Category: Life

Sometimes, I feel the need to talk about me (imagine that).

A friend recently posted on her LJ where she thinks she’ll be in the next 15, 20, 25 yeas. Since I rarely if ever think about I’ll be in the next 5 years much less farther out; I decided to take a moment to ponder the same question. Here is what I came up with:

2021

  • Age: 46
  • Employment: Still working and probably shoved into some sort of managerial position. Reading the techie news sites so I can follow the conversations being held by the people I’ve got reporting to me. Wondering if we’re ever going to get those flying cars that they’ve been talking about since I was a child.
  • Vanity: Rather enjoying how my beard & hair are intermixed with grey.
  • Health: Still working to get rid of my cookie gut1 and probably starting to take a variety of medications for arthritis.
  • Hobbies: Still reading plenty of sci-fi, fantasy and mystery novels. Actually, I’m probably reading more of the mystery novels as I either don’t understand what they’re talking about in sci-fi/fantasy these days or I just don’t care anymore. Additionally, I’ll be doing odd jobs around the house renovation/restoring bits & pieces of my castle2. Lastly, I’d like to be working more on my photography skills and possibly learning to build furniture3.

2026

  • Age: 51
  • Employment: Starting to think a lot more seriously about retirement and giving this work crap over to these younger guys with all the energy. Probably shifting my retirement investments to being more conservative. Also, taking advantage of my seniority to get myself sent to all the interesting conventions, training seminars and events. Or at the very least all the ones taking place in interesting places.
  • Vanity: Not so sure I like the all grey hair anymore. Particularly when the little whippersnappers running around call me gramps.
  • Health: Finally got rid of my cookie gut, but getting awfully cranky about all the meds I have to take.
  • Hobbies:

2031

  • Age: 55
  • Employment: Some sort of senior design position, as management jobs might get better pay but they all suck.
  • Vanity: Seriously, I’m 55 and not dead. That’s probably all I need to be vain about at this point.
  • Health: Seriously hoping the current research into cybernetics will be completed in time for me to dump my meatbag for some shiny steel & silicon.
  • Hobbies: Going to public places and pretending to be older and meaner than I actually am to annoy all little whippersnappers running around. 😀

Side note: I started writing this post up a couple of weeks ago when the friend’s post first appeared, but as happens a lot set it aside to work on later. Now that I’m going back to work on it again, I noticed a few differences in how I’m organizing the information. Whereas my friend wrote her post in a more narative form; I’ve got bullet points. I can think of two immediate reasons for this difference.

  1. I’m lazier than my friend
  2. My friend studied English and writing; while I studied business & computers. All my training tells me that nobody really wants to sit there and read the crap I’ve written so I’d better convey my point as quickly & clearly as I can. Her training is all about trying to engage the reader in what she’s saying. I think I like her way better. Ah well.

1 I don’t really care for beer, while I do love munching on freshly, baked home-made cookies. Yummmmmm!
2 “Castle” is used here in the sense that every man’s home is his castle. Rather than in the more literal sense, though if that did somehow happen I think it would be pretty dang rockin’.
3 I like woodworking, but opporunities for doing it while living in an apartment have been extremely limited. Since I’m buying a house, I expect I’ll get to do more of this. If only in home repairs and it might lead to more interesting things.

Well, maybe you aren’t but I am today. It probably has something to do with me waking bolt upright at 1:30 this morning thinking my alarm clock had gone off and it taking me 10-15 minutes for the following realizations to dawn on me:

  1. It’s awfully dark out, even for 6AM.
  2. I didn’t turn my alarm clock off or hit the snooze button, but I don’t hear the radio playing1.
  3. The clock on the microwave says 1:30 AM.
  4. The clock on my computer says 1:35 AM.

*sigh* I suppose I should be thankful I only lost that 10-15 miunutes of sleep but it sure is making the day drag along today.

1 I use a clock/radio for my alarm clock and will shoot anyone dumb enough to switch it to that god-awful beep from the radio.

Dang nabbit! I was not picked for the final 10 and I didn’t win bumpkiss in the game. Ah well, maybe they’ll have another season of the game and I’ll do better then. Since my last entry about TH I received a couple more questions. Additionally as the game is over now, I don’t mind sharing my totally lame and incorrect guesses as to the final location of the treasure1.

@Stephen Y.: As you already found out, the correct answer to last week’s question was the Gutenberg Bible. I have to say I felt really proud of myself with that week’s question as it was the first time since watching the show where I was comfortable enough in my knowledge of the subject that I did not have to research the question before submitting the answer2.

@Jorge: Mind you it’s been many weeks since I did challenge #3, but as I recall it’s a matter of which way the wind is blowing (watch the clouds to determine this) and then of timing. For me, I had to wait for the ship to touch the raised chain and start it’s turn. While it was turning, I aimed for the right-hand side of the screen and fired. That allowed me to hit the ship by basically having them sail right into my canonball.

