Another Self Portrait

Another Self Portrait
by toastfloats

The answer to why we stopped sailing is highly dependent on a number of factors: who you ask, when you ask, and whether or not we have had anything to drink.

The short answer most consistently proffered is that we ran out of money. It's easy to understand. Frankly, most folks can't imagine how we could afford to take off so many years anyway. Admitting that the cash is gone seems a logical barrier to further adventuring. But of course, it isn't strictly true. We didn't run out of money so much as we ran out of liquid cash. We could have stopped and worked briefly then continued (as did our good friends Totem). We could have made money en route (as do our good friends Ceildyh). We could have sold everything we still own and liquidated the rest of our savings (as have too many boats to name). The last thing I want to do is discourage people from cruising based on the mistaken notion that it can't be done on limited funds. It can.

And weirdly, the real problems with money started on landing in New Zealand. It's like Murphy -- having largely left us alone for major problems for nearly five years -- decided to move in. It started with just landing in the country: cat ($1300), medicals for immigration ($750), immigration ($1500? I can't remember… I was in a daze), Dean's medical reinstatement (a couple of thousands to various folks… and yes it was all legal), and a thousand dollar transformer so we could plug into New Zealand shore power. Then my nose decided to implode ($5000 USD deductible), the heater melted ($2700), and the batteries exploded (will be ~$2500). Self inflicted wounds include a latte'd laptop ($1000), a trip to the States (~$6000), and an iPhone ($350… yes, I got a 3GS unlocked ). The van was a few grand, school uniforms and "donations" another two, and a business wardrobe for me which probably set us back at least 50 dollars.

It's hard not to buckle. We can not can not can not get ahead which is an awful feeling. I try to console myself with the knowledge that if even half of this crap went down while we were sailing around last year, it would have bankrupted us. With money coming in, we can basically -just- keep up. But it would be nice to catch a break.

Or a job. A job would be good.

The radio silence on the blog these past months resulted from the fact that I finally did get some work. A former employee of mine moved on to bigger and better things, then revisited his past by to hire me as an editor. It was surprisingly fun work to dig into my technical writing roots. The documents were some of the most technical I've ever read, let alone edited. I learned about touch sense capacitors, oscillators, and methods to send IP packets over an electrical power line. I totally geeked out. I actually -- wait for it -- learned how to use the Equation Editor in Word. The single most important lesson from this experience was that Microsoft Word sucks. It is horrible. I will pay clients from now on to switch applications.

Aeron Peace Out
by toastfloats

Now, I have a new client, the IS team at Tegel Foods. For Americans, think Foster Farms with a Kiwi accent. They want to upscale the docs and training for the self-rolled software systems. I very much look forward to this. The project is in my favorite zone of work -- build awesomeness from raw materials and get paid.

Paid is good.

So if Murphy will just park his ass someplace else for a few months, maybe we can finally start saving for Jaime's college education. Gotta start somewhere.

A Walk in the City

Auckland - The City of Sails
Originally uploaded by toastfloats.

I love cites in the morning. Marching through the brisk air with a spring in my step and head buzzing with ideas for what I want to accomplish, it is finally time to admit that I missed this. I still pine for the people we left behind in the States, but most of the life we precipitously abandoned causes me no pain of loss. But this... these cool mornings in a city just waking up, the air fresh from sea breezes, the sky almost painfully blue, the commuters all around pushing through the crowds with feet on auto-pilot while they check email on their phones, the busses rumbling by and the cars getting jammed up at the corners. This city is so familiar, and this walk is reminiscent of hundreds of similar mornings in That Life. The one part of that life I unequivocally loved was going to work downtown with people I absolutely adored, respected, savored.

I play a game as I walk, people watching and trying to match the outfits with their job description. The women are easy, the young ones in tight little outfits with costume jewelry say new to the business world, probably working as assistants, clerks, receptionists. While the wiser, older women in the same outfit are much sleeker, the gold and gemstones real, the shoes fine tooled leather and the overall look so much more polished in a way that says management or executive. Males in New Zealand are either white colar in blue, black or grey suits, open dress shirt of a light color and faint pin stripe, no tie, leather shoes, or they are blue colar and sport some form of flourescent vest. Sprinkled throughout are the geeks -- the IT professionals are an entire gender-less class in expensive jeans, software branded t-shirts, ear buds firmly lodged under hair cuts that are inevitably at least a month past their prime. There are a few students either young enough for school uniforms or scruffly shlepping their way to University. They are hard to distinguish from an entire subdivision of the service sector on their way to retail shops. The baristas are, of course, already in place as are all the many newly arrived entrepreneurs who have opened Korean, Thai, sushi, curry, and Chinese food shops all over the city.

It amuses me to wonder what I am saying to the world with the look I sport this morning. The rough, tattered backpack says tourist or college student, but the iPhone says money and the expensive leather boots say management. The wash and wear haircut, no jewelry, no makeup put me squarely in the old-school feminist camp but the gawdy tanzanite and diamond ring DrC likes me to wear is so girly it messes with my dyke groove. But the strongest signal I send this morning is probably the jeans and t-shirt look.

A confession... During those dot-com boom and bust days when I was a pregnant, tech writing matron, it's true that I found it delightful to watch the eye candy of Hbunny, Noey and Greg parading around in their artfully aged, insanely expensive jeans. The boys (and they were boys at the time even if now they are quite clearly attractive men who would balk at the diminutive) were appealing in a way that a mother, wife and manager should not ever admit. So yes, they are the inspiration for my current outfit. Because it's 10 years later, and I can't resist painting these pants on to my newly sleek legs. Every time I pull on a size 10, I chortle and preen. I strut through the city with the slight bell sliding over my black, pointed boot toe and like to think that I am even half as sexy as my lovely young friends were in the same styles. Of course, the very fact that I am hiking up Queen Street in jeans that cost roughly the same as a smartphone screams tech.

