Hugo's Blog

This Blog Has "Moved"!

2010-08-01T14:58:02Z

According to feedburner, this blog has over a dozen subscribers. I feel honoured, and would love to keep you on board. I could point this feedburner feed to one of my new blogs, or some aggregation of my new blogs, but I'm not sure what would be appropriate.

You read that right, it's plural. I've now got something like half a dozen other blogs, intentionally fragmented. For example I have a blog whose purpose it is to serve as a place where I can write German (eventually), or about German, and not everyone wants to be spammed by that. (It's not very active yet.) Blabbing about sport and my attempts at making the most of my stay in Switzerland goes on Exploiting Switzerland, whereas if I ever feel like writing about something related to tech, I'll do so on my tech blog (which still needs a unique header image, that's still the default cutline banner).

I would like to keep y'all on-board, so get in touch, let me know what you're interested in, and I'll point you at the right location or feed. Thanks for subscribing thus far and putting up with my rambling, much appreciated!

Latest Developments

2010-04-26T20:42:17Z

I'm no longer on-call every third week. Yay! (Merged rotations.) That means more weekends that I can make better use of.

I never did visit the gym when I last mentioned it. Today I did though, this is another on-call week. I can no longer afford to let some weeks go by without exercise, due firstly to the triathlon I signed up for, secondly the XTerra off-road triathlon I want to sign up for in September, and thirdly the trail run I'm considering in South Africa on the third weekend of October. Yup, I'm visiting again then, for about two weeks.

So yes, I'm now officially old, since I always said "naah, old people go to the gym, those people with jobs that ensure they don't have time to get some real exercise!" ;)

Lastly on another note, I want to start a "German" blog. Well, a blog in which I grapple with my lack of knowledge of German anyway, it will contain English and Afrikaans as well. Pretty much exhibitionism with my notes as I try to learn the language. The existence of the blog is supposed to help motivate me to write some notes and solidify my understanding. It will likely just get occasional posts, nothing too regular. (Surprise!) And of all the hurdles I could come up with: I'm sticking to the exact same blog theme, but with a different header image — problem is I can't decide what. I'd prefer to use some photo I took myself. What kind of thing would fit well with a "German" theme? Ponder...

The Sun Stood Still for an Hour

2010-03-29T22:13:09Z

Interesting to note how important the sun is in regulating our daily cycles. As winter gradually gives way to spring, we're finding ourselves slow to go to dinner: it's still so bright outside, we think "can't be dinner time yet!" And then, this weekend, the sun stood still for an hour. Dinner time came today, while the sun was a full hour slow in setting.

Well, it's now officially summer time. As in, we're operating on Central European Summer Time, or CEST. That means we're now also back in sync with SAST, South African Standard Time. Just so you know.

Getting Back into Shape

2010-03-28T00:10:56Z

I've signed up for the Zurich Triathlon on 24 July. There's nothing like an actual event I'm signed up for to motivate me to actually start training. Thus far, I've gone for one run. ;)

That was last weekend. In typical silly fashion, I didn't start out easy: immediately tackled Uetliberg to compare my fitness level to that of 2009. As best I can tell, I've done this twice before, once on 31 May and once on 14 June. My first attempt took 46:20, and my second was a bit slower if I recall correctly. This weekend I didn't expect to do too well, but given a ~3 minute margin of error (for taking a different place as my run's start/end), I actually set up a personal best?! 43 minutes.

It must have helped that it was a cool day, about 11 degrees C. In fact, it was raining! The rain began 15 minutes into my run, and I spent some minutes wondering if I should turn back. Good technical clothing copes fine with rain though, and the run was actually very pleasant.

What might also have helped is my favourite short-cut: I really cannot remember whether I took the short-cut while setting up last year's baseline. In fact, I might even have taken Uetlibergstrasse last time, instead of running up next to the river. I know I've jogged Uetlibergstrasse before. I guess I'll just have to do that next time and see how my time compares.

For your viewing pleasure, I took two pictures, one at the top, one on the way down again:

"View" on Uetliberg. A cloud?

The run back home was quite atmospheric. ;)

And since I'm such a geek, I also have a gps track of the run.

