2/14/2006

And so it begins...

And what a crazy two days it's been. And will continue to be all the way until my first day of work.

Monday:
Spent 7.5 hours working with the packers (although they did all the real work) to move my apartment. Now I currently live in the empty shell of an apartment, especially my room - only with a few sheets of paper (the inventory) that represent all my possesions. Here's hoping that truck doesn't get lost...

Joe and I even had a moment of silence and a few words when he came home and saw the two TV setup had been taken apart, only to yield one lonely television.

... yes, I'm serious ...

Top it all off with a late night ride to HEB to get toiletries, since the packers packed my bathroom too, and a night's sleep in the ground, and you have a full day.


Tuesday:
Nice 'n sore from sleeping on the ground, so I stayed in "bed" late, and made more calls and emails about the move. Finally got the evergy to move, and took an afternoon visit to campus to say goodbye to some Orientation friends (the supervisors, etc). On the way, the Mustang cut off from the gas again. Luckily, it happened as I was riding into the parking garage, so I could idle my way through the garage. However, going up the slopes at .001 mph was a little frustrating.

Needless to say, I had to fashion a makeshift fastener for the gas pedal to the engine fuel input, so now my car has a pivotal piece being held together by a paperclip - had to go MacGuyver on it, so I could get it home for the movers tomorrow.

Finally "attached" the missing 'S' to the back of the Mustang, through a lot of frustrations, pain, heat and super glue. The tabs were misspaced, so I tried to bend it into shape, which worked until I tried to actually attach it, and the tab broke, so in comes the superglue. Whee.

A nice ride on the motorcycle and a trip to Fry's ends my last night living in Austin. The bike is as 985, and if I have time tomorrow before all the moving, etc, I may take it out for the last 15 miles.


Wednesday:
The last day in Austin - still have to visit the Harley dealership, finish packing, wait for the movers, and drive to Waco. Oh, and another night of sleep on the floor. Whee.


So, tomorrow will truly mark the beginning of a new life. It's a decision I never thought I would make. I've always been a creature of habit, and given the chance to toss my life into a blender or stay at home, and I willingly jumped in. I'm looking forward to it, but it's going to be odd for a while. Moving to a new place, with new people (really none that I know) and starting work immediately, all while trying to buy a house.

It really feels like a year's worth of stuff is happening in the next few days - I'll be moving to Dallas, living in temp housing, hunting for a house, starting a new job, and saying goodbye to a friend as he leaves the country. That stuff really shouldn't be crammed in a few days.

A new life in a new place starts tomorrow. I'm going to welcome it with open arms, looking straight ahead.

2/12/2006

Gamers unite! :)

Alright, so I'm officially done with my current job. Friday was my last day - and it was really tough to leave. But there's no going back now. I can only look forward.

On a more positive note - gaming helps to keep the mind young. Everything in moderation. I like the fact that apparently the bilingual videogamers were unstoppable.

Also, if you ever liked gradius, this is awesome. Be sure to download the video.

2/09/2006

One more night.

And I'm terrified. It's such an unnerving feeling to be quitting a job. I started off the day today with one of my friends at work saying:

"Yeah, we just had our first 'Ok, so Vijay's leaving for real - how the hell are we going to do all the stuff that he does around here?'" Way to make a guy feel important, at the least.

On a more depressing note - it's really hard to say goodbye to a lot of the people here, because there ARE a lot of great people, and I almost feel like I'm abandoning them by leaving (especially QA - noone else pays attention to QA =\). I had a meeting with a good friend at work (in management) trying to convince me to stay - basically trying to figure out if there was anything they could do to get me to stay, but I'm already committed to the transition now. "It kills me to see a guy like you leave." Right now, it's killing me to leave, too.

There's also the people who say things like "You're still young, you have plenty of places to go."

I'm excited - but also totally terrified. Shopping for houses and talking with the movers doesn't help.

2/02/2006

Ahem

"Don’t ever say anything at all about anything. Ever...ever."

This rivalry (Sony / Xbox) reminds me of one of my favorite VGCats comics. Can you guess what the babies are referring to? 10 points for whoever gets it! :)

2/01/2006

It just keeps getting harder

So news finally started to get around the office more that I'm leaving, and that I'm going to Ensemble. There's been a lot of people saying things like "I wish you were at least staying in Austin" and "I was really hoping you were going to go to Gordon's thing". Definitely not easy here - kind of a solemn atmosphere. A part of me feels like I'm letting a lot of people down. Time will tell.

Edit: And then there's the other reaction - "Man! Do you realize how screwed we are? Who's going to take care of the builds and make sure this place still runs!? You did ALL of that! SO screwed!" (delivered in a dramatic tone)