Aquarium - The Toast Mermaid
Originally uploaded by toastfloats.

A casual people watcher might be confused about the mixed signals I send with my basic tech mixed with executive and college student look. That's okay. Frankly, I'm confused, too. I don't know what I want to be when I grow up. Part of me wants to stay scruffy, barely off the boat and picking up the occasional contract to plump the cruising kitty. Another part wants to dive hell-bent into the management career track I left in Seattle. I love telling other people what to do. As with my clothes, the only clear signal my heart is sending my head is tech tech tech. I want to stay in software and hardware development if I can. I love the gadgets and the newness and the constant change and the insane schedules. I like the sexy young engineers who don't know they are sexy because they are so frickin' smart and so incredibly dorky. I want the bleeding edge crap that breaks every time I work with it and sales teams who straddle some strange line between engineer and carnival barker. I love the feeling that I know what's going on in a world that most people find necessary to their very lives but completely incomprehensible. I want to crawl back into the black box.

My pack weighs heavily on my back, chock full of a Windowsian brick, power cords, and a newly emptied to-go mug as I turn the corner on the last stretch to my client. Today, I get to restructure a single-source database for a software company in the business of electronic medical records. It's a start in the right direction. Passers-by can attribute my little smile as amusement at the podcast feed trickling into my ears, but I know it's because I'm exactly where I want to be.

Working Away

Getting Run Down by the Spirit of New Zealand
toastfloats on Flickr

We've been in New Zealand since mid-October. The original plan -- such as we plan anything any longer -- was to get DrC settled into work, the girls into school, and then I would begin the long slow process to rebuild my consulting business. When I say rebuild, it is perhaps an exaggeration. For most of my consulting life, I have made little or no attempt to be fully employed. Usually, I use contracting as a method to work part time at things I enjoy so that I can spend the rest of the time doing tasks I truly love. Whether it is raising babies, homeschooling little girls, or sailing big girls across oceans, I realize now that contracting has been for me a gateway to spending time with my children.

However, now my children do not really need me so much any longer. They need the love and the support, sure. They don't really need me to wipe their noses or pick up their toys. Granted, I didn't really ever spend much time wiping either noses or toys. I remember wiping a lot of asses, actually. Come on. You were thinking it. Someone needs to have the courage to stand up and say, "Children are about butt wiping." They are not cute or fluffy or particularly fun, especially not in those early years when the quantity of crap flowing out the back end is truly mind boggling. Seven straight years of diapers and look where it got us… ten straight years of high school girls. I am somehow failing to see how this can be interpreted as the golden statue for Lifetime Achievement in Diaper Pinning.

Yet, there they go. Strong, independent Jaime. Beautiful, talented Mera. Charming, clever Aeron. Little people all grown up into bright young ladies with not the slightest interest in whether or not I stay home as long as there are plenty of snacks in the bin when they get back to the boat after school. The adjustment to institutional school life is going much smoother this round. I don't know if this is because the schools are better, they learned a great deal about public schooling the first go in Pukekohe, they are more mature, or some combination of the above. We are only three weeks into the year, and they have already established patterns and connections which bode fair well to ensuring I never see them.

Jaime has perhaps the hardest road this year. A combination of senior year pressure and a failure to do anything strictly educational last year means that her academic load is fierce. To this she added water polo, a job, and a boy friend. Kids these days. I have no idea how she'll handle it. She might not. Look, I know it can be done. I did at least that much my junior and senior year. I just don't know if Jaime is the one to do it. My only contribution to the decision making process is to offer my support, rides to 5:30am practice, and a lesson on GTD should she choose to go ninja on her personal productivity. After that, we'll have to see what she is made of. Smart bet is she either takes me up on learning how to get organized or she selectively reduces her work load until she has the bandwidth to do it all well. The one extremely good sign is that her eyes are wide open, fully aware that she may have taken on too great a load.

While Mera's choices appear on the surface marginally less ambitious, she is something more of a perfectionist. She is enrolled in Y10 accelerate which as near as I can tell means that functionally she is a Year 11 taking her NCEA Level 1 college qualification courses this year. The academics are a larger work load than she is accustomed to. More importantly, she goes through school with an odd combination of sublime arrogance and complete lack of confidence. I can not fathom it. One minute, she's the smartest kid in the room and not afraid to let you know it. The next she is dithering and fussing and agnsting over the micro details of a paper due on Monday, fearful of tests and worried about how her teachers will respond to her presentations. The worry causes her to spend energy and time perfecting every assignment, perhaps well beyond what is strictly necessary. For extra curricular, she was cast as a Shark girl, plays badminton on the weekends, and… much to the entire family's delighted surprise… made some friends with whom she actually *gasp* does things. Our little Mera, hanging out uselessly at the mall eating bad food and browsing shops. We're so proud. Really. Sometimes we can convince her not to take her Kindle on these excursions. We all count this as a major step forward.

Aeron is no longer the baby of the family, but she does at least have the advantage of being the youngest and with thus the lightest pressure. Her middle school is only moderately challenging academically, so she is channeling her boundless energies elsewhere. Horrifying both her father and myself, she wants to take up netball. In our opinion, netball is what you get when you take cheerleaders, put them on the basketball court, and make it impossible for them to smash into one another or do anything even moderately interesting. On the other hand, it is a huge sport down here, and I suspect Aeron will prove outstanding. She's scrappy, strong, and highly athletic. She was voted her class captain last week. No surprise, really, with her empathy and charm she's a natural leader and politician. DrC and I are thoroughly underimpressed with her course of study so we're supplementing in the evenings with math and French. We'll see how she goes.

