lol, jesus man, that sounds freaking terrible. First sweat to death, then stuck with a bunch of drunk idiots. As if air travel wasn't shitty enough.

So, in my world, the software I've been helping write finally officially launched today. The last few days/week were an utter nightmare of last minute fixes and cramming in all the bullshit our marketing department wanted to add at the last minute. Complete clusterfuck as far as lack of planning goes. Most of the developer group (including me) ended up working through the 4th of July as a result... that's one of the few holidays I give a shit about, so it's pretty aggravating. Also, I had to take Shiny to the emergency room on Monday night (she's fine), so I was stuck there from about 9:30pm to 2am. Didn't get home until almost 3am since we had to make a bit of a detour to fill a prescription. So.. yea... pretty shitty last week or so.

On a positive note, work is pretty much in a holding pattern for the next week as we wait for bugs and other problems in the new platform. I'm a goddamned rockstar, so the code I wrote is pretty solid. The last few days I've mostly been fixing other people's fuckups and doing things that aren't really directly related to my development work, like dealing with AWS and copying/syncing files and whatnot. That'll probably continue for a bit, until things settle down and we begin serious work on the next round of updates.

I don't have much of a life outside of work as result of all this shit. I'm hopeful that'll change. I really need a freaking vacation.

What about a vacation to Europe eh? So I don't need to feel so guilty for not going to America hahaha.

Sounds pretty horrible too man, but I'm glad you made it through! You know what the most frustrating part about you coding like a god and other people putting in sloppy ass code (and you correcting it) is? It very likely won't matter too much. I mean, I guess it may help you move up if something opens up, but there won't be any consequences for these chumps. They're just keep on keeping on until something really bad happens. Which is good for them I guess, but infuriating if you are actually good at your job and serious about it.

That's what I deal with every day. Fucking incompetence in every department. It's like no one has even half an idea of how to do their job, and asking them either results in a complete stonewall or a reluctant admissal that they don't know. Doesn't mean they will try to find out though, they'll just say no. I routinely will send the same person the same question 4-5 times, always staying polite (I find that persistent politeness is the best way to do this, even when you hate them. Then they can't whine to their managers that you're an asshole). In some cases, they never answer. One could wonder what these people do if not ever answer their emails.

So yeah, I take shortcuts to bypass whole departments that can technically come and bite me in the ass (if they weren't too lazy to even check), I take over work from others that I know I can do myself (usually involves translations and rewriting stuff), advise people on how to structure and manage their teams and rant and so forth. As much as I hate them, I always stay nice and polite. Unless you are in charge, being a douche usually doesn't work too well in the long run.

Erh...anyway, sorry for the rant. Just wanted to add to the sentiment of "if I don't fucking do it myself, it's usually shit".

P.S. Oh yeah, the whole trip was horrible. Slept for a solid day when I got home, recovering from heat exhaustion.

No euro vacations this year. Sorry bro. On a positive note, both Shiny and I should be paying off our cars by the end of the year. That'll free up quite a bit of disposable income. Assuming we don't immediately turn around and finally buy a house.

How much is an average-sized house in your neighbourhood? Just curious.

I'm trying to save money as much as I can while I'm raking in good money from home (jeez I sound like one of those internet ads), but even then I'm not anywhere near to "buying a house"' money. Unfortunately that shit seems to be only for people with two incomes these days. I guess I can always take out a 40-year loan though. On a more positive note, loan interests are historically low (and I mean low) in most of Europe, so it probably really is the time to do that. But yeah...I really can't get over the fact that I'm gonna be the bank's slave for such a long period. /may be exaggerating slightly

On the other hand, Ox, your savings probably generate hardly any money. But i can imagine that taking (not to mention getting) a loan on your own isn't exactly that straightforward. Not sure how much we pay monthly, but wouldn't be able to do that on my own.

Man, the housing market around here has gone crazy over the last few years. Maybe 5 years ago you could get a ~2500 square foot house in the decent suburbs for ~$200,000. Now the same house is going for $350k or more. It really sucks. I'm just putting all my money into my car for now, and once that's paid off I'll stack it up. My hope is that we're in another property bubble. If and when that bubble pops, I'll jump. And hope I don't lose my job because of that bubble burst.

Lol, J, you don't know what you're monthly payment is? Is your wife the financial brains of the family?

Yes, that's completely true.
Either it's because she has a master in economics or because i'm lazy/don't care that she's running our finances.

Last time i checked we had some savings in the bank, so i guess she's doing a good job.

Haha, I think J's got the right idea, more time to sit back and have a beer.

