“Back from the Brink” – my professional path 2007-2010
This guest blog was published on SF Chronicle’s SFGate website Nov. 23, 2009 and garnered +150 comments. It is a slightly-edited version of an essay by Penny Mudd, who describes her ongoing evolution from tech to teaching. – Tom Abate, Editor
“Two years ago I was a Silicon Valley veteran of nearly twenty years. I’d had a typical whirlwind career, gathering expertise about technology partnerships with Europe and creating software with smart teammates at companies like Novell, Remedy and Borland.
The start-up firm I’d been with for the last eight of those years was on track to find a buyer. I had imagined the day that I could leave the grind and make a direct contribution to society. Maybe be a teacher. Gone would be the 60-plus hour work weeks. No more massaging boy wonders’ unchecked egos. Hello summers off and dinner at home at a reasonable hour.
But in late 2007 I was kicked to the curb by the aforementioned start-up. A second Dickensian moment occurred on Christmas Eve in 2008 when I opened a package informing me – with all the details down to the penny – that instead of commendation and reward for the long stint I had dedicated to the firm, the CEO and Board had engineered the disbursement of very paltry sums to the long time employees, while they loaded up the stockings – to the tune of seven figures – for a relatively new management team. I found myself in a fog of disillusionment.
Finally, there came the third event and (near) coup de grace: The Recession. I’d skated through the last two downturns (1990, 2000) so I had no clue how to protect myself. My skills were still in demand, but there was now super-abundance of applicants, both American and from the vast H-1B job pool. I had no choice but to re-evaluate my earlier daydreams in light of these changed circumstances and start building a new professional identity from scratch at age 50.
So much for the past. These days I wake up at 6 a.m. to study before I go to an 8 a.m. math class at the community college right down the street from my house. The instructor is not only easy on the eyes at that hour, but teaches in a manner that brings the bleary-eyed 20-something students (and one middle-aged, would-be math teacher) along for the learning curve.
Two days a week, I follow that up by driving another mile to a well-funded local junior high school where I’m a teacher’s aide. To round out my pre-credential curriculum, I study piano (as I plan to teach our newly arrived students some national anthems), US history and a symposium of what it takes to work in public schools led by veteran teachers. On Fridays I volunteer at the Monterey Aquarium down the coast, an activity that got me thinking about teaching to begin with.
Most days I’m calm and committed to my new path as a middle school math teacher. Other days I feel betwixt and between, like I’ve lost my right arm and I want to flee back to my old identity. But when given the chance to mingle with the tech crowd at a trade show in NYC recently, I could see I’d been bitten by the bug of helping kids find their place in the world.
Though the road to teaching is long and winding, studying math has been strangely therapeutic. That, along with the love of a good man, compassionate counseling and some short, but fun travel has helped me keep the faith during this painful and extended transition. I find I am a much better-rounded person that I was during my SV days. With two careers in my arsenal now, I look to 2010 with a spirit of adventure and a curiosity about what the future holds.”
Follow Penny on Twitter @calliopeconsult.
Report on INTEROP NYC 2009 Cloud Computing Conference (written 4 for Webgrrls International)
CONTENTS
- Intro
- What is cloud computing
- Conference Highlights
- Resources
The fragile economic recovery did little to deter a thousand techies from visiting the INTEROP 2009 NYC conference and tradeshow at the Javits Center in Manhattan, Nov. 16-20, 2009 and its symposium-within-a-conference on “Cloud Computing”. Despite the fact short term tech growth will come from broadband being built out or healthcare and education reform, everyone from newbies to grizzled veterans are girding themselves for the next really big wave (hold on…a switch of metaphor is coming), the ambiguous “cloud”.
“How painful can something called the ‘cloud’ be?” I asked myself that as I flew from Silicon Valley, where I was most recently an engineering program manager for a medical device start-up, to JFK to investigate this conference on behalf of Webgrrls International.
(Note: a Web 2.0 conference and expo was also collocated at Javits last week. It attracted a decidedly Gen X crowd of both sexes. Many were attired in black.)
What is “cloud computing”?
