Foggy Without Sleep

Working on a multicontinent schedule means I have calls at 7:00 a.m., meeting in the afternoon, and calls around 11:00 p.m. - 1:00 a.m. Ugh. Be careful what you wish for....

First Days in Germany

Came across this note from the first week I spent in germany in October 1999:

Well, it's been a full week, I can tell you--left last Monday, arrived Tuesday. Came to the office for a couple of hours, then went to the hotel they'd booked for me. Wednesday was a full work day! Thursday, too--and that night I went out with three of the guys from the company to eat & drink & chat. Lots o'fun! Friday I was told I'd be moving to an apartment...but I'd already made plans to go see a good friend of mine play blues in Belgium (see http://hometown.aol.com/terrygblues or http://www.macol.net/~~jsokohl/blues.html). Had to leave at 1 and got there at almost 10. Great night, lots of music, but had to find a place to crash. The club owner was nice enough to let me stay with him. The Belgians are very nice!
The next day I spent on the trains getting back to Hamburg. Saturday night I then had to get all my stuff from the hotel & move into the apartment. Yesterday I went shopping at the main train station (Hauptbahnhof), since the stores aren't open on Sundays...except for the ones in train stations. Comical....So, I had to buy a few items, just to survive for a couple of days. Still have to buy soap & another pillow (the one in the place is a feather pillow, and I like more neck support!).
So, I´m slowly getting used to living in Germany...it´s a bit different from all the times I traveled here before!

It was a great time, and it was quite a weekend. Seems like so long ago...

Coming Back from Boston

Had a set of very good meetings with my former boss/now peer, Kathy. We had great discussions about IAs, UX, and the integration of our newly defined areas. It's a small but important step.

Are You Es-in' Me?

Unbelievable. Not the archaic title (it's users folks, not end users), and not the context-mapping marketing....but the freakin' price. In an Amazon.com email, they sent me this info:

We've noticed that customers who have purchased or rated GUI Bloopers: Don'ts and Do's for Software Developers and Web Designers (Interactive Technologies) by Jeff Johnson have also purchased End-user Computing: Concepts, Methodologies, Tools and Applications by Steve Clarke. For this reason, you might like to know that End-user Computing: Concepts, Methodologies, Tools and Applications is now available. You can order yours for just $1,400.00 by following the link below.

Yup, that's the price—One thousand, four hundred dollars! Not Rupees, not Lire, but dollars. Four hardbound books with a total of 2,600 pages. That's a buck-eighty a page. Compare that to Jeff Johnson's great and practical book, which comes in at about a $.067 a page.