Webster Hill State Forest is 926 acres on the hill west of Pixley Falls in North-Central Oneida County, south of Boonville. Largely undeveloped, crossed by the deep ravines of the Chase Creek.
I was looking at end of day today at the database I maintain at work and all the points of data I’ve gotten entered into it — IOI Codes as we call them — and I was thinking how powerful the dataset has gotten with all the record’s I’ve tagged and improved.
It’s a creaky old system in many ways, but when you bring together the data from dozens of State Agencies, the Census Bureau and Commercial vendors, carefully linking it all together, you see a lot of beauty in it. To an outsider who doesn’t understand the meaning of codes it might seem like gobbly-gunk, but when you look in the data dictionary, and see the power of combining the data in SQL you know someday it’s going to provide a quality product that will be backbone of the agency for years to come. All hacked together with a lot of R code, quite a bit of SQL and some shell scripts and C. Might look like mess, but it’s beauty to think you’ve built it all in your year of leadership of the organization.I’ve been working my ass off to make this all happen. Never had a job I’ve worked so hard at but I like the independence, writing code, matching and merging records. Now just I have to sell the idea to people — I have some buy in but people really have a hard time seeing the beauty and my vision in the agency, despite the meeting I had with staff today. I have big dreams for it over the coming years. Just now it’s to get people to take advantage of what I’ve build.
Not as cold today, I probably would have ridden to work but I want to get new brake pads on the bike, and the bike trail really has too much snow to safely ride in. Maybe it would have been okay, but I I don’t know, it would have been sloppy. Plus I’m bringing my laptop home. Sometimes it’s just easier to hop on the bus and shuttle and pay the $2.60. Thing of it is even if I rode in I’ll still be busing it home for a few more weeks, even though the sunset is later and later. Another pretty sunset this evening too. Shuttle bus broke down this morning, so I was riding in a very full state car back and forth from the Empire Plaza. Still haven’t heard from Parking Management if I’m eligible for a Commuter Only Swiper card, sure would be nice to have unlimited rides on city buses for $8 a biweekly pay-period. Of course, it could make me lazy, and ride the bus more, but whatever. I could also use the bus more with the bike, you know explore more downtown and to parks using a combination of the bike and bus if I’m not paying for each ride. Really did wish I got more exercise today, but I’m tired and did a lot of cooking this morning between the bread and beans. Good dinner though.
Down at the library this evening to use the internet, although it’s mostly just an excuse n to bundle up and hike down to the library. I guess I could and probably should do an evening walk, but the cold bothers me more these days. After the coldest period and having the landlord come over to service the refrigerator, I turned the heat back to 50. Hoping now with the new, energy efficient working refrigerator my electric and gas bill will be less then $100 for February, but with the relentless cold I concede it will probably be over that. Not sure when the landlord is coming by to pick up the old fridge, it’s kind of in the way but I don’t care enough to reach out to him about it. Honestly, at this point it might be better to wait for the warmer weather so not to waste heat hauling out the door. Plus I rather not have my landlord snooping around my pig sty, run down apartment any more then necessary, even though I damn well he knows what it’s like inside.
![Untitled [Expires February 7 2025]](https://andyarthur.org//data/photo_017704_large.jpg)
carefully linking it all together, you see a lot of beauty in it. To an outsider who doesn’t understand the meaning of codes it might seem like gobbly-gunk, but when you look in the data dictionary, and see the power of combining the data in SQL you know someday it’s going to provide a quality product that will be backbone of the agency for years to come. All hacked together with a lot of R code, quite a bit of SQL and some shell scripts and C. Might look like mess, but it’s beauty to think you’ve built it all in your year of leadership of the organization. 
I’ve been working my ass off to make this all happen. Never had a job I’ve worked so hard at but I like the independence, writing code, matching and merging records. Now just I have to sell the idea to people — I have some buy in but people really have a hard time seeing the beauty and my vision in the agency, despite the meeting I had with staff today. 
I have big dreams for it over the coming years. Just now it’s to get people to take advantage of what I’ve build.
and the bike trail really has too much snow to safely ride in. Maybe it would have been okay, but I I don’t know, it would have been sloppy. Plus I’m bringing my laptop home. Sometimes it’s just easier to hop on the bus and shuttle 
and pay the $2.60. Thing of it is even if I rode in I’ll still be busing it home for a few more weeks, 
even though the sunset is later and later. Another pretty sunset this evening too. Shuttle bus broke down this morning, so I was riding in a very full state car back and forth from the Empire Plaza. Still haven’t heard from Parking Management 
if I’m eligible for a Commuter Only Swiper card, sure would be nice to have unlimited rides on city buses for $8 a biweekly pay-period. Of course, it could make me lazy, and ride the bus more, but whatever. I could also use the bus more with the bike, you know explore more downtown and to parks using a combination of the bike and bus if I’m not paying for each ride. Really did wish I got more exercise today, but I’m tired and did a lot of cooking this morning between the bread and beans. 
Good dinner though.
Plus I rather not have my landlord snooping around my pig sty, run down apartment any more then necessary, even though I damn well he knows what it’s like inside. 
