Strange week. . .

I know I’ve been unusually quiet this week. It was partially due to the work load on the job, but also due to some fairly strange activities this week as well.

The experience I posted about last ended up very oddly. I’d emailed the person who’d originally contacted me to let him know I’d been very surprised, and disappointed when I’d talked to the account manager. He actually called me on Monday to let me know it hadn’t been his account manager as she’d ended up going home sick the day of the call.

Interesting because it had been at the exact time we’d scheduled for the call, but, I have to admit I didn’t verify who I was talking to, I simply assumed I knew who it was. In the end, they agreed to present my ‘package’ to the client, so I guess we’ll see what shakes out.

The next thing that happened, was that someone I haven’t talked to in over a year, called me, ostensibly “by mistake” and we ended up talking for 30 minutes or so, and it’s possible he’s finally decided it wasn’t me who was hacking his system at work. I’ve missed talking with this fellow; we were good friends for many years. When he accused me of hacking into his system, I was hurt, and yet flattered, at the same time.

Hurt, that he’d think I was stupid enough to even attempt such a thing. (I can’t imagine a better way to commit professional suicide) Yet flattered that he would think I had the professional chops to slip past the firewalls, gain control of the servers and cause him the problems he was having, all without leaving a trail of ‘breadcrumbs’ behind. (for the record, I don’t have those types of skills).

At any rate, it was good to hear from him, and know that he’s well. I guess we’ll see what happens next.

Then yesterday, my stepson called me.

This might not seem like much of a deal, but, it’s been about a year and a half since I’ve gotten anything except a stray email from him. Long story short, he made me a promise, broke it, and I called him on it. He vanished the next day and has been rarely heard from since.

It seems he and his sister (who hasn’t called since New Years) have decided they want to show up and take their Mom out to lunch on Sunday… Our conversation essentially revolved around the concept that he’d do himself, and his sister, a favor by asking their Mom if she wanted to do that before they just showed up. I know their absence has hurt me, but, I also know it’s been much harder on their Mom.

The last strange thing that’s happened this week is that I was asked to put a new application in place for the Customer Service Center at work. This, less than a week after I was told that FoxPro applications could not be used for internal, or external applications by one of new folks I report to. Not only was I asked to do that, but when I emailed my old project manager that I’d have it ready to go for a Monday install, she announced it to the company… It will be interesting on Monday to see how that all plays out.

The last item on my weirdness-meter this week is a project I’ve been tossing around in my head for a bit now. I ran it by 4 or 5 folks I thought might be interested in working on it with me as I think it has a fairly good chance of being a viable commercial product if we do it right.

One guy, “across the pond” is on board, the others, even the two fellows locally I’ve mentioned it to (and was sure would want in), have basically said “nice idea”, but don’t seem at all interested in working on it. Regardless, I know I’ll press forward, but I felt it would be a much better product if I could have gotten a team of 4 or more to collectively lay it out, break it up, and then dig in and build it.

I know the approach is unique, the need is there and it’s a very “do-able” project, even for a small team… maybe I just haven’t found the right team players yet.

On the other hand… we got a bunch of needed rain this week… and we’re supposed to get a bit more overnight tonight, with the sky’s clearing just in time to mow the lawn on Saturday!!

So what kind of week have you had??


Technorati Tags: Weird Week - Friends - Family - Software Development
-IceRocket Tags: Software Development - Family - Friends - Weird Week