flexagon | In ur cafe eatin seared tuna on mashed celery root.

My first day at Zillian was definitely smoother than

heisenbug's; only about 60 people were starting, most of us engineers, so that may have helped. I had my backpack, my badge, my 17" macbook pro and my login all set up by 1:00 PM. Insert funny videos, lots of talks about Zillian culture, and gratuitous free food here. I have one t-shirt so far.

I'm thrilled and terrified to find that Zillian, which is famously secretive with the outside world, is extraordinarily transparent on the inside. I know things already that they really don't want me leaking to the media (or to you)... exciting things, too. It's a lot of trust to invest in a new hire, and I want to be worthy of it, so... sigh... I'll just have to learn to keep my mouth shut.

Most of what I'm not allowed to tell you is about the future. Some things I can tell you:

My initial assignment is to work on Blogger.

The first water I found on campus was infused with Thai purple basil and navel oranges. This is my new favorite drink.

At the same cafeteria, at dinner, they had duck a l'orange, which I did not eat because that's just ridiculous. (I have no idea what was served at the other 15 cafes, or how many of those others serve real food.)

And everywhere there are massage chairs, large screens showing this and that, and cafes and mini-kitchens and brightly colored exercise balls and free shuttles. We are, of course, being put up in an apartment. It's hard to talk about Zillian without sounding like I'm bragging; but I'm not bragging and this is why. I don't feel remotely ENTITLED to all this crazy stuff. I'm just impressed, like you probably are!

Oh yeah, and also? I am totally confused and useless-feeling. There's a lot of tolerance for that around here. Part of this is because, at the scale of Zillian, most external tools just don't work. So a lot of things are home-rolled and there's a lot to learn.