Another helpful tidbit: if you are tired enough, you can actually sleep on a cement floor! I proved this by passing out in our conference room for nearly two hours. I say passed out because it wasn’t sleep in any sense. I actually felt worse when I was roused. Ah well, such is my work-life.

Onto the random paragraphs that summarize my life in the past little while!

I’ve been obsessed with the newest season of Sam & Max by Telltale Games. This season (with the exception of one episode) blows the first season out of the water. I’m not saying that the first season is bad, far from in actuality, but this seasons writing and direction are much tighter than the last season, and I’m rather looking forward to the last installment. I pray that they continue making more seasons.

There’s a new Dentyne commercial out that I’m in love with, and thanks to a little investigation Theresa and I found the band that made the song. Ben’s Brother is the culprit, and after listening to their myspace page, I went and tracked down their 2007 album: “Beta Male Fairytales”. It turns out that though ‘Stuttering’ will be a super hit single, the rest of their music is pretty much top-end awesome. I’ve officially become a fanboy of them and pray that they visit Canada at some point in the future. I’ll make sure to do a review of the album this week. For those looking for a copy of the track (which cannot be downloaded from the bands MySpace page there is another MySpace page that features the download. How long it’ll be up I don’t know so I suggest getting it while it’s ‘hot’.

So a new Panic! At The Disco album came out. Considering how hyped up the first CD was, I’m a little shocked that this went so under the radar. I’ll admit I liked them when I first heard of them (I was visitor 63 on their MySpace way back in the day.. and I still have their original 3 track releases). Then they got huge and over-played. Then they disappeared. I was expecting them to burn hot and then fizzle out after the first album. Then I heard about “Pretty. Odd.” two days before the release date. I got my hands on a copy recently and I’ve gotta say that it’s a drastic departure from their last album. “A Fever You Can’t Sweat Out” was all about being bouncy and energetic and borderline insane. “Fairly Odd” is toned down and dare I say, a more matured sound than before. I don’t know whether I like it or not. I’ll try and review their newest album this week as well.

I was recently recommended an artist called Matt McIntosh on Last.Fm and I have to say that I’m at least a little impressed. Very haunting, toned down, with a weird-hollow voiced sound to it. I’ll try and review this one when I get the chance. Apparently he’s made a lot of music in the past.

Last thing to note, I’ve been getting more into Twitter, though I’m not entirely sure why.

Until next time folks.

So kiss me again
Cause only you can stop this stut-stut-stut-stuttering
Kiss me again
And ease my su-su su-su su-su s-su-s-suffering

Ben’s Brother – Stuttering

Corey signing off

I can honestly attest to what he’s saying, seeing as how I have worked insane amount of overtime at my current place of work. The worst part about it that I have noticed is that I bust my ass off by working overtime just so we can hit the all-important, all-omnipresent deadline and then turn around to find another one looming overhead. It’s painful, and to be honest it’s aggravating, infuriating, and depressing all at once. Point 2 – “If the deadline set for your project [...] next deadline will be as tight as this one. If not tighter.” – is so true it hurts. I have stated many times at my current reside that the time lines are made without actually talking to us (in some cases) and this in turn screws us, the development team. I don’t know if my statements fall of deaf ears, but I have noticed that recently I have not had to work the overtime I used to… with the exception of last week. That was rough.

Anyways!

I cannot say whether this tight-lining the deadlines is purposely done, but I can tell you that it leads almost instantly into point 4 and 5. Working overtime burns you out. I worked 7 weeks straight at my job at one point. It was our whole development team’s trial by fire. We pulled it off, but there is nothing to brag about pulling a 45 hour work day. No matter how hardcore you feel, you look like shit and your appearance will scare small children.

The second half of the post is the really important part though. It’s the part that attention needs attention paid. It’s easy(ish) to state what evil will be wrought from working overtime, if given enough time to think about it. It’s another thing entirely to actually come up with ways to stop doing it. I have trouble with this part, as I’m sure many other people do. It’s hard to say no to the people who sign your paychecks and keep you from living out of your car. Trust me on this one, it’s hard to do and I’m still trying to figure out how to get the idea across.

Jarkko makes good points on how to get rid of overtime; points 4 through 7 on the second list are easy to do and I feel are just good practices to… well… practice! Number 8 is the truly difficult one. If you do this wrong, people will feel you’re not a team player, only looking out for yourself, etc. When talk like this hits managements ears, you’re in for a world of hurt and/or welfare checks. I’m not saying you should live in perpetual fear of your higher-ups (though a little fear is healthy, or so I’m told) but shooting yourself in the foot by arrogantly declaring that you are a slave to overtime no more will not win you any points.

I’ll clearly state that I’ve got a screwed up work-ethic, and so overtime though a horrible concept, I perceive as an occasional requirement. I think I may have gotten it from my father, but I’m not entirely sure. I’m slowly working on being able to work without having to complete projects via overtime but it’s an ongoing process.