Life
Weird situations. Is there anything else than that actually?
My girlfriend and me broke up, but it was much cooler than I
expected. Things had been going downhill (we've been
together nearly 5 years now), but while our couple has been
so-so the last year or two, we find that we are great
friends and that by staying together we'd probably get to
hate each other.
Now, we're still sleeping in the same bed, and it was a bit
weird, but not in the sense that we didn't look at each
other.
We still appreciate each other very well, and getting back
together is not excluded, but we agree that we need some
time for ourselves. Both of us have never been single more
than a week since we were 16 (I'm 24, she's 23), we both
feel we might be lacking something there that's needed.
Work
There was a Cray beer and pizza with some of the managers
from the main offices visiting. I finally learned that the
senior analyst title I had been proposed had been given to
another guy I work with. I could have done good with the
extra money, and there was an attractive suggestion that we
would sometimes do development work for special projects,
but overall I think that guy might be more up to the task of
the day-to-day work this job means (meaning that I'd
probably get "bored doing work" rather than "doing stuff
like open source development to avoid getting bored, because
I don't have a shitload of work").
Photography
Got a new lens (my second), the Canon 100mm/f2 USM. This
thing is awesome.
- the amazing USM motor (near total silence and very fast
and precise autofocus)
- the "one-way" focusing ring (the autofocus doesn't make
the ring turn, so you can hold it firmly and autofocus)
- the full-time manual focus (thanks to the USM, you can
do manual focus even if autofocus is enabled, unusual)
- the large aperture (the glass goes right to the inside
edge of the lens casing)
I finished off a roll of Sensia with some nice portraits of
Mélanie's dog in the autumn leaves, a neighbor cat and some
of the visiting Cray bigwigs.
I also got a nice Lowepro S&F Reporter 300 AW bag to carry
that new gear. I previously used a regular backpack, but now
that I have two lenses means that there would be a
free-flying lens bouncing around in that unpadded backpack,
and I wouldn't want that to be a $500 lens, so it's more
"protecting my investment" than "getting new toys" (although
there is a part of this!).
I have to take some time to myself and do some photography.
I'd like to do a project doing portraits of a number of
friends, that'd let me go out and be with friends.