The devil is in the details

One of my first real jobs was for a mainframe computer company that designed systems for the stock market and all of the major banks. They were extremely complex computers designed to never fail.

One weekend after working crazy hours all week, I dialed in from home to perform some clean up and maintenance. I had to delete some files and was tired and accidentally typed the asterisk, which in computer language means "everything."

That was how, on a Sunday afternoon, I deleted the contents of 1200 people's email.

I called my boss in a panic and he calmly told me that it was okay, I would just have to execute the recovery programs our systems were famous for. I took a deep breath, threw on some shoes, and drove to the office.

I took the disks offline and prepared for the recovery process. I had never done it, but had taken several classes and had some notes to follow. It started out okay, but then one of the tape drives started acting up. It kept spitting out the back up tapes and would take sometimes three tries to load. Restoring the files took nearly eight hours. I kept a watch on the system and was relieved to see the data being replaced. Finally in the wee hours of the morning it was finished. I tried to start up my email and to my complete horror found that the files were empty again. I couldn't call my boss so I had no choice but to phone our company emergency systems hot line which was manned 24/7 from all corners of the earth.

A smooth Australian voice answered and we walked through what I had done.

Then he asked if I had used the "to first purge" command. This basically meant, restore the system file until just before a delete command was executed. Three little words. Kind of a big deal.

I managed to start the whole thing over and get the files back online by 10 AM on Monday. My boss didn't fire me, but actually admired that I was able to recover the system since the process was so complicated.

I drove home delirious, but sort of proud of myself.

And isn't it always like that? Just something small that changes the entire thing? Sure the devil is in the details, but still you stop and try again.

A few words, a sentence, a paragraph even, that becomes the difference between failure and success.

Booby trap

Ah the injustice of the world.

The morning I have to get up extra early to go get a mammogram, Little Dude "sleeps in" until 6:15.

I guess it will have to be enough that I got myself in bed at a decent hour, popped some herbal sleep aids my girlfriend left here a few weeks ago, and slept like a baby.

Wish me luck!

Taking a puff of parenthood

Sleep, which was once something that I never thought of, has now become a vague future goal, like returning to work in a few years or getting a Master's degree. Between Little Guy waking up at 5:30 AM and my inability to fall asleep, I am skating by on just a hair over four hours of rest today.

While I tell myself I can get away with it, I know that my brain does not function properly. I am spaced out, forgetful and slightly delayed in my reactions, kind of like I have indulged in a certain fragrant herb, but without the munchies. Not that I can remember what that felt like, at this point.

You might be a redneck if...

One of the perks of moving 2000 miles across country is that my southern-ness, which hardly shows at all in Georgia, is decidedly exotic in Arizona. My accent is so much more noticeable here and people pick up on it pretty quickly. So I find myself slipping a few y'alls in when I probably wouldn't have back in Georgia.

It brings to mind a slew of southern jokes, one of which is that the last words spoken by a redneck are Watch this y'all!

Little Guy has started running around pulling crazy stunts and yelling "Momma watch!" to get my reaction. This includes death defying leaps from the fireplace, tossing rocks in the pool, and my new favorite, picking up the dog poop (to which he adds a little twist Momma watch! Poop!).

Not sure where he was going with this, but this afternoon he insisted on running around with this metal bowl on his head, nearly knocking himself out a few times while trying to keep it on. Momma, watch! And I just barely make it over to him before he crashes into the cupboard.

Not the smartest way to entertain yourself and it made me wonder if his southern was showing. If he starts saying y'all, we'll have to give up the mail order grits.

Love Phoenix

I hung out with a girlfriend this weekend and we managed to pack in bunch of local Phoenix stuff. We attended an art benefit at local art space MonOrchid. We ate dinner at Bario Cafe and brunched at both Chelsea's Kitchen and Coronado Cafe (where we had our first Pomosa, yum). We sipped wine at the original Postino, hands down one of my favorite wine bars anywhere. I finally made it into Frances Vintage, a great downtown boutique where I got my retail fix and picked up a cool gift for my sister in law's birthday. While there, I noticed these cute T's imprinted with the phrase "Love Phoenix or Leave Phoenix".

Phoenix is a newish city relative to it's size. It is an oasis of sorts in the desert, a bizarre vacation hot spot (literally) flanked by trendy Scottsdale where everything is new and oversized and Tempe where everything is old and undersized. Since Scottsdale is for the beautiful people and Tempe is for the smart people, Phoenix suffers a slight identity crisis.

Despite all of that I happen to love it. Sure it's horrendously hot for a few months out of the year. The sun is unrelenting and comes up at 4:30 AM by the middle of the summer. Still, it has so much to offer, great hiking, quirky culture, and it feels like a giant small town where a local with some pluck can still make a mark. The landscape is gorgeous in it's sparseness and the moon rises over the city in some of the clearest night skies I have ever seen. I have pool to dip my toes in and parks at every turn. Overall, it is a fairly relaxing place to live and the transplanted palm trees that spring up everywhere make me feel like I am on a permanent vacation.

Yesterday, we ventured over to Scottsdale to wander through the Anthropologie and check out to the new West Elm store and found out that an H & M is (finally) opening this fall. Really, once that happens, I may never leave.