Work and Play

There are many reasons that I do the work I do.  First and foremost has by far been my medical history.  Fraught with (what I believe to be) probably a bit more than my share of health issues, I soon became interested in performing scientific research, specifically with genetic diseases of all manners.  One important aspect of scientific research has also intertwined with something else that I've enjoyed for a large portion of my life: computers.  The connection?  Put simply, troubleshooting.  In a larger context, problem solving.  One thing that I've always loved to do is solve problems.  There's something incredible about the feeling of being able to fix an issue.  When you start, something isn't working, be it a computer booting up, software not working, or an experiment doesn't give any viable data.  Getting from that point to a workable product/data brings a wonderful sense of accomplishment.

That being said, everyone has a breaking point.  For many it's fast, for many scientists it tends to take substantially longer to reach.  Not to mention IT people.  Patience is an incredible virtue for both scientific research and technologies.  Again, this is work, and I enjoy it, and I'm good at it.  I have a knack for getting stubborn computers to work and working through molecular biology experiments.  At work.

Once done, however, I enjoy doing what probably anyone else does: relax and hang out.  The last few months have made this very difficult.  Work has been ridiculously uncooperative, the puppy that my fiance and I got has been driving us completely insane, and we generally have not had a great deal of time to just chill.  Unfortunately or fortunately, there aren't a great many things that I enjoy doing as hobbies.  For anyone that reads my posts regularly, you know that a large portion of these are focused around playing games; tabletop and video.  More recently I've been making my little videos portraying not only said hobbies, but my opinions on numerous topics.  Fun times and a good way for me to relax and be with myself, in a sense.

As some of you may know, the last week or so I've had a great amount of difficulty getting my latest video to render correctly in the editing program I've been using.  It's one of those things that just drove me completely nuts.  Yes, I enjoy fixing things and figuring out what's going wrong, but this is not WORK.  When I'm working with my hobbies, is it too much to ask for things to work?  I mean seriously.  If my experiments don't work, fine, let's figure it out.  But my free time to do things I enjoy?  There's only so much I can take.  It's ridiculous.

Not only, but it's one of the things that I haven't been able to figure out.  I went through a great deal of work trying to fix this issue.  Reinstalling software, re-doing the entire video, reading I don't know how many forums, trying different rendering methods, everything I could think of.  Finally, I thought that it may be a hardware issue, so I decided to upgrade my RAM (from 4 to 8 GB).  I figured that was a likely issue, as the software kept crashing at somewhat random times, including during rendering.

While attempting to remove the screws from my computer, the driver I was using got ruined, now basically looking like a nail.

Enter precision screw set.  Thankfully these won't be stripped by screws, huzzah!

Memory upgrade successful!  So now we're fine, right?

Short answer is no, still not working.  After weeks of work, struggling to get my video software to cooperate, and spending a substantial amount of money, it is still not working.  I am essentially at wits end and could not be more frustrated.  The few things that I do solely for myself are not coming to fruition.  Not a good place to be.

All that aside, I strive forward.  Why?  Because, in the end, there's no point to anything else except moving on.  Things don't always work, but so what?  Yelling and complaining to the computer doesn't make the software function correctly.  Throwing a fit and banging fists doesn't make a reaction work in lab any more than it makes a computer change its function.  Yes, spending whatever little free time and effort I have available to so things I enjoy to only have said things fail is by no means an enjoyable experience in the end, but it is still a learning experience, and I did get 8 GB on my laptop and a cool driver set, so, like I said, why does it matter?  Does it matter only right now or will it matter forever?  Think about it.  Just the thought for the.... month I suppose.

*whew*.  So, rant over.  Hope you enjoyed it and that maybe, just maybe it can help someone see through some of their own issues.