Tim Fogarty’s Blog

Yesterday I received my first unemployment check: $410. Woo-hoo!

I keep getting asked things like “Are you enjoying all your free time now that you’re not working?” In reality, my days are not much different than they have been the previous seven months when I started working for home for Instinet. I spend the day working on the computer. With Instinet, I had to be available and next to the computer for any production problems for the New York close and the Tokyo open, which was 2-7 pm pacific time. Now I’m putting just as many hours on the computer, if not more, but the hours vary.

My job with Instinet was supporting legacy systems. While I did do some web development and Java programming, the skill sets that Instinet needed from me was VMS. VMS was big in science and engineering in the 1980s, and finance in the 1990s. But now its just considered a legacy system, something to be maintained until a replacement can be written.

There are not many job listings today for VMS, but there are dozens for Java. But its not just Java they’re looking for. Its Java and Swing and JSP and Servlets and EJBs and Struts, and this and that. They may list 5 skills that they’re looking for. If I have 4 of the 5, they’re not even interested in talking to me.

While I know Java and Swing, I was weak on JSP and Servlets and had no experience in EJB and Struts. So I spend my days teaching myself these new skills. I have Eclipse on my computer which is a great tool used to develop Java applications.

The other problem is that my resume screams legacy systems. I was hired because I’m an expert at VMS systems. While I’ve done Java programming for my website, there is little to show of my Java experience from previous employers. Someone who’s looking for a java programmer is not going to spend too much time on my resume.

So, to show that I can do Java, Swing, JSP and Servlets in a production environment, I’ve been spending my days creating demos. We’ll see if it helps me get a job.

There are other things I could and should be doing with my down time. The biggest one is finish the remodeling of my house. A year ago I remodeled the back bedroom and bathroom. For the bathroom I gutted it down to the 2×4s. I replaced the fiberglass tub and shower combination with a cast iron tub. I installed a new shower valve, redid the drain, installed a pedestal sink. I put wonderboard up all around, then tiled the whole thing with 3×6 inch white tiles in an offset pattern. The floor is a 1 inch white octagon mosaic with black squares. The bedroom I replaced the carpeting with a hardwood floor. The floor is laminated strips (like plywood with a nice top layer) that are glued to each other, but not to the concrete floor underneath. I did the whole thing by myself, and it turned out really well.

That was a year ago. The front bedroom has been waiting for me ever since. The front bedroom is much bigger and has the bathroom’s vanity open to the bedroom. There is a door to the toilet and shower. I want to expand the bathroom area by about a foot into the bedroom, and enclose it. I want to place a whirlpool bath where the shower is and a shower/steamer where the vanity is. Then on the inside of the new wall I’m adding to enclose the bathroom from the bedroom will be the vanity.

Then in the bedroom I want to move the closet from the east wall to the west wall. This is because this would then give me space to add a window right above the front door on the first floor below. This bedroom has french doors that open to a one foot deep wrought iron balcony. There are no screens on the door and the bedroom can either be opened to the world or closed. I can’t really leave them open at night and I have to close them when I leave. It would be much nicer to have a small window with a screen that I can leave open all the time.

Then I need to put in a hardwood floor.

My biggest concern was the whirlpool bath. Getting the cast iron tub up the stairs for the back bathroom was a real challenge. I figured the whirlpool bath would be much harder. But it turns out that whirlpool baths are all fiberglass and much lighter, even with the attached motors and heaters.

Now the task in front of me is selecting the tile. Since I did so well with the back bathroom I’m willing to tackle something a bit more challenging. One of my architect friends suggests doing all four walls and the floor with a glass mosaic tile. My first impression is that that would be a bit much. I’m also considering doing a stone all the way around, but again that may be a bit much. I don’t want to feel like I’m walking into a cave. Perhaps a combination of the two.

One concern is that I’ll gut the bathroom and then get a job and not have time to finish it. But then I suppose that if I get a job and make lots of money, I can pay someone to finish it. But what fun would that be?