byluke.com

It seems like I’m waging a bit of a battle on a number of fronts at the moment. That said, viewing it in such a way constructs it rather negatively, so I am left wondering if there is a way I can construct everything I’m doing in a more positive light…

The new position at work seems to be quite self driven, I’m not sure if I expected it to be as direct support-less as it has been. There are plenty of reasons that it is the case, some excusable, some not. Regardless I’m presented with a set of circumstances and I can either work with them, or not. I’m choosing to work with them and smile along the way! I just hope Apple gets its act together soon and releases new laptops so I have stock to sell… even if I don’t have an internet connection, printer or proper chairs (we have however upgraded from the camp stools. Thankfully!)

Outside from the store, the traffic each morning seems to be a bit of a battle, and at the moment I seem to be a little scatty, so remembering everything I have to do in a given day is proving challenging, forgetting to charge my phone should have acted as the canary in the coal mine for me, but alas, I wasn’t listening. Unfortunately today I was back in my old “launching from one thing (read: minor disaster) to the next” mode. But how to grow up and prioritise.

I start back at uni this week. As I sit here typing this I realise that I have yet to check my timetable and I might even need to swap a class or two if it doesn’t work in with my work schedule.

I think the big thing for me at the moment is having things to rely on… or rather, lacking things to rely on. Perhaps nothing has changed and I am simply passing the buck, but I genuinely feel that I have turned a corner in the way I work, but at these formative stages I still need a little help (or at least a reliable internet connection), which seems to be lacking.

At this reflective point I look back to my path in this life. For those not in the know, my three names (Luke Rohin Martin) combine to mean a Light Bearer/Warrior journeying on the upward path. Interestingly while I’ve never struggled with the meaning of Luke Rohin, it is the Martin / Warlike quality that has always seemed at odds with me. Perhaps it is the Martin that I need to spend some more time getting to know, and the third leg to my personality that while inactive is getting in the way of me and my potential (which everyone assures me I have plenty of, and I have only recently come to accept).

Interesting times most certainly ahead. I’ll keep you posted (and blog more in the meantime).

There is a certain degree of currency to the thoughts and things that I seem to post up here, so when a thought pops in and I don’t have time to write about it, it will languish until I have moved on from it and it is not half as relevant as it was when it first popped in.

I just wanted to mention this! Until they invent a way to dump a consciousness stream directly into a blog there will always be a lag, and some topics that I just don’t get around to!

This I do need to say. There are a lot of things working well at the moment. Working on Campus is a fantastic vibe to be surrounded by, and I’m looking forward to starting lectures again, when I work out when they’re on (this week some time!)

I had some big wins last week, with a fairly successful Market Day in O-Week, actually making it into work on time even though I missed the train and needed to drive, having a great last training session at the Gold Coast store and a phenomenal Sunday on the Broadwater with some great friends.

I’ll try to include some of what’s right in future, instead of simply what it wrong (next post excluded… I’ve already written it but for some reason it seemed apt for this one to come first!)

Turn it up!

This is so cute!! But don’t talk back to Darth Vader… he’ll get ya!

So I started my new job today. Managing the new Next Byte store up at the UQ St Lucia Campus in Brisbane. The store is lovely… it’s quite small, but fits in lots of stock and is in a nice location on campus. Check out the photos!

That said, this morning was a disorganised sham. No internet, no phones, no printers. Not even a computer on display in the store until 10:00am. All of that on top of the fact that I hate peak hour traffic, and that it took close to 2 hours for me to drive from my door to UQ mate for a somewhat peeved start to the morning. 

Then the rental rep arrived and was in my face about policy and procedure while I was busy trying to setup my god damn store that I have had zilch training in how to run. I really shouldn’t be expecting any better, but hey, one can always hope!

My day improved a little, I met a few UQ staffers who all seemed lovely and quite helpful. We managed to even sell a copy of World of Warcraft (worth a total of $30!)

In short, I’m starting to realise that I am going to learn a lot in a short space of time. There is no one to hold my hand or really help me out and I’m going to have to asset the authority that has been given to me. Make some decisions and work with the outcomes! 

So with that in mind, tonight I called into Ikea on the way home. I have no idea if “work” will pay me back for the $60 of stuff I bought, but frankly I don’t care. It’s my store, I’ll make it pretty and organised if I want to! And because I don’t want to sit on a printer box tomorrow while I do orders I bought a camping stool! 

May the assertiveness begin!

… and it is that just because I can do something doesn’t mean that I always should. May the path to further enlightenment follow!

It’s Sunday morning. Two more semi complete blog posts sitting in text files. I might publish them, I might not.

