I've recently been accepted on as a Junior Developer at a new startup company! I've gathered that I'll be programming in JavaScript and Cypher mainly, with maybe some Python thrown in there, as well as implementing UX and UI redesign plans. This all looks to be challenging and interesting work, and I'll have the chance to dive deeper into these programming languages to master their usage. The company is called PIR-a, and I'll be programming towards an application to be used for environmental surveys for the decommissioning of oil well sites throughout the province. At PIR-a our goal is to streamline this decomission process in order to more quickly make better use of the land in question. I'm finishing up my employment at the University of Calgary this week and next. I have had a wonderful experience working at the University and I'm sad to leave, but I am glad to be parting on good terms with everyone here and into a position where I can grow as a programmer.

In other news, my attentions have been diverted from side projects and sample code to focus on learning the machinery and application of JavaScript and Cypher. Most of my free time has been taken by this goal to better prepare for my new position. I want to be able to start going through the code base with some knowledge of what I'm looking at, and I'll be able to contribute more fully to the project with this language skill under my belt.

I have, however, seen the new Blade Runner film and I absolutely loved it. It wasn't the action-based superhero movie with explosions that we have all enjoyed over the past few years, but it was still very rich in the content that it delivered. It encompassed everything that I love about the Science Fiction novels that I read, and beautifully rendered a grim future that is all but unimaginable. The story is very centered in reality, and some of the issues portrayed in the film are not all that dissimilar from issues that we know and are growing today. The world and the mood of the original Blade Runner film was maintained quite well in this film, which is refreshing to see in a sequel made so long after its original. Not all movies achieve this sort of consistency (Blues Brothers 2000, for example). Blade Runner (the original) was based on a novel by Philip K. Dick (who happens to be my favorite author) and was the only film based on his work that he was alive to contribute to. I think that Dick would have approved of this sequel for it's mood matching that of the original work.

Apart from that I've started playing with ideas in my head about how to expand on a story that I'm currently writing. I'm just brainstorming at this stage; I wrote the story initially as part of a Fiction Writing class I took in my undergraduate degree and it was quite short, as small assignment stories tend to be. I'm looking to build a larger world for the story and I can then enrich the story and characters with that world as a framework. When I find the time though...