Donald Livingston

I’d like to start at the beginning, but that would end up being a very long story so…

This Christmas and New Years were a whirlwind. After three weeks of low-intensity torture disguised as “training” I started taking calls at my new Call Center Job. (Or as I’ll refer to it from here on out the CCJ) I won’t mention specifics about the CCJ, (i.e. where it was, or the nature of the calls I was taking), I will say however that I was at the very least grateful for the work, and determined to give it my best effort, even though it was not work I could find joy in doing. At the end of my first week of being on the call floor, I got a call for another job interview, and the evening after my first interview I was called back for a second interview. At the end of the second interview I was offered my first full-time Web Development and Design job. (HoodyHoo!) The moment I was offered this new position, I immediately went in to turn in my badge and clear out my desk at the CCJ. While I do feel a small pang of guilt for not giving more advance notice, I don’t think there would be any reciprocal guilt if the CCJ decided to pull the plug on the project, and told us “Don’t let the door hit you on your way out.” Continue reading →

Big week. On the good news side, I started a new job so I’m no longer unemployed. On the slightly-less-good news is that the job is only part time call center work. However, work is work and part-time income is better than no income. On the other hand, call centers shrivel my soul so I’m less than enthusiastic about the position, and I’m going to continue looking for actual development and design work.

I started training on Wednesday, and the first day was filled with confusion, chaos and corporate marketing diarrhea. Once the actual training began, it was conducted via conference call by a trainer in India. Outsourcing call centers to India is one thing, but now I’m being trained for local call center job remotely by a guy in India… This doesn’t bode well for the remaining taters of sanity that occasionally scurry out from under the rocks in my head to make sure I haven’t started chewing on my shirt.

After months of poking, hacking, tinkering, thinking, designing, building, tearing down, and building again. I’ve finally put together the final design of my website. While there are other more professional sites out there, I’m proud to point at this site and say. “This is mine. I made this, and it is good.”

Now that I’ve got this under my belt I need to start generating some content. ^_^

I’m going to set myself a goal of writing at least two blog posts a week. I don’t have ambitions of being a professional blogger, but if I force myself to learn about something to the point of being able to write about it intelligently, it should really help to focus my attention. That’s the theory anyway.