@Everybody else: Keep in mind that I only started watching TH/playing the online game with week 6. My guesses for the final location of the treasure were:

  1. Washington, D.C.
  2. Washington, D.C.
  3. Library of Congress
  4. Lincoln Memorial

As you were warned, my guess were all lame & inaccurate. I guess it is just as well that I didn’t get picked as one of the final 10 contests as the odds would have been against me winning. *shrug* Oh well, you can’t win ’em all.

1 According to this post on the NBC message boards for Treasure Hunters, the correct final answer was Smithsonian National Museum of American History.
2 It didn’t hurt my ego that I also answered that question before my wife did either (also a first since I started watching the show).

While I have no official ties to my former employer, a little birdie told me a couple of interesting facts:

  • they’re officially closing the Iowa office on 9/29.
  • they sold the company (or at least part of it) again.

The CLB was quoted as saying: This is an exciting day. I am thrilled for all of us… After running his statement through the realitizer bullshit remover, we found his real meaning was : This is an exciting day. I am thrilled for all fat loot I just made by screwing all of you over (again).

Good luck to all you still stuck working for that place!

I don’t know if it’s because I was extra-tired & cranky this morning but it seemed like everybody forgot the basic safety rules of the road today. Let’s start with the bicyclist who cut me off. Don’t get me wrong, I’m all for sharing the road and I know cycling myself, but I also know it’s suicidal to cut off a car with my bike. But that’s exactly what this lady did. Without even looking she rode right out into the street, cut right in front of me (forcing me to slam on the breaks to avoid running her over. Then instead of getting over to the side road like a cyclist should; she just kept going right in front of me just slowly enough so we both got to the stop light as it turned red.

After getting past Ms. BikingWithADeathWish, I headed down towards to the interstate and into heavier & heavier rain. I got about halfway down the highway when I got stuck behind some giant, red Ford pickup. I don’t know what was going through this driver’s mind but I do know it had nothing to do with his driving this morning. Slow to stop at reds, slower to start at greens and an almost total lack of acceleration on the ramp leading up to the interstate. Then after finally getting on the interstate, I was able to get past Mr. ImDrunkAtSevenAm and on with motoring up the interstate to get to work.

Most of the way up wasn’t too bad, though the rain did get pretty unpleasant at one point. On the other hand the rain was also nice & soothing; unfortunately, I was tired and did not need any soothing this morning. *sigh* Anyway, I finally made it into town and was working my way past downtown through three-lane traffic with the rain pounding down. And what do I see before me as the traffic hits the 55 MPH zone? Why wouldn’t you know it, it’s another giant, red Ford pickup! This one had a few more of the extras installed and was an even worse driver. I first noticed him tailgating a vehicle in the lane to my right, but then I got my own taste of his brand of “driving”. When I was only about 2 maybe 3 feet back from this idiot; he suddenly decides to cut over into my lane (without signally) and go on to cut over to the far lane where he could pound down the gas pedal as he headed into the slower section of the interstate.

That pretty much covers the worst offenders on this morning’s commute. Now I just have to look forward to the insanity of driving home tonight. Wheeeee!

Update: Actually, it turns out I got to witness some extra fun insanity driving over lunch. I realized at lunch time 3 things:

  1. I was totally out of the trail mix emergency rations I keep at my desk.
  2. I’d packed a small lunch today.
  3. I was really hungry.

So I made a quick trip down over to a nearby Target to pick up one of their containers of trail mix1. Then I drove back to the office but I didn’t even make it out of the parking lot before I had encountered both idiots.

Idiot #1 decided to start walking in front of me on wet pavement after I’d started moving forward from the stop sign. If I’d been driving our old car, that pedestrian would have been road pizza.

I had just about made it out of the parking lot when idiot #2 showed up. Oddly enough, it was another red pickup truck; though I’m not sure if it was a ford. In any case, I was heading for the back/side road access as it leads to a stoplight making it much easier to get back to my office. That’s when this idiot came tearing into the parking lot without slowing down at all and tried to turn to follow the curve of the “road” in the Target lot leading to the parking area. The main problem with this “plan” of theirs is we’ve been getting rain all day today and the pavement was wet slick. The idiot lost control of his pickup and went into a slide/skid/spin/whatever that missed hitting me by mere inches. He didn’t quite pull off a full 360° and he did pull away shortly so I figured besides being terminally stupid; he’d be ok.

But I really have to wonder, what the frak is up with people who drive red pickups? I mean that’s 3 of them in 1 day that all were driving recklessly!

1 They’ve got several flavors sold under their house brand, “Archer Farms”. And every one I’ve tried is good stuff.