometimes people still talk on their phones) and for the change of scenery.

A lot of people rag on the library, no one really goes to them anymore, and with digital books, let’s face it, they might not be around much longer.  But I remember when the library was a magical place.  I believe it still can be but only if they let some new people in there to modern things up.

-Erica

Back in the Saddle

I have been away from blogging for a while for two reasons: 1. I don’t know what to write about, and 2. I am kind a sick of gadgets.  Getting back into the swing of things, let’s talk about nothing technological for a moment, shall we?

For the past two month’s my main focus has been looking for a new job, spending time with my family, and cleaning my house.  Seriously, I never really looked at my house.  5 years of working 24×7 had left my dwelling looking like an episode of Hoarders.  The first three weeks of my “vacation” were spent cleaning and throwing out trash.  Now that my house once again looks like a home I feel a bit of relief about my current situation.  I can see straight through the house now, and the carpets have been steam cleaned.  I have a nice little home now.  This is one of the things that we can’t do when we work all the time.

I am glad I had my resume updated, because I was ready for the onslaught of recruiters that I have spoken to.  I have been lucky, I think with the recruiting situation.  Many of them are really nice, easy to work with, but the drought of jobs that is November and December was a tide that was just working against everyone.  So much so that I gave up mid December and decided that it was time for “Me Time” and shut off the PC, left the house and went for a walk.

One of the things I was not ready for was the afterburn that comes from being busy all the time and then just being home.  Burnout, is defined as ”the experience of long-term exhaustion and diminished interest”. I didn’t feel burnt-out when I was working, but once I wasn’t it all hit me.  And how!  You really never realize that people aren’t meant to sleep 3-4 hours a night and work the other 20.  The first week home, I was up at 6:30am, dressed by 7:00am, and out of the house by 8:00am.  I even went to a couple of morning masses at the local church, just to have something to do in the morning.  The masses were nice, but they made me sleepy and no one at my church talks to each other that early in the morning, so I stopped going.

I did develop a routine though.  I started going to my local library every day and read actual non-digital books.  I did NaNoWriMo and made it to 21250 words!!  The novel is crap, but the endeavor was an awesome experience, even if I didn’t make it 50k words.  I still have no idea what the story is about or what is going to happen to Ethan and Sara, but I know that whatever happens, they are good characters and I loved creating them.

I also attended a career workshop, visited the Department of Labor, went to the Metropolitan Museum of Art, which is something i used to do once a week and now it’s been almost 5 years since I had last been there.  The biggest shock, however has been the blackberry withdrawal. I think I am detoxed now. So much so that I left my phone home the other day when I went for a walk and didn’t even care.

Now that it’s January, I am looking for a job again and I am happy to see that my speculation about the number of postings has opened right up.  But the most important thing is this.  I got up every day, showered, got dressed and left the house. Even if it was for a little while.  I refuse to be one of those people who just sort of stays home and lives on their couch.  I turned my kitchen table in to a mini office, and each day I spend at least 2-3 hours researching and looking at job postings.  I have been a busy bee today and well, let’s see how it goes.  It’s only my first day back and already I feel productive!

Happy New Year

Happy New Year!! Its 2012 and if the world doesn’t end I am looking forward to a better year than the last.

I find it interesting that my last post was about writing resumes, as I am now looking for a new job.  The economy is donw but I am not.  Full disclosure here. I have recently become unemployed, and am now looking for a great position in the great states of New York and New Jersey.  I have already declared that 2012 is going to be the year of the Tech Diva, and so it goes without saying that things are going to be awesome!

Okay, now that all of that is out of the way, here is what we are going to do.  In the past, the Tech Diva Blog has been a cold and desolate place.  I am going to change that.  This blog was meant to be about me, my life, interests and other things that I find either hilarious, or relevant.  While a lot of my old posts are great, I think I have missed the mark so much that even I had become bored writing about things that I am not really interested in anymore.  So the format change is this:  The Tech Diva Blog is about me, and this year I will be sharing more about myself, my goals, dreams and ideas. I really hope you like it.

Thanks for Reading,

Erica

 

Are Resume’s Still Relevant?

Every month, I spend some time updating my resume.  Every time I do it, I always feel like I have to take away a peice in order to add new items, or skills.   Since I am always learning new things, and keeping up with the IT industry, it’s a smart thing to keep the resume up to date.  Even if I don’t plan to move to a new position, or apply for new jobs.

