I've made a conscious choice lately to more or less return to my more introspective and sedentary wasys. I won't be going out all the time during weekends, and occasionally during the week, throwing money at waitresses and bartenders. I no longer plan to try in vain to meet people, only to ultimately have to cope with the icy cold feeling of dejection and depression that surmises at the conclusion of the evening. I've more or less decided that these kind of escapades are no fun without friends in the first place, making my efforts nothing more than a Catch-22.

Actually, I proved that just last night. What started as a usual meeting back home with some of my friends about our small business venture, turned into an all-out virtual party. Thats right, 'virtual party': I think we may have coined that. Since I was teleconferencing in with my webcam via netmeeting and mic with Gtalk (since Gtalks audio is better than netmeetings), and since it was Saturday night, meaning were having some drinks, talk of ASP and Databases quickly turned to watching Dane Cook on YouTube, sing along of Gnarls Barkleys 'Crazy', virtual jamming with the bongos on my side, and the jugs and keyboards on their side. And then, the best part, virtual Cranium. I acted out charades on the webcam with my partner over on the other side watching on his monitor. I read the cards that were held up to the screen for me (having to process them backwards) to the other team, and even drew on the netmeeting whiteboard for the pictionary-esque challenges. We didn't finish the game, but my team was clearly winning when we all started passing out.

My roomate said when she came home she knew I was the only one here, but she distinctly heard a party in my room. She was right on both accounts I told her - and she was visibly confused.

In other news, this weekend, and the past, I have spent with myself. Reading, writing, playing video games, taking walks, thinking deeply about my job and life and where I want to go with it. It's been a while since I've lived this way - funny, too, cause that's the only kind of life I knew before I started partying and drinking at some point in my Junior year and college. It feels much more rewarding overall, right now. I also sacked up and bought a guitar. I've thought long and hard about it for a while, and even consulted with my younger brother, who plays, about it. I think this is the real creative outlet I need. It also aligns well with my decision to not go out as much, seeing as how she cost me about five-hundred bucks - yet, a bit of a setback, but it will make up for itself in lack of bar tabs and club covers ...

anyway, in case you want to see the future object of my devotion and time:



and if you understand guitars - not that I do much right now - here's what she has goin for her:

* Neck thru body design
* Carved top mahogany body
* Black pearloid binding
* Black pearloid vector inlays
* USA Seymour Duncan pickups: JB at the bridge, '59 at the neck
* Black pearloid vector inlays
* 5-way pickup switching: Position 1: full power bridge humbucking sound; Bridge pickup (series). Position 2: single coil sound with hum cancel; Bridge & neck pickups; Parallel (bridge pickup's bridge side coil & neck pickup's bridge side coil). Position 3: full power humbucking sound; Series (bridge pickup's neck side coil & neck pickup's neck side coil) Position 4: single coil sound with hum canceling; Parallel (bridge pickup's neck side coil & neck pickup's neck side coil) Position 5: full power neck humbucking sound; Neck pickup (series)
* Black chrome hardware
* Grover Tuners
* TonePros tune-o-matic bridge
* Thru-body tail

My brother Craig tells me it's one of the best things out there for lefties right now, and it should last me a good while, which is what I wanted to hear. He also tells me those are REALLY good humbuckers. Alrite!

So yea, all in all I'm feeling good. Which I think means no one will leave comments on this entry, cause it seems when I'm not struggling with the perils of my situation people don't feel compelled to add their thoughts. I mean, my last entry was the most upbeat and humorous thing I may have ever posted, and I got only one response. Not that I do this get attention or anything - I stand by the fact that it's a creative exercise for me, akin to a mental unloading and checkpointing of my life - but I did note that lack of feedback as an oddity in my mind.

Also, I noticed that my post about Quixtar months ago is still garnering comments and controversy between a Quixtar robot and a Hero of Truth. I find that kind of disturbing, since it speaks to the raw brain damage that Quixtar doles out to it's victims, causing them to feel compelled to preach, and defend in this case, the fabricated virtue and legitimacy of the parasite corporation leeching off of their frontal lobe ...

I recently received an article from a friend which is about modern work culture and it's influence, and synergies, with happiness, self-fulfillment, and 'success'.

I post it here not just so I can share it with anyone else, but so I can keep a copy for myself. It hits very close to home, what with all the related musings I have been guilty of:

"Today's generation of high-earning professionals maintain that their personal
fulfillment comes from their jobs and the hours they work. They should grow up,
says Thomas Barlow.


Copyright The Financial Times Limited

A friend of mine recently met a young American woman who was studying on a
Rhodes Scholarship at Oxford. She already had two degrees from top US
universities, had worked as a lawyer and as a social worker in the US, and
somewhere along the way had acquired a black belt in kung fu.

