The ‘Calm’, part 1
I don’t have COVID-19… but I now have an asterisk.
I am a Public Transit rider (‘TARC’), here in Louisville. A few days ago, a news report came out that one of the TARC drivers tested positive for COVID-19. The driver was on the #4 route – “4th Street”, “during the early afternoon hours” of July 21st, when he became ill.
Route #4 is the route I ride to/from work.
‘Early afternoon’ is when I head home.
So I now have to be hyper-vigilant with monitoring for any symptoms. I don’t know which branch of Route #4 he was driving but I do know that the likelihood that I was on his bus is well over 50%. Hence, the ‘*’ in my initial statement.
In better news, I graduated from the Summer session of ‘Code Louisville’! My “Prospective marchers” web site met the major requirements – 1) Must be Mobile Responsive, adjusting columns and layouts to fit on phone and tablet screens, 2) Must have separate, linked files for JavaScript and CSS, and 3) Must be on GitHub, with at least 5 Commits (all through Git) – and the list of features including having a ‘Hamburger Menu’. It took a while (with 2 complete redos) but I was happy with the final results! I may post the GitHub link to it soon.
On a side note: ‘Code Louisville’ had a list of Mentors that would work with us, from running the separate classes to having small ‘Break Out Rooms” on Zoom, where they would give more individualized attention to any problem areas that we were having. One of the Mentors, Drew, reviewed my project before I turned it in. He is a big Drum & Bugle Corps fan and loved the idea of my project (‘potential marchers would enter info into a form, where it would go out to a database that Directors could access; this could save marchers time and money from traveling around the country, multiple times, to tryout for Corps and Groups’)! Thought it was cool that he was a Drum Corps fan.
I deleted the Snapchat app from my phone, a while back. I only used it when I was marching with Cincinnati Tradition (‘CT’); we would use it to keep track, and encourage others, on fitness goals. With the 2020 season cancelled, and me maybe not marching 2021 (if there’s a season), there wasn’t any reason to hold on to it.
I did, however, start an Instagram account, this week. It gives me a better place to post photos – and the occasional video and meme – than Facebook, plus a good friend, who asked me if I had an account, frequents that site more than FB (long story), so I can now keep in touch with her. I loved taking pictures while at UofL but got away from it, other than the random phone pic. This is a good way for me to get back into picture-taking, starting with my phone and possibly buying a camera, down the road. My name is ‘antb729’; I don’t have much up, at the moment, but there might be a pic or 2 that you may like.
Part 2 of ‘The Calm’ will be about video games, and will be a separate post. Stay tuned! 😉
The Storm
This will start with the finale to my Systems Analysis, On Demand class. I have 2 chapters left to read and take quizzes on, plus the majority of a Scenario-based section to finish. The scenario: I am a new Analyst for a company. Each ‘week’, I get emails, voice mails, tutorials, and assignments from my immediate ‘boss’ and mentor. I have to turn in these assignments – usually 2-3 page papers on different topics. On Monday, I will likely sign up for one of the final 3 classes that I need, also On Demand. On Demand classes start from the moment you sign up, so I have to pay up front (if I get any Financial Aid, it has to be ready to use at that time). I don’t know which class this will be, yet – I’m still narrowing down the list of what to take.
The other two classes will start when Northrop Grumman sends EdAssist aid to me. In the past, I’ve had issues with them and WKU’s payment system (to make a convoluted, long story short: EdAssist sends me a Virtual Credit Card; WKU’s system doesn’t know how to process that card). Let’s hope this goes much smoother, this semester!
The first few days of testing our work system at home have been pretty successful. There were some login bugs that were fixed last week, plus some wifi hotspot hangups, but they seemed to have resolved themselves. I’m kinda hoping that I can stay working from home for the next few weeks.
The Fall session for 2020 Code Louisville begins on August 31st. This session will focus on different Programming languages: JavaScript, C#, Python, SQL, and UX Design, plus possibly Ruby. I’m choosing C#: I like Python better but I had more trouble with C# when I took both as classes at Jefferson Community and Tech. College, a few years ago. Thankfully, I still have the textbooks for both, so I can maybe get a head start on (re)learning. The session goes through mid-November.
Before that session starts, there are a few loose ends to wrap for the Summer session. I have a couple of voluntary Tech seminars that I want to check out, I have a meeting with the Staff about the session, and I have a Job Workshop (via Zoom, I think) next Tuesday, where the Community Coordinator and Event Coordinator will help revise my resume and my LinkedIn account, plus give me access to a Slack “Jobs” channel.
In addition to work, school, and Code Louisville, I am also starting a new D&D campaign on Saturday mornings. Me and my Tiefling Ranger named “Noxx” will be joined by Game Night host Scotty, friend Katie, her friend Mike (also a newish player), the DM’s stepson Anson, and the DM, Eric; we will be traveling in the area of Neverwinter. I missed Session 0 (generally used as the character setup), so spent Tuesday afternoon setting my character up with Eric. If he allows it, I will become a Gloom Stalker at level 3:
It should be fun! I haven’t seen Katie much in the last few years, so it’ll be cool reuniting with her. I’m also excited about playing as a Ranger: ‘Ranger’ was my favorite class to play in Baldur’s Gate II and the Throne of Bhaal expansion pack.
There’s also the restart of ‘Podicus Wrecks’, the comics (mainly) podcast that I co-host with Comicdom Wrecks co-founder, J.R.
It’s going to be an insanely busy Fall semester. I don’t know if Team Trivia will start back in the Fall, if Game Nights will start back, or if I will go to either of them. I also need to decide how long I can do the podcast before school work and Code Louisville work take priority during the weekdays. Code Louisville and one class took up a lot of weekday time and that was including not doing a lot of class work in May or June. We will see.
In the meantime, I will get back to work, start on the other part of this blog, later today, and enjoy the cool (for Louisville) morning!
The Nexus 