Remember, resumes are not just for getting a “new” job. Your resume should stay as up to date as possible because you never know when an internal position will open up that you might want to grab.  They also come in handy during review time, when you are not sure what to write on that self assessment.  If you already know what you have worked on each year to better yourself you are ahead of the game.  Achievement Unlocked!

I find it interesting how the formats of resume’s have changed over the years.  Way back in high school, I was taught that there is only one type of resume, and that if it doesn’t look the same as the others, you are doing it wrong.  While I no longer believe that, I have seen my fair share of cookie cutter resumes.

The curriculum vitae, (CV) or Resume is really serious business.  In school, it is explained to us that the resume is representative of  your entire school and work life on one sheet of paper.  It sums you up to a potential employer and you only really get one shot to impress.  If this is the case then why do they all look the same?!  That part always drove me crazy. If you worded or spaced that piece of paper incorrectly, or tried anything new with it, you would never get a good job.  In essence, we were taught to color inside the lines, or face destitution and failure in the career world.

Sadly, while some formatting has changed, my typing class teacher is still half right.  Resume’s have not changed that much since ever and employers still use the CV as the primary method of determining, at the very least, who gets to walk into the office for an interview.  So, how does one make sure that their whole life fits on an 8″ 11″ sheet of marble paper?

You shouldn’t have to, and we need a new way of doing this.

I know, I know, I can see the recruiters reading this right now huffing and puffing at their screens right now. “Oh but Tech Diva, you don’t know what you are talking about.  The big companies don’t want to use LinkedIn or any of those fancy Original styled resumes with the colors and images.  You must follow a standard formula in order to get a job”.

My answer is still, you shouldn’t have to.  And my hope is that while technology is driving changes in all facets of our lives, this will be one of the greatest ones.

**General disclaimer, I am not a human resources generalist and this is all just my opinion. 

If my ideas/opinions help you to create a resume that land’s you a great job, YAY.  

If not, please re-read the first part of the disclaimer again.

There was a time when I had direct reports, you remember the days before the recession when people had staff?  Yeah, those days.  Back then I went through a lot of resumes. Hundreds, or at least it felt that way.  There were far too for what I basically wanted, which was get a good group of candidates through the door and find out if they would be a skilled, and beneficial addition to my team.  Every resume that HR gave me had the same credentials, the same level of schooling, the same format and the same boring nothing jumping out from the pages.  I grabbed the first ten that had no errors on them and didn’t care what happened until they walked through the door.

One thing that they never tell you in school is that all a resume can do for you is get you in the door.  Once you get an interview, the rest is really up to you.  To me, and to many hiring managers it doesn’t matter what is on the piece of paper when you have ten candidates with the same exact credentials.  In technology this is all too common and until the candidates are sitting for their interview they are pretty much all on the same level field.

When going through piles of resume’s a hiring manager, or recruiter gets to be picky.  One of the things I did was look for sloppy work, and typos.  Yes, I know it sounds trivial, but let’s be honest here, a resume is about selling your brand to a company.   If you don’t have the focus to give a decent summary of your skills, take (meaning taking pride in it, editing for content, formatting and especially typos, then your audience may assume that you do not have the level of focus needed for the position.  Yes, the fundamentals are still valid.

TxtSpk and LOL’s should never be on a resume, unless you are applying  for a job where  being fluent in OMG my BFF Jill IKD BRB is required.  And in that case, by all means go for it.

Please Do:

• Edit for content – Do not be wordy, do not under-describe
• Spell Check, spell check, spell check… you get the idea, right?
• Keep to the format of the template you have selected
• Make sure your contact information is at the top of the document

Please Do Not:

• Use caps-lock, it is not a font
• Use script fonts that are not readable
• Use  Comic Sans font, ever.  Seriously.
• Lie about your skills
• Omit work experience for a job, even if you were terminated

Other than those few items the reset is really just your own experience.  So what goes into a decent resume?

Not to point out the obvious, but you need to have your contact information.  You may laugh, but I have seen some CV’s come in without a name or number to reach them.  Also, make sure not to use your social email address.  Always keep another email address that is First.Last@name.com or F.Last@name.com, or something similar.  No one wants to sent or receive a professional email from pinkypookiebuttz@notmyname.com (discliaimer not sure if that’s real or not so don’t spam poor pinky)

Next you need to have some objectives.  Obviously if your resume is on my desk, your Objective is to get a job, right?  Sort of… What the Objective does is tells me a little about you.  Its the one sentence that can bring you to the table or put you in the trash.  A typical objective is usually something like:

1. To work in an XYZ organization that helps children build their skills
2. To work in the ABC industry and gain experience working with teams
3. Seeking a Widget Making position in the ABC Industry where there is a need for (insert talents).