I’ve just spent the better part of the last half hour reading Frankie and I can’t remember the last time I sat down with a magazine on a couch I can stretch out on and just lost myself in the pages for a little while. It’s been too long.

As I turned the pages, the strange mix of content of the magazine became more apparent. We have stories about adult-angst, cleaning products, amazing journalists visitng war torn places, people who love to travel and another page on iPod speakers.

Did Morrison Media design this mag for me? Right now it seems farily certain that I’m about to move to Brisbane to accept a job managing a Mac retail store on the UQ campus. I’m going back to uni and I have a solid job which is flexiable enough to let me study. According to most people, I should be over the moon.

The problem of course, is I am not most people. Reading about travel to the remote corners of the world just isn’t enough for me. Owning the funkiest t-shirt doesn’t define me (it also won’t stop me from buying it… I own about 65+ tees now). There is this amazing world out there and I want to start contributing in big ways. Which is what worries me about taking on the new job.

Sure, there’s new challenges, and I finally get to find out if I am manger material after the last failed affair (I’m told I am, but time will tell) but something about the whole thing just doesn’t seem like it’s enough. I’m left wanting more.

The sensible thing to do of course is take the job, move to Brissy and enjoy my time at uni. Perhaps I should relax a little and enjoy my early 20s while I’m still in them. But when you want to travel the world (literally) and have an overwhelming desire to be “real” in a world that is so manufactured and focussed on appearance and status I wonder just how long I’ll be able to relax for!

All I do know is I’m off to buy a subscription to Frankie. At least the combination of content makes me feel like I’m not alone in all this! 

It’s been a fortnight since my last post, which means that I’m off to a slow start. Firstly, thanks to Xander for any traffic he threw my way, and to Danu (who also just launched his new blog) for reminding me that the more I think about what I’m going to write, the less likely it is that I will *ever* post anything.

So two or three semi-complete drafts (which may never see the light of day) later, I was midway through reading a post on Danu’s temporary Facebook blog about his ‘take’ on Los Angeles when some of the thoughts that have been running around my brain for the last few days bean to cement themselves. To quote, if I may…

“LA is thick with the silent labouring of millions of people each trying to be more successful than everyone else. And if they can’t do that, then at least make it look like they are. The result is bizarre and like a movie - a plausible, some would say more pleasing, version of reality so long as you stay inside the frame.”

If you know me, you probably also know I’m a fairly emotive person, I endeavour to feel my way through things, and so often I trust my initial reaction. For me LA was interesting to visit, but I never quite understood what the hubbub was all about. And yet, Danu’s perceptions are so succinct. I never understood the city because I was out of the frame. I made a judgement on the basis of an initial reaction and didn’t revisit it later to seek out an alternate frame of view.

Anyone who has spent moments behind the viewfinder of a camera, still or film, will know that the perfect shot is often so produced there’s nothing real left in it. Only an expression of what is perceived as real chosen from a very specific angle with the intent to convey something precisely. And yet, our collective psyche is bombarded with these images minute to minute, engineering a generation that is more opinionated and constantly demanding. We are always asked what we think about something and although I’m not aloof enough to suggest there was ever such a thing as pure objectivity, I still long for the days (if they ever existed) where fact meant more than opinion.

But what does this all have to do with first impressions? On Friday last week I installed Microsoft Office 2008 for Mac. I was appalled by the direction the Mac BU at Microsoft had taken the application and I lamented the seeming lack of thought that had been put into some of their decisions. My first impressions almost had me uninstalling the app straight away because I didn’t like something Microsoft had done. They’d changed the Word icon and it didn’t suit me.

Why such a strong reaction? In the lead-up to the release I’d seen plenty of very attractively designed pieces put out by their team, I was even looking forward to having a play, and yet when one thing didn’t fit the way I’d forethought it out, it was cast aside. I’ve even written the first paragraph of a blog post about how much I hated those icons and the needless eye candy in the new release.

(Let the permanent record state that Microsoft are, at present, eye candy crazy as were Apple about 4-5 years ago. They’re playing catchup in a new world they don’t understand and are making themselves look worse at every turn - Vista anyone? But I digress, more on Microsoft another day).

Having looked at the icon, and the packaging a little more, the new icon is growing on me. Just like some of those songs that are on high rotation in the Top 40. Does this mean I actually like it, or should I just trust my first reaction like I did with the Rhianna’s Umbrella.

I’ll have to get back to you on that one. Eh eh.

 
[EDIT] In an ironic twist, I spent the better part of 5 minutes looking for the Umbrella video to link to this post - I didn’t like the one with Jay Z in it, but apparently it was the only version. Resentfully I started watching it… and guess what? It’s growing on me.