Much like “Web 2.0″, the term “cloud computing” was a collection of related concepts, a definition in search of a term. (See Resources Section). But it was when Erik Schmidt of “The Goog” used the term in 2006 to describe Google’s way of managing data and then Amazon included the word “cloud” when it launched EC2 shortly thereafter, that the term went mainstream and the hype began. Fast forward to late 2009, and Google, Microsoft and Amazon are making major investments in “cloud computing” – though the projection is that the profits won’t be there until 2015 – and voilà! The technology finally caught up to the metaphor!
What is cloud computing? Some execs answer that question with a very Zen “whatever you want it to be.” Here’s what we found out: Businesses must wring more efficiency out of their daily activities. Cloud computing is the umbrella term that refers to a major shift of raw computing power and applications out from a company’s own internal IT infrastructure to space in a mega data center operated by (so far) giants like Google, Microsoft or Amazon. And maybe someday out to a data center operated by what is now a start-up like Joyent. http://www.joyent.com
These data centers are scattered west of the Mississippi (cheap land) and in one other technical and linguistically compatible country, Ireland. And they include all the new HW and apps that these titans need to create or buy to operate them. As the Big Players start renting out computing capacity and application space to companies who had previously maintained 100% of their own apps at their home offices, this increases the requirements for literally bullet-proof infrastructure and is very disruptive to both existing corporate hierarchies and traditional ways of selling and choosing software and services. Some companies like Nokia and GlaxoSmithKlein are already storing hundreds of terabytes of data “in the cloud” but this is mostly non-critical data, like email. To date, due to competitive and security concerns, the Big Players have been secretive about their new server farms, thus discussions of cloud computing are tinged with excitement, mystery and ambivalence about the changes it will eventually bring. It has been reliably reported that Microsoft has its first European server farm in an industrial park in Dublin from where it runs the network for its own Bing search, Hotmail and MS Messenger services. Microsoft is adding 10k of new servers per month to its other server farms in Washington State and Texas.
Another challenge in this new world of “the cloud” can be appreciated if you’ve ever been involved in moving your company’s critical data from one vendor to another, as I was when I worked for a healthcare start-up that moved its network and data from EDS to NTT/Vero. You know what a slow, painstaking thus expensive process moving data from one service provider to another can be. In fact, once a company gets its critical data up in someone’s cloud, it may never be cost effective to move it again! In other words, decisions must be made carefully, as they will not be easy to reverse. As with any “game changing” shift, many security and legal issues remain to be ironed out.
Conference Highlights
General observations
While conferences today mean everyone is emailing, tweeting and posting photos in real time, why is it other aspects of conferences and shows never seem to change? There’s the dais with the expert panel, the PowerPoint presentations and the guy who runs around bringing the microphone to the next person who wants to ask a question. And the tradeshow booths always have seasoned, mostly male presenters throwing out T-shirts to the audience, aided by a few perky young gals. And last but not least, there are the small attractions that are borrowed from the county fair, like the photo opportunities that provide costume props so straight-laced engineers can step momentarily into a fun role, like a rock star. Let’s not forget the strong drinks (after 3pm) and the sweets kiosks and the endless technical documents and tschotskes. The Interop show did have a nice feature whereby engineers led tours of the show floor for other engineers. The best T-shirt I saw last week was for a Xirrus product named “splunk”. It said “Take the SH out of IT.” It was interesting to see the full NOC (network operating center) that ran the conference and show displayed behind glass walls so you could see the equipment and staff. And I must admit I was quite willing to tweet about IBM’s “Sweet Bar” in exchange for a small sack of candy. My only disappointment – as will be evident to you if you view the conference photos on Flickr (see Resources Section) is that – in stark contrast to the the Web 2.0 conference that was co-located with INTEROP NYC – women are almost nowhere to be found in decision making or key roles in this new, hardware intensive arena of cloud computing. A notable exception is Cisco VP Marie Hattar who delivered one of the keynotes entitled “So what is Borderless Networks and what does it really mean to IT professionals? “
People
The sole bit of star power on the program came when New York Times personal technology columnist David Pogue – himself a former musician and entertainer – took an entertaining turn on Wednesday. See his site at http://www.davidpogue.com. Since I came to the conference alone and don’t have any personal contacts in the infrastructure world, I was your average attendee. From following Interop on Twitter (and searches under keyword #interop) I gleaned that Microsoft had just lost a Big Kahuna named Don Dodge to Google – and this conference was Mr. Dodge’s first show appearance in public since his defection. So when Microsoft’s senior engineer for its Azure product (its cloud OS) , Mr. Yousef Khalidi was wrapping up a panel discussion on cloud computing and made the mistake of telling someone to “Google it”, the audience snickered. He quickly corrected himself and advised the audience to “Bing it” instead. Thus everyone could appreciate Microsoft’s uphill battle: the Google brand has long since entered our language as a verb synonymous with the search function. To those of us who worked for companies that Microsoft crushed in 80s and early 90s, it’s nice to know Microsoft is getting a taste of its own medicine.
