Old and Tired

Perhaps I'm just getting old, but last week really wore me out.

It wasn't so much the number of hours I worked - just above forty is probably one of if not the lowest number I've had in 2007. No, it was the feeling of being pulled in multiple directions I think that did me in. Two months ago I was pulling 50-60 hours a week for three straight months, perhaps more. But as stressful and as tiring as that was, it was all spent on a single project, with word spread around the company that I was inaccessible for input or questions on anything else. Last week however there were multiple projects all vying for my attention, all in the name of "this is critical." It was like I was living a software parable of Solomon, sliced across competing project-owning mother figures. Verily, I tell you, few hours in an IT pinball machine, bouncing from issue to issue, trying to appease both those with direct and indirect feedback towards promotion is far more draining than extensive hours dedicated to a single task or related set.

It took me an entire weekend of early bedtimes and sleeping in (as much as 8am is sleeping in, thanks to two human alarm clocklings) to recover.

Today, I'm back at it, crossing what will be my fifth year threshold with BlueCross of SC.

Just Another whack-a-mole work week.

My next post will be more upbeat, I promise!



- Scott

Class of 1997

This past friday I had to come to grips with the fact that I've been out of high school for a decade. Yes, I made the painstaking hajj of a whole 20 miles to go to my alma mater's homecoming football game. I had a blast seeing everyone "all growed up."

Since then, I've revisited our class' little home on the Web, finding links to blogs and websites of several classmates who weren't able to attend.

And it hit me. Five years ago, I believe I showed up at homecoming only to hear of a few classmates being married, engaged, traveling abroad, etc. I was engaged at the time, so I dragged Becca along to show off what the dumb ol' offensive lineman managed to snag.

But whoa-ho we've all been busy since then! A great majority of us are married, many of us for several years now. And a very large number of us have at least one child either here to stay or on the way. A surprising amount of us have multiple kids. Most of our kids are (duh-huh, given how things were at the 5 year mark) around the same age - 4 and under. Sure there are a few early adopters - sort of the class of '97 parenthood beta test group - but for the most part we're all current or recovering slaves to the diaper companies.

I'm not a sociologist, or whatever ologist likes to study statistics like how many students of a given high school class wind up in varying professional fields (a boredomologist perhaps). But just off the top of my head, I can think of the following who I've read about or met up with over the weekend:

• Doctors and healthcare professionals (John Kim, Jennifer (Chapman) Terry, and probably more but I'll stick to two examples)
• Lawyers (Nathan Woody, Josh Maggard)
• Preachers (Mike Rogers - who by the way as a man of the cloth (and a large cloth at that) is now unable to continue perpetuating the lie that I didn't whup his behind up and down the football field on a regular basis)
• Teachers & faculty (Monika, Jeanie, Marie - yes that's three; rules are made to be broken)
• Engineers (Seth King, Chris McFadden, Andy Rekers)
• Salesmen (Jack P., John Weaver)
• Sports Somethingmen (Pat Shine, who I can't help but wonder if whose USC Athletics affiliation includes groin massages)
• Musician slash President, Hair Bands Are Back Foundation (Tim Hollohan)
• Accountants (Ryan "CPA sounds sexier" Foster)

And last but not least a SLEW of full-time mothers and housewives.

As far as I can tell, I'm the only software developer geek guy. Or perhaps I'm the only one to admit it. Or perhaps the others had their jobs outsourced to India... but I digress.

I've been stewing on this idea lately that the addition of two children in my life has had the unfortunate side effect of creating a bubble of sorts (not to be confused with bubble sort) in that I'm envisioning a line chart of "contacts with close and extended friends" whose downward trend rivals the SCO group's stock price. After seeing all the Class of '97 broodlings, I can't help but wonder if I'm not alone in that feeling.

Oh, and I really need to update my blog more often... am I thinking out loud again?


- Scott