New IT building

On Friday, they had a groundbreaking ceremony for a new building for our department. We are now officially a part of the ever changing face of campus. The University President and the CIO were both there for the thing. (The engineers were just excited about the donuts and hot chocolate they brought...)

On Wednesday, Grounds showed up to clean the outside of the building. Custodial were working hard to get the lobby spiffed up. (I guess once every 20 years or so it gets cleaned whether it needs it or not...) On Thursday, they dug a hole, and bring a bunch of dirt in to fill the hole. (This is also what the construction crew did outside my window all Summer long. We couldn't figure out why they kept digging the hole and filling it again, then coming back in a couple of days to do it all over again. It turns out they couldn't find a gas line, and didn't want to leave a giant hole sitting there.)

After they filled the hole with nice loose dirt, they covered it with a tarp and left. Some engineers wanted to find a mannequin and bury it so that it would get dug up during the ground breaking. I wanted to get the fire hose, take it out there, and turn it on just a little, so that by morning they would have a ton of ice on top of the loose dirt. No one was brave enough to do the mannequin, and they talked me out of the fire hose.

They would be digging the foundation right now, but UDOT runs the street out back, and they are holding up the project because they want to study the easement impact to the street. I don't understand why, the easement has always been there, it's not like we are suddenly adding tons of cars back there, and the main parking lot is in front, pointing at a different street.

In about a year or so, we'll have new digs. Some people are worried they will impose a dress code. I'm not worried, I don't think a dress code would fly all that well. (At least not a 'shirt and tie' type dress code.) Others are worried about the noise, our floor will have no walls, just cubicles. I'm not worried about this, either, since I will be the one making all the noise...