Hello I'm Rich Brown and this is my personal website and blog. I'm just your simple, average, down to earth, professional, out gay man and aspiring circuit boy, living in Phoenix, Arizona with a few things to say while trying to find my place among all the scary, conservative, religious nuts in this sick and twisted world.
Monday, October 22, 2001
@ Work
Ok -- so I basically had a pretty terrible weekend.
First of all I'm still sick from last week. At least one good thing -- my cough is almost gone now and all I have left is some congestion and general ill feeling.
The weekend actually started off pretty good. I went out to dinner with Steven, Philip and Brett to Tin Pan on Friday night. Steven met up again with his cousin Bonnie and we headed down to Martooni's to hang out and have a Martini. Philip, Brett and I left them there after about 2 hours to head up to the Cafe for a little bit. Martooni's was fun but I can only handle that place in small doses, and besides there wasn't much to look at in the crowd. Steven eventually headed up to the Cafe and we closed the place. Following the Cafe we went over to Baghdad Cafe to have some late night breakfast and that pretty much ended the night. Steven stayed overnight again at my place and we talked for a bit and then went to sleep.
Saturday was supposed to be a relaxing day. We slept in and got up around noon. I did get some rest and felt good since I was able to sleep in. I hoped in the shower and that's when things got really bad. I was coughing so much in the shower that I pulled a muscle in my back. I was just standing there coughing and all of a sudden this sharp pain hit me in my lower back, I almost fell to my knees. I stretched my back a bit and it seemed to feel alright, just a little tight. Steven and I headed down to our favorite place, Squat & Gobble to grab some salads before we went out shopping. As the day progressed my back just felt worse and worse. I couldn't even stand up straight. Anyway we headed down to the Sketchers Outlet on Mission so that I could hopefully get some shoes. Steven served as my personal fashion consultant and helped me pick out some "non-big-old-clunky-lesbian" shoes. I really like the 2 pairs that I purchased. They are pretty stylish. We then met up with Philip and Brett and headed over to Stonestown Mall where I bought some new clothes from J Crew, Abercrombie, and Banana Republic. I used the money my Mother gave me for my birthday since I was in desperate need of some new things. Following our shopping spree we dropped Brett off at his house in the Haight and headed back to my place so that we could go to the gym. The moment I sat down on the bed I knew that I wasn't going anywhere for the rest of the night. My back was just killing me and I could barely move. I decided to skip the gym, skip the party at Brett's friend's and skip a late night at Metropolis all to stay home and rest.
So -- I thought I was going to stay home and rest, but did that happen. No -- Well I did stay home but the rest part never happened. I was checking my mail for a minute and wondered why my computer was responding so slowly. I did a scan on the network connections and found all of these connections from Europe open on my server. After some more research I found that my system was totally compromised and there was about 2 GB of files being stored on my computer from Europe. Ugh -- so that started my long night. I had to back up some file and rebuild my server from scratch. I was needing to do this anyway, but it just gave me the reason to do so. So I spent the night getting things backed up and rebuilding the server. Just as I was about done with most of it, it was around 7am so I decided to go to bed. So much for laying in bed and resting. One of these months I may actually get to rest. This is really throwing my workout schedule off.
Sunday wasn't much better. I woke up around 1 pm and as I sat down in front of my computer again I found that I had been targeted again and had been infected with 3 viruses. All because I didn't apply the Microsoft Security patches before I went to bed. Ugh. So I had to once again rebuild my system and clean the contents of both drives. What a chore. This time I kept it off the internet until I had everything patched. It seems like everything is alright now. I should actually image my drive at this point and then I won't have to start over again in case something happens. So my Sunday was spent with a sore back and rebuilding my system for a second time. Not exactly my idea of a restful day. The evening ended up with me laying in bed and watching some TV before I went to sleep. What a bust.
I'm really going to have to take one of these weekends and just spend some time to myself. I love my friends and hanging out with them but I just have not had any time to get some things done that I've needed to do. Rest is one of them. I know this weekend isn't going to be any better with it being the weekend before Halloween there are going to be a bunch of parties. Also my friends from Philadelphia are coming out so I'll have to go to dinner with them one of the nights. Maybe the weekend after my birthday I'll be able to just stay in and get caught up on some of my tasks. Who knows.
So now -- I'm sitting here at work with a sore back and just irritated. I am actually starting to feel a little bit better with the exception of my back. Hopefully the Motrin will kick in soon. I know that I have to go home tonight and go to bed at a reasonable time. Maybe around 9 or 10.
So I'm irritated about my job. Can I just say how much I really despise my job right now. I don't know why ... well yes I do ... it's boring, mundane, routine and I just hate what I'm doing. I do not want to be a programmer. I know that for a fact. I enjoy computers but I think I rather enjoy them as more of a hobby then working with them for my career. I don't know ... maybe I should think about going back into system administration. At least that wasn't the same thing every day. I just hate having to sit here and write code all day. I really think I was meant to be around people and interact. I feel so secluded at work and I hate it. I actually hate getting up in the morning to come to work. I don't know if I'm ever going to find a job where I'm happy.
I think the only choice left for me is to get my bills taken care of and go back to school. I really miss college and I want to go back.. I want to go back and stay there and hopefully get a teaching position somewhere. Oh well ... Back to work I suppose.
