West Portal Reflections #12, November 22, 1997
West Portal Director of the MSU Communication Technology Laboratory
West Portal Reflections document my experiences as I try to open a portal to Northern California for Michigan State University. They are targeted to my teams in the Comm Tech Lab and Virtual University, to my close colleagues and bosses throughout Michigan State University, and to close friends and family. These pages serve as ethnographic documentation of my participant-observation research on TeleRelating ("using technology to sustain and enhance close personal relationships"). The contents mix professional and personal life because I am reaching out 2500 miles to people I care about and work with. I hope my reflections help you to keep me in your hearts and make San Francisco a place that is yours. Thanks for journeying with me as I think, learn and experiment.
A Telecommuting Milestone
I returned for a week in East Lansing in early November, for 44 quick meetings with colleagues and dear friends, students and bosses. During those seven days, I was able to check email once for 2 minutes before being swallowed into talking with people, and only then because I had gotten the time wrong for one of my guest lectures. I did not have an office or computer to park at during my week there, but it didn't matter because that one scheduling mixup was the only time I would have had to sit.
I talked Bob into co-purchasing a mountain bike that I could use as an affordable and healthy means to get around while I am in EL and he can use the rest of the time for transportation. Did not have the opportunity (?) to try biking in the snow.
Being back in East Lansing for a solid wall of nonstop meetings switches everything 180 degrees from working alone in a basement. The transition in both directions is surreal and abrupt. Seeing people was wonderful though too much. Being without them again was hard. Getting impossibly behind has made life unpleasant ever since. I have definitely not found a happy medium.
It is 8pm on Friday night. I feel I have been chained to the chair in this basement for the entire week. Today about six different people all needed things immediately. Yesterday was hours of online meetings generating lots more work. I have five significant deadlines on projects I have not even begun due before I sleep on Sunday night. Managed to put off four other deadlines until Monday. I feel completely stressed out, pressured, doing a half baked job on everything, with no time to think or work on the telerelating research or Bay area connectivity I came out here to accomplish. I was up until 3:30 Sunday night finishing a proposal, up at 7am for a doctoral defense, and today is a total race to get head above water.
I was feeling pretty sorry for myself until I realized what I have achieved in only four months of telecommuting. I have managed to recreate over two thin phone lines as overloaded and unmanageable a workload as I fled from when I left East Lansing. It is possible to do all of that remotely. Telecommuting really works! The technology is irrelevant when I am this busy. Just the usual basics are enough -- but they lack the thrill of new tech toys I live for.
What's different is I am living with Sheldon, instead of living alone with my computer. I have new motivation to be able to transform into a pleasant person to be around at the end of the day. I can't believe I used to get less than three hours sleep six days a week for more than ten years. I do not know how to get the workload down to the point where I can do a better job, work on the important things and feel less distressed, but I do know we need to figure out a way. Advice desired.
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Tamiko Theil talked about being a chick who does tech during Chik Tek at the San Jose Museum of Art. Women with wires before and after the talk make the picture more real. |
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Cancer Prevention Low Fat Celebration
Darcy Greene led her team to the successful on time completion of the Cancer Prevention CD-ROM, and then invited the group to her home for vegetarian lasagna. On previous projects, I usually drive in with Hostess Ding Dongs and chocolate throughout the night to keep people going and then take them to a restaurant for steak when the job is done. So, this is the first "healthy" Comm Tech Lab project completion.
Darcy and a different crew also completed the Cancer Pain CD-ROM and Web Site. (Thanks to Kurt for finishing revisions to the web site at 2am last night.)
The presence of Communication Arts and Sciences Dean Jim Spaniolo is so powerful it bends brick walls when he stands too close. (Do I get a raise for that headline?) This is the digital photo I neglected to take my last visit to East Lansing.
Fall Leaves Come to San Francisco
My mother federal expressed a large box of fall leaves from Chicago to the West Portal branch of the Comm Tech Lab. The leaves still decorate the dining room table on top of a few newspapers. The weather here in late November is pleasantly fall crisp/cool. Frequently rainy, but usually getting sunny for part of the day.
The only day of the year I wouldn't mind having a video camera pointed at me during our online discussions, and you missed it. I am considering painting my face with lines when I come to ViaTV videophone meetings...
Halloween is my favorite day of the year and I found 45,000 kindred spirits on the streets of San Francisco this year where Halloween is an adult holiday. My favorite moment was as we were waiting to get on the Muni to go home from the massive costumed crowds at Castro Street. A two car unit pulled up packed beyond capacity with people in costumes. The doors opened and some 200 weird creatures poured out the doors and up the escalator to join the milleu.
I delivered a presentation called Creativity-Driven Design describing the Comm Tech Lab methodology of software creation at the ACM Multimedia conference in Seattle. It's in a form on the web useful for CTL tours and demos, but currently needs a human to make some of the points.
The minute the panel ended, I ran upstairs to participate by phone in the weekly VU meeting. Unfortunately that prevented me from being able to interact with any of the people who heard my talk. Under the circumstances it might have been wiser to say I was travelling and not interrupt my panel to telecommute. Or perhaps my presence with VU that week was essential.
I felt like I was living a promo ad for "The Jetsons" on November 17, as I turned 41 and my virtual friends and colleagues used technology to wish me well. Darcy and the Comm Tech Lab began with a chorus of people singing into six phones. Virtual University sent a musical post card.
John Johnson sent a java card.
And Randy Russell put together a Director animation with a cake and candles fluttering the breeze and a button labeled "blow." After the candles went out, a new button labeled "bombard" appeared. When clicked, a meteor came from above and blew up the cake. I exported the director file to a quicktime movie for easy inclusion in this web page. It loses the impact of interactivity and the home grown sound effects, but does give some flavor of the virtual cake.
Lori Hudson and Libraries, Computing and Technology actually planned ahead enough to send a physical card through the mail.
Thanks to all of you for your kindness.
