[Gnu-arch-users] my status

[Tom Lord]

                           A little Ramble

So:

Attentive readers will have noted that over the past few weeks 
I've not been as productive as in weeks and months prior.

This condition will continue to be the case throughout the month of
April.

This is related to some good news, actually.

I got a fairly generous contribution recently.   Not
earth-shatteringly-now-i'm-rich big -- but a pretty healthy chunk of
change.  

Now, some background:   

About 10 or 12 months before I started on arch I got a job here in
California.   I moved from Pennsylvania to take this job and, because
of where it was located, bit the bullet and signed a lease for a
fairly expensive apartment.

I had to quit that job after just a few months because I had severe
and unresolvable ethical objections to just about every aspect of the
company who had employed me.   In my view, the product was turning
bogus, the way they related to customers was bogus, the way they ran
this shop was bogus, it was all adding up to creating a risk to the
public, and on top of all else, they treated me very poorly.   Y'all
know how I am.   It's arguable that the disconnect was all my fault.
Perhaps I just wasn't cut out to work in certain environments.   But
it's a simple statement of fact that it was the afforementioned
ethical concerns of mine that caused me to have to resign.

I did so.   I therefore had to repay them various relocation expenses
on top of the expenses they didn't cover.   Overall -- I lost a decent
amount of money by accepting that job.  Essentially, I lost money by
taking the job in the first place.

(So, let that be my advice: never take a job you have doubts about in
the first place.  Trust your intuition.  Don't be so quick to
compromise.)

Anyway: here I am stuck in this fairly expensive apartment.  It costs
a lot of money to move, at least around here.  You typically have to
pony up first and last month's rent for a new place, plus a security
deposit, plus the expenses of actually physically moving your stuff.
For many months after quitting that horrible job it was even worse
because I would have had to pay off the remainder of my lease.
Consequently, at any given time for a couple of years now, my only
option has been to scrounge the rent for this place and muddle
through.  To limit my thoughts of moving to pure fantasy.

I'm helped in this regard by two things:

First, the incredible, awesome,
my-gosh-i-want-to-throw-a-big-party-to-thank-y'all generosity of
people who have contributed to the arch project.   I would be _so_
screwed without that.   I'd be living in People's Park or Golden Gate
Park and eating out of a dumpster.

Second, my long-term partner/friend/common-law-spouse is a "library
paraprofessional" -- someone that helps make libraries run but who
doesn't happen to have a graduate degree in Library Science.   That's
not even close to a lucrative career but between that salary and
contributions to arch we're still here.   It's not a sustainable
situation -- for example I have no health insurance and, here in the
US, that means I'm entitled only to crisis-level medical care --- but
for a couple of years?  Yes -- here we are.  Alive and mostly well.

But, anyway, back to my status:

I got a fairly large contribution recently.   Not humongous -- just
usefully large.   That's enough to overcome the activation energy -- I
can finally afford to move.

And moving I am.  Found a new place.  Lease is inked.   Notice is
given on the current place.   I'm locked and loaded.  Oh my gosh I
have so much to pack.

The new place is a bit cheaper than the current one.  That's a bit
curious because it's also nicer and in a better location (from my
perspective).  I could explain at length the regional economic reasons
why I got this break.  But... for now.  Wow.  Cheaper _and_ nicer.

Heck, "nicer" is putting it mildly.  The new place is an architectural
gem.  Round about 1903 the City of Berkeley built a firehouse.  Crufty
old strange but large non-descript building.  My new landlord bought
the place, gutted it, extended it a bit, and divided it into three
units.  I'm privileged to get to rent one of those.  Very simple
floorplan.  Big open space in which cooking and living spaces are
barely separate.  Huge windows.  Nice neighbors.  I can't do it
justice in a few words but -- it's a very winning space.

And, it costs a bit less than what I currently pay.   My partner can
walk to work from there so we save additional money on commute costs.
Basically, it's a big win to move there.   It's even just down the
street from my favorite microbrewery :-)

It's going to take most or all of my recent big gift/grant to make the
move --- my flushness is quite fleeting.   But I think it will be
money well spent because it will reduce my monthly expenses thereafter
and, in the same action, greatly increase my quality of life.

Right... right... this is supposed to be about project status.

So, please forgive me, but:


(a) that big move thing is going to happen over the course of the 
    month of April.   That's going to take up a lot of my time.

(b) oh....it's probably going to amount to nothing, but:  i'm making
    something of a priority this month on trying to start a business
    based, in part, on arch.   Concurrently, I'm negotiating for
    employment with someone else who is also trying to start a
    business based, in part, on arch (except that, these negotiations
    being nearly over, he's giving me bad vibes (to put it mildly)
    and, to take my own advice: "trust your intuition".


The upshot being that my _visible_ progress on arch for April is
doomed to be, to be generous about it, sluggish.   Sorry.

I am working very hard on making my work sustainable in the long run
--- just not so visibly in the sense of rapid merging and releases.

So, thanks for your patience.   If I'm not back in true form in May
then please send out a search party.  I fully expect 1.3pre1 to be
available in May.

And, I expect that in May, I'll also be able to "go apeshit" on
progress on Pika.

Regards and Thanks,
-t

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-----

        The cause of death is birth.
                        -- George Harrison