The First Week

So, by way of a catch-up, here's a quick run-down of my first week as a "resident" of New York City.

Ok, I say resident. The first 10 days I was in a hotel, but a nice one. Here was my room:

And the view from the window:

It was just off Wall Street. Whilst I was glad of work paying for the hotel and flying me over, I tried to spend as little time there as possible. Working the day after I got off the plane helped! We're in 7 World Trade Center; currently on the 30th floor and looking to move even higher. The current view is not too shabby though, aside from the 9/11 Memorial's construction:

Then, on the first full night, I went round to Matt's in Jersey. He has a mat with his name on it:

Well, sort of. Anyway it was a good idea to check out his place as he has one of the most enviable commutes in any big city; a 5-minute walk and a 7-minute train ride, to the door of the office! I was thinking of moving to Jersey for this great commute and also it might suit us better when L moves out here with me. Also, Matt's place is huge and for a similar price as I might pay for a closet in Manhattan. More on that later.

So, I then hit the weekend. Of course, the office took me to a couple of local bars by way of a welcome. I drank too much and staggered back to my hotel. Saturday I had planned to go see an apartment in Brooklyn. Whilst my plan was to look for a cheap flat-share to get me out of hotel stays (allowing me to then look for a place for me and L), I wasn't expecting as er... studenty... as the place I saw. Not a nice neighbourhood, and a window-less room in a converted factory which smelled distinctly of *ahem* "special herbs" and looked like they had thrown a party until 6am. Which they probably had. Not for me. I had very little luck looking for a place to do me after my 10-day hotel stint; so I changed my approach. I figured I could look for places starting May 1st and deal with surfing the many couches my wonderfully kind workmates had offered. But as for Saturday, it was a write off. So I went up to a friend & colleague's place in the Upper West side of Manhattan, and had a blast. Drank in a couple of really nice bars which were, naturally for NYC, open until 4am. Taxi back to the hotel, awaiting more flathunting hungover the next day...

I wasn't too hungover. Thankfully sticking to beer mostly paid off. So I went up to the Upper East Side and saw one of the strangest places ever. It was 4 floors up (no elevator in these old buildings) and the "room" was a loft conversion. Well, not exactly a loft, but a loft SPACE. I wouldn't store my suitcases up there, yet there were TWO rooms, accessible via a hatch, which somehow had a mattress in each. I could lie down in my room, but that's it. Surely that has to be illegal?

So, feeling rather out of luck I went all the way back down to South Manhattan and caught that luxury 7-minute commuter train out to Jersey City. There was a room for grabs out near Matt's place and I figured it sounded good. It may have been the sunny day, the hangover, or the really nice friendly people (a couple) in the place but I decided pretty much there and then I would go for it. It was a bare room, and I had no bed, but that seemed trivial compared to the dismay of no responses and looking at terrible apartments. Plus, it was CHEAP and that commute! So good!

I walked to the nearby park and enjoyed the sun, calling L on a cellphone I had borrowed from another saviour of a workmate. Living without a phone is weird in this day and age! I then decided I would check out one of the nearby "trendy" neighbourhoods that Jersey has to offer; Hoboken. They had a nice riverside walk and I snapped a quick pic of Manhattan on my (SIM-less) phone:

Not bad. That place in that picture will be my home for at least a year. Well, looks like I'm going to be in Jersey for a little while at least, but the proximity to the office where I spend 5 days a week means that NYC will still very much be "home" for now!

What's Happening?

I haven't used my blog much. That's going to change. Why? Because a lot is happening, and people will want to read about it. Maybe not many people, but enough that makes me happy to know they're in the loop. Here's the quick breakdown:

1. I got engaged, to the delightful Laura Kate. 
2. We packed up our things, put a load in storage, moved out of the flat in London. 
3. Laura moved home to Wisconsin for a bit. 
4. I transferred to my company's New York office. 

And what's going to happen?

1. We will get married in October, in Wisconsin 
2. Laura will join me in New York 
3. ...who knows. Probably go back to London! 