Couple of Walkers
toastfloats on Flickr

And then there is the good doctor. I was supposed to start work in January. Instead of working and starting the family down the path of putting money into accounts, I have spent the past two months either prepping for or recovering from surgery. As a result, our finances are worse than anemic. DrC stepped into the breach. He has been picking up extra shifts at every possible opportunity. When he isn't doing doctor stuff, he is scraping away -- sometimes quite literally -- at the back log of boat maintenance chores. It would be hard to be more impressed with this work ethic, diligence, and emotional strength. He is a good life partner in so many ways. It didn't take this experience to make me recognize it, but it never hurts to be reminded that I made an outstanding choice and am lucky to have him.

So that's it. While I've enjoyed some amazing professional experiences, I haven't worked full time since 2005. On ramping isn't going to be easy. On the other hand, I look like the sole slacker in a family of over-achievers. Might be time to remind these Congers where they got that hyper-activity, more is more, I-can-do-anything-better-than-you gene.

Elephantine Musings

The Girls Contemplate Our New Home
Uploaded by toastfloats

At times I am convinced that the Fates are determined to prevent me from successfully reentering the work force full time. I swear it is not merely an elaborate form of laziness which over the years has pulled me out of the employment market. Homeschooling, cruising, extended stays in foreign countries, all these are arguably my fault but I OWN them. I fully admit that life distracted me. I did it on purpose with a purpose.

Now, however, I want to work. Okay, world? I want to work. I work hard. I'm good at what I do. Let me work.

Except not for the last two months while I sorted our immigration paperwork, got DrC all spiffied up and off to work himself, and scrapped nearly 8 months of indescribably icky goo off our bodies and out of the boat.

And not this month while my Mommy is in town.

And apparently not next month while I have a good chunk of my face reassembled.

It turns out that the little bump on my nose which initially appeared like the world's most persistent and slow forming zit is actually not a zit at all. It's a zebra case of a tumor which is going to just keep growing until I either cut it off or I can't see past it and run my car off a cliff. The medical definition of a zebra is a disease or condition that is so uncommon that a doctor only learns of it because medical schools engage in a form institutionalized hazing which in any other context would be declared a felony. Any given zebra only shows up in the average medical practice once or twice in a doctor's entire career, if that. Such cases are shared with colleagues over a slice at lunch or at the annual Christmas party after a few drinks. Professors make presentations about zebras, others make a living doing research on them and publishing the results in esoteric journals.

This zebra tumor has -- as is usual in such cases -- an unpronounceable, unspellable name which I promptly forgot but which DrC rattles off with élan whenever the topic arises. It apparently has been there for years and years… maybe even since childhood! … just waiting till the perfect moment when lack of ready cash, a high deductible insurance plan, and extraordinarily pent up demand to get back to work combine to make this the worst possible moment to erupt into sight. Now that it's growing, however, the thing is on a roll. Depending on my mood, the girls either refer to me as The Two Nosed Witch or Rudolph, the Double-Nosed Reindeer. It just gets bigger from here. Fortunately, there is just about zero chance it means death to Toast unless I am foolish enough to allow it to grow so large as to block my ability to eat.

Unfortunately, getting rid of it is fraught with all sorts of horribleness. It'll be expensive. It'll leave a really nasty scar. And, I am not shitting you, I am going to spend three weeks with an "elephant trunk made out of skin" stuck gobsmack in the middle of my face. Explaining how this works may require a diagram. The idea is the plastics doc cuts a strip of my forehead, backs it with a chunk of belly fat, then without detaching it, twists it over and down and attaches it to my nose where the dermatologist has left a great gaping hole after cutting out the tumor. Then we let the thing sit there for nearly a month while the skin grafts together after which we "trim the tusk off". You're damn right you are going to trim that off.

Climbing Out
Uploaded by toastfloats

On the upside, I told you I didn't need all those 'get rid of belly fat' Facebook adverts. I have my own creative ways to reduce that flab. On the downside, I'm not entirely clear how I'm supposed to go on a job interview with a skin trunk curling up from my nose. I'm going to look like a Star Trek character, and I don't mean that in a good way. I know I should be happy that I'm not cast as a Red Shirt in this drama, but I just keep thinking that no one really ever thought the Ferengi were doable, no matter how lovable Quark got towards the end.

Tonight, I'm glib about this, able to tell jokes and contemplate the whole thing with some degree of distance and equanimity. I have to be honest, however. After leaving the plastics consult, I just sat down for awhile and cried. I don't want to do this. It's expensive, painful, and scary. I have no real hope I'll look like Nicole Kidman after my surgery is complete. I'll probably look like someone who has been through a far worse experience like a car crash or the collapse of a building in an earthquake. It'll take a long time to heal and might require several additional surgeries before I don't look like someone grafted a piece of my ass on to my face. I had a real zit on the other side of my nose this morning which almost sent me into hysterics. I want to be brave and strong and reasonable, but my inner me appears to just want to scream and jump up and down and bitch about the unfairness of it all. Fairness, of course, has nothing to do with it. Our own troubles touch us more profoundly than the most terrible trials of others, because they are our own. That doesn't make my trouble less to me, the thought does help me with the reasonableness of it all. It's a benign tumor. While I can't see how it could possibly make me stronger, it isn't going to kill me. I am not a great beauty to begin with and this isn't going to make me less so.

Getting down to brass tacks, what I really need is some work to do for the month of February that does not involve seeing people. Reasonable or not, I don't think I can shake hands with a client and keep a straight face when my face isn't.

Working for the Man

Ferried Around
Uploaded by Toastfloats

DrC started work last week.* It was a bit of a shock when he gave us all good bye kisses on his way to start the first day. For six months, we’ve rarely see him wear a shirt, let alone all the trappings of civilized society. He smelled delicious… all shaving cream, deodorant, and shampoo. However, he looked so peculiar in his dress shirt and slacks, leather shoes, and combed hair. We hardly recognized him.

The commute for the good doctor is a long one. He walks 100 feet to the ferry dock. There is a 10 minute ferry ride across the harbour to downtown Auckland. There he walks across the street and down the stairs to climb on to a commute train heading south. Unfortunately, this is where things slow down as the train ride is 45 minutes with another 15 minute walk at the other end. The trip takes an hour and a half each way.

