Another week comes to a close

Well another fun filled week of 9 to 15 hours a day at work comes to a close. What fun... in that 'Water Torture' kind of way.

The CEO stopped by my office the other day. Normally that might sound impressive, but the company in which I work only has at most 12-15 employees. Of those at least 1/2 half or more of the employee base carry the title 'Director' or 'Vice President' ... :-/

If there was any wonder why I pay *no* attention to a person's 'Title' ... there ya go.

He wanted me to tell him how he could help lower the hours I work! lol.. Naturally I looked him right in the eye and said "Hire more software engineers! I can't and don't want to do it all myself." Now will he listen? Dunno. They did post job openings for a junior and senior level software engineers. So we'll see.

But, this week at lunch I managed good headway into a second rewrite of Cold Case. Added a few new scenes and got the character doing some deeper detective work than before. I like it. I had sent the story to a professional fiction editor. As a plus, she writes fiction herself. Now, no one person is the end all be all of fiction writing.. something I've come to learn the hard way, but she gave me some *fascinating* insight into how publishers and agents look at manuscripts. Very valuable information I've been putting to use with Cold Case. I really want to get this manuscript done before the end of August given time.

Also.. to take breaks from Cold Case and Kinloch 2 (yes I'm still working on it, just a bit slowly.. I know, shame on me), I got a very interesting suggestion to write some fan-fiction. Something just for fun so to speak. Normally, I'm a bit resistant to fan-fiction. It always feels like I'm tresspassing in someone's backyard so I don't do it. This time I'm dabbling though with a Star Wars fan-fiction centered on a squad of Imperial Stormtroopers (if you've not seen Star Wars.. think 'military science fiction'). So far, it provides a nice break from the normal routine as it were. Well, since I have this deep seated need to do something with things I create.. I've an idea to make a blog to post these 'episodes' on. In a way, like a homage to the serialized radio shows. When I get the first one done and posted.. I'll drop the new blog link on here. For those who might be curious.

Out from under the gun.. for now

Two months.. I still can't believe I wound up working 12 to 15 hour work days at 6 to 7 days a week for 2 months. At what point do you say "Enough is enough"? Its about to start again soon, I can see it. I'm not wanting a perfect job.. I just want one that doesn't ruin my health every few weeks. No job is worth this. I used to say "Well its just a paycheck". Well.. how much is "just a paycheck" worth? My health? My ability to function normally? I don't think so.

On top of that, I've come to the suspicion that these "crisis modes" are being artifically created. You can't have every project that comes along in two calendar years start off being late. Nor can anyone be thick enough to not eventually understand that you can't make a full blown ecommerce site or application in a week "if you just work hard enough". I'm convinced its some attempt to try and get me to voluntarily give up my weekends without them having to outright ask. What a crock.

It robs me of my personal life, it robs me of my time to write, to sleep, and just mentally rest. Its not right.. and I'm not sure its worth it anymore.