Note: this is a long and personal post. Feel free to skip it.

Listening to Games people play, by Alan Parson's Project. On repeat. Feeling nostalgic. Some people know about what the song represents to me. For the others, let me quote another song:

Oh when I look back now
That summer seemed to last forever
And if I had the choice
Ya - I'd always wanna be there
Those were the best days of my life

Last week everything went, in a way, wrong. I failed my last exam, the damned Differential equations (fmi sudents will probably shiver just by hearing the name). It was kinda fun to take the exam with the 3^rd year students I was teaching Asp.net one month before. But I've failed it. And this means I won't be finishing university. Not this year anyway.

Other personal problems appeared. Too personal to write about them here.

And then I had to decide what I'll do next. I was lost. And I had to decide.

A while ago, 2 years to be precise, I decided I wanted to teach at the University. Teachers liked me, the doors were open, everything was fine. I wanted to specialize in databases. My skills also qualified me to teach a lot of other things. However, I realised that staying there will be a failure. More about this in a dedicated post to come.

Last week I had to make what was probably the hardest decision for me I had to take. I quit 417. And joined the large group of 8 hours, 5 days a week working men and women.

I started working at the faculty almoust 4 years ago. I still remember going to room 28, timid, and meeting Radu and Cezar. Pulling out my pack of Assos and seeing Cezar smoked the same cigarettes. And bonding with him because of Assos.

I remember cabling the entire math faculty, laying out kilometers of ethernet cables. Spending hours over hours in 413, the junkyard, building Pentium 1 desktops for teachers from mountains of old parts.

Running my first server from that room. And many other things.

417 was a family to me, even if I didn't probably show it. I stayed there more than I stayed at home. I loved the place, I loved the people there and I loved the freedom I had. I could learn what I wanted, I could implement what I wanted, I could work when I wanted. And I learned a lot. What I am today (not that I am anything much) I am because of 417.

I had 4 years of freedom, of great moments, of sad moments (not that many though) and of memories I'll never forget.

For this, I have to thank the wonderful people that made and still make the 417 team. I'll always love you guys (yes Radu, even you).

Cezar, Radu, Gremlin, Keats, Ciocanel

And then there's also Mihai and Raztud, who were there briefly.

Alan Parson's again:

Where do we go from here?

I've joined Martin, with whom I've been collaborating for an year now, at Creditlink. We'll do serious stuff, we'll do cool stuff, he's a great boss and friend and I hope things will turn up ok. But part of me is still crying for the things I had some time ago...

There's some pictures at 417.ro if you're the peeking type.

Games people play, you take it or you leave it
Things that they say, just don’t make it right
If I’m telling you the truth right now, do you believe it
Games people play in the middle of the night