I don’t like it. I don’t like that three hours of his day is ‘lost’ to commuting. I hated it when I had to make a similar journey myself, and I can’t imagine he enjoys it any better than I did. On the upside, we’ll have his iPad replaced by end of this week. With wireless available on the train, he should be able to do all his reading, email, and news while on the train. The commute also has the advantage of not requiring his attention at any time, e.g. at least he doesn’t have to drive.

Driving from here to anywhere is horrid. Bayswater and Devonport are on a narrow peninsula jutting south into Waitemata Harbour. The entire area is densely populated, wealthy, and ridiculously posh. It is served by a single narrow road from end to end. The commute hours of 7 – 9 am and 3 – 7 pm are an absolute nightmare along this route. Aeron and I decided during the first week that we run errands between 9 and 3 or we refuse to do them at all.

DrC’s absence has been hard on the SuperClinic. Combined with some illnesses and vacations, the clinic is way way behind. They had our captain doing surgery the first day. Every day since has been absolutely chock-o-block. He comes home looking completely beat by the commute and work day, grim, quiet, and exhausted. The back log at the clinic will clear over time. He will get used to the commute. Working will get easier. Right now, however, the long hours and hard work are hard on him. I sympathize, but inside I am selfishly cowering a bit in dread and fear. That picture of exhaustion will be me in a matter of weeks. After years of sabbatical and contract work, soon I too will be putting in those days, those hours, that effort. Poor me.

I started the job hunt process this week. Either I am looking at the listings differently or there are more opportunities this time. The job boards offer some promising options. I still haven’t completely committed myself to full time permanent or contract. I miss having a regular ‘crew’ of co-workers – colleagues with whom I can develop lasting relationships and staff who I can hire, train, and pass on to bigger and better things. On the other hand, contract work is so much more flexible, the time commitment less and allowing more opportunities for adventures with my girls and husband. It’s still a toss up. I suspect that the decision will have more to do with fate and opportunity. The best option to open up will be the one I leap on, wrassle to the ground, rope up and drag home.

* Actually, it's been several weeks now. NaNoWriMo got me way ahead on my writing.

Right Between the Eyes

Big Eyes
Originally uploaded by toastfloats.

Contrary to popular belief, cruising is hard work. It is not, however, the same kind of hard work as living on land. Land is tedious, frankly, and we are all heartily sick of it. No number of beautiful train rides through stunningly green spring pasture and meadow can make up for the fact that this train is taking me to a grey and blue cubicle on the tenth floor of a downtown office building. I think the worst part of working in cubby-land again is the lighting. Flourescent lighting is a complete menace. To those of us who are sensitive to the flickering, it's like being immersed in a spinning, dizzying white walled hell. As I stare at the monitor trying to make sense of the words in front of me, I recognize the incipient signs of an ocular migraine.

Unless you have had the dubious pleasure of experiencing an ocular migraine, it's hard to overstate how much it hurts. The first sign of the headache is a glittering, glazing effect. It's like the world is coming in to your eyes in chunks that your brain decides to randomly rearrange and send into constant motion. It's nauseating and disturbing, but this isn't the bad part. The next phase is when the motion becomes so extreme that you literally can not see what you are doing through the ever-shifting cascade of random images. Yet still we are not done. Now the world begins in one corner of your eye to be overlaid with sharply delianiated chevrons and stripes. These too are in motion, zig zagging across the field of view in ever growing, mesmerizing patterns.

Now... NOW... the headache hits. Up to this point, it's merely been a parade of increasingly nauseating, unpleasant visual auras and disturbances -- distracting and delibitating but not particularly painful. When the pain does make it's presence known, however, it is like someone is putting your head in a 360 degree vice and tightening rapidly. The pain is punishing, the neck and upper back clench in sympathy, and the body just shuts down.

I have found two cures for migraine -- neither of which are practical in a downtown office building. The first involves an incredibly hot bath or shower at the first onset of symptoms. DrC tells me this dilates the blood vessels in the neck and brain, the increased blood flow stemming the progress of the headache. I stand in the shower with the water just short of scalding and let it flow from the top of my head down the back and over my shoulders until my skin turns bright red and I feel like collapsing in an overheated puddle. Then I take a handful of iburpofin and lie down for awhile until my skin is no longer hot to the touch. This works. What also works is to simply skip the shower, take the ibuprofin, cover the eyes so absolutely no light gets in, and sleep until the episode is over.

I am very fortunate. My migraines generally only last for two or three hours. They leave me tired, cranky and bitchy but essentially unscathed. Online, you can read horror stories of migraines lasting days, weeks, even chronic. No joke, but if that were me I'd seriously be talking to the hemlock crowd. It's very hard to imagine the drain of constant, intense chronic pain. At minimum and regardless of the choices I would make in that situation, I empathize with the limits of their choices.

Here in the grey soul-less corporate world there is no escaping the worst of this headache. I can't lie down in a dark place, I can't take a hot shower, I can't escape the flourescent lights which are a known trigger. The commute home is nearly two hours -- by which time I will have endured both the peak and the valley of this particular episode. There's nothing to do but to get a large cup of water, turn on some Vangelis, and pretend to work. I'll make it up to them when I get home. For now, I'm just going to dream of a sunny beach on Hiva Oa.

The Tropical Butterfly Garden
Originally uploaded by toastfloats.

The Same All Over Again

Same or Different
Originally uploaded by toastfloats.

I am resisting the impulse to say “I told you so” with every fiber of my being. It’s Thursday afternoon, and I’ve spent two weeks sorting and cleaning out a half dozen training presentations, stirring up the rat’s nest that is masquerading as a single source help system, and trying not to beat my head on the desk. I want to know why every software company in the world thinks that that any half assed trainer or washed up engineer can write their documentation. In their copious free time.

I want to know why people think that what I do professionally has no value.

