Julio’s Musings Around Columbia County, New York

Cow on Airport Road

Originally uploaded by julio.miyares.

Where else can you step out of the office to relax a bit from the intense development surrounding a major portal release and see a cow trying to cool itself down in a mound of mud? Well India of course, [tag]Bangalore[/tag] to be more precise! This scene captures one of the main thoroughfaes in the city ; Airport road, about 100 yards from the Leela Palace which is probably the most exclusive and expensive hotel in the city and one which i proudly state I have stayed at various times.
Not conveyed by the photo is the noise from constant honking, the polution and dust from the enormous amounts of traffic just to the left of this photo.
[tags]bdc[/tags]

Hard at WorkOriginally uploaded by julio.miyares.

This is me. In my office in Northern Virginia. Taking a break from office politics and other nonsense. Well actually I am being unduly negative here and I shouldn’t be. In fact I am having more fun then anyone should be allowed to have , working on a major product/technology initiative at the World’s largest ISP (at least for now) and one of the top 3 portal destinations. When this picture was taken, I was relaxing for a moment during the frenzied last few moments before getting ready for a trip almost 1/2 round the world to Bangalore, India.
[tags]Julio Hernandez Miyares, aol [/tags]

Giving some thought about what to write about. I have volumes to write about work but not sure if that is a good thing. Suffice it to say, for now I will keep it as generic as possible. I work for a large USA based corporation. My job can be characterized as in the Technology Development area and I inhabit the quintessential middle-management role. Which means I get it shoved down from above and up from below. It also means I have to really work at technology development. The company’s location is on the Eastern seaboard more specifically in Northern Virginia. I myself am situated in [tag]Reston[/tag] which as a native [tag]New Yorker[/tag] has an inherent charm amidst the countless strip malls anjd franchise restaurants that apparently consume about 50% of the usual land in the remainder.
Interesting thing about blogging or writing for that matter. As I was driving around with no access to a computer today, Iwas chock-full of ideas but now in front of a computer, its a drought. Another Interesting thing about me blogging, why would anyone even care about what I am writing? If blogging is akin for most to keeping a diary, I thought diaries were supposed to be private?

That is what you mostly hear when at the many teleconference meetings I attend on a regular basis. In fact I hear the same thing at in person meetings as many individuals bring their PCs to “work” during the course of the meeting. It has become a pet peeve of mine as if you are not the Project Manager and taking notes (how they got that unenviable responsibility I don’t know but better them then me , then you should be listening intently to the on-going conversation and not incessantly im’ing or blogging or reviewing the number of worthless stock options or whatever.

In fact, I believe one of the major contributors to the lack of decisions or even agreement on what a decision was when one is made is that most people attending the teleconference are not paying a wit of attention to what is going on in the proceedings.

Irrelevant picture of one of my dogs.

As an aside ,Can’t imagine how difficult it was to grab a copy of this AOL Pictures image on my computer. Downloading to desktop doesn’t work whether on a MAC or a Windows machine. I have been using Flickr to maintain my photos. That statement is a stretch as I only recently purchased a digital camera but now I take it with me all over and takes photos of skyscrapers, subway stations, dogs, countryside whatever. I tried out a free Flick Account and within one week I had upgraded to the Pro version for approximately $25 a year. Something like 2 gigabytes upload storage per month! Quite easy to do the basics including selecting an uploaded photo, writing some text and creating a blog entry directly from the Flickr site. Now if only AOL Picture could do that!

Gloomy Sunday afternoon in Columbia CountyOriginally uploaded by julio.miyares.

Now this is one of the main reasons why I prefer intense construction activity in places like New York City. This is the view across the road from my home in Columbia County NY. Columbia County is approximately 110 miles north of Times Square , New York. It has not suffered from the intense over-development of other nearby suburban or semi-rural counties closer to NY like Southern Duchess county or Orange county on the westside of the Hudson River.
It is infected with Deer, Deer ticks, other vermin, lots of mosquitos in the summer and intense cold and lots of snow in the winter. Nevertheless since the land is cheaper and housing costs are naturally cheaper then in the close environs of New York City, there is the inevitable pressure from people who habor the idea of buying a primary residence and commuting 6 hours roundtrip to jobs New York City. People are doing absurd commutes like that already from the Poconos , PA or from mid to lower Duchess County which is about 36 miles to the south of where this picture is taken.
With the rise in gas prices and with the propensity of the Southern Duchess mindset to purchase gas guzzling SUVs, I sometimes wonder (gleefully) what that must be doing to their pocketbook.
The fact that most heat is also fueled by either Oil or electric around here and as I said, it is quite cold for long stretches during the winter, I often wonder how long the development pressure can continue.

[tags]Columbia County[/tags]

Bank of America tower – Under construction

Originally uploaded by julio.miyares.

New York Ctiy is in the midst of another construction boom. The picture shown here after work hours is the steel skeleton of the new Bank of America tower that is rising on the corner of 6th and 42nd Streets. Once complete it will rise to about 1,200 feet including the decorative spire.
Why do I even care? I just believe that construction booms should be restricted to center cities instead of being spread out through suburbs and exurbs especially given our energy situation. The new tower is at the confluence of about 10 mass transit subway lines within a one block radius. Concentrating this type of activity in a city center opposed to tearing up cow pasture land in my opinion is a more efficient use of resources and land. Of course I would say I probably hold a minority view taking the United States as a whole.
I feel that not until gas gets to $5 or $6 per gallon in today’s dollars will the shift in mindset change throughout the country.

Tsar looking at ants, Columbia County NY

Originally uploaded by julio.miyares.

What wouldn’t I do to be a dog