Other pleasant or amusing aspects of the conference included off-site activties like bowling, where of course the bus driver to the venue apparently just arrived himself from parts unknown – and promptly got lost in Manhattan’s rush hour traffic – only to be rescued by accurate directions from some savvy Australian passengers on his bus!
I hope this short report has provided you with a better sense of some of the concepts, players and ambiance at Interop NYC 2009. If you’re an engineering student, you might want to check out opportunities to volunteer or intern with the conference organizers in the NOC, for example, as there will be Interop conferences across the country in 2010.
We’re all so tightly networked using gadgets that these conferences allow us all a rare chance to get out of our chairs, and practice meeting and greeting our fellow human beings, a skill that will never go out of fashion!
Additional resources:
1) Summary site by the INTEROP organizers
http://www.interop.com/newyork/
2) Interop on Twitter
http://twitter.com/interop_events
3) A set of conference and show pictures – nice photos but most do not contain names
4) History of the term “Cloud computing”
http://www.johnmwillis.com/cloud-computing/who-coined-the-phrase-cloud-computing/
5) Explanation of demand for “private clouds”
http://reddevnews.com/Articles/2009/11/20/Customers-Press-Vendors-for-Private-Clouds.aspx
6) Presentation on Load Balancing (also search Slideshare under “interop” and “cloud” for other presentations)
http://www.slideshare.net/dyninc/failover-and-global-server-load-balancing-for-better-network-availability © Jeremy Hitchcock
7) Eric Wolford, Riverbed Sr. VP discusses cloud computing and Riverbed’s recent announcement about their product direction for accelerating cloud environments.
(video) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NNxNJldm26Y
8) Conference report from Information Week
http://www.networkcomputing.com/virtualization/interop-cloud-computings-portability-gotcha.php?cid=ref-true © John Foley
9) (Video) Joel Conover, Cisco Marketing Manager welcomes you to learn more about Cisco Borderless Network at Interop New York, 2009. Hear customers talk about what Borderless Networks means (Cisco VP’s Marie Hattar’s keynote was on this topic)
Remembering Carrie Progen 1980-2001 (Aon Corp. employee, died 9/11/2001)
I came to the on-line Guest Book for Carrie Progen and was struck by the fact that people – not just family members - are still writing about her/to her ten years later on every anniversary of 9/11. What brought me to her page? My growing sense of my own mortality. I’m looking for family connections.
Carrie Progen and I were distant relatives, but we never met. Carrie was from Gen X, whereas I’m a baby boomer. Her great grandmother (Hattie) and my grandmother (Katherine) were “Carey girls”: modest and fun-loving sisters (and horsewomen) born around 1900. They grew up when women in N. England were pulled out of school to learn a trade at 14, and whose lives were greatly impacted by WWI. My Mom (nee Margaret Landers in 1926-2003) was Carrie’s grandfather Howard’s cousin. The family is very big and some branches are estranged from others, but the passing of certain beloved members (such as Carrie and Uncle Franklin) has had the effect of pulling distant family members like me back into the fold. I grew up relatively untethered to any family except for an unconventional one comprised of my mother Margaret, her brother Richard, and their mother Katherine Carey Landers. These “Landers” relatives all failed at marriage, and banded together to survive. Somehow they managed to raise me until I left home at 16. From early on, I also knew I was rejected (i.e. I did not exist for) my father’s side of the family (the Atkinson-Nichols from Appalacian Virginia and South Carolina) so I grew up feeling out of step with the “mom and dad” families that surrounded me. I even identified with the orphan’s experience despite having a close relationship with my own mother. Fast forward five decades and I’m grateful to my Mother’s side of the family – the Carey side from which Carrie came. This kind and loving branch welcomed me back after my Mother’s death.