And requires no particular skill.

The scene I am in at the moment – seated in front of an engineering vice president, explaining the basics of the documentation development process – is an eerie downstream echo of conversations I’ve had many times during my career. The older and more seasoned I become, the more I feel that I could hold up my end of the dialog without checking a script. The teleprompter of my memories rolls out the objections, the protestations, the multiple stages of grief that represent a V.P. coming to grips with the hard business reality that words cost money and that the absence of words costs more.

Saying “I told you so” to this man, however, is neither accurate nor fair. He’s young, American, probably quite good at what he does. The company no doubt hired him to stir their moribund development pot and breathe new life into an older software organization that has been stuck at the “mid-stage” for far too long. Like me, he is a hired gun slinger, here to revolutionize the engineering department and get everyone on a new and exciting development model. I don’t know these things for a fact; it’s just the feel of the whole set up. Also, there is something about his Chicago accent here in the land of Kiwis that makes the nerves twitch just so, no doubt a by-product of too much American television about shawdy gangsters and backroom poker games. I don’t think he’s here to make friends of the old guard. He’s here to play management bingo: carve off the fat, drive the team, throw out waterfall and implement extreme, agile programming. Yadda yadda.

One of his first concerted actions was to fire the documentation team. After spending only two days in the quicksand of their source files, I can’t say that was a bad decision. On the other hand, somehow management got the collective notion that they would replace the two full-time head count with engineering release notes and an occasional editorial contractor who would just roll in and “clean it all up” before each release. There are two major products, both release at least twice a year with multiple interim, customized releases to large enterprise customers. The existing corpus of documentation is roughly 20 manuals, guides, handouts, and help systems per product. It’s my job to explain why this intermittent editor plan is doomed to fail.

You’d think that would be self-evident.

I sympathize with this man across from me. I know him. I know everyone here. They are each unique individuals with families and goals and dreams and quirks. And yet, they are also just like their counterparts at the last company, and the one before that, and the one before that, and every other software development company I will work out into the foreseeable future. There is the smart and competent admin, the experienced project manager with the wry sense of humour. Over on the wall is the team lead who is excited to try out this new Agile thing and on the other side of my cubicle is the older, mumbler developer guy with no particular social skills but serious programmatic mojo. We have the nearly silent Asian engineer, the garrulous tester, the totally maligned network operations guy, and the random hired gun contractors drifting in and out like high priced, well dressed bullets. We even have the Asian chick with the high voice that all the white boys want to bang.

I try not to roll my eyes. I try really hard. The problem is me. The problem is that I care – down in the marrow of my bones – about these archetypal people. I don’t just enjoy the company of engineers, I thrive on their geek, luxiariate in their strangely twisted and totally reductive approach to problems both technical and social. I want this company to suceed. The real problem is that after nearly two decades watching these people, I know that this company, these people, this oganisation, these applications… they are dead. It’s a death spiral, late stage and unfixable. No number of hired guns from the States is going to fix the problems and rewrite the code in a way that will do anything more than delay the inevitable. I don’t want to know this, but those years have gifted me with prescience.

I’m sorry, guys. I can’t write you out of this one.

Twiddling My Thumbs

Rotorua Station or Bathhouse?
Originally uploaded by toastfloats.

Commuting totally sucks. Well, commuting from one of end of the kitchen table to the end closer to the power outlet isn’t so bad. Commuting an hour and a half by train to the Auckland Central Business District (CBD) pretty much sucks donkey testicles.

New Zealand has made a very good faith effort to improve the commute through the provision of a very nice train. It’s clean, fairly priced, and generally on time. The rail line runs south all the way to Pukekohe. As I understand it, the line also runs out to western neighbors some considerable distance, as well as connecting to bus lines throughout the region. I don’t know if there are plans for expansion, but we can only assume so. The traffic here on the highway is just as bad (and in some places worse) than Seattle. Public transit options are the only long run solution to gridlock.


A surprising number of my fellow commuters are students. They shlep all the way from the outer suburbs and rural outlying regions into the city to attend decile 10 (high income) schools in the CBD such as Kings College and Auckland Grammar. I have trouble recognizing the motivation needed to stick a kid on a train for a 3 hour round trip commute just to get said offspring into a marginally better school. It seems to me that there are so many better ways a child could spend her time, the educational advantage lost with the time frittered away texting friends and watching the cows roll by every morning and evening. In that sentiment, DrC and I are clearly in the minority regardless of the country. Kiwi, American, or Aussie, all parents… or at least all Right Thinking Proper Parents… send their kids to the absolute best school available no matter the sacrifice.

My time is also too valuable to spend on this endless journey back and forth. Two hours a day sitting on my ass staring at the back of the head in front of me and listening to podcasts is going to drive me mad as beernuts and brie. I don’t mind the 15 minute walk on either end which can count towards my daily step goal. In fact, on the way home I’ve been rerouting for greater distance and increased difficulty just to make sure the exercise does me a bit of good. It’s only the train time that I feel needs to be booked end to end with something useful.

We Take History Seriously
Originally uploaded by toastfloats.

I’m tempted to write a book. As premature and ridiculous as it sounds, I think I’ll write a guide to cruising the South Pacific. Or I could write a steamy, sexually charged romance, though I’m thinking my seat mates idly peeking over my shoulder might report me to the authorities. There isn’t a science fiction story in me, though I love to read them, and I don’t even enjoy reading mysteries, let alone writing one. What I must avoid is buying a stand along computer game. For me, computer games are more addicting than a vanilla latte laced with nicotine and heroine. I somehow envision myself missing my stop even though both my starting and destination stations define the end points of the Southern Line.

I’ve got the weekend to sort this out. On Monday I resume the daily commute. Hopefully, inspiration will strike in the form of a fully realized plot or a perfectly imagined, mouth wateringly sexy hero. Otherwise, I’m doomed to a daily regime of 500 games of Spider Solitaire.

