The end of my first week…

I’ve wanted to sit down and write a couple entries over the past night or two, but things have been… well.. fun! I’ll review the week a little bit, for those who are just dieing to know.

When the second day of work came, I had to hit the ground running. There were csv files (basically like an excel file) that needed converted into xml files (used for web stuff), so I had to write some python that did all this. I got into work around 1:30pm that day (Thursday) and worked till 9-ish. I then got to the place I was staying and continued writing python till about 2am. I managed to finish that little script up.

Friday came and I was informed that we needed different csv files converted into xml in a completely different manner. So again came another full day of python scripting. FYI, I got into work around 9:30am this day. I would like to go out of the way a little bit to cock my head back and grin at all those professors that went on and on about how 8:00am classes were a good thing because “once you guys get outta here and join the workforce, you’ll have to get up and go to work earlier than this.” WPNI is a dot com company, very modernly operated. You work when you need to until you get your stuff done. We have the freedom to come in and work all night if we need to. I like this style a lot.

Friday came to and end with a completed script that did everything it was supposed to. The plans where on for “pizza & beer” and who knows what else. Six of us (the some of the folks I work with) left the office right around 8:30 that evening (yay for 11 hours of work for me) and headed to the pizza joint. After this, we headed in to DC for a little place called Millie & Al’s. This is where the night got hopping. I’m not going to detail too much on this part, because you can improvise on the happenings of a bunch of young dot com folk on a friday night after work. This night ended around 3:00am after a bit of a walk and a metro ride back to my hotel room.

Thus came Saturday. I didn’t really see much of the morning here; waking time was well towards the end of it. A good long shower and I was ready for a long way of walking followed by a lot more walking. We (Chris and I) headed to the heart of DC (and evidently, the country too) for a little stereotypical tourism. I can now say that I’ve seen a number of the big political buildings: White House, Capitol Building, US Treasury, World Bank, several Memorials, the Monument, etc. I’ve got photos of some of these over at my flickr account, just click the link on the right of this page (if you want to see large versions of the photos, click the ‘all sizes’ button directly above the photo). Also, I’ve created this little Google map of all my walks, etc. You can find that here (click the image):

We made it to the Arlington Cemetery metro station and decided we’d explore more another day. Back in the hotel room we kicked up for a little bit, I uploaded some photos to flickr, did a little Photoshop work, and just relaxed my feet. Nine o’ Clock hit and we were back to the streets; we needed to score some food!

This was a little shorter walk that earlier in the day, but I was already sore, so it seemed pretty long. We managed to run across some really cool little areas around Clarendon; they reminded me a lot of the Plaza area in KC, but a lot bigger. I found a Whole Foods market just a few blocks from WPNI, so you know I’ll be hitting that up after work sometime. There were also a lot of really nice looking restaurants in this area and maybe a blues club or two. I will be heading back to there. We wandered around this neighborhood till about midnight, then headed back to the hotel to call it a night. You can see the path from this night on that Google map as well.

I’ve got to look up what all happenings there are tomorrow and Monday around here since it’s Memorial Day weekend and this is Washington DC. I’m sure it will be another two days full of walking.

I wanted to touch on one point I was thinking while we were walking around tonight. This DC area (Arlington, DC, etc) seems like a really nice, clean place. I know you hear about all the crime and stuff, but it’s really not that horrible from what I’ve seen. Sure I’ve seen a few neighborhoods that I wouldn’t wanna spend too much time in, but that’s when you just stay on the metro and ride on through to the other side. The Arlington area that I walked through tonight is really clean and well lit; it feels like a very safe place (no bars on the windows helps that feeling).

I’ve got to call it good here. It’s 2am and I’ve gotta get some sleep so I can hit that continental breakfast in the morning. Until next time…

Sean Stoops