It was one single run on a Sunday. The muscle ache finally dissipated towards the end of Thursday. Nuts? Well, not really. I was on-call, so I thought it might be good to get several days' worth of muscle ache while I still can! Such a good feeling, that. ;) And I was impressed by the lack of pain during the run. I felt in good shape. My unfit lower back didn't even hurt much. My conclusion is that the bits of walking that I do, the stairs I climb to the fourth floor, and the couple of skiing trips this winter season contributed more to my general fitness than I thought.

Tomorrow, nay, today, I might go for a short run or cycle, short enough to stay within 30 minutes of home/computer (or work/computer). On Monday I'll be untethered again.

Morning Person or Night Person?

2010-02-16T00:46:42Z

I don't really know the answer to the question "am I a morning person or a night person?" Ask me again in six months' time. ;-)

During my undergraduate years, I pretty much attended all my classes, 8am didn't bother me. When I first started running "for real", I even managed to fit in a morning run before class, every morning. For a week!

And weekends. I recall returning from an 18km run on a Saturday morning while the rest of the people in res had not woken up yet. Out running seeing the sunrise, back feeling energised, strong and ready for the day, I'm sure the good feeling was more than just a way to justify my lack of a Friday night social life. :-P

Then came my postgraduate years.

First semester, "rise and shine", attended all my classes, did some demi work (assisted in tuts), many a project... burned out? I like to think so anyway.

Second semester, "who am I and what am I doing here?"... ok, the seeds for that were already germinating in the first semester, but the second semester was surely where things started turning around a bit — if I ever transitioned from a morning person to an evening person, it was then. I actually checked out the Stellenbosch students' social scene, in some ways pretty much for the first time.

These days my waking hours tend to look much more like the "worst" of that semester than like my undergraduate years. On evenings/nights that I work, I work well, and mornings have not yet been demonstrably successful. But that is by no means a given.

On some of the days that I do get myself into the office early, the mornings feel so nice and long, like I can get a tonne done before lunchtime. It really could work, could work really well, which is why I must give it a thorough try before I can know for sure what I am.

Last week started well, I was in the office really early on Monday. But it was an on-call week, where my shifts are from 11am to 11pm. Such a shift just makes it too easy for me to chill on around the office until 11pm before I head home. And then I find myself not heading straight for bed, so the next morning becomes later again.

Last night kept me up latish, plus I got paged in the middle of the early morning hours, so this week certainly didn't start early. And now I'm writing this post after midnight. However tomorrow I start shifting my days forward, hour by hour. Besides, next week I have some relatively early morning commitments due to cross-timezone duties.

Thus the intentions I declared nearly ten days ago, "I'm now moving my day forward again, as far as I can manage: up earlier, to work earlier, leave work earlier, so that weekday evenings can also be used for something meaningful", will be pursued earnestly over the next two weeks. Nine working days.

Then I'm taking some time off. ;)

Assuming you read this far, what are you? A morning person or a night person? Or an evening person... is there a difference between an evening person and a night person?

Imagine Ice Skating in a Forest!

2010-02-12T15:20:11Z

Speaking of ice skating, the Meetup is going ice skating in the forest tomorrow. Unfortunately I can't go, being on-call I'll be at home.

Or maybe I'll visit the office, I live close so I can commute within my SLA. But not for work (I can do that from home), rather I might try out a treadmill in the gym. It's been years since I've been on a treadmill, I hate the stuff, but this morning I jogged to the bus stop and felt an urge to run. My body just feels like it. And a treadmill can offer me some of that while I'm on-call. ;) The rest of the weekend will probably be used for personal projects or movie watching.

With regards to this forest trail though, assuming they have good skates to rent, that would actually be something I'd like to check out, maybe in March.

Ice Skating on the Sihlsee

2010-02-10T20:17:27Z

On 31 January I joined the Zurich Hike & Outdoor Meetup on a trip to go ice skating on the Sihlsee.

I recorded a track of where I skated (and walked, for the last lap), zoom out to see where it was. I only took four pictures (added captions to those), but there are more pictures of the trip on the meetup site, including a couple of me. (Arrow keys work in both picasaweb and on the meetup site's photos.)

Finding good skates was rather difficult. I tried one pair, turned back after hardly skating at all to grab a smaller pair. With those I struggled all the way round (because the track is sort-of a one-way) before I could go swap them again, for a different kind this time, because that first kind just had no stability at all. With the new pair it went much better, I could actually build up some speed without risking breaking something, but they did hurt the back of the ankle.

Nevertheless, it was a good day out. I know every time I struggle with bad skates, I will want to go buy myself a good pair. However I unfortunately don't skate enough to justify that.