I found out about Carrie Progen because of the tragic ending of her life. In many ways, her life mirrored certain stages of my own very closely, so I can relate to her right up until that Tuesday in 9/11/2001 when she was in the Aon office on the 103rd floor of the WTC, working at her first real job after college. My time in NYC spanned 1977-1983 but the worst thing that ever happened to me there was being pistol whipped. I had also left a small backwoods town in Central Massachusetts for college and then went to the Big Apple to start a career . Going back further, my mother had taken me on week-end shopping and theater trips to NYC since 1965, so NYC was a focal point of my life for two decades. In addition, my mother loved celebrating with friends at the restaurant on top of the World Trade Center, whereas I had only been up there once, as I found the elevator ride creepy.
On Sept. 11th, 2001 I was on Cape Cod. My Mother had sold her house there and I had finally disposed of some family furniture (and its emotional ballast) early that morning. At 8a.m. I experienced a great sense of relief. It was short-lived. I went to my favorite beach in Centerville and was in a great mood. Then before I knew it, I was listening to the chilling updates on NPR. By 9:30 a.m. my mother and I were standing in a roomful of strangers watching the horror unfold on a widescreen TV at a local laundromat. Neither of us had any idea that a distant relative – much less such a young one as Carrie – was dying as we watched.
Here I am today, middle-aged and writing a few words on a foggy gray evening on the Central Coast of California, where I settled in 1985. The recession of 2008/09 has not been kind, but I seem to have come back from the brink. Carrie’s loss of her one life reminded me to count my blessings and work to make sense of what’s left of the life and gifts I’ve been given. And to take pride and comfort in the generations of good people (and strong women) in our family who faced tremendous difficulties over the decades, the loss of a child too soon in 2001 being only the most recent example.
Santa Cruz to Barstow – 385 miles
We somewhat guiltily snuck out of Aptos (and the fires) and headed for the High Desert north of the whole LA mess. I napped for a couple hours and woke up to a beautiful lilac and pink desert sunset, probably the result of wildfires down south. First Joshua trees, old stone railroad tunnels, and windy desert dryness. How dry? In Mojave, where we stopped at the only non-chain restauran for dinner – we were near a scrap yard for abandoned 747s. We also drove close to Edwards AFB – when the Space Shuttle lands when weather in FL is unreceptive. It was ust us and the long distance truckers after dark. I felt very Californian – as we were – like the few other passenger cars on the road – TOWING something! In our case: a Yamaha XS100 MNS motorcycle. Other popular things to tow in CA: skidos, boats, ATVs. Acton oriented people, these Californiacs! As for musical accompaniament – it’s Woodstock Week-end on XM satellite radio. Gives both Ray + I something to ponder, as we both remember who + where we were on Aug. 15 1969. Teenyboppers on the East + West Coast. Spent the night at Motel 6 (owned by French Accor Corp. and sooo clean + cheap). Breakfast on old route 66 in downtown Barstow. Studied up on my card recognition (Diamonds and Hearts are RED) – so we’re off to Vegas for 2 days.
Four days and counting…
Greetings,
We are headed off for a 12 day, 2700 mile road trip to the desert Southwest on Friday, August 14th. We plan to drive a comfy 2006 Honda Accord Hybrid with a sunroof and tow a small trailer carrying a 1989 Yamaha XS 1100 Midnight Special motorcycle. We’ll drive the long, hot stretches in the car and use the bike for the local roads. Unless we get fed up with each other.
We’re going to try a “dual” voice on some posts - an approach we’ve learned from friends Bob & Nancy McDermand of San Hosay (sic). Nancy drives the support car while Bob rides his fancy bike to Iowa every few years.