Already after 3 weeks in New York there is much to share and talk about, as it's a bit of an adventure for me. So we'll have some catch-up posts then hopefully start a regular (probably every other day) "Today in New York" posting, probably with a photo. Flickr is also the best place to get the full picture-story, but I'm behind on that right now.

But the blogging and updates start here and now!

A Natural Progression of a Day at Work

An Open Letter to Virgin Media

FAO Virgin Media Accounts and/or Customer Service Team:

Hello,

I am once again emailing with regard to a Virgin Media account which I have tried to transfer for 18 months now:

Account Number: XXXXXXXXXXXXXX
Address: XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

When I left the residence in June 2010, I asked on at least 2 occasions for the account to be transferred to the tenants who wanted to keep the service. On both occasions, I was assured the account had been moved. I contacted this email address once more having been hassled repeatedly by Virgin Media to pay bills or handle correspondence regarding this supposedly transferred account. Again, I was assured the matter had been resolved and that I would not be further contacted about the account.

I have now been contacted by tenants of the property, whose Virgin Media service has not been functional for some time. Virgin are supposedly unable to discuss the matter, without a password from the account holder, which supposedly is still myself. As I have been assured at least 3 times that I am no longer the account holder, and have not been at the property for over a year and a half, I no longer have such a password to hand.

Due to a complete absence of a contact email address or direct phone number on the Virgin Media site (I have been presented with many tempting opportunities to discuss this ridiculous affair with members of the "Community Forum" - but not the actual organisation involved) I have no idea what sort of information I can provide to allow Virgin Media to actually discuss the matter with the residents of the property involved. I am hereby giving full authorisation of the account to those at the property above. I have copied in (name removed), who originally got in touch with me about this situation. Please can a member of the Virgin Media accounts team liase with her to resolve the problems with her service, and to transfer the responsibility of the account from my name.

Urgency and effective resolution of the problems would be very much appreciated. I have thus far received neither from Virgin Media during my many discussions with their Customer Services, and frankly am insulted that I still have to deal with their mess 18 months later.

Best,
Alan Sharp

Juxtaposition

Been meaning to take this for months, since I found an amusing arrangement of disgusting takeaways and signage between my flat and the train station...

De-Beard-ification!

So, I was lazy during October and November so I ended up growing a beard. When I eventually decided to remove it, I of course *had* to take "progress report" photos along the way. Enjoy its ridiculousness...

Microsoft, Microsoft, Microsoft

At work I do an unfortunately significant amount of development for Microsoft products. This usually results in building solutions in Visual Studio, which is their preferred manner of building solutions, since it is of course their own product.

Today, I had to work out how to build a solution for SharePoint, and I was presented with the most glaringly obvious example of how Microsoft are lost in their own mess of products.

To break it down, here is what I was trying to do:

Develop using Microsoft Visual Studio
Develop in Microsoft Windows 7
Develop for Microsoft SharePoint

Now, bearing in mind that VS 2010 comes PRE-LOADED with a SharePoint development environment, how hard can it be? After all, everything here is MS; no 3rd parties, where I could see integration being a problem.

However, I cannot actually start a project without SharePoint installed. OK, I'll install SharePoint. But I'm not allowed to install SharePoint without running Windows Server as my OS. Some might think "fair enough, it's a server-based application", but others, like me, thought "how many developers log into a LIVE server to develop on a different machine??". Or "insanity!" for short.

What made the whole situation amusing, was this: a step-by-step guide, written by Microsoft themselves on how to essentially fool Microsoft SharePoint into thinking you have Microsoft Windows Server instead of Microsoft Windows 7 so you can use Microsoft Visual Studio. It involved installing lots of Windows "hotfixes". The whole thing sounded like one guy at MS, tutting to himself going "nice work guys, none of these work together... and who has to save the public? Muggins here...".

Of course, even though I have everything I need locally, I can't actually connect to our external server to read data, nor can I deploy any solutions directly to the server.

