Developing Usable Experiences

Happy Hour

October 25th, 2007 10:46 pm —  150 views

There was a happy hour tonight at a brew pub in Ann Arbor. It was for a student organization called SOCHI1. There weren’t a ton of people there but I knew a few faces and chatted about computer stuff and drank a couple tasty beers.

This happened after a group meeting that started at 6:00 and lasted until we got kicked from our meeting room by another group around 7:30 PM. Before that I was working fast and furious on all kinds of things. I rushed from work to a shoe store to pick up a pair of hard to find sandals for W. Poor girl, she’s been trying to get a pair of these sandals online and they have sent the wrong size 3 times! She has been great this semester so I felt it was the least I could do to get these for her.

Most nights during the week I’m on campus and get home after she has gone to bed. She’s usually awake and we chat a bit about our days before I head downstairs to check my email and pound some characters into this blog. Sadly, we don’t see much of each other during the week. We have such busy schedules during the day then I’m gone most of the night. I hope she isn’t feeling estranged. I know I’ve said it before, but she is very supportive of my academic pursuits. Her support helps immensely.

I met a woman tonight at happy hour from the law school at Michigan. Very outgoing and friendly. Apparently the SOCHI group was at the table reserved for her group but nobody really cared. Everybody was drinking and talking about how they’re going to make a ton of money and help people at the same time. Idealistic maybe? Maybe not. How would I know being a corporate code monkey for so many years? Then you have the older students like Mr.Beach and myself that have some scars inflicted by the sharp edges of the real world.2 It’s all good and rubbing elbows with my peers makes me feel more involved. Being a part-time student I don’t get much interaction with other students outside of class. But call a meeting at a bar and I find it tough to pass up. Go figure.

One week from tonight I’ll be hunched up in an airplane a few thousand feet in the air on my way to the big island. W. and I are looking forward to this trip but the pre-trip planning and packing can be daunting. Once I get my homework and school stuff in order I’ll be able to sit back and sip mai-tai’s with a smile.

Image: After I got to Leopold’s I sat at the bar and had a quick bit to eat and enjoyed the ambiance of the pub. To mark the occasion I snapped this picture of the board behind the bar. Ah, bartending…those were some interesting times. Good experience, many memories, lots of lessons.

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  1. Student Organization for Computer Human Interaction. See http://www.si.umich.edu/SOCHI/ [↩]
  2. Nice chatting with you Mr.Beach. You’ll love Java if you give it a chance. [↩]

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2 Responses to “Happy Hour”

  1. mom on October 27th, 2007 2:39 pm

    hey punkin, i didn’t see a title for the “reflection” picture -

  2. Spike on October 27th, 2007 3:30 pm

    Oops. Forgot to put one on there…all better now.

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