Miscellany of a Cheshire Cat

Another photo from my birthday. An Asiatic black bear (Ursus thibetanus) at the Philadelphia Zoo. Thanks to the cooler weather, he was finally awake and wandering about. Perhaps he was hoping I’d bring cake. In general the animals who were wout that day were more active than I’d seen them in the past. (The light cross-hatching on the picture is from the wire fence I took the photo through.) They are native to Japan, parts of China and southern Asia but they’ve been hunted to extinction in many areas. Yes, this sweet-faced bear is very popular in traditional medicine. Well, bits of him are. Sadly, they’re bits he can’t live without!

Work this week has been a great deal of fun. I may have the chance to show off not only my geekitude but also my incredible desire not to reinvent the wheel next week. I was assigned to a project that had been strugling for about 5 weeks. Ever since I’ve been hearing about this project I’ve thought,”Wow, that’s a wiki.” In one week I’ve narrowed down the options for a solution and identified an enterprise wiki solution that happens to be part of the standard architecture and could save us an enormous amount of time, effort and money. The project to put the wiki in place will be finishing the end of February. From there, we get space and go wild!

How did I find this magical solution? I asked around. How novel, right? One of my standard interview assertions is that I’m not afraid to ask stupid questions. I love proving that it pays off to do so! In this case, it could pay off very tangibly. My boss seems impressed, the project liason from the business side likes the solution… next week hopefully we’ll get some more answers and present it to the business customer. I’m not looking to advance my career here, just solidify it. I like this contracting stuff. And I like solving problems intelligently.

On top of all this? I really enjoy wikis. I think wiki is an awesome technology that fosters a great user community.  This wiki may not quite fit what the business customer is looking for but the price is likely to be right enough that we’ll make it work for her. Most importantly, I think she’ll be happy with it.

tags: asiatic black bear, bear, philadelphia zoo, photographs, photography, project management, technology, wiki, work, zoo