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2008-03-12 02:42 -
It’s been two months since I moved to the Bay Area on a permanent basis, nine months since my SRS, and six weeks since I started working at Google. I’m roughly at the point where my life is becoming stable, productive, and completely happy (albeit with a few small hiccups). I occasionally get in an introspective mood and read old journal entries or forum posts of mine – the contrast is pretty visible to me. Transition was truly magical for me. To the psychologist who claimed 3 years ago that I was confused, “transition is a simple, shortsighted solution to a set of more complicated issues [she] needs to discuss and work out”, and that “surgery won’t solve the problems… [there are] indications that [she] will be just as unhappy after SRS” – you were so incredibly wrong. Thank you for making my life so much harder when I least needed to be hurt.
My work at Google is immensely fulfilling – I don’t regret my decision to leave Caltech for a single moment. I love the fact that I can throw myself entirely into tackling problems or designing new infrastructure for hours on end (and get paid for it, instead of paying for the privilege of turning in set after set…). Although people here are a little bit less off the wall than Techers, I can imagine most of the people around me being grown up versions of Techers – very witty and smart, but quite not as crazy :). Real Genius was mentioned at lunch a few days ago, and led into an enjoyable retelling of my stories about Hell Ride, Ditch Day, and the tunnels. And of course, there are quite a few Techers that are out as Googlers, including Niniane (who was among the people who encouraged me to join Google) and Dan (who happens to be also a former UGCS sysadmin).
Unfortunately, I lost my Sidekick last Friday while waiting for the shuttle to work. I have to heap copious amounts of praise upon the team at Danger for their platform – although replacing my phone Monday wasn’t pleasant for my pocketbook, it was amazing to have my new phone magically recover every single setting, contact, and application within 15 minutes and for me to rest assured that my old phone had been effectively bricked and the data erased from local storage. It let me more or less get on seamlessly with my digitally-obsessed life (the weekend was an immense pain without a consistent connection to the internet).
Dilation is interfering with my life less and less – I’m down now to 2 or fewer hours once every 36 hours and have occasionally done every 48 hours without too much pain. I can finally make plans to stay out late and sleep in without worrying about my chores. I recently acquired a small plastic vibrator that’s about the same shape as the small dilator that I use but much shorter (so it’ll stay in without being held by hand in addition to its other advantages). I can actually be more productive during dilation time and am no longer confined to bed with useless hands.
I owe a hat tip to my father for co-authoring an amicus brief before the California Supreme Court in favor of gay marriage. Thank you, Papa. I love you.
World of Warcraft is also going fairly decently, although I’ve mostly been signing on only during scheduled raids recently. In addition to my current commute’s drain upon my energy, I’ve found that using my brain the whole day at work means I need a lot more time at home to spend quietly reading instead of taking on challenges in WoW. Amitié has been consistently running Karazhan with 3 separate groups, and clearing Gruul’s Lair. Unfortunately, only one or two of the Kara groups each week has been managing a full instance clear within a single night (~5-6 hours in one stretch), but hopefully people will have better attendance and gear/skill in the near future to make things run more smoothly. My character is now geared almost entirely in epics and has 3 pieces of her Tier 4 set. I’ve had a great deal of success with my unorthodox talent spec – I’ve been occasionally topping the DPS charts and am always in the top half now. I’d say that my grinding over winter break has gotten me to the place I wanted to be – at the same level as others in my raid groups and keeping up with a very modest time commitment each week.
This Saturday, I’m moving to Santa Clara and joining a friend at her apartment complex – we won’t be sharing the same apartment, but we’ll be just down the hall from each other and able to hang out spontaneously on weekends/evenings and carpool to work together. It’ll be really nice to be on a flexible 15-minute commute rather than my current fixed-departure 75 minute commute (the latter has wireless, but that doesn’t offset the suck of being in limbo between work and home). The rent is rather eye-popping, but worth it for the better balance between work and life I’ll have. I definitely should have enough room for people to come and visit as well as possibly subletting space over the summer if anyone’s doing an internship in Silicon Valley.
My next big non-work project (well, aside from completing the move and getting my 2007 taxes done) is to plan my travel for the next few months. I was planning on going skiing in Bear Valley with a number of Caltech alums this weekend, but the apartment move is going to have to preempt skiing unfortunately. I’m contemplating going to ROFLCon in Cambridge, MA on April 25-26; however, they’re down to the last 100 spots and I’m still on the fence (if I can work that week in Boston, logistics become a lot simpler). I’m definitely attending the unofficial Puzzle Pirates gathering in Dallas on May 16-May 18 to say hi to some old faces from that community. And yes, frosh, I will be popping down to Tech for Associates’ Tea and/or Ditch Day, assuming that Tomorrow doesn’t conflict with any other obligations of mine (psst, if a friendly senior reads this, please drop me a note so I can book my tickets – I won’t peep a word).
The main issue I’m struggling with is the reality that some of my friends aren’t having a smooth ride at the moment. Unfortunately, there’s very little that I can do aside from listening if someone needs to share, and offering comforting hugs. The powerlessness is what is frustrating for me – I find myself periodically reminding myself of this XKCD comic. Everyone’s path is different. Does the walker choose the path or the path choose the walker?
Anyhow… that’s pretty much my current state. It is now officially waaay past my bedtime as I have to be out the door in about 5 hours, but I tend to keep writing once I get started…
<- Settling in She listens like spring and talks like June ->
