Saturday 5 mile run

Today, Sara and I ran 5 miles. It's been a long time since I have done that distance, but felt pretty good through most of it. Here's a link to the stats and map of the run:

West Creek 5 mile run

I captured the data on my new fitness GPS / watch. It's a Garmin Forerunner 205 -- a very cool birthday gift! My family gave that to me last night, after a visit to my new favorite Mexican restaurant in town. Thursday was my actual birthday, but it was very busy for a number of reasons. KT played in All County Orchestra that day, and the concert was that night. After a long day at the office, it was just time to go to bed after getting home late.

The Forerunner 205 has a built in GPS receiver, so the link above gives you date, time, distance, pace, elevation, and a map of the run from start to finish. The unit probably gives you a whole lot more, but I am mostly looking to capture data on where and how fast I am training over a long period of time.

Here's a photo of the 205...

My career in two pages

This afternoon, I am trying to rewrite my resume. My current position is not getting any better, actually regressing to what I did several years ago. This is certainly not where I want to be in my career.

My company outsourced much of the IT department to a really big company, otherwise known as Itty Bitty Machines, but I won't mention names. Since that has been implemented, we lost all of the administrative staff that was on-site, with that now being handled by an off-shore team in Argentina. While I think that they are doing a bang up job, they simply don't have the experience to perform the same functions that the folks who left did. That lack of experience and personal accountability is showing in the fact that they have many times more people doing the same job that the three people were doing on-shore.

Well, I am not a complainer at all. At least not until lately. I have found myself complaining about the number of things that they don't know, the number of circumstances for which they simply cannot respond without my intervention. At times, I have 4 or more chat windows open with them requiring my assistance since it's a new situation or a "we don't handle this, do we" question. The down side to this is that the rest of my job doesn't stop when I am handling this other work. So, I have found myself working more and more hours, and thinking / stressing about work more. Even on the weekend, I work, and certainly don't ever clear my mind of work. I've become unable to break the barrier of work and my family is starting to pay the price.

So, it's time to look elsewhere. Putting down on paper the things at which I excel is uncomfortable. I have spent 10 years accumulating the experience at my company that is the reason why I do so well. Experience is not common in my company, sans a few key players, and allows me to see a very broad picture that a newby just doesn't. I will struggle on how to put this down in words without coming across as cocky, but enough to get my foot in the door at a new firm. If they would only talk to my references first, I don't think that I'd even need a resume. If they could talk to some of my co-workers, they would hear that I am able to and am willing to help them when no one else does.

All I really know is that 10 years in one company is now actually held against you in many cases -- not seen as a stick it out / make it better strength.

Rock climbing 101 (or is it 102?).

Jake has completed his required observed belay sessions, so is ready to take his final belay test at the local indoor climbing gym. He has really enjoyed the challenge, as he does with most outdoor activities. I will try to see if there is an outdoor club that he can join, on his own to continue the climbing. He's very athletic, and enjoys all of the time spent recreating outdoors.

After spending more than a month over the past two years outside, he's anxious to spend more time outside. I do believe that he needs someone to push him to continue to stretch his climbing, camping, and hiking. While you believe that your children can do whatever they want when they grow up, I can firmly believe that Jake will be happiest outside. He is not driven by money, so being a park ranger is certainly not out of the question - even if not directly after college (or high school). At least I know he'll have a job to fall back on if he wants!

Atlanta public transportation rocks

heading back to the airport on Marta...

Atlanta sunrise

This was taken from my 15th story hotel room in Atlanta this morning - obviously facing east! That bright blue rectangle on the left is the sign from the Lenox Square mall.

My missing snooze button (why I'm awake at 5 AM)

I have always had an internal alarm clock, and I think the snooze button is broken.

I'm not sure when it started. Likely, it was not when I was young - and I'm fairly certain that my parents would concur. But sometime in the last 20 years or so, the alarm has gotten set, never requiring a backup battery, so to speak.

The alarm clock is pretty regular - around 5 AM every day, seven days a week. On most alarm clocks, there is a snooze button that allows an extra 10 minutes or so of extra sleep. I know of co-workers who hit the real snooze button several times each day, then rush to get ready to leave. My alarm is different. It has no snooze button, no need for one.

When my internal alarm goes off, my brain knows that there is no snooze button. My mind starts racing at what needs done, and the race continues until I'm up - about 10 minutes later at the most. I have done my best to convince myself to sleep in - to wait until the real alarm goes off (set "just in case"), but that is never the case. Once my body's alarm goes off, I'm up for the day.

While this internal alarm clock is all well and good, I cannot reset based on when I go to bed. If I go to bed at midnight, I'm up at 5. If I go to bed at 11, I'm up at 5. If I am exhausted from a long day and happen to drop at 9 (maybe twice in a year), I'm up before 5, but never after. I think that the most sleep I have gotten in the past year was 7 hours once or twice, most of the time it's around 5 - 5 1/2 hours. Once I hit that mark, the internal alarm goes off. And, as I said before, there is no need for a snooze button.

So, it's 5:15 AM and I'm awake. Maybe I'll go back to sleep - yeah, right...