Asia 2011-Bali
Author: FoDaLey
Prior to going to my brother’s wedding, my cousin Kane and I decided to take a trip somewhere…it was a toss up between Indonesia (Bali) and the Philippines. My brother said Bali is much cooler. So, we went to Bali.
My Two Companions
Author: FoDaLey
From Wikipedia:
The earliest known turtles date from 215 million years ago, making turtles one of the oldest reptile groups and a more ancient group than lizards, snakes and crocodiles.
It is common to find dog lovers, cat lovers, and lovers of many other cute and cuddly creatures, but I haven’t found many turtle lovers. Well, I am one. With the disappearance of my last turtle, I will capture my memories of them – my companions of the past 14 years.
In 1997, when I was 14, I took a trip down to Belize to visit family. One of my relatives owned a pet shop housed in a small wooden building facing a canal. My visit to the pet shop ended up with me walking out with two turtles. It was one of those impulsive decisions children make without knowing the long term ramifications. Compared to impulsive decisions my friends made, like doing drugs, this is turned out not too bad!
I brought the turtles back to Florida. They were simply stored in a small container and stuffed in my pocket during my flight. Back in Florida, I would place my turtles, housed in their green transparent bowl (with a miniature plastic palm tree inside) on a table near the window. One day, one of the turtles crawled out, and fell onto the hard tile floor. After I heard the clunk, I rushed over to find him/her still alive, but in shock. The turtle stayed in the shell most of the time afterwards…and one day, passed away.
Concerned that my turtle would not have a friend, and knowing someone was coming to Florida from Belize, I asked for another turtle. I’ve long forgotten which turtle, Tiny or Minnie, I had first…but when I’ve had my turtles as long as I have, the difference in weeks is not significant.
These two turtles, Tiny and Minnie, are the ones who will accompany through the significant phases of my life. When I was about to move to college, my grandma told me not to take the turtles with me because people would make fun of me. Well, I brought them with my anyways! Immediately after my first turtle died, I moved them to a protective Rubbermaid container, and that container was brought up with me
Tiny in the Rubbermaid Container
In college I was housed in a small room with two other roommates. While living in the dorms, a lot of my floor mates knew of my turtles. My turtles were kept discretely in my room, but I brought them with me to the communal bathroom to change their water. I would run into people once in a while who would ask about my turtles
After moving out of the dorms, I upgraded their container to a 10 gallon aquarium. While on an internship in Atlanta my senior year, I purchased a 20 gallon aquarium for them. It was around this time that Minnie started to get sick.
Minnie in the Aquarium
I noticed she did not eat very much. One weekend, I took her to a vet. She got x-rays on this visit, and it was discovered she had some calcification that was blocking up her rectum. The vet went in and broke up the calcification. Later on, Minnie got sick again…and found out it was respiratory infection. I obtained some medicine from the vet that I had to inject into her thigh muscle. It was awkward for me to give her the injections…I could see her squirm and snap at me in discomfort as I gave them to her.
Minnie at the Vet
I drove up to Boston to complete my internship, and Minnie never got much better. A few weeks later, while back at UF, she passed away. I buried her in the backyard of my apartment. She was with me for six years, and from then on it was just me and Tiny.
I had another internship, and move apartments a few more times. Each time, Tiny came with me. After graduating from grad school, I moved up to Georgia where Tiny came with me, still in his 20 gallon aquarium.
In my last move, I had an apartment that had an open balcony. I purchased a large Rubbermaid container for him, so I can store him outside. It was covered and protected. When the weather was nice, I would put him outside to get some fresh air, and some sunshine. It was on one of those days, that he decided to escape. Well, I’m sure he decided for years that he wanted to escape – if anything, for curiosity sake. He would sometimes escape from his original Rubbermaid container, only to be found hiding under a bed or in a corner. But this time, it was his final escape.
I had a sturdy plastic net covering a large Rubbermaid container. The sides of the container were too high for him to escape, and the container was completely covered, except for a slit in the middle. At the slit, there is no wall for him to prop himself up to escape with. However, at this slit, the net drooped a bit. I believe he pulled down the net, and was able to climb on top of it to escape it. He then plunged to the grassy first floor, and hopefully, crawled to the lake just 20 feet away. I applaud you, Tiny, for conjuring up this escape plan and hope you made it to the lake.
Tiny and Minnie Together
My turtles have been with me through high school, college, road trips, internships, and my first real job. They’ve met all my family, all my roommates, and many of my friends. Deep down inside, I wanted them to have been passed down to my children. I do wish I could have provided a better life for the two of them. After Minnie passed away, I hoped that Tiny would live for a long time…long enough for me to own a house, to build a landscaped area with a small pond for them…so he can live happily…to make up for his time spent in rubber maid containers, in aquariums.
He was a very active and healthy. His personality was quite different from Minnie. Minnie was like the quiet shy young girl…him the young teenage troublemaker. I always enjoyed coming back to my apartment, and seeing and hearing him great me by paddling fervently as I enter. Now, I am just greeted by the echo of a ticking clock.