The indication to me is that Microsoft, so large following their success in the 90s, have too many teams, too many products, and too little help. Huge ranges of products may provide businesses with out-of-the box solutions; but they definitely lack a "uniformed interfacing" approach when it comes to development. After all, how can any developer be expected to integrate Microsoft systems with their business, when Microsoft can't even integrate their own systems without their own special brand of "hotfix glue"...?

Relax Before The Rush

Right before I rushed off on holiday (more on that later - I really need to catch up!) we were taken on a little treat at work...



I say rushed off. I mean it: by the time we finished for the night I had 3hrs before a taxi to the train station! So I tried the best I could to enjoy the peaceful surroundings and amenities of Babington House, in Somerset.



It's reportedly popular with the celebs for a bit of getaway; we took the entire company (minus one, who was there in spirit as well as cardboard cut-out form..) and rented out the place. And then had a sports day! How nostalgic!



But of course, when the sack races, egg-and-spoon races, and well-throwing was done, we got to enjoy the heated pool, the free bar (FREE BAR!), a delightful meal, and one great party! I was remarkably tired, and with a plane to catch, I was a little disappointed I couldn't enjoy my amazing room for a lot longer!





See the whole set here.

10 Years Ago

It seemed apt to post some thoughts today, on the 10th anniversary of the attacks on September 11th, 2001. I don't want it to be cheesy, or disrespectful, or anything like that. So no pictures.

I remember the day well; it's hard not to remember "where you were" when you first turned the TV on. I was hanging about at home, with no job as I was preparing to head off to University for the first time a couple of weeks later. I was talking to friends online, who suddenly went quiet except for demands that everyone should turn the news on, right now. I remember looking at the twin towers, one on fire. I didn't think too much of it; fires happen all the time, right? Then I saw the replay of a plane flying into it... That set the whole air of disbelief for the entire day. The other plane, news of attacks on the Pentagon and other planes coming down, until the towers themselves came down. It somehow never seemed quite real; you couldn't really get your head around the scale of what was happening.

In fact, I never could quite comprehend, even from all the news cameras and amateur footage, the size of the buildings as they were toppling - never mind the amount of people they would contain. I had never been to New York, nor had I been to any city even remotely as "tall" as New York. Only once I visited New York for business last year, did I try to get my head around the size of what happened. I went to Ground Zero; not deliberately (I was merely playing tourist around South Manhattan); and it was looking up that made me realise that something so huge was so very missing, in a sudden wide open space.

Our New York office has now moved into the new WTC 7 building - I've seen the view from pictures, across the site of the original towers and the memorial pools in the old footprints. A few of the colleagues I have there; even those not from New York, and mostly unpolitical; reluctant to get into any debate on "conspiracies" or "the war on terror"; have said they find it hard to take in. I think I'll find it difficult if I'm ever there, looking over the site and still remembering so much from 10 years ago.

Glastonbury Festival #6

This summer, like every summer since 2005 (except from the year it wasn't on), I went to Glastonbury Festival. It's a yearly occurrence giving a good group of friends the chance to catch up, sleep rough, drink cider, and see bands. Here was this year's "crew":



If you enjoy music festivals, I can't recommend Glasto enough. Once you go, you will be comparing every other festival to it for the rest of your festival-ling days! So many good places to eat, a great atmosphere, a sea of tents (as modelled by myself below)



...and of course, the music. We weren't too thrilled about the lineup this year, but there was still a decent amount to see. My particular favourites were Eels, Queens of the Stone Age, and a long-term favourite of mine, who I'd been waiting at least a decade to see, Pulp!



Ah, Jarvis... your banter, your "moves", and your songs are still tremendous.

The mud and rain were quite horrible at times, especially as it took 6 drenched hours to get into the site, but we battled through. As always, it was worth it. We will have to think of something else for our "Glasto friends" group to do next year, as they're having another off. But I certainly won't rule out a return in 2013... or 14...

Check out the full set of pics here!