I often wonder if the standard resume templates out there aren’t a bit droll and old fashioned.  Whenever I am asked to read a resume for a potential employee I often glean nothing from their one pager except for how long they were employed in jobs similar to the one they are applying for and trends in how often they change jobs. This really tells you nothing about what the person behind the paper is capable of.  A resume shows no potential. We are in a new century and a new age where I can get more out of a job applicant from a Google search than from their own resume.

Note: I do advise against using Google searches for potential employees, as these too give little insight into what one is like professionally.  Though I am a proponent of looking at their LinkedIn account.  The bottom line is that what one does in their personal life has little relevance to their work life.

Professional sites such as LinkedIn are favorable because they do three things:

1. Give the same career/position overview as a resume while giving you the ability to elaborate on tasks, successes and career goals where you would not be able to do so on a resume.
2. Show that the person has a network of co-workers that are willing to interact with them.  This speaks directly to the ability of a person to be a team player and even just being well adjusted.
3. Provide instant recommendations from peers and previous employers.  LinkedIn allows for colleagues and friends to recommend you and say nice things about you.  Hopefully they say something about your work performance too.

The key to remember is that while the resume may only get you in the door, it will Get You In The Door.  This is important because without the interview you have no chance of landing that job.

I would love to hear from some recruiters or HR personell on their thoughts about resumes and linked in accounts.  Feel free to check out my LinkedIn profile here.

Thanks for reading,

Erica

My Favorite Apps

My iPad (not to be confused with iPad2) and I are starting to get better acquainted.  I am using it more, and finding more uses for it.  Here is a list of some of the free apps that are my favorites.

Pocket Cloud – WYSE

Pocket Cloud is a cloud computer client.  The basic version is free and the paid version is $14.99(US).  The free version is ad-supported and you can only have one remote at a time.  Basically, I can use RDP (remote desktop protocol) or VNC (Virtual Network Computing) to control another computer right from the iPad.  Like other programs like Logmein, it allows for remote control of the system over the internet through a client you install on the machine you want to control.

What I like about this app is that it’s a full screen version of your computer and it’s actually workable.  In the paid version you get more connections, more features and even streaming media over 3G.  This app is available for iOS and Android.

Flipboard

Every once in a great while an application comes along that provides a life changing experience. I think Flipboard is one of these apps.  It has changed the way I view social media and my blogfeeds

Here is how it works:  Flipboard works by first having you link your Facebook, Twitter, Google Reader and Flickr accounts to it.  You then have a pick of some of their Original Content (including the Oprah channel, FlipTech and FlipMoney) You can also add in some of your own favorite sites.  For me it’s i09, CNN, Wired and Lifehacker.

Once this is done you get a lovely front page which uses the slide show feature to toggle through the images posted to all of these sites.  (see the duckies?)

This is what my twitter feed looks like as a magazine: I can post, reply and check trends all from the application.

And this is what the Wired RSS Feed looks like.  Fewer options here but I can star as a favorite or tweet the link.  I can even comment on my Google Reader Page about an article.

Other things that Flipboard does allow for users to view the original page in a build in web browser, or open the pages in Safari.  Of all my apps I think this one is my absolute favorite. As far as I know this is an iPad only app.

HBO Go

HBO has decided to toss their hat in the ring with Netflix/Hulu/ABCGO to create an app for its customers.  This Free (with cable subscription) app allows you to do everything the HBOGO.com site does.  You can watch movies, series and create a watchlist that will queue up your programs for you. (I am a FiOS customer, hence the Verizon check mark in my screenshot)  Again, not sure what other devices are getting this app right now.

Stitcher

Lastly, if like me, you are into Podcasts, then this app is for you.  Available on iOS, Android and RIM, it is one of those things that once you have you can’t live without.  Got an hour to kill, tired of you playlist, forgot to synch your podcasts to your device? No worries this app is like the Hulu of Podcasts.  It is ad-supported but the ads are so slight you hardly notice them. Working similarly to Pandora, it streams the content very well.  The account syncs between devices with your account info, so if you start a podcast on one device and move to another, you can continue listening at the point you paused.