I think in most couples I know the man tends to handle the finances overall, but I know quite a few where it's the woman who does it. One of my brothers has always been horrible with money, and lucky for him (and us) his wife stepped in and took over his/their family finances. Shit is making a lot more sense now. Before it was the typical "let me just buy this" and then figuring out later that he didn't have the cash, with us bailing him out with no interest loans. He always paid us back, mind you, he's not completely irresponsible or an addict or anything. But it was annoying as fuck.

And Satis, the property prices are rising in Europe too, but it's the loans that are becoming dirt cheap. So yeah, it's not exactly ideal yet. Let us pray for that bubble bursting haha. In the meantime I'll keep stockpiling euroshekels...which I should really invest in something, as savings don't make any money anymore, J's right about that. But in what? Mmm.

In other news: I was feeling a bit hot today and looked at the weather report. No fucking wonder:

https://www.maltairport.com/weather/7-day-forecast/

If you need me, I'll be slowly dying the next few days. My fan is basically just blowing hot air at me. May need to fire up the AC after all...

Holy crap, that's really freaking hot. We've had a surprisingly mild summer (for Texas). Only broken 100F (~38C) a few days this year, I think. In 2011 (I think) we had like 40 straight days of 100+ degrees F. It was hellish.

I didn't realize your wife had a masters in economics. I'd let her handle my finances too. Shiny and I handle our own finances, but I had to step in a time or two because she will also go and blindly buy stuff. That should hopefully no longer be an issue.

Lol @ Shiny being attracted by shiny things. Who could have thunk?

Yeah, heatwave is finally over. Back to normal now, not that it will do me much good as I'll be going on holiday in Finland next week. A week of drinking, enjoying way too late daylight, lakes, breweries and other shenanigans. Gonna be good!

Nothing like a vacation. Shiny and I are taking a week off around my birthday... this is day day (August 19th). Just got to Houston, spending a few days in downtown in a pretty nice suite. After that San Antonio, then Austin. It'll be awesome.

Happy birthday!! Hope you're having a great time, take some pics!

Just got back from Finland, great trip. As you can imagine, it was quite a difference from when I visited in the winter. Instead of permanent sub-zero degrees, frozen over water, snow and ice and darkness it was glorious fields, forests and lakes for hundreds of kilometers with sometimes not a soul in sight. Not to mention very long days. Took a little trip North to not even halfway the country, and realized that it was as North as I've ever been in my life. Apart from a slightly cooler temperature compared to Helsinki and slightly longer days I didn't notice that much of a difference though. I'm sure it's very different once winter rolls up.

Mostly got drunk, hung around by lakes and in the forest, took in the nature and ate some good food. Ate some reindeer and bear, for one. That last one is another animal I can scratch off of my list. Oh yeah, also took a very small trip to Estonia with the ferry (takes about 2 hours). Was nice to see Tallinn, had some good food there too. The main purpose was to stock up on on affordable alcohol though (as it is for most Fins). Alcohol is extremely expensive in Finland and only sold in government stores (or bars), for some context. A pack of 24 cans of decent local beer will cost you around 50 euro in Finland. On the ferry to Estonia, it's around 17 euros for the exact same beer iirc. So yeah...there are some limits to how much alcohol you can take from one EU country to another for personal use, but they are only there to stop people from actually reselling etc. The limit for beer per trip per person is 110 litres.

Oh yeah, also explored some ridiculously amazing saunas. It's messed up what kind of sauna facilities private owners have in Finland sometimes. Went to a sauna in someone's backyard that was built inside a greenhouse and had an adjacent bathroom, changing room and booze stock (with fridge). The sauna itself could easily hold 10 people. This shit was in someone's backyard. Then they had a 3-4 people heated tub outside of the sauna in the garden too, with beer holders and a fucking grill next to it. You can imagine how great it was to drink beers in that when the sun doesn't set before 22h. I'll see if I can get some pics up soon.

That sounds freaking awesome. Looking forward to some pics. I'll try to post some from my own as well. Bear and reindeer sounds amazing.

Haha, I didn't take any pics of me eating them, unfortunately. Was too drunk at the time.

I did get some others pics ready to share, but I forgot how to access the 'catalogue' thing you made Satis. Can you remind me how I get there again?

oh, crap. Uhh... looks like you can get to it via clankiller.com/gallery. I have no idea what your login is. I could figure out your username with some database trolling, but the password.... I guess I could reset it? Maybe? Any info about it in your PMs?

Actually, I poked around a bit, and I'm not sure I ever gave you access to clankiller.com/gallery. You do have FTP access to the site. Man... it's been a long time.