This is an archived version of this page. The current blog is here
So after the great resolution of my last piece, I completely failed to follow through. The reason is that I've been made redundant from my job as a software developer. This follows the takeover of my company -- Mercator Software -- by another one called Ascential which is made of the leftover bits of Informix after they sold their database platform to IBM. Ascential have a big pile of money after selling the database, so they are in an aquisitive mode at the moment. Suffice it to say that the UK development operation never looked a good fit for Ascential's strategic plan, so in the end the inevitable happened.
This is the first day when I haven't had to go into work, and it's a strange sensation being alone at home (my wife has taken our daughter out to playgroup). I've never not had a job since I started my first one after college almost exactly 10 years ago, so I have this odd feeling of being let out to play, coupled with a fairly profound sense of worry about what will happen if I can't find another job before the redundancy money runs out.
It's annoying in a way -- I don't have to find another job immediately and it would be nice to enjoy some time at home with my family, do some jobs around the house and so forth, but I won't be able to enjoy it until I know where the money is going to come from. Not only that but I feel it would be all too easy to settle into a blissful domestic routine that will be idyllic until the day that the bailiffs come round.
But at least I now have both time and material to write about, so expect a bit more activity on the site for a while at least.
Posted by MFreestone at October 15, 2003 10:59 AM