for the past year and a half, i've been working on a client site doing some really great and interesting work, as well at times as doing some less exciting and rather frustrating work. yesterday was my last day at that site, and now, i am moving on to a new client to once again resume doing great and exciting work in a completely different vein - work that is really interesting to me and also happens to be interesting to my company. it's a great opportunity and i couldn't be more thrilled about it. and best of all, the client is back in my home province of alberta, in calgary.

when i decided to stay here in toronto a year and half ago or whenever it was, i never expected to have the opportunity to have the best of both worlds - to be able to do leading-edge work that i rarely rarely saw out west, but to be able to do it for my beloved toronto-based company in a place that was so very close to home and my old friends. i've never lived in calgary before, but i can't wait to take advantage of being so close - closer even than when i lived in edmonton - to my beloved rocky mountains, to drumheller, and even on a larger scale, to vancouver and victoria! all of this is during the best time of the year to be in alberta! there are so many great ways that i can take advantage of this opportunity outside of the great work that make this gig even more precious and wonderful to me. it's like a dream come true.

there are many many logistical obstacles to be overcome first. i need to find a place to stay for three to four months. i need to get my cats to calgary so that i can be free to take care of them over the week and leave them alone for just a few days while i reconnect to the west. i will probably need to drive my car across the country so that i can get the cats there, and to have my car available for the many many roadtrips that will be involved in seeing everyone i know in the west. i need to find some time to fly back to toronto once in a while to maintain the bonds of friendship that i've made here and make sure that no one ransacks my apartment in my absence. and i need to figure out all of these things more or less the day after i get back from new york next week.

one of the biggest problems that i have in achieving all of this coordination is that i won't have a computer next week. normally, that would be a pretty good thing - to not have to be tethered to the internet at the hip. but i gave up my imason workstation when i got my client laptop, and i gave up my client laptop when i left the client yesterday. my new laptop is still on order and won't be available to me over the trip, and all of the other imason floaters are accounted for. so i will be relying upon internet cafes and hotel shared pc's for connectivity - so no VPN access to work and limited access to file storage to my home PC and its production tools. accordingly, during one of the most exciting weeks of my life, i will probably not have a chance to blog and i don't see how i will have time to catch up once i start my new project in calgary.

sigh.

these are pretty minor problems for someone who has received such amazing gifts from work like the chance to go to new york for a great conference, to go to work so close to his far away home, and to do some work that i've been itching to try for a very long time. but it's a problem, nonetheless. if you don't hear from me for a couple of weeks - please promise that you'll come back later. this is only a temporary black-out. i promise.

- g

song of the day for leaving the matrix: session, mr. han of linkin park

ps. i totally missed a great timelapse opportunity today and i'm kicking myself hard. maybe in a month or two, my new hair stylist will let me film a timelapse haircut. i would have loved that even though there wouldn't have been any cats in it.