Zero to Eighty (Hours/Week)

Nice Hat
Originally uploaded by toastfloats.

For months I’ve been trying to get work. Freeloading off of DrC for five years is all very well, but eventually a girl has got to earn her bling. Since my bling consists of three children and an 11 meter cruising yacht, there is a lot of work to be done.

Getting work in New Zealand can be challenging. Fortunately, there are several fine web sites which offer solid recommendations and advice. I’ll tack a list of the ones I found most useful at the end of this article. I wish I could provide insightful tips over and above what you’ll find on those sites, but no. I made all the n00b mistakes you’d except and have only stumbled into work after trying in every possible way to sabotage my professional future.

First, let’s just start with the demographics. I’m an American female over the age of 40 with a Masters in Public Administration who hasn’t worked full time in nearly five years trying to get a job in the information technology sector during tough economic times. Just typing those words makes me snicker. IT is for young whipper snapper metro male engineers with a degree in some flavor of hard core geekery who listen to Massive Attack and pin up pictures of Felicia Day. Twenty years in the business notwithstanding, it’s hard to imagine crafting a resume more unlikely to impress the New Zealand hiring managers.

Moreover, New Zealand is the Land of Certification. This country has a fondness for check boxes, degrees, and qualification certificates that borders on the persnickety. Even DrC had trouble here. In fact, to this day the Royal College of New Zealand isn’t entirely convinced that he is an ophthalmologist. Despite owning his own practice for over a decade, DrC’s qualifications are considered provisional; He is under the supervision of a qualified ophthalmologist for two years. For months, I couldn’t even make it past whatever passes for H.R. sorting ‘bots until I figured this out. It’s all about the Search Engine Optimization, baby.

Then, of course, we dropped the family one hour south of Auckland. At the time, it seemed like the right thing to do. No one in the family felt up to living in the city; Quiet, beautiful, bucolic Pukekohe felt like a safe harbor in rough seas . Now it feels like we’ve plunked ourselves down in the Bay of L.A. -- beautiful, bucolic and a ridiculously long ways from gainful employment. The nearly three hour round trip commute initially made me reluctant to apply for jobs in the central business district. It only took me six months to come to the stunningly obvious conclusion that no tech company worth its weight in routers would open an office any farther south than the airport.

Another classic mistake in which I indulged was to apply for jobs for which I was fully qualified. It is said that Auckland has the best educated taxi drivers in the world. This is probably not an exaggeration. People from all over the world are attempting to resettle in this country, not all of whom are fortunate enough to come in as we did with one member of the family already gainfully employed. Lawyers, aeronautical engineers and physicists all end up working wherever and however they can to keep the family fed and housed. A recommendation I arrogantly ignored for six months was to apply for entry level jobs in my target industry rather than to positions that are commensurate with my experience in my home country. It is a good idea to spend time getting to know New Zealand… and let Kiwis get to know you. After a year or so, you can start rapidly working your way back up to your former level of pay and responsibility.

Finally, I really thought I should get paid what I’m worth. However, New Zealand is notorious for its high cost of living and relatively low pay scale for professionals. “It’s the lifestyle, mate!” For immigrants like ourselves, consider this a positive, not a negative. The economic conditions mean that qualified, educated Kiwis flee their home country in search of higher paying jobs in Australia, the U.K. and the U.S. This leaves a lot of openings for off shore professionals that would otherwise be filled by the natives. You just have to be willing to work for a lot less than you’d expect elsewhere.

A Flood at Haku Falls
Originally uploaded by toastfloats.

Today, I start work for my first New Zealand client. It’s a pretty basic, four week contract updating existing user guides for a software release. It’ll be a good reintroduction to the daily grind, but it won’t last for so long that I and the family grow miserable from the insane demands on my time commuting. And one article a day per trip, I should finally be able to get back to a regular schedule on this column.

Now I just need to rediscover my sense of humor.

When You Can't Sell, You Sail

Comrades in Drumming
Originally uploaded by toastfloats.

Don Quixote has now been for sale since the beginning of the year. The news on that front is pretty grim. It's not her fault, beautiful boat that she is. The problem is a combination of the horrible market and the horrible state of the banking industry. It is just about impossible to get a mortgage on an expensive boat, let alone a boat bobbing in foreign waters. So there you go. No sale for the sail.

In our case, simple mathematics tells us that if we can't sell her, we have to live on her. Why? Because to pay the mortgage, maintenance and insurance on Don Quixote is about the same as owning a standard suburban home and more than renting the same. We can't really afford to maintain two households. Don Quixote needs to be our home, or she needs to belong to someone else.

This is actually a rather interesting exercise in decision tree logic.

1) Can you sell the boat? YES | NO
- If yes, all the world is your oyster. Go have fun.
- If no, you must move aboard. Go to 2.

2) Can you live aboard without making money? YES | NO
- If yes, move back aboard and go cruising. Have fun. See you in a few years.
- If no, you must find a place to live aboard and make money. Go to 3.

3) Make a list of cities to which you can sail in the amount of time you have money left in the bank account and in which you can both live aboard and make more money:
San Diego, San Francisco, Seattle, Vancouver, Sydney, Brisbane, Auckland.

4) Branch each city and ask the following question: Do I wanna?
- If no, remove from list. Remember that saying no to some cities is politically dangerous with friends and family so be prepared to deal with the fallout.
- If yes, apply for jobs. Whichever city comes up with the best money/lifestyle choice, go there.

It feels like a bit of a rinse and repeat action with DrC once again applying for jobs abroad while I continue more or less in vain to find technical writing contracts which I can undertake from the deck of a boat any time any place. Those who play Brain Age and are on the sharps have already noticed that San Diego, San Francisco, and Seattle got booted from the list since DrC is only applying for "jobs abroad." I'm afraid we are just not ready to go back to the United States. Part of me wonders if we'll ever be ready for the U.S. again since every time we're given the perfect opportunity to repent our wicked ways and return to American soil, we run screaming in the opposite direction. While this requires some introspection and probably a series of blog entries, navel gazing will have to wait.

