ten billion butterfly sneezes

My company’s promises to me after we decided to remain in Northern Virginia came true today, as I relocated to another building immediately adjacent to the fire trap facility where I’ve spent the last 5+ years.

I’m still doing pretty much the same work, which is cool. We’re not particularly title conscious where I work; you can either get it done, or not. That’s how you are evaluated. I arbitrarily changed my e-mail sig from:

Sr. Unix Systems Administrator

to

Sr. Linux Systems Engineer

I’ll still kickstart a few systems, occasionally plumb up an ethernet interface or two, and do the “Other duties as required” that inevitably accompany any endeavor. And that’s all right too. But my primary responsibilities are, at this juncture, to script, package, and craft deployment and maintenance methodologies that impact a bunch of boxen. I call it, not to blow my horn too loudly, Being an admin to admins. I’ve engaged in many hand-to-server combat battles over the years, so I know some pitfalls first-hand. As the sheer number of servers, whether bare metal or virtual, increase, better methods are needed.

And I’ll work my ass off to help that effort. Reminds me of a Jerry Jeff Walker song, one line of which is

Don’t know why it is I do it
Guess there must be something to it
Gettin’ paid for doin’ something I’d be doin’ anyway.

And I still want to play that Honky Tonk Music.

-k-