Well, there you have a list of a few of my favorites.  I would love to hear what some of your favorite apps are.

Sanity: Work life balance and a small format change

Confession time: I am burnt out and disgruntled with certain aspects of my work life.  Like many people in the IT field, I work long hours, am on call all the time and never sleep.  Unlike may of my counterparts I am starting to feel like I am losing passion for what I do. When you stop liking what you do, its time to do something that you like.

Being a well-rounded person, I have my fair share of hobbies.  This blog being one.  The problem is that I have been acting with single focus, which is not well-rounded at all.   I have been so busy and focused on work that I haven’t really given myself the time to dedicate to writing about technology as my passion, hanging out with friends, or even just taking time for myself.  It’s a vicious circle really, because in the end, the last thing I want to talk about anymore is my work, or even just plain old technology.

So, what can be done?  Well, after seeking advice, I have made some decisions and am going to try an experiment.  I need to re-kindle my passion.  I also need to jumpstart my career.  As lucky as I am to have a job right now, with so many people out of work, I think it may be time to start looking for a new one. (more on that later).  Lastly, I need to reboot my personal life so that I have one again. So don’t be surprised if you start to see some non-tech posts going on here.  I have decided to write as a way of breaking through some of this stress.

Work-Life Balance is a topic that almost every business site has taken on as a topic.  Monster.com has a whole section dedicated to it, and they have a lot of good advice.  However, in the real world, when you are in the thick of it, the only thing a person can do is take things one day at a time.  Here are some of the tips that I have found most useful:

• Scheduling work/life events and plans is not the same as maintaining balance.  Life is supposed to be spontaneous sometimes, and if you schedule an hour to “have fun” you will just be miserable for an hour trying to figure out what to do.  It’s much better to just clear off an hour of your time, take a half a day, and just see what happens.
• Try to bring your working hours down.  If you don’t have to answer that email until tomorrow, then don’t.  Set realistic expectations, and remember, if it’s not an emergency then you are not obliged to jump into the fray.  Let yourself have a dinner time, and time to rest.  Give yourself time to decompress from work and during that time, you don’t need to react to every email/call/etc.  That is, unless there is actually work that you must do.
• Cut down procrastination/distraction time during the work day in order to get done faster. If you cut down the water-cooler conversation you can save up to 60 minutes of work time, thus giving yourself time to get out of the office earlier.

Some of the things that I have done recently in order to try to gain back my work life balance are:

• Join a gym – this has forced me to create three hours a week (sometimes up to 5) to just disconnect and work out.  I am very happy that I did this. It was hard at first, and I even felt guilty locking my blackberry in a locker and walking away from it, but it also made me realize that my after-hours hours are mine.  And to date, I have not missed anything extreme happening while working out.
• Stop answering emails off hours if they are not emergencies or scheduled work. – If an email can wait till morning, then answer it then.  No one gets extra points for answering emails as soon as they come in.  There are definitely no points system for being “first” on an email thread at work.
• Wait at least 10 minutes before answering any email. (Even emergencies) – This one is tricky.  If there is a meltdown at work, it usually takes about 10 minutes to get everyone organized.  By the time I am done drafting an email, my phone is ringing where I have to repeat everything I just wrote.  Cut out the middle man, and just wait for the phone call.  In the meantime, you have time to gather your intel, and draft a response.  One lesser note on this, is that in times of frustration, waiting before answering any email is often the best response.  You give yourself time to detach from the situation emotionally and just get the facts.  Most emotional off the cuff responses happen in the first ten minutes of an email thread.  Being the first to respond means you are usually the least informed.  Doing this does not give me more in the way of work-life balance, but it does keep me sane.

I am trying new things all the time, but I think in the end my mind keeps turning to that format change.  As a woman in IT engineering, this pace makes it near impossible to start a family.  In fact the only women in my department (there are a handful) who have families are the ones who are administrators who don’t work the same hours as the infrastructure groups. They go home at a normal hour, can do their work from home a lot of the time and are not on call.  For me, a new pace may be needed to get what I want out of my life.

I am a proponent of freedom of choice when it comes to our work and home lives.  My respect for women who are “married” to their jobs is equal to that of those who have families and those that decide to leave the workforce and raise a family full-time.  We must all do what we can to be happy in our lives and no one should look down on that.  While I am still figuring out what I want, I will be looking at all of the options open to me.  This includes career changes where I am less engineering and more administration/programming.  It also includes looking into career changes.  Either way, there will always be tons to write about.