Scenic Smell
Originally uploaded by toastfloats.

There is a strong probability that DrC can renew his existing contract at a clinic near Auckland. We like this idea. It's simple, it's familiar, and it's almost a lock. But in this world of shaky economics and in the face of a dwindling supply of ready blunt in the Don Quixote bank account, "almost" is just not good enough. So we are also working to secure positions in Sydney, Brisbane, and possibly even in Samoa or the Cook Islands. All of these are attainable from the west coast of Mexico, all of these locations periodically hire American trained eye doctors, and in all of these places we can live and work on the boat. New Zealand is at the top of the list, however, mostly because our eldest child has reached that stage in life where she has a Plan of her own. This Plan is ambitious and would result in her being qualified to attend New Zealand universities before her family sails away again. And as painful as that separation is to contemplate, the strength, sanity and sheer ambition of this Plan is impressive and inspirational to the rest of the family and worthy of going a bit out of our way to enable.

Though, I'll grant you that another 2,200 miles south from Tonga is probably more than a "bit out of our way."

So as we fast approach our first spring Halloween (which is just Wrong, by the way), it is increasingly clear that s/v Don Quixote is going to join the Coconut Milk Run. Yesterday, I listed our boat with the Pacific Puddle Jumpers 2011. It's time to start ordering parts.

Take That Job

Seconds Before Wipe Out
Originally uploaded by toastfloats.

My husband and I have been singularly fortunate in our employment timing. We left the United States just as the economy began to unravel, and we have largely been able to avoid the very real angst and frustration that resulted. Friends and family struggled to keep it together, find work, pay the mortgage, keep going, adjust to the new conditions, while we cruised in our bubble of semi-retired self-indulgence. So it is with a wry understanding of how lucky we've been to date that I begin my whine about getting a job in New Zealand.

Let us first state the obvious -- I am not whinging about getting a job. I am obviously whinging about not getting a job. Here is Toast pitching a tantrum and stamping her feet because nobody wants to fork over large amounts of money for the privilege of hiring an immigrant, female Yank with weak recent employment history in a difficult, tight market. Stamp stamp stamp…. why not?! Stamp stamp stamp…. really… why not?! Of course, the obvious answer to that question is that I'm an immigrant, female Yank with weak recent employment history in a country which doesn't have an enormous technology sector to start and which is further beaten down by the global economic melt down. Moreover, I know not a single soul locally who can, in a feat of professional nepotism, leap me over otherwise qualified Kiwis to pull me into the fold.

Even if I could find a sugar daddy with the perfect job, the family engages in a collective gasp of horror at the thought of mommy leaving the house at 6:00 AM every morning to shlep for an hour into the central business district, returning at approximately lights out. Let me give you an example of how spoiled the family has become. In a fit of frustration last week, I walked into a local Curves franchise and applied as a coach. I didn't even ask what it paid. I'm just so sick of sitting in Chicken House emailing resumes into /dev/null I was ready to do anything. I was hired right there on the spot. Four days a week, 2 to 6.

DrC and the girls pitched a fit. "No. You can't do that, Mum!" cried the girls. "Really, Toast. The hours are just not going to work," said DrC.

Oh for cripies sakes, people. Cut me a break… So back to Curves I went and reluctantly told the owner that the family had vetoed the job. She was surprisingly gracious and put me on the short list to receive a call when a morning shift opens up… though I got the impression that would be at approximately the same moment as pigs flew out of the prime minister's ass. So now in addition to: not in the central business district, part time, and not involving medical experimentation, I have to add the restriction "only between the hours of 8 AM and 3 PM." At this rate, I will absolutely never find work in New Zealand.

"Do you think I'll ever get a job?" I moan to DrC.

"Well…," he temporizes. This question probably bears a strong similarity to the perennial minefield surrounding, "Do I look fat in this?"

The difference between positivism and optimism is as follows: Optimists assume that good things will happen. Positivists assume they always know what is going to happen. "I am positive I am not going to find a job." I'm stepping to the plate, accepting reality, skipping the grief and denial phases entirely, and getting into mad and whatever the hell happens next. "This just isn't going to work. Or I'm not going to work. Whatever."

"Um…" DrC's waxing particularly articulate this morning.

"I'm done with this shit," I declare with another vicious wave of positivist thinking. "Preparing for the Zombie Apocalypse means we are flexible!" DrC winces. "Adaptable!" I'm getting louder. "Ready to do whatever it takes!!"

DrC covers his ear with one hand to protect it from my strongly positive thinking, "So…"

Always Helpful
Originally uploaded by toastfloats.

"So I'm done. I'm going to get a job answering phones four hours a day so I don't go out of my flippin' mind stuck in Chicken House, and I'll spend the rest of my time working on that d* book."

"What d* book?"

"The d* book everyone keeps telling me to write." With this declaration, I spin the van into a parking spot and practically push him out the door, "Go to work. I've got stuff to do."

Bemused, DrC climbs out of the van, his parting blessing, "You know I'll love you no matter what you decide."

Muttering, I zoom off, "You're d* right you love me no matter what, or I wouldn't be here in the Antipodes baking cookies and dropping my man off at the Kiss and Ride…"

Step 4 - Start Work

Trust Me, I'm Your Doctor
Originally uploaded by toastfloats.

I woke up this morning unaccountably depressed. It was a bone deep feeling coming off a restless night and punctuated by a low grade headache.

I suspect two causes. The first resulted from of all things an earthquake nearly 3, 000 miles away. Yesterday was a full day of drama for our boating friends. The tsunami generated by the Chilean earthquake rolled out from the coastline and echoed across the Pacific from Japan to New Zealand, Mexico to Australia. While it fortunately wasn't a destructive tsunami as these things go, it was not a non-deal for those in the boating community along Pacific Mexico. If you need to see just how you can be screwed by something as "small" as a meter tidal wave, visit my good friend Behan's blog. Another fellow cruiser, Dennis of Dulci Vida, touched bottom in Barra Navidad where cleats were sprung left and right at the marina. Folks all up and down the coast were chattering on email, news groups, and Facebook.