Should he actually make it to the lake…I suppose, it is bigger than any enclosure I could provide. He’s in a habit, one with nature, amongst other turtles and fishes. I hope he is happy.
Asia 2011–Beijing
Author: FoDaLey
I took another extended vacation this year. This time it was ‘only’ 3 weeks vs. 4 weeks last year. I had the opportunity to visit Beijing, Hong Kong, Bali, and Tokyo.
I went to Beijing with my parents, and my 6th aunt & uncle. I was in Hong Kong for my brother’s wedding. I went to Bali with my cousin, Kane. And I visited Nae in Tokyo.
Me, mom & dad at the Great Wall of China.
Me, mom, dad and aunt at Tiananmen Square.
Peking duck!
4 Star Toilet…heh
Temple that overlooks the Forbidden City
Summer Palace
Summer Palace
Personal Life Update
Author: FoDaLey
In October of 2009 I had a post…it said “I’ve met a girl. Her name is Nae. She makes me happy, I make her happy.”
To complete the story…she left back for Japan in December, 2010. We officially broke up in May, 2011. I guess I didn’t make her happy enough. That’s all I have to say. Next post!
My first NAS
Author: FoDaLey
I have always been paranoid about losing my data. I don’t have a lot of data, but my most precious data, like most people, are my photos. I do have a Flickr professional account which lets me upload an unlimited about of photos, but I have not populated it with all my photos…even though I’ve had that account for more than one year??
My data has been scattered across several drives…a 80 gig, 250 gig, my 200 gig partition…etc. I finally purchased a 1TB drive last September to consolidate all my drives, but I want redundancy. I have more than 250 gigs of data, so I couldn’t have redundancy easily since I only had 1 drive that’s more than 250 gigs.
I then purchased a 1.5TB Drive…and then saw a NAS on sale, for $90. It was the D-Link DNS-320.
It holds 2 drives, and has an ethernet and usb connection. Power consumption is very low. The OS is Linux based. I can share files online…etc..etc..fairly standard stuff.
Well, there was one problem…only certain drives are compatible with this son of a b-tch. My 1.5TB drive I purchased…is a Western Digital “Black” drive. It’s basically a high performance hard drive. Turns out, it’s not compatible with the NAS. The NAS would not detect it. I tried out my 2TB drive, another Western Digital, but a “Green” drive. It’s eco friendly, runs at a lower RPM and uses less energy. It turns out that there were issues with it…but overall, issues with all Western Digital consumer grade drives. The drives have an error correction mechanism…which on a NAS, the NAS should be the one to handle that.
Essentially, the conflict screws things up and the NAS kicks it off-line. There was a recent firmware upgrade and it’s suppose to have fixed it…but based on my forum searches, I couldn’t find an answer. I posted an answer in the forums, but no one ever responded. Then I e-mailed D-link…and after several days I finally got an answer. I can use my drive.
Oh yeah, I bought a 2nd 2.0TB drive..since my 1.5TB did not work. The drives were exactly the same, except one has a 64MB cache, and the other a 16MB cache. The 16MB cache was not on the ‘officially supported list’…sigh…
Oh well, my coworkers say I should have gotten a Synology NAS
I’ve resorted to cloning my NAS onto my 1.5TB drive…in case it fails.
Reaffirming My Belief in Technical Analysis
Author: FoDaLey
I believe in technical analysis of the stock market…at least, the majority of it. I do understand that some of what you conclude from charts is up to interpretation. When your doctor looks at your charts it’s their interpretation as well, yet we still believe them. It’s not like I don’t believe in fundamental analysis…I just think technical analysis can bring better gains, faster. And now….
That was the big news for the day. The biggest drop since the 2008 crisis…all the gains for 2011 are gone. $1.9 trillion dollars wiped out.
Luckily, I was mostly in cash. After pocketing a gain of 27% on Athena and 11% on TNAV…I did not invest in anything else. I sold my holdings in my Roth IRA about 2 weeks ago. My dad’s stocks…most were sold over the past 2 weeks (Except for Apple and Netflix…Netflix sold today). My 401k…I got out at the nick of time…sold yesterday! They actually made money today, because I put them in government bonds.
If I did a ‘buy and hold’ on Athena and TNAV, I would actually have lost *a lot* of money. TNAV has dropped 50% since I sold.
I was able to justify all my time and resources invested into stock analysis by my purchases of TNAV and Athena. Thanks to those two stocks, I have now beaten the market. Now I can justify my time and resource investments further, because I was out of the market in time for today’s plunge.
I think a bear market is coming…at least for the month of August. We’ll see what happens. But so far, it doesn’t look good. If tomorrow shows more signs of weakness, I may short the market next week.
Amazon Interview
Author: FoDaLey
Apparently I did well enough on my Amazon.com interview to warrant a 2nd round. Actually I did well on my two interviews on site in Atlanta. The feedback I got has been positive, and I have a feeling I will be getting an offer from them.