Now, however, her course at Oxford was coming to an end and she was thoroughly angst-ridden about what to do next.

Her problem was no ordinary one. She couldn't decide whether she should make a lot of money as a corporate lawyer/management consultant, devote herself to charity work helping battered wives in disadvantaged communities, or go to Hollywood to work as a stunt double in kung fu films.

What most struck my friend was not the disparity of this woman's choices, but
the earnestness and bad grace with which she ruminated on them. It was almost as though she begrudged her own talents, opportunities and freedom - as though the world had treated her unkindly by forcing her to make such a hard choice.

Her case is symptomatic of our times. In recent years, there has grown up a
culture of discontent among the highly educated young, something that seems to flare up, especially, when people reach their late 20s and early 30s. It arises
not from frustration caused by lack of opportunity, as may have been true in the
past, but from an excess of possibilities.

Most theories of adult developmental psychology have a special category for
those in their late 20s and early 30s. Whereas the early to mid-20s are seen as
a time to establish one's mode of living, the late 20s to early 30s are often
considered a period of reappraisal.

In a society where people marry and have children young, where financial burdens accumulate early, and where job markets are inflexible, such reappraisals may not last long. But when people manage to remain free of financial or family burdens, and where the perceived opportunities for alternative careers are many, the reappraisal is likely to be angst-ridden and long lasting.

Among no social group is this more true than the modern, international,
professional elite: that tribe of young bankers, lawyers, consultants and
managers for whom financial, familial, personal, corporate and (increasingly)
national ties have become irrelevant.

Often they grew up in one country, were educated in another, and are now working in a third. They are independent, well paid, and enriched by experiences that many of their parents could only dream of. Yet, by their late 20s, many carry a sense of disappointment: that for all their opportunities, freedoms and achievements, life has not delivered quite what they had hoped.

At the heart of this disillusionment lies a new attitude towards work. The idea
has grown up, in recent years, that work should not be just a means to an end a
way to make money, support a family, or gain social prestige - but should
provide a rich and fulfilling experience in and of itself.

Jobs are no longer just jobs; they are lifestyle options.

Recruiters at financial companies, consultancies and law firms have promoted
this conception of work. Job advertisements promise challenge, wide experiences, opportunities for travel and relentless personal development.

Michael is a 33-year-old management consultant who has bought into this vision
of late-20th century work. Intelligent and well-educated - with three degrees,
including a doctorate - he works in Munich, and has a "stable, long-distance
relationship" with a woman living in California. He takes 140 flights a year and
works an average of 80 hours a week. Some weeks he works more than 100 hours.

When asked if he likes his job, he will say: "I enjoy what I'm doing in terms of
the intellectual challenges."

Although he earns a lot, he doesn't spend much. He rents a small apartment,
though he is rarely there, and has accumulated very few possessions. He
justifies the long hours not in terms of wealth-acquisition, but solely as part
of a "learning experience".

This attitude to work has several interesting implications, mostly to do with
the shifting balance between work and non-work, employment and leisure.

Because fulfilling and engrossing work - the sort that is thought to provide the
most intense learning experience - often requires long hours or captivates the
imagination for long periods of time, it is easy to slip into the idea that the
converse is also true: that just by working long hours, one is also engaging in
fulfilling and engrossing work.

This leads to the popular fallacy that you can measure the value of your job
and, therefore, the amount you are learning from it) by the amount of time you
spend on it. And, incidentally, when a premium is placed on learning rather than
earning, people are particularly susceptible to this form of self-deceit.

Thus, whereas in the past, when people in their 20s or 30s spoke disparagingly
about nine-to-five jobs it was invariably because they were seen as too routine,
too unimaginative, or too bourgeois. Now, it is simply because they don't
contain enough hours.

Young professionals have not suddenly developed a distaste for leisure, but they
have solidly bought into the belief that a 45-hour week necessarily signifies an
unfulfilling job.

Jane, a 29-year-old corporate lawyer who works in the City of London, tells a
story about working on a deal with another lawyer, a young man in his early 30s.
At about 3am, he leant over the boardroom desk and said: Isn't this great? This
is when I really love my job."

What most struck her about the remark was that the work was irrelevant (she says it was actually rather boring); her colleague simply liked the idea of working
late. "It's as though he was validated, or making his life important by this,"
she says.

Unfortunately, when people can convince themselves that all they need do in
order to lead fulfilled and happy lives is to work long hours, they can quickly
start to lose reasons for their existence.

