Untitled #17

Today was another nice day out. For the first time since I started working at NC, I had lunch by myself. I had a usability webcast to watch at 12:30, so I took my lunch early where I went to the foosball table room and read my book. It wasn’t til I was sitting on the couch, unpeeling the plastic from my TV dinner that I began to really appreciate the usual company of my co-workers during our daily lunch hour outings. I couldn’t imagine having lunch like this everyday, as I once expected I would be when I arrived my first day.

The HFI webcast was titled “The ROI on Usability” and despite the fact that the latter half of it was a bit of a shameless plug for their usability consulting services, it wasn’t half bad. It reminded me of Boiko’s class as if taught by my accounting professor. That’s probably one of the most noteworthy things I’ve encountered since I started work, applying a business model to the last two years of Informatics schooling. Sure “user-centered design” was pounded into our heads for the last two years of our college education, so none of this is at all new. Usability is good. Can’t question that. However, during the last couple weeks I’ve been forced to see it from a different angle: “Usability is good… as long as it positively affects the bottom line.” You can be as user-centered as you please but ultimately you’ll need to be able to convey what benefit it provides in real terms. Like numbers. In either case, coming up with a return on investment for usability practices wasn’t as far-fetched as I imagined and it was somewhat interesting.

After work I met with Trevor, Kevin, and David in Queen Anne at TiniBigs. The walk and bus ride took me nearly an hour to get there. Luckily, I was too into my book on the bus to recognize the irony in how long it took to move 2 miles across downtown in rush hour to get too irritated.

Tinibigs was all right. We managed to get in 4 minutes before Happy Hour though so I had coconut prawns and steak quesadillas for dinner. I was in the mood for my usual Hefeweizen but as they did not have much of a beer selection, I do what I usually do and attempt to order a mixed drink, which I later taste, dislike, and typically pass on to a friend. David kindly obliged. Afterward we drove around ending up the ritziness of Magnolia and enjoyed their view of the water and mountains. It really was gorgeous out.

After Trevor dropped me off at home I ended up walking over to Ryan’s where I continued to read my book as he studied. I’m on page 635 now. I need to be careful on the Internet once Book 6 releases in London tomorrow. Two years ago a certain friend posted a certain spoiler on my blog about a certain character’s death and I’d certainly like to prevent a repeat. And look at the time I did it again. Time for bed! Happy Friday, everybody!


Posted

in

by

Tags:

Comments

One response to “Untitled #17”

  1. jules Avatar
    jules

    since i know you blogged ‘specially for me, i offer you eprops. But since I can’t do that, I left bubbles on your desk at home.