Jarrah was celebrating her change of job at the Belgian Beer Cafe. It was good to catch up with her and her better other half, Brettski (as well as Sven, but more on that later). Its not often I get to catch up with those guys, and I always wish it could be longer. Seeing her in "business attire" was kinda funny too :P

The problem with the infrequent catch-ups is that you lose common ground for conversation, and once you've done the usual "so what have you been up to then?" type pleasantries I'm sorta lost for anything to talk about (I don't have what people would call 'good social skills'). Except the common ground that we all have - work. Sure, the purpose of tonight's celebration was work (Jarrah is celebrating a change of job), but still, as we were leaving Brett mentioned that I should update my blog more often so he could read about me bitching about work :P And it's true, I do bitch about work a lot. I don't mind that, but I sometimes worry that I'm being seen as someone who's always bitching about it - a thin line sometimes.

I think that bitching about work is not a bad thing, if you have the right frame of mind about it. I use this space as a place to let people know what I think of things. If something is on my mind and is pissing me off, I will probably say something about it here. Usually, if work is going well, or I've vented in some other forum, or nothing much is really happening, then I won't mention anything. It's kinda cathartic to put it all down on the digital landscape, and it gives you an opportunity to come back later and see how your perception of things changes over time. Sometimes the things I write here are more for myself than for other people, but I don't mind others seeing my thoughts: I am what I am, and what I think is a big part of what makes up me. (Whether or not it's just a bunch of pretentious wank is another story).

But for now, I can stop my bitching about Curtin. I've had my rants and tantrums, bitched about it, etc etc. But I handed in my resignation today. iiNet invited me to apply for a programming position in the Applications department, and after going through the interview process offered me a job.

Over the past year and a half I've had a lot of time to reflect over my previous employment at iiNet, and the things that caused me to leave. I think that the problem was two fold: I didn't fit with the way that iiNet worked (in my area, at least); and I couldn't handle not fitting with iiNet. No matter how I want to put it (the technical aspects of my reasoning at the time, the project work what wasn't proceeding, etc), that's all it boils down to. It doesn't mean that either one of us is more right or wrong than the other, but we're just different (although I still have opinions about that for some things).

People don't normally change much over a year and a half, or even up to 5 years. But I feel that I have, at least a significant amount for me. I worry that I'm not making the right choice to move back to iiNet, but I'm still going to. I want to. I've regretted not taking the opportunity to move into that team when I had the chance, and I feel that I'm in a much better position, mentally and emotionally, to approach the problems that really bugged me last time I was there. I reckon I'll still bitch about "My Crap Job" - that's just what I do. I think it helps me sort out what I feel about the situation. It helps me be more honest with myself, in turn allowing me to be critical of myself with a view to improving things. And even though I'll probably end up bitching about stuff, I'm looking forward to the challenges, both personal and professional, that are going to come from this job.

So yes, the Bitching Will Continue Until Morale Improves. You don't have to worry, Brett, I'll still be bitching about my job once the New Shiny Job Smell wears off :)

Don't you love it when two blog posts you were going to write come together nicely as one?