Free Thinking Radical

In Calgary all the radio stations have traffic reports every ten minutes; in NORTHern Ontario they have weather reports every 15 minutes — it has snowed here four out of the seven days we’ve been here working on the house.

We’ve been slowly restoring our old house out here in Cochrane, Ontario and this past week was Structural Week with a dash of Make Sure It Doesn’t Burn To The Ground and a heaping dose of Find That Smell.

So far we’ve ripped out all the existing walls and slat-board and beams and some rotten trusses and have replaced them with new load bearing walls, quadruple laminated beams and braced trusses. So the house is now more structurally sound than its ever been and seems happier for it.

This house is just under 100 years old and when we removed the layers and layers of wall-coverings to expose the slat-board walls we found someone’s old homework written on the wall itself, which must date back to the early 1920’s:

“I will not chew gum in school.”

“1, 2, 3, 4, 5 …”

“Boy, Toy, Roy …”

Pretty wild stuff, I’ll post some pictures later, but we’ve got one more day here to get the tools put away and the rest of the insulation in and extra wood put away.

There’s this thing that is bugging me.

Back in the day when I was just starting my new media design career, my friend Brad and I were talking; Brad is a little older than I am, a little wiser, an accomplished designer and I was excited to tell him about a CD project I just landed.

“It’s a cool project.” I said, and I went on to tell him about the sound and video and web components.

“How much did you quote them?” asked Brad.

“{very small number}, but they said I could use it in my portfolio and it would be good publicity for my company.”

Brad looked at me, disgusted, “You’re an asshole.

“You don’t even know what you’ve done, do you? We’re professionals, you’re a professional, when you undercut yourself just to get a job the client stops seeing the value in what we do. By taking this job for less than it’s worth you have devalued the entire creative industry and it makes it more difficult for everyone else to get paid fairly.”

“I never thought about it that way.” I said.

“Don’t ever do that again.

“Always get paid fairly and promptly for your work. Being professional, beyond executing your role as a Creative Problem Solver, means maintaining a certain rate and standard of billing. Some people can afford your services, some people can’t.”

That was a long time ago and I’m happy to say I learned my lesson the first time I was taught it. But don’t take it from me, take it from Harlan Ellison:

So. I caved. Couldn’t take it anymore. I was fed up. Done. When I first started working at Service Intelligence as their Senior Graphical User Interface Developer I wanted a Mac. It was what I was used to, but they were a windows shop and I said ok. My bad.

Mac’s are too expensive; you can do the same thing on a PC.

I didn’t want to make waves so I said OK. Flash sideways eight years and I have finally had enough of this Window’s crap. Seriously. Enough is fucking enough. How many hours do I have to spend waiting for my computer to boot only to decide not to recognize a select few of my important devices. I used to convince myself I didn’t get a Mac because buying a Dell Windows box was cheaper.

I bill out at $110 per hour.

So, when I say it takes my computer a few hours to get outta bed, do its hair and not be a bitch for the majority of the day that’s money I don’t get to bill. This is money I don’t get in my pocket. Let’s do some simple math … $110 p/hr * 2 hours p/day of no productivity = $220 p/day of wasted opportunity AND a few hours of frustration, gnashing of teeth and a fast dive into depression.

A new Mac Pro cost is $5,000 all in. This accounts for software, monitor, box, 6 GB RAM, 2TB drive space, you get the picture.

5,000 / 220 = 22.something. I wish I could CAPS numbers. Let’s call it 23 days. In 23 days I would have paid for my new computer, but no, I’ve been fighting with Windows XP and Windows VISTA (fuck I hate Vista), for YEARS. Where is my head?? What have I done?

I brought my new Mac to my office. I connect everything. Everything is working. I install the printer driver (Dell) and I can print. I logon to our secure network. I can see everyone’s computers. ALL of them. I am up and running in minutes.

I moved my XP box (I gave away my new VISTA computer) four feet to the left and it can’t find the fucking keyboard which I placed right in front of it. I’ve hit the CONNECT button. I’ve changed the batteries. I’ve changed out keyboards. Window’s will not acknowledge it.

Meanwhile, on the other side of the room, my Mac is ready, willing and able. No issues. None.

Not only does the Mac help me accomplish my goals, it thinks ahead and prepares itself for what comes next. QuickSilver is heaven sent. Spaces has blown me away. Yojimbo might help me change the world. My iPhone LOVES everything.

Life is good. I like working again.