As they start to think of their employment as a lifestyle, fulfilling and
rewarding of itself - and in which the reward is proportional to hours worked -
people rapidly begin to substitute work for other aspects of their lives.

Michael, the management consultant, is a good example of this phenomenon. He is prepared to trade (his word) not just goods and time for the experience afforded by his work, but also a substantial measure of commitment in his personal relationships. In a few months, he is being transferred to San Francisco, where he will move in with his girlfriend. But he's not sure that living in the same house is actually going to change the amount of time he spends on his relationship. "Once I move over, my time involvement on my relationship will not change significantly. My job takes up most of my time and pretty much dominates what I do, when, where and how I do it," he says.

Moreover, the reluctance to commit time to a relationship because they are
learning so much, and having such an intense and fulfilling time at work is
compounded, for some young professionals, by a reluctance to have a long-term
relationship at all. Today, by the time someone reaches 30, they could easily
have had three or four jobs in as many different cities - which is not, as it is
often portrayed, a function of an insecure global job-market, but of choice.

Robert is 30 years old. He has three degrees and has worked on three continents. He is currently working for the United Nations in Geneva. For him, the most significant deterrent when deciding whether to enter into a relationship is the likely transient nature of the rest of his life.

"What is the point in investing all this emotional energy and exposing myself in
a relationship, if I am leaving in two months, or if I do not know what I am
doing next year?" he says.

Such is the character of the modern, international professional, at least
throughout his or her 20s. Spare time, goods and relationships, these are all
willingly traded for the exigencies of work. Nothing is valued so highly as
accumulated experience. Nothing is neglected so much as commitment.

With this work ethic - or perhaps one should call it a professional development
ethic" - becoming so powerful, the globally mobile generation now in its late
20s and early 30s has garnered considerable professional success.

At what point, though, does the experience-seeking end? Kathryn is a successful American academic, 29, who bucked the trend of her generation: she recently turned her life round for someone else. She moved to the UK, specifically, to be with a man, a decision that she says few of her contemporaries understood.

"We're not meant to say: 'I made this decision for this person. Today, you're
meant to do things for yourself. If you're willing to make sacrifices for others
- especially if you're a woman - that's seen as a kind of weakness. I wonder,
though, is doing things for yourself really empowerment, or is liberty a kind of
trap?" she says.

For many, it is a trap that is difficult to break out of, not least because they
are so caught up in a culture of professional development. And spoilt for
choice, some like the American Rhodes Scholar no doubt become paralysed by their opportunities, unable to do much else in their lives, because they are so
determined not to let a single one of their chances slip.

If that means minimal personal commitments well into their 30s, so be it.
"Loneliness is better than boredom" is Jane's philosophy. And, although she
knows "a lot of professional single women who would give it all up if they met a
"rich man to marry", she remains far more concerned herself about finding
fulfilment at work.

"I am constantly questioning whether I am doing the right thing here," she says.
"There's an eternal search for a more challenging and satisfying option, a
better lifestyle. You always feel you're not doing the right thing, always feel
as if you should be striving for another goal," she says.

Jane, Michael, Robert and Kathryn grew up as part of a generation with fewer
social constraints determining their futures than has been true for probably any
other generation in history. They were taught at school that when they grew up
they could "do anything", "be anything". It was an idea that was reinforced by
popular culture, in films, books and television.

The notion that one can do anything is clearly liberating. But life without
constraints has also proved a recipe for endless searching, endless questioning
of aspirations. It has made this generation obsessed with self-development and
determined, for as long as possible, to minimise personal commitments in order
to maximise the options open to them.

One might see this as a sign of extended adolescence. Eventually, they will be
forced to realise that living is as much about closing possibilities as it is
about creating them."



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I feel this actually supports, and almost justifies for me, many of the feelings I'm having about work right now. I think if you have the right job, you will want to work long hours - but forcing yourself to do just that in order to achieve happiness isn't the way. I feel like that's the routine that I'm in now, or at least the culture that surrounds me.

I'm also very aware that I essentially have many options open to me outide of this job, but the difference in my case is 1.) I'm only, technically, qualified for the one I am in now (just one degree, people) and 2.) I'm financially and contractually indebted to the one I am in now

And I can say, with unwavering conviction, that I am more certain with every passing day that this job is not for me. It doesn't reciprocate my mind, thoughts, and soul - it will not satisfy my deep desire to create things that are profound and meaningful, to stir people's minds and heart - to enrich their lives.

It's funny seeing myself write that. I wrote those same words many years ago in high school when trying to describe what I wanted to do with my life without pinpointing an occupation. It doesn't fit at all with where I am. I'm far too human for my job.