Rhino Signs on the Dotted Line

Well, your ever lovin' Rhino is rejoining the ranks of the gainfully employed beginning 5/5 - I met with a guy today and signed a contract through 12/31/09 - so that will give me 8 months of serious cash flow while my partners and I ramp up our consultancy here. The gig is with a software company and I'll be managing the monthly release (yes, I said monthly, which is insane - just ask Orin) of enhancements for the application installed at their largest customer. I'm led to understand that the process is chaos personified and that they need a strong horn, errr hand, to take the reins on both sides of the equation.

Amazing what one can do in this information age ... This gig is for an Irish sofware company and their HQ in Wicklow, Ireland. The U.S. office of the company is in San Francisco. My boss is based in London. The application development team is in Sri Lanka. Their client is in Miami. Fortunately, I'll have to do ZERO travel. I'll work very closely with all of these people for the next eight months and, most likely, I'll never meet any of them face to face.

I was contacted for the gig, out of the blue, a couple of days ago by a guy I hired and mentored at a start-up 7 years ago - he lives in Atlanta and now works for this company as a road warrior. I spoke to the London guy yesterday morning (smart and funny) and he liked me, of course, as I am funny and smart, so instead of them just emailing the contract to me my old protege and I took the opportunity to meet for coffee and to play catch-up. My little project manager is all grown up now - I'm so proud. Actually, it really is great to see someone that I've had an impact on, a positive one in this case, grow up to be successful. To be completely candid (and fair), in my early days I was a complete and utter shark and left a little more than my fair share of destroyed careers in my wake. The sick part is that I don't regret one.

I'll work out of my home office. Official uniform of the day will be boxer shorts and t-shirt. My secondary office will be, of course, the cigar shop. I'll have to sacrifice and put on a pair of shorts when working there. Shoes will be optional at either location.

I need to go out tomorrow to buy my Skype headset and credits. Should probably review business etiquette for Sri Lanka as well.

I have a feeling that my life just got very interesting ... especially when I start doing the time zone shuffle.

Thanks for all of the support you freaks.