{"id":589,"date":"2009-01-01T22:16:39","date_gmt":"2009-01-02T06:16:39","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.chesnok.com\/daily\/?p=589"},"modified":"2009-01-01T22:16:39","modified_gmt":"2009-01-02T06:16:39","slug":"meme-current-state-of-me","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.chesnok.com\/daily\/2009\/01\/01\/meme-current-state-of-me\/","title":{"rendered":"meme: Current state of me"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><center><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/www.chesnok.com\/daily\/wp-content\/uploads\/2009\/01\/2874786866_4731cdec70.jpg\" alt=\"\" title=\"Me, in Mexico City\" width=\"350\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-593\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.chesnok.com\/daily\/wp-content\/uploads\/2009\/01\/2874786866_4731cdec70.jpg 500w, https:\/\/www.chesnok.com\/daily\/wp-content\/uploads\/2009\/01\/2874786866_4731cdec70-300x199.jpg 300w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 500px) 100vw, 500px\" \/><br \/>\n<\/center><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/dyepot-teapot.com\/2008\/12\/08\/the-current-state-of-me\/\">Audrey<\/a> started a meme that I liked &#8211; so here&#8217;s my answers: <\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Did I earn a living?<\/strong> Yes, I did. I&#8217;ve never been happier with <a href=\"http:\/\/www.endpoint.com\/\">my work<\/a>, who I work with and who I work for. I surprised myself a little with a job change that has me working at home, and co-working at various places in Portland. I find myself jumping out of bed every morning, excited to start my work day, and attending amazing geek events 2-3 times a week. (shameful Portland tech scene junkie confession!)<\/li>\n<li><strong>Was I able to incubate new ideas?<\/strong> Well, I was certainly *exposed* to tons of creative, exciting ideas, and felt energized to participate and organize in ways that I did not in 2007. As far as generating my own ideas, I think I was in the same boat as Audrey &#8212; spending a ton of time *doing*, but not as much time reflecting on experiences.  The one exception to that was my vacation last August in Mexico.  I took nearly three weeks to unwind from work, and I spent that time learning a little Spanish, and taking photographs that I was very proud of. Looking out to next year, I can&#8217;t wait to see what happens, and feel like I won&#8217;t be able to avoid an explosion of creativity.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Did I grow in ways that I wanted?<\/strong> YES. OMG. I had an incredible year, personally and professionally. I organized two PostgreSQL conferences &#8211; one in Maryland! &#8211; and helped get new user group leaders started with groups in at least five new locations. I&#8217;ve seen several long-time community members step up, join boards and become more active in the core community building work I championed. I met Tom Lane. I stood by as close friends, inspired by a growing community, started their own projects. I was inspired over and over again by the humor, grace and intelligence of the people who make PostgreSQL happen. I contributed code, presented nearly a dozen talks and traveled. <\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>So, 2009 will be a lot about co-chairing Open Source Bridge, with a big helping of PostgreSQL community work, primarily speaking about the filesystem performance testing we&#8217;re doing here in Portland, and hopefully a bit more about user groups. I&#8217;m looking forward to a great work year, with a company that continues to be successful in a difficult time, and with coworkers that make me laugh every day. <\/p>\n<p>I&#8217;m looking to Portland to inspire me: with cool ideas, exciting companies and a vibrant tech scene. <\/p>\n<p>Your turn!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Audrey started a meme that I liked &#8211; so here&#8217;s my answers: Did I earn a living? Yes, I did. I&#8217;ve never been happier with my work, who I work with and who I work for. I surprised myself a &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/www.chesnok.com\/daily\/2009\/01\/01\/meme-current-state-of-me\/\">Continue reading &rarr;<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[60,43,20],"tags":[176,645,631,177,178,175],"class_list":["post-589","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-community","category-personal","category-portland","tag-176","tag-community","tag-portland","tag-state-of-me","tag-tech","tag-year-in-review"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.chesnok.com\/daily\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/589","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.chesnok.com\/daily\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.chesnok.com\/daily\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.chesnok.com\/daily\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.chesnok.com\/daily\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=589"}],"version-history":[{"count":9,"href":"https:\/\/www.chesnok.com\/daily\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/589\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":599,"href":"https:\/\/www.chesnok.com\/daily\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/589\/revisions\/599"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.chesnok.com\/daily\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=589"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.chesnok.com\/daily\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=589"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.chesnok.com\/daily\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=589"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}