Hellish work commitments...the Inferno

Well, I warned everyone that posts would come few and far between for a bit. The powers that be finally decided that we were going to do this project, and the torture started on the 13th of October.

It was especially bad for me, because our office had just started a web integration project which melded two applications for the production of web documents, one to store the data in XML, and one to display it to our standard. It works really well, allows for dynamic updates to documents, allows the same information to be used for different products (for instance we can create an executive overview out of a massive multi chapter document), and, best of all, it allows the users to correct their own mistakes, as the information is pulled from the XML. So we don't have to correct the HTML typos anymore, leaving us poor webmasters to patrol the site, and do better things (like make it look prety) with our time than add a period to some poor schmoe's article.

Because this project was going on, I was pulled from the active list of candidates to work on this other project, and placed as a backup, in case for one reason or another, someone couldn't finish working the project. And then the fun began...

Several of the primaries began to get dropped, and they started casting around for alternates. Well, you can probably guess the rest. I didn't stay on the alternate list for long, and got dragged (kicking and screaming) into the mess. Not fun. So we all get packed up, and get moved to our new assignments (let me just say that this whole project spans several countries across the Middle East) which means that we are going to be working away from the family for a while. Then, to compound the horror, the team I'm on (which, BTW is slated to do some futures plans and integration work) get to our new offices, only to find that the whole plan there has altered, and we get diverted to doing a related, but entirely different, project, which entails us being scattered across several sites.

I'm now doing databasing work, instead of the integration work I was supposed to do. I'm the only rep from our company here, and its slightly maddening. I've even begun to forget my webmaster skills (I had to post something to a website today and had to look up how to do an align right tag!!).

Anyway, this is supposed to go on until the beginning of April. Horror of horrors, they've announced that the project is going to overun, and that we might get our time extended on it (we've been told six months at the moment). NOOOOOOO!!!!!!

And the hell continues.....

Anyway, Happy New Year to all the readers.

The Tea Jerk