As promised, here's the follow-up to this morning's post. I had a good first day at work, a little nervous, but still good. It was very strange being the new kid on the block after being the longest-serving developer for a long time at my previous job. It's also an entirely different environment there. It's just a big office full of hardcore developers, and it's all about the software. I felt a bit out of place trying to get used to completely unfamiliar tools on the fly. Still, everyone I met was really nice, and they've already got me started on an interesting project.
The commute, as expected, was a bit of a drag just in the sense that it really eats in to my day. Still, as a process taking the subway is pretty comfortable, so no worries there. Being downtown has it's perks too... chief amongst those being a wealth of restaurants to choose from when lunchtime rolls around. My inaugural lunch was at Khao San Road, a Thai place just up the road from the office. Mmmmm... Thai food. I've still got Smoke's Poutinerie and Burrito Boys in my sights. Both of those establishments are in the same building as my office, so that shouldn't really be a problem. Burrito Boys was top of the list for today, but we headed out for lunch around 12:05, which is far too late to be going to Burrito Boys. We'll head out a bit earlier some other time this week.
Well, I think I've given my dinner enough time to settle, it's time for me to get into my evening workout. I hope you're all doing well and I'll talk to you next Tuesday.
Tuesday 22 February 2011
A New Hope
Well ladies and gents, it's just about time for me to start my new job! It's an exciting prospect; this is the first time I've changed jobs since I finished college. I hadn't really been thinking of a topic for this week since I wasn't sure how my schedule was going to play out, but it's looking like I shouldn't have any difficulties continuing with my usual Tuesday morning posts. I think I'll actually double-up on the blogging this week and write to you again tonight to let you all know how my first day at the new job goes.
Unfortunately I'm looking at less free time during the course of a usual day because a lot more of my time is going to be spent commuting. I'm looking at something in the area of a 45 minute subway ride to and from work. So I'm getting up an hour and a half earlier than I usually do, but I imagine I'll be getting home from work around the same time I always did. I'll just roll with that for now, but in the coming months I think I'll have to start looking at making a move closer to the downtown core. I don't think I'll be getting anything right in the heart of downtown, but something a little closer to work wouldn't hurt my feelings.
In completely unrelated news, if you're a Rammstein fan and you don't read Jay's blog over at http://jabbles.blogspot.com/ I highly recommend that you go check out his latest post. Looks like they're coming to Toronto and I aim to be there.
For now I'd better wrap this up and get ready to roll out. Like I said before, I'll make this a two-parter and update you all on my first day when I get home tonight. The blog postings should continue their usual Tuesday routine uninterrupted by my change of employers! Have a great day everyone.
Unfortunately I'm looking at less free time during the course of a usual day because a lot more of my time is going to be spent commuting. I'm looking at something in the area of a 45 minute subway ride to and from work. So I'm getting up an hour and a half earlier than I usually do, but I imagine I'll be getting home from work around the same time I always did. I'll just roll with that for now, but in the coming months I think I'll have to start looking at making a move closer to the downtown core. I don't think I'll be getting anything right in the heart of downtown, but something a little closer to work wouldn't hurt my feelings.
In completely unrelated news, if you're a Rammstein fan and you don't read Jay's blog over at http://jabbles.blogspot.com/ I highly recommend that you go check out his latest post. Looks like they're coming to Toronto and I aim to be there.
For now I'd better wrap this up and get ready to roll out. Like I said before, I'll make this a two-parter and update you all on my first day when I get home tonight. The blog postings should continue their usual Tuesday routine uninterrupted by my change of employers! Have a great day everyone.
Tuesday 15 February 2011
What's Happening In Toronto
Good morning everyone!
I'll apologize in advance, but I'm going to have to keep this short. My net connection has been shockingly slow this morning and just getting through my usual morning routine and getting logged in to Blogger has taken up the better part of my free pre-work time.
That's okay though, I really just wanted to bring this to everyone's attention: http://www.
The show isn't this coming weekend, but the following one and while I'm not sure exactly how that weekend is shaping up at the moment, I'm certainly going to try to get out there and check it out. It's at the International Centre, which is a pain because it's not nearly as nice as the Metro Toronto Convention Centre downtown, but I think this will be worth the trip out to Mississauga.
I'm not actually in the market for any new camping gear, I'll mostly just be going to see what's new and exciting out there. Also, it seems like a guy could get some interesting travel ideas at a place like this.
If anyone is going to be in the neighbourhood that weekend let me know and we can go check it out. Otherwise I'll report back here on what I find out in a couple weeks.
Well, this is probably going to take 10 minutes to post, so I'm going to wrap things up here. I hope you're all doing well.
I'll apologize in advance, but I'm going to have to keep this short. My net connection has been shockingly slow this morning and just getting through my usual morning routine and getting logged in to Blogger has taken up the better part of my free pre-work time.
That's okay though, I really just wanted to bring this to everyone's attention: http://www.
The show isn't this coming weekend, but the following one and while I'm not sure exactly how that weekend is shaping up at the moment, I'm certainly going to try to get out there and check it out. It's at the International Centre, which is a pain because it's not nearly as nice as the Metro Toronto Convention Centre downtown, but I think this will be worth the trip out to Mississauga.