I can only imagine the VHF traffic on nets in La Paz, Puerto Vallarta, and Manzanillo… but I can imagine. I know the voices and the types of raging arguments that must have taken place regarding where to put the boats and what to do. There would be gloom and doomers and naysayers. The whole day would have been full of chit chat, smart aleck comments and updates from those with 3G access to the news services. And it hurt a little to be land bound, eleven stories up in the middle of an urban center out of sight and out of touch with the cruising community.

The second probable cause of my dreary mood this morning was that today was DrC's first day of work. He was hired as a general ophthalmologist for a county health system in Manukau. Manukau is just south of Auckland. The clinic is shiny new with great, modern equipment, a friendly staff, and more advanced pathology than a doctor in training could possibly desire. We're making money finally. DrC is getting his medical credentials all spiffied up while simultaneously expanding his knowledge in key, growing medical areas. It's all good, right?

But it isn't really. We're coming off of years of spending all day every day with each other. As wrong as it is to say so, today felt like an epic fail... like somehow I'd managed to fail my husband and the girls by letting things get to this point where we had to feed Daddy toast and yogurt, make him a sack lunch, and send him to an office. 

Breaking Big Rocks Into Small Ones
Originally uploaded by toastfloats.

So I didn't get off to the greatest start today. However, I made a vow -- quite literally months ago -- that when DrC started working, the girls and I started working even if school and my own job were weeks or even months in our future. We had a long list of tasks to complete by end of day. School, of course, as well as errands consumed most of our time. We also cleaned house and exercise. DrC actually only worked till 2 so he joined us for our afternoon adventure to look at possible places to live. The day got easier as we got moving. By spending every minute following DrC's axiom to "Use your time wisely", I pushed through the heavy sense of loss and wrongness and worked to find a new balance in our new life.

This is only a foreshadow of the dip I'll no doubt experience the Monday morning I wake up and send the entire lot of them off to school and work. I absolutely refuse to cry at just typing it. While there is simply no sense or bandwidth or purpose in trying to find a job before I've got the family settled, work is going to have to be part of my day as soon thereafter as I can possibly arrange. My family is growing up and excited with their new roles. I want new toys and new people, too, if only to serve as distraction.

And Now A Word From Our Sponsor

Mera Hard At Work
Originally uploaded by toastfloats.

I stare at the screen befuddled for a moment, trying to remember how to generate an em dash in FrameMaker. It used to be second nature. Em dash, en dash, copyright, registered and trademark are all symbols so hideously counter-intuitive to generate in FrameMaker that it is a constant source of amazement that Adobe ever succeeded in establishing the application as the preeminent tool of technical writers. More bewildering is how long the program stayed at the top of the heap. Even today, when they swear that the last update is long behind them and other tools – commercial and open source – pop up like daisies on the authorial landscape, Frame is still used by the majority of my clients.

Which actually brings us to the real problem I face this afternoon: I have clients. Clients are the companies which keep Toast afloat. Clients want stuff. Clients ask questions, set deadlines, and need things. Clients are like children with bank accounts and an attitude. Clients are simultaneously my best friends and my worst enemies.

Technically speaking – and as a technical writer I should try to speak technically, albeit more or less inaccurately – I have had clients since the day I quit my full time job. For the most part my clients come from people who worked with me in the past and then scattered to the four winds after leaving our shared employer. Former employers, employees, and coworkers find themselves in a bind with a product to get out the door and either no user guide or a really spectacularly bad user guide. While I'm a bit pricey on the technical writer pay scale, I work fast, independently, and generally leave a client with documentation in fine shape to hand over to a less senior, less experienced writer... for example, the engineers.

Since I quit my job, I can name a double handful of companies for whom I consulted on documentation, training, or simplified English. Ironically, during those years I was a documentation consultant for the largest, most complicated training development project in my career. I've done little quick start brochures and a command line interface guide. I've written help in Robo, Wiki, CHM, and a text file. I developed a database used to direct the development effort of a team of 22 content producers, and I contributed to the documentation on a number of open source projects.

However, when you get right down to it, my resume or LinkedIn profile is a white lie, a bit of true stretching, or total and unmitigated bull shit depending on your perspective. At any given time out here floating around off the coast of Mexico, I have two or three ongoing projects or active clients. String them all end to end, the number of hours I bill out each year probably only amounts to 8 man weeks. Or woman weeks. It's not enough work to keep us in limes and honey roasted peanuts, but it is enough to make the resume look really good.

Because the real reason I work is insurance. Working is a back door to the real world in case something bad happens. If the boat is destroyed, DrC injured, or family reasons force us to make a quick return to the States, I don't have to tell anyone that I've been playing footloose and fancy free for four years. I can truthfully point to these professional experiences and say that I'm still active, I know my stuff, I'm still growing. Hire me. I'll find the em dash... really

Candeleros Heading South
Originally uploaded by toastfloats.

Which was a great theory until the market crashed and the economy went to hell and the unemployment rate in the tech industry skyrocketed and technical writers started hitting the streets in record numbers. No matter how good I look on paper, there are a hundred applicants for every full time job in my business, a hundred hungry people with children to feed and a roof to keep over their heads with whom I would rather not compete. I'll take my five hours here, my interesting project in London there, and continue to work part time, staying out of the way of the people who need that full time work for as long as I possibly can. I cross my fingers, try to keep DrC out of trouble, and keep my handful of steady, resume-padding clients happy while we wait for the world economy to sort itself out.

Ah ha! Found it. Ctrl-Q then shift-Q and you get an em dash. What idiot thought that was a good idea?