11.27.07 What's News?

• This was another of those great days where I went in early (the upside of insomnia), and left reluctantly. Fall and Winter are great times to be a workaholic. It is difficult to be like that during the Summer and in the Spring. I was thinking about what I wrote last night. It has been brought to my attention that it sounds like I'm doing shoddy work, and I am surprised my employer keeps me around. That's not the case. I work hard, I work smart, and I am surprised my employer keeps me around. One big catalyst for me getting serious about my Associates degree was the phrase “Don't be left at the end of the contract”. It means that our contracts represent periodic 'slimming' of the staff. In my case, not having a degree when the contract ends would be a great reason to “trim the fat” until the next contract comes along. There is no doubt that there would be others standing in line with 4 year degrees from respected schools to replace me. In a way, one could say that I got my degree to keep my job. It sounds stupid, but when they made the offer, I was thinking to myself, “F**k a paper degree, I have real world experience.” I go through periodic spurts of stupidity. At any rate, there have been several rounds of “Corporate Weight Loss” over the past 6 months. During one of these, I was transferred from one project, which was overstaffed, to another, which was understaffed. While I did not know most of the newly unemployed, the ones I did know all had more education than myself. I kind of feel like having lower education makes me more “keep able” in some ways, but I know from experience that having low education makes it harder to get on board in the first place. With that being the case, my one major question right now is as follows:

  • Should I postpone getting the bachelors degree in favor of a higher paying position, if the position is offered?

I have a strong feeling that the position will be offered. While I do value education, I also know the value of the money. As they say, “A bird in the hand is worth two in the bush”. I also know another saying, “Out of the kettle, ...”. Right now, I would consider myself as a person with a lot of “professional acquaintances”. Periodically, I keep in contact with people who actually know me, but for the most part, it's my family, and the people at work, many of whom don't even know any of my most charming attributes. Come to think of it, I don't even know my most charming attributes. Personal note: Find out what my most charming attributes are. The Yehuyans (Stratford Place) are good for talking about the same “fat shit” we have always talked about, but they, like myself, have always fumbled through the employment, rather than navigating through the career. Needless to say, I would never consider asking the “professional acquaintances” about any of this, but I wonder what they would do.

11.26.07 What's News?

• First of all, I'm enrolled, registered, and getting ready to go back to school to get my degree.

  • I'm excited, nervous, and eager. I have always thought of myself as the type of person who would always like to be taking a class, just to always be in the process of learning something new, but now, I'm thinking that I'll be glad when it's over, and I can finally start making some money with what I have learned. I don't know if that has to do with getting older, or with the fact that I have seen so little return on investment from my education. Even the job I have now, which is in my desired field, near my desired salary range, was obtained more or less as a fluke. I got the position and my first raise before I got my degree, the position calls for a higher degree than I hold, and I sometimes wonder if I still have the position because I don't have the required education, and thus, get paid less than I would if I did have a 4 year degree. I guess the real benefit of the degree (for me) comes with the job hunt. So many positions have turned me down due to my lack of education, always telling me that they were impressed with my experience.

• Should I take the job in NoVa that's offering me $12k more per year?

  • When ever I am feeling dissatisfied with my current position, I like to 'Monster' around for new jobs. Recently, the JobHunt got a bite, and it seems like they might make an offer. Of course, the cost of living up there is higher, but could it be that much higher? I should find the Ttox, he would know. Maybe smack some sense in me.

• This is depressing.

  • Of course, we all know it, but it helps to have it reinforced. I found the site because I was looking for proof that a smelly man was actually a great turn on to women, due to Pheromones and such. This is a hypothesis of mine that was questioned by Vino's girl last week. I didn't find the proof that I needed, but there is a lot of other interesting stuff on this site.

• Work's going great.

  • I hate to be like “if there is nothing to complain about, there is nothing to write about”, but I have little to complain about, so little seems worth the effort to write about.

• My Dell Laptop computer is on the Fritz.

  • A while back Vino asked me to look at his machine, which is the same as mine, to see if I could figure out what was wrong with it. I'm no laptop tech, but he said he would probably throw it away and get a new one before he spent money having it repaired. I couldn't get it fixed. Tech with a desktop generally involves swapping out suspect parts with parts that were known to work from other 'Frankenstein' machines. At that point, my machine was working fine, so I didn't want to make his problem into my problem. Now, My machine is acting funky, and I, like him, really am not interested in a game of “Polish the turd”. I have 2 work laptops, I guess I can use one of them.

• Thanksgiving holiday was a blast.

  • I have so much to be thankful for, I don't know where to begin.