On some days, Ray (my significant other) will offer his perceptions and version of the days events right along with mine! Look for blog posts from Las Vegas, Zion National Park, Colorado Rockies, Santa Fe, Sedona and Scottsdale. We have yet to determine which route we’ll take on our way home to the Central Coast of California from Scottsdale. My significant other has outgrown Disneyland (too bad), so Anaheim is out. Maybe via Pasadena. I haven’t taken a long road trip since the 1980s. I’m really looking forward to this one.
See you in the funny papers,
Penny “Motorcycle Mama” Mudd
Another Whole Foods Market location is opening in our town…
In the Fall of 1980, I was living a happy hand-to-mouth existence with my musician boyfriend in Austin, TX. For a special treat, we’d hang out in a small health food store in the Clarkville neighborhood, drinking then-exotic smoothies and chatting with other quasi-hippies.
That store: the first Whole Food Market.
Fast forward to Spring of 2009. I’m a recovering high tech cube dweller living in a community that prides itself on being on the forefront of healthy outdoor living. The now-multinational, 235 stores and counting, Whole Foods Market has come to town. Two stores opening in a span of 3 months.
The initial hoopla and curiosity tapered off after the opening of Store #1. It brought 100 P/T jobs into the town, you have to grant them that. It’s now pure American competition – of Whole Foods against our beloved local chain – New Leaf Markets – and the lone Staff of Life store. In a recession.
On one hand, Whole Foods may have conquered other college towns, but we keep it local – we don’t export our money. And no Kombucha on tap is gonna lure conscientious Santa Cruzans away from their principles! On the other hand, the recession forces people to alter some choices based on their bank account balance.
If we locals should be surprised at anything, it’s that it’s taken this long for the forces of (you take your pick) NAFTA or globalization to arrive in our little piece of paradise. Hell, it’s been nearly 20 years since Wal-Mart’s revolutionized food shopping in Mexico, shaking up Mexican supermarkets to pay attention to what was on their shelves and how customers were treated. In the end, we are not exempt from market forces.
I wish all the players could win, but we know that’s not how the story usually ends.
[Note: Whole Foods Market opened its 2nd Santa Cruz location on July 28, 2009.]
Me and the Founding Fathers (on the eve of Obama’s election)
Last November, I showed up at an out-of-town meeting one day too early. So there I was – next to Independence Hall in Philadelphia with an entire day stretching out before me. This was not like another occasion when I had unexpected free time. I’d been ambushed by a pink slip wielding VP and found myself back at home before noon, drunk dialing old friends – having finished off a couple bottles of champagne I’d been saving for a happier occasion.
No – this was more like that day in first grade when my Mom dropped me off at my parochial school. That day when neither of us had gotten the note that said it “was not a school day”. Before cell phones, one didn’t call a parent’s place of work about such matters. I spent the entire day in the jump seat of a Ford station wagon full of visibly inconvenienced nuns as they buzzed around town doing errands. I’d give anything to remember where we had lunch, what they bought and what movie we saw. It might have been “The Sound of Music.”
So back in Philadelphia with time to kill, I took every tour the Park Service had to offer. As I walked from Independence Hall to the adjacent Liberty Bell installation, I felt exhilarated while I listened to the retelling of how our country was founded. I especially enjoyed the parts where rabble rousers roamed the streets, knocking down statues of King George.
I’d clearly been brainwashed growing up near Boston. (Of course I found that out then I first visited New Mexico twenty years earlier). But Philadelphia was a refinement of that previous reality check. In Massachusetts, we were given to understand that the Pilgrims’ landing in 1620 and The Revolution of 1776 (with details like the clackity clack of the ride down to the Charles River to toss the tea overboard) were the seminal events in Colonial history. Wrong!
Having received my latest update from the Park Service guide, I could feel every neat brick, dormer and garden in historic Philly silently reproaching our tour group’s carefree modernity: our compulsive shopping, our house flipping, our celebrity worship. (Ed. note: Yes, this was at the crest before the economic freefall.)
I liked thinking that the founding fathers were smiling down on us that day, pleased that the system they created gave us a Barack Obama on the upcoming ballot.