A Buffet of Activities

2010-02-07T21:22:15Z

Ever had that feeling at an all-you-can-eat buffet where there is just too much to choose from, and you know you won't be able to sample all the interesting bits. Or if you do, you don't eat enough of anything to really appreciate it?

Life's often like that. In a developed country anyway, I recommend a minute's silence and thought for peoples and countries suffering hardships.

In any case, I loose Friday's bet — I'll spend the next couple of posts writing about various activities and social integration. Blame this weekend's busy schedule. It was a good weekend.

I know myself. There's a lot I can do at home, I can keep myself busy all day, all night, all year... and if I'm not careful, that's too easily what I can end up doing. That's not human though, psychologically that behaviour is destructive. And it's not just about mental health, it's getting out and about and doing stuff is about social interaction, about physical health, and about living something that's worth calling a life. ;)

In retrospect, it feels like I've been keeping life "on hold" for some reason. Some recent wake-up calls, it's now onto a more active/aggressive "go-get-em" attitude to getting out there and doing stuff, not every now and then like I feel was the case last year, but regularly.

This year so far there's been skiing, cycling, dancing, ice skating, a comedy show (that didn't really impress), a visit to Tonhalle to see the New York Philharmonic, and a weekend of stay-at-home due to being on-call. And we've really only just finished week five of 2010.

Still... Using weekends well: not enough. Doing the kinds of activities that sound cool when you list them like that: not enough. So I'm now moving my day forward again, as far as I can manage: up earlier, to work earlier, leave work earlier, so that weekday evenings can also be used for something meaningful. And as I sit back and look at my options, I conclude there's too many things to choose from. The challenge thus: making good choices! (Not the right choices, no such thing. Rather aiming for good choices that I can feel happy about when I look back six months from now.)

The next couple of posts should talk about the past five weeks' activities. Probably won't be labelled "navel-gazing" either. I ought to have some time this week to write them (and hopefully give this blog's code some much needed attention): it's another on-call week. Unless I use this week only for overworking myself, there must be time available.

Topics for Contemplation

2010-02-05T19:42:04Z

It's been nearly three weeks since my previous post. Didn't think it would take me this long to babble some more.

Some of the topics being considered for navel-gazing:

The feeling of "I suck at my job". I want to unpack those feelings. They're last year's feelings, this year is markedly better, in part because I've already unpacked the feeling in my mind, understood its source, and debunked as much of it as I need to. (And what remains can be used to guide career choices in the future.)
Social integration in Switzerland. Or lack thereof. ;) Again something I'm now actively working on fixing, but the intent of this navel-gazing is to consider the past in order to construct a better path for the future.

Actually, those two points might pretty much cover all of it. I mean, the way I just expressed it, first point is "all things professional", the second is "all things personal" — between those two spheres of life, what did I miss? Well...

general pondering about what I want to do in life, here and now and in the future

might be something of a broader sphere that encompasses non-personal and non-professional aspects of life. Like, sport! Which I've been neglecting, relative to what my dreams suggest I'd enjoy. I suppose that falls under "health" to some degree?

Next post will be soon. Time will tell on which topic, but my money is on the first at the moment, that "I suck at my job" thing. ;-)

To The The Future, be it Bright or Bleak!

2010-01-16T11:09:47Z

On 6 December 2009, at 6:13 PM, I wrote a tweet:

15 months in, I still have very little clue about whether I can survive living in Switzerland in the long term.

That innocuous looking tweet was in aid of not keeping things in, a solution to many, many thoughts running around my head wasting my energy and needing some (re)solution. Throw all those time-wasting thoughts into a smelting pot and come up with a homogeneous thought that could be expressed in 140 characters. Accept that as a simple fact of life and move on. A bite-sized answer that need not be obsessed over any further.

However, the nature of that "I still have very little clue" is unsatisfatory, so with these navel-gazing posts I intend to revisit those thoughts, unpacking and deconstructing them carefully. The future is bright, not bleak. Pessimistic ideas that suggest bleak outcomes need to be debunked. There's lots to be learned, and important attitude or strategy changes to be made through this exercise.

The time to get proactive and decide what I want the future to be, rather than simply riding along on a small rubber dingy to see where the water takes me. Rapids can be an exhilarating ride, if you tackle them right, or they can oblige and capsize you if you've chosen to rather act the victim.