I'm not actually in the market for any new camping gear, I'll mostly just be going to see what's new and exciting out there. Also, it seems like a guy could get some interesting travel ideas at a place like this.
If anyone is going to be in the neighbourhood that weekend let me know and we can go check it out. Otherwise I'll report back here on what I find out in a couple weeks.
Well, this is probably going to take 10 minutes to post, so I'm going to wrap things up here. I hope you're all doing well.
Tuesday 8 February 2011
Time For A Change
Good morning ladies and gentlemen!
My apologies for missing last week's blog post, I seem to be a bit disorganized since the beginning of the new year and haven't been keeping up with the blog the way I should. I'm trying to get myself back into a normal routine here and get everything working the way it should.
Contrary to that though, I've got a major shake-up coming in my daily routine! I've just recently accepted a position with Five Mobile and will be working downtown with Graydyn making software for cell phones. My last day at Computershare is February 17th which will give me a 4-day long weekend (with Family Day on the Monday) before I start work at Five on the 22nd. It's all pretty exciting; this is the first time since I got out of college that I've changed jobs. I've been at Computershare for over 7 years now, so I think it's going to feel pretty weird not going there anymore. Still, I needed a change of pace in my life, and this was the perfect opportunity. I'm going to be working with some really exciting new technologies, and I know I'm going to learn a lot while I'm there.
The flip-side to all of this, and what makes it relevant to my travel blog is that I'm losing a lot of vacation time in the deal. Going from 5 to 3 weeks of vacation time is going to be a difficult adjustment, and is going to heavily impact my ability to travel this year. I don't have any travel plans at the moment (outside of a couple days for our camping trip in May) so I'm going to have to think long and hard about what I want to do with my limited budget of vacation days. I can see myself really trying to do what I'm doing in May and just use a day or two to extend out a long weekend and get the most bang for my vacation day buck.
Working downtown should be an interesting experience for me. I've only been downtown a couple dozen times in my 7 years here in Toronto; it's just not somewhere that I go very often. I know that Graydyn has really developed an appreciation for life downtown since he started working with Five, so maybe this will be an eye-opener for me in regards to urban life.
In regards to the camping trip that I'd mentioned earlier, it's still a bit up in the air at this point. I don't foresee it being an issue, but I will need to confirm with my new employers that I can get a couple days off around the May 24 long weekend. I'm just going to wait until I'm in the office on the 22nd to confirm all of that, and I'll get back to you all then. Dad wanted me to mention though that this may be one of our easiest and most luxurious camping trips yet, so anyone who feels like a camping trip but doesn't want to subject themselves to our usual routine of portages and dehydrated foods may want to get in on this one.
That's all for now folks. I hope you're all doing well, and I will do my best to talk to you all next week as promised! Until then, have a wonderful week.
My apologies for missing last week's blog post, I seem to be a bit disorganized since the beginning of the new year and haven't been keeping up with the blog the way I should. I'm trying to get myself back into a normal routine here and get everything working the way it should.
Contrary to that though, I've got a major shake-up coming in my daily routine! I've just recently accepted a position with Five Mobile and will be working downtown with Graydyn making software for cell phones. My last day at Computershare is February 17th which will give me a 4-day long weekend (with Family Day on the Monday) before I start work at Five on the 22nd. It's all pretty exciting; this is the first time since I got out of college that I've changed jobs. I've been at Computershare for over 7 years now, so I think it's going to feel pretty weird not going there anymore. Still, I needed a change of pace in my life, and this was the perfect opportunity. I'm going to be working with some really exciting new technologies, and I know I'm going to learn a lot while I'm there.
The flip-side to all of this, and what makes it relevant to my travel blog is that I'm losing a lot of vacation time in the deal. Going from 5 to 3 weeks of vacation time is going to be a difficult adjustment, and is going to heavily impact my ability to travel this year. I don't have any travel plans at the moment (outside of a couple days for our camping trip in May) so I'm going to have to think long and hard about what I want to do with my limited budget of vacation days. I can see myself really trying to do what I'm doing in May and just use a day or two to extend out a long weekend and get the most bang for my vacation day buck.
Working downtown should be an interesting experience for me. I've only been downtown a couple dozen times in my 7 years here in Toronto; it's just not somewhere that I go very often. I know that Graydyn has really developed an appreciation for life downtown since he started working with Five, so maybe this will be an eye-opener for me in regards to urban life.
In regards to the camping trip that I'd mentioned earlier, it's still a bit up in the air at this point. I don't foresee it being an issue, but I will need to confirm with my new employers that I can get a couple days off around the May 24 long weekend. I'm just going to wait until I'm in the office on the 22nd to confirm all of that, and I'll get back to you all then. Dad wanted me to mention though that this may be one of our easiest and most luxurious camping trips yet, so anyone who feels like a camping trip but doesn't want to subject themselves to our usual routine of portages and dehydrated foods may want to get in on this one.
That's all for now folks. I hope you're all doing well, and I will do my best to talk to you all next week as promised! Until then, have a wonderful week.
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