Hindsight is….useless
(Just before the distressing extent of the economic meltdown became clear…)
While events swirl in far away places and our retirement accounts drop zeros, here in Santa Cruz we’re keeping our heads down. Adversity is notorious for pulling communities together. We suspect we’re some of the most fortunate people on the planet. We take the Presidential election seriously but first we’re focused on wresting the last rays of warmth from another dry autumn. Houses get painted. Humpbacks harass orcas, who in turn harass seals in Monterey Bay. Rambunctious children are driven to school. Artists open their studios. The crop of new undergrads notice everything we take for granted and stick out like a sore thumb. We play with our dogs on our beaches. We bike around because gas costs so much or to save the planet or just for fun. We segregate ourselves into our favorite coffee houses. We throw the last outdoor parties of the year. Driving home on a starry night from a merry grape harvest fiesta where the hostess sang Willy Nelson songs along with the band, my headlights pick up three gangs of juvenile raccoons out foraging.
In the light of another hot day, I am ready to fall back on strategies learned growing up in New England and honed during my travels before settling down. I consider what my Grandmother said about the Depression, that it was a great leveler. But this is Santa Cruz, so in the end, I take a workshop…. on compassion.
Tarnished medals
Michael Fred Phelps! What were you thinking?
Comics have snarked that this explains those 5000 calorie breakfasts you used to consume….back last summer, when we got a good long look at the smiling boy-next-door in a Speedo. No hyperbole was too over the top. Pool shark. Stroke of Genius. Our man in Beijing. On the podium every time we turned around. All that bling. Six months later and you’re on the apology circuit with R&B singers, bankers, A Rod and Peanut Processors!?
And your biggest fan, Mom. She thought she knew the worst – about that gold digging hoochie in New York City…that was, until The Bong Shot hit the stands. OK, whoever sold that photo is a (BLEEP) but you looked awfully comfortable ripping that hit – like it wasn’t the first time.
Now Mom sits in the sunny breakfast nook in Baltimer (sic) listlessly eating her Wheaties. Kellogg’s sent a pallet. But the new boxes no longer feature you. Tears in her big brown eyes as she tells her coffee klatch – for the umpteenth time – how Mazda and Guitar Hero are sticking by you.
Michael, Michael. Granted our first choice was to keep you on that pedestal until 2012. Now we see you’re more than a Swim God and marketeer’s dream. You’re an American kid, one of us after all. Some folks are wise and some are otherwise – so separate yourself from the baseball and cycling ranks whose records are meaningless. In all your apologies, you’ve said, “The pool is my home”.
Dude, haul yourself back there!
Sometimes the best thing you can do for your country…
Another summer is on the books. How did you spend yours? Did you leave the country? Maybe you built houses in Mexico through your church?
Or watched birds in equatorial jungles? Or lazed on Thai beaches? Or trooped through European capitals?
Then maybe you shared some of these feelings?
- Gratitude as you flew to a destination of your choice with your luggage in the hold, not on “Air Uncle Sam” to the Afghanistan border along with hundreds of nervous comrades wearing all their gear.
- Pleasure as you sank into the linguistic fog of the local language, deliciously out of earshot of the American harangue. No Senate hearings, no Mujahadeen, no weight loss strategies, no OJ/Brittany/Michael.
- Dismay as you handed over your dollars, which these days garner as much respect as the Armenian Dram.
- Humility at your brief glimpse of how it must’ve felt to your ancestors, assuming they immigrated to the USA. This time you got to be the outsider, the foreigner for a couple weeks. You know, the one who the waiters scorned and vendors shortchanged. The one at whom people rolled their eyes when you attempted to speak the local language.
- Or maybe you went for the “total powerlessness package”. No ugly American tourist, you really went native! You got robbed and so spent a couple nights in the only backwater hotel the U. S. Embassy would pay for. Due to sudden budgetary constraints, your diet consisted mostly of dry crackers and stinky cheese. You slunk out past the snarling hotel receptionist daily to see if the folks in the back office had finished putting your life (i.e. your Passport, credit card, prescriptions and return ticket) back together yet.
- Relief as you boarded the plane to back home – tinged with stirrings of patriotism – despite the actions of our government or maybe because of those actions.
Sometimes the best thing you can do for your country…. is to leave it.
– Broadcast on KUSP 88.9 FM, Central Coast Public radio, part of “First Person Singular” series – Sept. 2008