Most people at work know I’m seeking other opportunities. If they don’t know, they will know by Monday when my supervisor tells my group. I’ve spoke to my squadron director (my boss’s boss) and he wants me to stay in the squadron. So, he opened up more opportunities for me too. In total, let me count how many potential opportunities I have.
1) My cousin is working with a startup…but they are not hiring at the moment, and when they do hire they are going to hire people at the previous company.
2) My friend Gabe, extended an offer to interview at his company. Would be lovely to work in Boston, but all the other opportunities below are moving fast I don’t have time to consider it, plus it’s a different technology that I do not have experience in (Ruby on Rails).
3) The ‘group staff’ team has a business process management software they want to implement in a pilot program. They need java & oracle programmers. The man in charge wants me on board. It’s a high visibility project…started by my boss’s boss’s boss.
4) My supervisor gave me several opportunities on other projects…I declined. My #1 requirement at the moment is to leave the group and see new things
5) I spoke to a lady named Jill..she’s in charge of hiring all engineers on base. She was going to let me look at other squadrons. Sadly I think she’s been out of town and it hasn’t happened yet.
6) My squadron director gave me an opportunity with another group. Their project is actually interesting…it’s to setup a test bench for the C-130…lots of programming in ADA.
7) Potential job offer with a contracting like software company
8 ) Potential job offer from a software company in the travel industry
9) 2nd Round interview with amazon
10) I was contacted by an Army contractor to work on some cloud based data processing application. The description of the software looks very interesting. They want me to solve 4 programming problems before even talking to me. The problems do not look difficult…not sure if I will pursue them…they are based in Seattle and DC.
A birthday gift from the stock market
Author: FoDaLey
All my years of studying stock analysis and technical analysis…all my books…was made up by this baby. With the huge surge in volume, it should have no where to go but up. It might pull back…but hell…at 17.5% gain in 1 day, a little rest would do it quite a bit of good. Happy 28th to me…hoping for more successful crystal ball reading in the years to come.
Job Hunting
Author: FoDaLey
On a quick side note…woulda made 16% off of accenture if I had kept it (see post below).
I am active searching for jobs…well, I’ve been searching for almost the past 1.5 years actually, though I was very specific on the city and confined myself to government work. I have not had a good experience with usajobs. Though to be frank, I have not been applying for positions that I am fully qualified for. I have been applying to IT positions and such, even though I am a software engineer. I’ve been trying to get abroad, and the government doesn’t really have engineers abroad. I figure with my Security+ certification and overall knowledge of operating systems and network I would at least get somewhere.
I have recently decided to expand to the private industry. I posted my resume online at dice, monster, and classifiedjobs.I did not post my phone number because I did not want to be bombarded by calls, but I did receive…I don’t know, 8 inquires or so?
There are a couple of potentials. Some of the inquiries were recruiters, so they don’t really count, but I would say half is from the company themselves. I’ve talked on the phone with one, and we will be proceeding with an interview with their VP. That position is in Atlanta.
I would not say Atlanta is my #1 spot to move to. I live 1.5 hours south, and I go there frequently on weekends. I want to try somewhere new…like California, Texas, Boston, North/South Carolina, Colorado.
I’ve gotten inquiries from Washington DC and Seattle. Seattle is an interesting one, as it’s from Amazon.com. I think it would be fairly close to my dream job to work for Amazon. The position is for kindle development. The description says having experience in mobile development is preferred. I do not have that experience, but I assume since it is Amazon contacting me (and not some recruiter) that they liked something.
Anywho, after doing some research I’ve realized that Amazon is very very thorough on their technical and behavior interviews…to that point that I am intimidated. I can only try my best to prepare…which from my research seems like a lot of basic computer science principles. It’s stuff I have learned and mastered at one point in undergrad, but I do not use actively everyday. I will have to review some topics.
I’ve also applied to several positions in Northrop…and today I applied to a dozen through usajobs that are more aligned with my skill set.
One of the main reasons I am seeking a new position now is because I’m bored with the projects I’m on. I had expressed this fact several times in the past 2 years, but every time I had an opportunity to do something new, it does not get followed up on. I’ve made contact with someone pretty high up who is willing to move me around on the base, so at a minimum I believe I will leave my position, even if I do stay in Warner Robins.
Overall Market & Accenture
Author: FoDaLey
The overall market seems to be doing well – though the volume is not as high it should be. I’ve placed some trades (GDX, BIDU for one) but I will hold out for more trades until there is a more assertive confirmation that the current correction is over.
On another note, my Roth IRA has been doing well in the past several years, beating the SPY 500. One of the stocks I have is Accenture. It was sold several days ago because of poor technicals (RSI was less than 40, MACD turned negative & it broke below 50 day MA. It is no surprise to me that it rebounded pretty strongly with good earnings…after all it has performed very well over all the past few years.
It has gone up 8% since I sold last week – 4.5% on 3.5x volume on Friday itself. *sigh*
