ODDREE.COM

Progress

It was tough dragging my ass out of bed this morning. I was in no hurry to start another week of working the day job, then running to the part time gig immediately after. The good news is that I am "sitting" as a student in another SuSE class this week. It's nice, because it gives me time to study and maybe even goof off a little bit when the instructor is covering stuff I know all too well (like right now!).

I had a lovely three day weekend for Easter, and man was I looking forward to it. I had the night off from Best Buy Friday, and so I called off my day job since I had only taught two days earlier in the week. I had a list of things that needed done and I think I got most of that accomplished. Foolishly, I left my laptop in lock up at my day job Thursday night. Then I remembered that my desktop PC back home hasn't worked in weeks. I either have a bad processor, or a bad motherboard. Reguardless, it's trash now. I hadn't used my little old buddy lately (my old iBook) so it was good to show her some attention and drag her around all weekend. Friday morning I got started on finishing the kitchen floor. I began tiling it a few weeks ago, and since then I have had a refrigerator in the middle of my kitchen, and torn up vinyl shit covering one third of the room. My wife has been kind not to bother me about it (I have been working a lot), but I know it had to be bugging her. So while it's still not done as of Monday morning, I just have some grouting to do and it's a done deal!

I had also planned on getting the Bug back on the road. It's been sitting in my driveway with an "electrical problem" for the past few weeks. Meanwhile, I have been keeping the Honda all day long and leaving my wife locked up at home. After screwing around an hour or so with a multi-meter I found that my semi-functional light in my car was probably the root of my dead battery problem. I unhooked it, and wrapped it with tape. Now ... I have to let it sit a day or so and try to start it again. Wish me luck.

I did a bit of studying over the weekend too. I got it in my head that I need the CISSP certification. I have tossed around the thought of getting it just for resume use and bragging rights. But as I get closer and closer to the door (quitting this job) I realise how important it will be to have it. Doing a search through a good search engine like indeed.com (thank you Poe) I found all the jobs that I am interested in. But hell, do I really want to work for another corporate entity? Not really.

I think ideally, I want to work for myself. I have bumped into some instructors recently that I used to work with, and they make some seriously good money. It seems, I can make several hundred bucks a day doing the same thing I do now, which is teach. Sure, there are downsides like ... staying in work. And not having health insurance. Of course, with this new "plan" that my company is on, I am paying all my own medical bills anyway ... plus $150 a paycheck for the so called "insurance". It has been hailed as "insurance for people who don't use insurance". I think that's pretty accurate.

What would it take to be self employed? A few months, and a leap of faith I think. As of now, I am trying to catch up on my mortgage payments. Once that's been done, my income could be a bit more flexible. I would also need to make some arrangements with brokers, and training centers to set up some work relationships. I can't very well do that now, or I will certainly be sued for breaking my "non-compete" agreement. You know, I wouldn't want to bite the hand so to speak. For that matter, my employer may not want me to leave. If they don't want to release me, that non compete agreement will still be good. I think I may just be able to convince my employer that releasing me from my employment here and hiring me when they need to will benefit us all. My utilization here has been so low lately, that they are usually losing money on having me here.

So, I can see some of you are anxious to see my 21 day play. I think it may be more of a six month plan. Not because I am procrastinating, but because I am realistic. In the next 21 days I would like to have studied enough to go out and take the CISSP exam. I've heard of people that have worked six months to get ready for this test. That seems excessive to me. I think a month or so is plenty of time to absorb it all. I need to also convince my employer that they need to pay for it. That shouldn't be tough. They have talked about having me teach security related courses anyhow. This will be a good investment.

Real Life

So what's going on in real life? You know, the life that I have when I am not working. Yesterday my wife and I celebrated our 10 year aniversary. We didn't do much to celebrate. But then we are having a party in mid April. Originally, my mother was going to watch my kids so that my wife and I could go out Saturday night. That fell through. It didn't upset me, because my mother has been going through some medical issues. I would later learn that she called off the sitting job, to go to the zoo with my sister for some "easter bash" where you can watch gorillas eat hard boiled eggs. My wife was a little ticked off too.

I'm a little worried about my mom right now. She found "a lump". It wouldn't be the first false alarm that she has had with lumps. But this one is in her breast, and her doctor didn't seem to think it was a cyst. She is going Wedneday to get it checked out and I am a little nervous about the news I am going to get back.

Aside from my mother's scare, my wife is going through termoil with her mother who can't care for herself. She has rendered herself completely helpless with obesiety, and there aren't a lot of answers for "what to do with her". At the same time, her grandparents are having what I consider to be 'genuine' health problems.

We all got together for the usual easter celebration at my wifes grandparents house. It was a bit uncomfortable, and there were a few nasty words between the grandparents and my wifes mother. I can feel for the grandparents. They are in their upper seventies, and beginning to have some health issues and concerns of their own. Yet, they have to worry about what their daughter is doing with herself, who is in her fifties. She has become a victim of her own doing, and they know it. She plays a victim every chance she gets, and digs for attention. She definitely has some mental health issues, but the family has tried to help her for years and they are all sick of trying.

Aside from what my wife called "the grumps", it was a nice time. The kids got to do their easter egg hunt, and we took some nice pictures of everyone. I would like to share some with my Blog vistors, but as you can tell by the stripped down appearance of my blog ... I am 'between' web hosts as of now. My wifes grandparents also bought a gigantic aniversary cake, which will take the next six months to eat! It was very thoughtful.

That's all that's new in my world. I had better get my head back into this class now. Or back to the books if this class doesn't move forward sometime this century. I have quite a bit of reading to do.